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Beef Brisket Recipe: Bookmark This

Published by Jonell Galloway + Tuesday, November 6, 2012 Permalink 0

Beef Brisket Lover Recipe: Bookmark This

Chicago Tribune‘s Bill Daley interviews Daniel Rose in Paris about how the French make beef brisket. Rose, who runs , formerly in Chicago and now in Paris, shares his beef brisket recipe.

Food Art: Vineyards in B&W 1, food photography by Rosa Mayland

Published by Jonell Galloway + Tuesday, November 6, 2012 Permalink 0

This is the first in a series of B&W vineyard photographs by Rosa Mayland, author of our column Rosa’s Musings.

Rosa’s Musings: Beet Salad with Cottage Cheese & Soft-boiled Egg

Published by Jonell Galloway + Monday, November 5, 2012 Permalink 0

Rosa’s Musings: Beet Salad with Cottage Cheese & Soft-boiled Egg

by Rosa Mayland

Some people are not afraid of the cold and others regard it with utter contempt. Even though I can’t say I savor every season or mid-season of the year, I nonetheless definitely prefer the fresher season as I hate sweating excessively or getting sunburned like a shrimp on a barbie.

Sometimes I wonder if those predispositions are linked to my DNA or whether is it just a personal preference. What if our genes influenced our manner of conducting ourselves and our traits of character? Hmmm, that is quite a difficult question to answer, but I believe that if our health can be defined by our bloodline, then there are chances that our emotions, temperament and identity are also outlined by it.

You see, my father’s ancestors were Swiss mountaineers who might have had Danish or English origins (my family name is NOT Swiss at all). Then, on my my mother’s side they came from the rugged areas of Northern England where Viking settlers made themselves at home and also from European Russia, a place which is known for its dreadful cold.

A Look at Slow Food’s Salone del Gusto, October 2012, in Turin, Italy

Published by Diana Zahuranec + Saturday, November 3, 2012 Permalink 0

by Diana Zahuranec

Salone del Gusto ended on Monday 29, but I can’t stop thinking about it.

Salone del Gusto, held in Turin, Italy, is a Slow Food biannual food fair and conference. To sum it up in these few words undermines everything else it is, too, and its importance as an event that brings together producers from all over the world. These are producers that grow ancient varieties of grain to save genetic biodiversity, that make Slow Food Presidia cheeses or salumi, that pipe their cannoli full of the freshest organic ricotta you’ve ever tasted, and whose principles and values align with your own and, it goes without saying, Slow Food’s – good, clean, and fair food for all.

The Slow Food mascot

For all things Slow Food, here are some links courtesy of Scoop.it and Slow Food. To understand a few of those words in the paragraph above, just look at the end of the article.

This year, Salone del Gusto was a marriage of the original Salone del Gusto, first held in 2006, and Terra Madre, first held in 2004. While both events had food artisans and producers from all over the world, different activities were held at each and were not all accessible to the public. Salone del Gusto focused more on the exposition and sale of high quality foods and products, while Terra Madre was a gathering of a network of food producers from around the world. Having never been to either of these before, I can’t offer judgment on the differences of before and after. What I would love to do is share my first-time impressions of this year’s.

To say Salone is a food fair means that, like your down-home county fair, the place is jumping with activity – with a few notable differences. The funnel cakes are replaced with French butter cookies in 20 different flavors, the groundhog whacking game is replaced with the foodie’s (divisive word, I know) form of fun, that is vertical Barolo wine tastings, and that feeling of riding the Zipper right after you eat your funnel cake is replaced by the feeling of pressing up against crowds right after you drink your Barolo wines.

Slow Food’s Salone del Gusto 2012, Turin, Italy, photo essay 1

Published by Jonell Galloway + Saturday, November 3, 2012 Permalink 0

by Jonell Galloway

I went camera-crazy at the Slow Food Salone del Gusto 2012 in Turin, Italy. Here are my unedited photos, part 1, documenting the incredible products available. The signs tell you where the product came from and give a full description in English and Italian. Watch the slideshow!

Wild boar with sunglasses, Piemonte,Slow Food Salone del Gusto 2012, Turin, Italy

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Handmade Italian cheese from Tuscany at the Salone del Gusto 2012 in Turin, Italy

Published by Jonell Galloway + Friday, November 2, 2012 Permalink 0

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Beef Production in Feedlots – How we do it in Australia

Published by Amanda McInerney + Friday, November 2, 2012 Permalink 0

by Amanda McInerney

I have no illusions. The majority of people do not think too hard about where their food comes from. There are lots of reasons for that – life can be a pretty distracting business for many and they just don’t need another thing on their plate (pardon my pun) to cause anxiety and emotional or financial stress. What concerns me, though, is that those who find their way to my site and others like it and actively choose to consider their food options do so from a well-informed foundation. To that end I always endeavor to make sure I am as well informed as possible about a subject before I start “blowing off “about it.

I’m a carnivore and a (very) small-scale Angus beef producer, so have a direct interest in how beef is produced in this country. My cattle live a very pleasant life indeed and their end is relatively quick and clean, but for some time now I’ve been curious about what happens to other cattle. While it would be nice if all livestock could avoid the industrial food system, this is unlikely to happen any time soon and I wanted to try to understand how the general beef production model works. These days we hear much that is negative in relation to U.S. feedlots, so I’ve been interested in learning about the conditions on Australian feedlots and comparing our system with the the US model. Recently, I have had several requests for information regarding the perceived difficulties of sourcing grass-fed beef and a query regarding the Australian commitment to corn crops and government subsidies of them, so clearly I’m not the only one who needs to become a little more well-informed on this subject.

There are quite a lot of clean, comfortable and slightly detached ways to go about researching a topic these days, but never let it be said that your trusty correspondent was reluctant to face up to the cold hard facts of life – which is how I found myself at one of Australia’s largest feedlots and processing plants just outside of Toowoomba in Queensland last week. I was pleased to be able to accept an offer from Meat & Livestock Australia to see, absolutely first-hand, exactly how feedlotting is operated here and, while it is a little tricky to use the word “enjoy” in this context, I certainly found the experience enlightening and even bracing.

Housing cattle in feedlots is an intensive animal feeding technique designed to fatten livestock and encourage the deposit of more fat in the beast’s muscles – known as marbling. There are approximately 600 accredited beef cattle feedlots in Australia, with over 95% family-owned and -operated. In the U.S. the feedlots are much, much bigger than any here in Australia, often holding 150,000 to 200,000 head of cattle. Beef City, the lot I visited, has a 25,000-head capacity and we have only one other which is larger than that in this country.

The fact is most Australian beef is grass-fed and even feedlot cattle spend 80-90% of their lives on grass, only being sent to feedlots for “finishing”. Cattle are generally sent to feedlots when poor pasture quality during poor seasons or during the dryer winter months, and in southern Australia during the dryer summer months, can result in low weight gain and the need for feedlot finishing. In comparison, U.S. beef cattle are introduced to a grain diet very early – indeed, some are weaned on to it – and generally spend a much larger percentage of their life confined in small feedlot yards.

As I’m sure many are aware, U.S. grain-feeding is heavily dependent upon a ration of GM corn by-products (obtained from ethanol production), with the addition of antibiotics to prevent the infections that will arise as a result of the stress placed on the beasts. Once again, this is not at all the case here. Australian feedlots use a much more varied combination of wheat, barley and sorghum – all grains which cattle prefer to grass – and follow strict transitional protocols over a period of weeks to ensure that the beasts have no rumen problems from a sudden change in diet. Antibiotics are NOT used as preventatives here in Australia and are only ever introduced on direct evidence of infection.

Australian feedlots are regulated through the industry’s quality assurance program, the National Feedlot Accreditation Scheme which, in 1995, was the first agricultural quality assurance scheme introduced in Australia and means that every lot in the country is individually audited every year. Environmental aspects are of significant importance here in Australia, too, and all feedlots have to provide monitoring data on soil quality and water tables annually.

My own impressions of Beef City in no way contradicted any of these facts. I was one of a group who were visiting the lot as part of their training and we were taken through every single part of the operation. Nothing was hidden from us, no question went unanswered, and the only thing we were requested not to photograph was the actual kill in the abattoir – not an unreasonable request, I thought.

The cattle in the yards (which were ALL shaded) were content, relaxed, but alert and very curious about the visitors – just as my own cattle in the paddocks are. They are very inquisitive beasts and like to know what is going on. Another thing which is worth knowing about cattle is that they are highly “vocal” and leave you in no doubt if they are unhappy or distressed about something. There was not a murmur out of this lot – apart from the odd contented conversational lowing – and certainly not the calling I hear from mine if one or two of them become separated, or the anxious bellowing of the cows when the calves are separated from the herd. If they were uncomfortable or distressed, they sure weren’t talking about it.

I’m not aiming to convert anyone with the above thoughts, nor am I posing as any sort of a mouthpiece for industrial agriculture – this is simply an issue which is of personal interest to me. As it turns out, the facts are a good deal less confronting than I expected and I’m nowhere near as horrified as I thought I’d be. Large-scale meat production not going to go away and, if we are going to eat it, there is no point in being squeamish about how it gets on our plates. As meat-eaters we have a responsibility to the beast that dies for our dinner and that responsibility includes treating it respectfully while it is alive. Of course, that will not happen in every case, but the standards which are in place are helping us get there. I believe that, as far as Australian beef production is concerned, we are on the right track.

Switzerland: Raphael of Fribourg making Fribourg-style Swiss fondue using cheese he makes

Published by Jonell Galloway + Friday, November 2, 2012 Permalink 0

Making Fribourg-style Swiss fondue at Swiss Slow Food stand, Slow Food Salone del Gusto 2012, Turin, Italy

Fribourg-style Swiss fondue is referred to as moitié-moitié. Unlike fondues from other regions, it is made with a hard, cooked cheese native to Fribourg, known as Vacherin Fribourgeois (not to be confused with Vacherin or Mont d’Or). The recipe calls for half Vacherin Fribourgeois and half Swiss Gruyère.

In this photo, Raphael is making fondue using the handmade cheeses he makes himself, at the Slow Food Switzerland stand at the Salone del Gusto in Turin, Italy last week. The visitors ran to his stand every time he put a new pot of fondue out. Obviously, it was very good!