weekly round-up of our favorite finds from the front lines of food
- Some of our favorite images from Pinterest this week, above. Come on by.
- Like so many coastal areas, fisherman are struggling in Southern California's Orange Country, highlighting the need to preserve culture as well as the natural world. Thanks to regulation in the name of conservation, these hard-working men face extinction: "The last people on earth who want an empty, fishless ocean are the people who make their living off fishing in the ocean."
- "Smart aquaponics" in Oakland, California at Kijani Grows is using tech in new ways: "Gardens that can communicate for themselves using the internet can lead to exchanging of ideas in ways that were not possible before. I can test, for instance, whether the same tomato grows better in Oakland or the Sahara Desert given the same conditions. Then I can share the same information with farmers in Iceland and China.”
- The New York Times OpEd Dirtying Up Our Diets argues that getting natural with microorganisms and unsanitized food might be just what the doctor ordered: "As we move deeper into a “postmodern” era of squeaky-clean food and hand sanitizers at every turn, we should probably hug our local farmers’ markets a little tighter. They may represent our only connection with some “old friends” we cannot afford to ignore."
- The title might be inflammatory, but soem interesting points are raised in the recent Salon article Eating Local Hurts the Planet. How your food is produced really, really matters. Shipping is just the part of the food system that we can see. "Not surprisingly, it turns out that food miles can only be taken at face value in the case of identical items produced simultaneously in the exact same physical conditions but in different locations — in other words, if everything else is equal, which is obviously never the case in the real world."
- The Practical Philosophy of Fish-Killing and The Ike-Jime Man explained for you by International Culinary Center instructor Dave Arnold. It's everything you ever wanted to know, and probably a bit more. (warning — an article for chefs or the otherwise sturdy)
- Chef Marcus Samuelsson talks about his memoir Yes, Chef and his life in the kitchen on the radio show Fresh Air (audio link).
