The Omnivore's Dilemma

This is a great book! I'm not quite finished (I have about 1/5 left to read), but already know this is a book I'll be recommending to everyone I talk to... The book is a highly readible, interesting and thought-provoking look at food and why we eat what we do.

I heard the author interviewed on KUOW's Weekday a few months ago and got my interest piqued then. (You can listen to the audio here). That was followed by a Steph's positive comments (and decision to seek out grass-fed and grass-finished meat instead of eating regular feedlot meat). I thought "Anything that could convince Steph change her meat eating habits must be good".

Do take a look at the review on Amazon by Erik Marcus - he raises some good points and criticisms of Pollan's book. The main thing I wondered about while reading the chapters on Polyface Farms was "Where's the accounting for how much water it takes to run this place?" Pollans makes it sound as if the farm is a completely self-sufficient system: grass grows and converts sunlight to food, is eaten by cows, chickens move in to the pasture a few days later, break open the cowpats and eats bugs and parasites, fertilize the grass with their droppings, lay great eggs which get sold, finally get slaughtered, and their byproducts re-fertilize the soil. Pigs break up other waste and make manure from woodchips, etc... This idyllic composting circle-of-life sounds great, but I don't see it working as a role-model for farming throughout the country or the world.

The philosphy of Polyface is something to at least think about and maybe strive for, taking local conditions and limitations into account. Other ideas from Polyface make sense to me, such as opening up abbatoirs and slaughter houses to the public so they can see what goes on and how well the animals are treated as they are killed and processed. (Apparently there is one slaughter-house in the US with glass walls precisely to facilitate this...) How many people would bother to go look though?

I've already queued up a related book: "The way we eat: why our food choices matter"

Stomhoek tasting party pics

So, I've finally put some pictures of the tasting party up online:





Focusing more on the wines than I did in this previous post, I was pleasantly surprised with the Stormhoek wines. Being free, it's hard to know how they did in terms of bang for the buck, but in terms of taste, they were all very pleasant, easy-drinking, and tasy.

My favourite white was the Sauvignon Blanc - light, crisp and slightly grassy with a hint of melon. Others preferred the Pinot Grigio, which was had hints of citus and minerals. The Pinot Grigio seemed a little "thin" to me...
The Pinotage was really nice - smooth, fine tannins and very fruit-forward. Usually Pinotage is a little harsh (I've only drunk it young), spicy and can be a little "green", although usually in a good way! (Yes, I think it's possible for red wine to be "green" in a good way). The pinotage was almost too fruit-forward for my liking - it became less regognizable as pinotage and tended towards the fruity merlots that abound. Still, I'd happily drink this over most cheap merlots and shirazes.

Overall, I'd give the Stormhoek wines scores in the upper-80's, and definitely buy them if they're in the $10-15 price range. Now to see how much they actually do retail for!

City Cellars wine store

Last Friday I had some time to kill between dropping my mom off at the airport and meeting friends for dinner. I headed into Seattle, and had the fun experience of being passed on the I-5 by one of the Blue Angels taking off from Boeing Field, right next to the highway!

I headed up to Wallingford to explore Bottleworks (a great beer store specializing in Belgian beer), but realized that I'd never been to the wine shop next door. So, I popped in to City Cellars instead, and had a great time. They have regular wine-tastings on Friday (for a small fee), so I was able to try three wines and chat to the owners. They're really friendly and the place had a nice vibe... They also have a "sale" section with 100 wines $10 and under. This selection in general is amazing - they had some South African wines I've not seen elsewhere, and some interesting NZ and Ausie wines, as well as the expected selection of American, French and Italian wines. Defintely worth checking out!

Of course, I picked up some wine:

• 2004 Markowitsch Pinot Noir. This is the first Pinot Noir I've come across from Austria, and is supposedly more like cooler climate (NZ) Pinot Noir which I love.
• 2004 Fairvalley Pinotage, from South Africa. A really cheap ($9) Pinotage. I'm interested to see how this compares to the Stormhoek Pinotage I had recently.
• 2001 Vidal Estate Pinot Noir, from New Zealand's South Island. Another NZ Pinot Noir to try...

I'll let you know how these are after I've tried them :)

An interesting article on French wine and consumers, and international tastings over the years

I found this article today: French Wine Producers and Consumers (Potsdam.edu)
While I haven't had time to read it and digest it fully, it looked interesting enough to post. I was talking about the 1976 Paris Wine Tasting with friends last weekend during our tasting party, and the article covers that event (plus others):

But some may say this is natural. Isn't French wine the best in the world? Knowledgeable people haven't believed this myth since the Paris Wine Tasting in 1976, at which time French wines were pitted against California wines, in that tasting, a California red took first place and California Chardonnays won first, third and fourth place in the white wine category. And many other countries around the world similarly produce award-winning wines as well. (Details of the Paris Wine Tasting in 1976 are found below.)
Automaker Henry Ford is reputed to have said that customers could buy any color Ford car they wanted so long as it was black. The attitude of French wine producers similarly seems to be "if we don't produce it, you don't need it." Unfortunately, it's the innocent French consumer who is deprived of choice.

Wikipedia has entries on the '76 and 30th anniverary tasting this year.

Tasting party

I threw a "tasting party" this past Sunday with some friends. Each couple or person bring a few varieties of a certain food for us all to taste and compare. (For example, 3 blue cheeses, or 3 kinds of cherries)

It looked like everyone had a good time, aided in no small part by the yummy wines from Stormhoek. I'll be heading off to Pete's Wines in Bellevue to see if I can buy some more!

Here's the final list of goodies:

• Me: Stormhoek wines from South Africa (Sauvignon Blanc, Pinot Grigio, Pinotage, Shiraz). The wines were all excellent, and I especially liked the Pinot Grigio and Pinotage. The Pinotage is smooth, fruity and juicy - no hint of greenness.
• Raymond: Beverages:
• Water (Evian, Dasani, municipal tap). Raymond did a blind tasting for these, and most people were able to pick out the Evian as being the most fancy/epensive. Most people found it hard to distinguish between the tap water and Dasani. Interestingly, several people preferred the tap water or Dasani to the Evian!
• Tea (Froufy tea [from a tea shop], Bigelow, and Lipton).
  Again, these were served blind. The froufy tea was easy to spot. Bigelow and Lipton are pretty much the same...
• Hilary: Cheeses: Stilton (blue), Cranberry Wensleydale, French camembert-type cheese. Onion jelly from South Carolina. We ate the cheese with a nice selection of crackers and breads (ProVita crackers from South Africa, Carr's water crackers, pumpernickel and caraway toast from Ikea). Yum! The onion jelly is slightly sweet and savoury and went well with the Wensleydale.
• Dorothy: Alsation-style fruit tarts (one apple, one apricot). Sweet olives to go with the cheeses (from the Riebeek Valley in South Africa). Sweet olives? Yes, and they're delicious - a bit like candied figs. The tarts were amazing - Washington Braeburn apples worked really well.
• Ben & Becky: Three salads. Sorry, I'll need to get the specific of each salad and update this... They were all amazing!
• Carrie & Keshav: Dipping oils (basil-infused olive oil, roasted garlic olive oil, artichoke and garlic dipping oil), with Pugliese bread from Trader Joe's. The artichoke one was my favourite!
• Mathias & Stephanie: Tapenades from DeLaurenti in Pike Place Market: Green olive, black olive, sun-dried tomato and also hummus.
• Eric: Three chocolates (randing from 35%-53% cacao). Callebaut chocolate from Whole Foods.
• Ari: Double chocolate chocolate-chip cookies. Sadly I didn't try these, but they looked very rich and decadent!

I'll post some pictures later this week...

Wine Info

I've been meaning to put together a list of some of the wine retailers, importers, storage, etc. in Seattle. So here goes...

Importers/Online Stores:
Garagiste (link). (Seattle). Mailing list offers new wines daily, you choose what you want to purchase. Mainly rare and unusual or limited production wine.
Mad Wine (link). (Bellevue). Online store with some a great selection of US and imprted wine. Nice Italian, New Zealand and South African wines.

Wine Stores:
Esquin (link). (Seattle) "Seattle's oldest and largest retail wine merchant". I haven't been here yet...
McCarthy & Schiering (link). (Queen Anne/Seattle). Very friendly staff, good selection and free wine tastings on Saturday.
Vino 100 (link). (Downtown Bellevue). Wine store franchise offerign 100 wines $25 and under. Interesting wine layout (by body/sweetness) so you can pick wine according to your taste, not region or cultivar. Friendly staff, and tastings offered.
Larry's Market (link). (Multiple locations). The Redmond store has a good selection of wine. Service can be iffy, though - it's sometimes hard to find someone to answer questions...
Trader Joe's (link). (Multiple locations). The place to go for cheap, easy-drinking wine, although they do have some decent imports too. No real service/help in choosing, though.
Pete's (link). (Seattle/Bellevue). I've heard good things about this place, but never been. Supposedly a good place to order Stormhoek wines in Seattle.
Pike & Western Wine Shop (link). Local (Seattle). I've been in a few times but been unimpressed with the service.
DeLaurenti (link). (Pike Place Market/Seattle). Great selection of Italian wine. They have a wine club you can join too (red/white Italian mostly).
City Cellars (link). (Wallingford/Seattle). Great selection, very laid-back, friendly staff. Wine tastings on Friday evenings for a small fee. 100 wines for $10 and under.

Storage:
Seattle Wine Storage (link). Seattle. Friendly, not pushy, reasonably priced and good access hours.
Elliott Avenue Wine Storage (link).
Eastside Wine Storage (link).

Overheard at the Oregon Country Fair

I heard this snippet of conversation at the fair this year, and it seems to me to be the perfect summary of the fair spirit.

(tall gangly dude walking in front of me) "... so I rush out onstage to shave him with the chainsaw running, my pink tutu wafting up around my waist, my privates in full view, and 3000 stoned hippies go 'Ooooh!' "

It turned out this guy was the Danish member of The Flaming Heterosexuals. I caught their show later during the fair and really enjoyed it! (Although there were no privates on display this time...)

Speaking of the OCF, here's an article on the fair for those that haven't been and want to get a sense of it.

Stormhoek 100 Geek Wine Dinner Party Thingy

I'm taking part in the 100 Geek Dinners in 100 Days thang.
I just heard from Jason that my wine is on its way! So, if it arrives in time, I'll be serving it on Friday as part of A's birthday celebrations. Otherwise we'll do something later in July (after the 4th of July and Oregon Country Fair madness dies down...) As luck would have it, my mom will be visiting during July, and she lives within 100 miles of the winery.

Update: 7/20/2006
"Ze wine, she is here!" I'm bringing it along to C's "We Miss Battlestar Galactica" party on Friday, and looking forward to trying the Pinotage in particular, what with all the boosting it's getting on the Stormhoek blog. If you're in need of a maddeningly catchy song, try this. (OK, it goes on a bit too long, but it's cute...)

Update: 7/21/2006
"No wine for you!" We* forgot to bring the wine along for tonight's shindig, so we're back to a future event. Probably next weekend...

* No, not the royal "We", but I was meant to remind A to take it with her when she headed out this afternoon, and I left it too late. She was on the road, stuck in traffic and sans vin, before I had called her.

Where are they now?

With Bill's anouncement that he'll be retiring within 2 years' time, this summary of where the founding Microsoft employees are now is interesting.

Comme est la blanchette?

Elle est belle!

One of the funniest movies I've seen in a long time! Hopefully it'll make it onto wide release in the USA and onto DVD.


Update: 6/21/2006
This film was voted Best Film by attendees of the Seattle International Film Festival!

Food in Disneyland, and other interesting foody rants

I took a quick trip over to TastingMenu today and scanned this ranty-pants entry on Disneyland food.

"The food at Disneyland is the most cynical food I have ever seen. Heaps and heaps of fried food. Tons of yucky crap prepared way in advance and reheated "a la minute". It is lowest common denominator food. Fat, salt, and sugar molded into "pleasing" shapes with Mickey ears. This is the food that is killing America."

There's certainly some nasty food (think caffeteria pizza-slice, fries and pre-made hamburgers). But I think there's some decent stuff too, if you look around. A is a Disneyland expert, and being vegetarian, she had to hunt for something good to eat over the years. The secret: Creole veggie gumbo at the Blue Bayou Grotto. The disadvantage is that you don't have much of a view since the restaurant is inside, and getting in can be tricky. Looking at this menu, there are a few other options...

Thanks to that entry, I discovered what looks like an excellent blog: Casing the Joint
"Why 95% of US Restaurants Suck and How We Learn Not to Notice" will give you an idea of the author's philosophy. There are also some nice entries on Real Ale, and a vegan brewmaster's dinner.

And speaking of things vegan, if you haven't seen the Vegan Lunch Box yet, now is your chance. What will Jennifershmoo do during the summer vacation?

Lots to read and digest...

Meritage aint a grape

I didn't realize Meritage is a tightly-controlled "appelation" invented by some California wineries to indicate a Bordeaux-style red blend, but without infringing on the Bordeaux "trademark".

So, if you like Meritage, you'll probably like Bordeaux, and vice-versa.

Top 10 Pinotage 2006

It seems you either love it or hate it, but of late there's been more positive press about Pinotage.
Spittoon has an entry about the ABSA Top 10 Pinotage competition.
The winners are interesting (and sadly I don't think I've seen any of them available here in the USA). I wonder if any of these will be imported (hint hint).

It's also nice to see some new wineries on the list, and some from areas outside the "traditional" and famous wine-making areas of Stellenbosch and Paarl. There's even one from Wellington, near my mom's valley.

PS: There's a cool aroma wheel here (from the Wiki entry).

2003 Vin Du Lac Cabernet Franc

Yummy, this was good! It looks like the Vin du Lac reds are maturing nicely... (I have one more bottle of this to savour). Their white wine (Les Amis) seemed to fare less well with time...

Taking a quick look at their website, it looks like they're in the middle of an overhaul. New wine label, a new logo, several awards for their 2004 wines, and "lots new, coming soon!". I'll have to pay them a visit this summer...

Any touristy suggestions for my mom's visit?

So, my mom is visiting from South Africa in a few weeks. I thought I'd open up a thread for people to suggest things they'd recommend doing in and around Seattle and Oregon.

• What would you do with your parents if/when they visit?
• What are some of the lodges, inns and B&B's you would recommend staying in?
• Any off-the-beaten path towns or interesting places you'd suggest we take her?
• Any good day hikes? (Without too much elevation gain and not too long, say 5 miles roundtrip max).

My mom is a great cook and a foodie, is into beading, books, wine and coffee, and hasn't seen much of the beauty of the Pacific NW. :)

Some of the things we have thought of already:

• Shipwreck Beads in Lacey, WA. (The largest bead store in the world?)
• Other bead stores around Seattle: e.g. Beads & Beyond in Bellevue
• Day trip to Mt. Rainier. Grove of the Patriarchs and other easy hikes sound good - are there others you would recommend?
• Drive to Mt. St Helens and explore the visitor's centre.
• Portland: Powell's, street market and walk around the Pearl district. Japanese gardens, ... Maybe Mt. Hood too?
• Sea-kayak day trip. (Assuming I can convince my mom she will survive, but I think Brad will look after her).
• Shows: Zinzanni. Maybe something at Benaroya hall or the Paramount. I'm not sure what's on in July yet...
• Specilaty shops/markets: Pike Place Market, Uwajimaya
• Dining: Gnocchi & cured meat @ Salumi, Veggie food at Cafe Flora and Carmelitas, Sushi (maybe at Kisaku)
• Northern Cascades Highway loop.
• The Olympic Peninsula. Maybe drive south to the Washington coast (stop and see the Capitol in Olympia), see Hoquiam and Aberdeen, drive north on the 101 and stay overnight somewhere. M-Jo recommended the Kalaloch Lodge. Include a short Hoh River hike. On the northern side of the peninsula we could do Hurricane Ridge, Lake Crescent Lodge. Port Townsend looks nice too. (I think the only time I've been was when I "helped" CraigH sail his yacht down from the Orcas islands.)
• From Port Townsend we could catch a ferry to Whidbey island. Whidbey has an arts/craft village that sounds fun (I think it's Langley?) Other islands maybe worth a visit are Vashon
• Parks: Visit Gasworks, Volunteer and Discovery park. The Arboretum and Japanese Gardens. Kubota Gardens. Bellevue Botanical Garden.
• Museums: SAAM/SAM in Capitol Hill.
• Small towns: La Conner (lots of interesting places to browse), Leavenworth, Roslyn (she could see how it's changed since she saw it in '99). Twisp, Chelan (we could come down this way from the Northern Cascades Highway)

Ports

No, not the drinking kind... I was amused to see that this website lists TCP port 135 as being used by "Blaster worm". (Other ports have the correct protocol in the description, e.g. 80 = HTTP).

Free computer help != correct computer help.

Update 5/26/2006: For the not-so-geeky folks out there. :)

Yes, the website above is in fact wrong. TCP (a protocol used to send data on the Internet) uses "ports" to direct traffic to different applications or services on a machine.
Port 135 is used on Windows machine for the DCOM/RPC service. The Blaster worm targeted a bug in this service and caused widespread disruption. (Machines would usually reboot endlessly - if you were really unlucky you might get malware installed too). I remember volunteering to help handle customer support calls in Sammamish. It was amazing to see how much time it took to resolve a single call - I think one call I handled took 45 mins, and the person at the other end remained amazingly friendly and patient all the way through.

Anyway, somehow the website above thinks the worm was so important that the TCP port should be re-christened in its honour.

Two wine-related stories on Slate

Just a quick pointer to two recent articles on Slate about wine:

• The Sad Plight of Cabernet Franc - An underrated grape.

I've always liked Cabernet Franc's. Mike Steinberger describes it better than I ever could in the above article:

"Along with the usual cherry-and-berry aromas, cabernet franc normally sends up a seductive whiff of herbs, spices, and violets. I get particularly weak-kneed about its sweet tobacco scent (perhaps because my childhood was spent in a cloud of cigar smoke). But the gratification isn't confined to the nose; in cooler climates, at least, cabernet franc yields pleasingly crisp, somewhat rustic wines that stand in welcome contrast to your garden-variety fruit bombs."

I've only got a couple of Cab Franc's at the moment (one from the Vin du Lac winery in Washington state, another from the Loire valley).

• The Judgment of Paris - What the French didn't learn from the legendary wine-tasting.

"... the most eagerly awaited Judgment of Paris re-creation is the one being held today—an event organized primarily by Spurrier that is taking place simultaneously in London and Napa. Once more, an impressive panel has been assembled, although this one is not exclusively French; the judges include Vannequé; two British masters of wine, Jancis Robinson and Michael Broadbent; and the journalist Michel Bettane, often called France's Robert Parker. With a few exceptions, the wines are equally stellar. However, unlike the original Judgment of Paris, which became controversial only after the fact, the sequel has been plagued with problems from the outset. "

Update: 5/25/2006: American Wine wins again.

Jamie Oliver's School Lunch Project wraps up

It was great to see that Jamie won two BAFTA awards for the series. And the FeedMeBetter website won a Webby award.

We just watched the last episode of this series last night, and it was great! The series ended on an optimistic but unresolved note when the secretary of education, Charles Clarke, after agreeing to push for more funding and healthier food in schools, was demoted after the prisoner scandal. It looks like there have been two subsequent secretaries of education after Clarke. From this report:

"[Jamie] complained that three Education secretaries have done little to sort out the problem. He said at the Bafta ceremony: "The day after I met Charles Clarke, he got moved on. Then I got to know Ruth Kelly and she's got moved on. There's always the same bloody excuse, which is, 'I've just started.'"

It seems like he has won the funding battle despite the high turnover in the government.

On a related note, Nora was the dinner lady that Jamie first worked with and had a hard time winning over. She later became his greatest ally and helped convince the kids to eat his food, and also get other dinner ladies on board. (Probably the weirdest thing that this series brought to my attention is that most kids today refuse to eat anything that isn't junk food. Watch the series and you'll see what I mean...) Anyway, Nora now has her own website and a cookbook. Go Nora!

PS: It'll be interesting to see what his podcast, due later this year, is like.

Some bits and pieces

Sorry I've been so quiet recently. To make up for that, here is a random collection of things I found interesting...

Queen Anne:
This past weekend we spent a very enjoyable Saturday afternoon with M-Jo's friends Eric and Michelle in Queen Anne. We walked from their place to the McCarthy & Schiering wine store for a rosé wine-tasting - they had some very nice stuff and the shop itself is very good. A nice selection of wine from all over the world (about 5/6 South African wines too), and very friendly, un-pretentious staff.

We walked back to Eric & Michelle's place and had an amazing dinner, which was preceded by some tasty Lillet aperitif's. I'd forgotten how tasty this is - similar to Italian sweet vermouth but with more citrus. After dinner, we took a short stroll to an amazing little park that has beautiful views of the Seattle syline - a great place to watch the sunset colours painting the Space Needle.
The funny thing is that the park's name is Bhy Kracke - we joked about the name within earshot of an idling police patrol car...

Koots Japanese Green Tea opens in Bellevue:
The first US store opened on May 13th in Lincoln Square, Bellevue. Coincidentally, I was reading about it in the Seattle Times on Sunday morning, and we stopped by later that day after doing some shopping nearby. The founder is the Japanase partner of Tully's (a Seattle-based coffee chain, way better than Starbuck's). After taking Tully's from nowhere to hundreds of stores in Japan, he moved on to his lifelong dream of opening a Japanese green-tea chain in the US.

The store is spartan and Zen-like in it's clean decor and open feel. They have a tatami mat seating area, and a pretty tokonoma. Their drinks obviously mainly feature Japanese green tea (matcha, sencha, hojicha and genmaicha) either brewed as regular tea or made into lattés with steamed milk. I've been enjoying the Starbuck's Green Tea lattés recently, so I tried something similar: the kuromitsu latté, which is made with matcha powder and Japanese molasses. Pretty good, but the molasses wasn't well mixed, so the drink started out fairly better and ended overly sweet. The molasses does give it an interesting taste (if you like the stuff). The white chocolate and hojicha drink sounds interesting...

Vino100: (website)
This is a new wine store close to Koots in Lincoln Square, and they offer 100 wines $25 and under. The layout is interesting too: instead of wines grouped by region or varietal, they are arranged from light to full-bodied, and each wine has a little placard indicating the body and dryness on a scale, so it's easy to quickly find a wine you might like. They have a good selection, so I'd definitely recommend checking them out.
They also offer wine tastings on Fri and Saturday, and classes on Tuesday nights.

SA blog and the Riebeek Valley Olive Festival

I just came across this nice SA blog. They have an interesting story about Tourist Radio - a nifty idea! A GPS receiver in the car feeds your position into what sounds like radio recorder that receives updated information over the regular FM radio network. When you are in a point of interest, the system switches over to the recorded content for that location. It can also predict where you're headed based on GPS data and give you "tour guide"-like updates. ("On your left is blah blah"). Of course, I suspect this will all be based on people paying advertising fees, so don't expect to discover a cool local restaurant or local museum...

The blog also have some entries specific to the Swartland, and mention the recent Olive Festival held in the valley where my mom lives. Too bad it's over already, but I don't think many readers of my blog were in a position to make it down to the festival. :)