Monkey Monday: coming up for air edition 14 December 2009 8:08 am
Posted by Tracy in : events,fangirl,geekery,health at every size,Marion Nestle,news,nyc,politics,school,sustainability,video,work,writing , 3 commentsHey, so it’s finals week from now until my last paper is due on the 23rd (which is an awful deadline and I sincerely hope to be done before then) and in the meantime I’ve been a big slacker which is why I haven’t posted and blah blah blah excuses excuses. Last week was ten thousand kinds of awesome, though.
On Monday morning, I went to an awesome event at The New School, celebrating the NYC FRESH initiative, which had not yet officially passed City Council, although it did on Wednesday. FRESH is Food Retail Expansion to Support Health, and it’s a mix of zoning and tax incentives for full-service grocery stores in certain underserved neighborhoods (Northern Manhattan, the South Bronx, Central Brooklyn and Jamaica, Queens). Not only must the stores devote a certain amount of square footage to fresh produce and other whole foods, they are required to accept EBT and WIC (which is really only common sense if they’re actually going to serve the lower-income communities that food retailers often avoid) and publically, transparently commit to good labor practices, so that people who work at those stores can afford to shop there. So awesome. And (more…)
Foto Friday: the last time I ate tuna. 30 October 2009 3:32 pm
Posted by Tracy in : books,consumerism,eating,environment,fish,food safety,food snobbery,health,Holland,Marion Nestle,Netherlands,not even vegetarian,photos,pictures,restaurants,sustainability,tuna , 1 comment so farIt has been exactly four months since I last ate tuna. I believe this may be some kind of personal record; at the very least, it is the longest I can remember going without tuna since I cared to keep track of such things. Let me explain.
I love tuna; I think it’s incredibly delicious. Unfortunately, since because of that deliciousness it’s effectively an endangered fricken species, I try not to eat it too often, on account of how I’ll be a very cranky old lady indeed if large ocean fish are extinct in the next 40 to 50 years and I’m trying to do my part to reduce demand and all that. (Because I eat it so rarely, I’m not freaking out about the whole methylmercury problem, but it is horrific and I am eternally grateful to Marion Nestle’s What to Eat for the revelation that it’s not bioaccumulative.) Anyway.
I’ve been reading a bunch about tuna farming this week — real tuna farming, not “catch baby tuna in the wild and raise them in captivity” tuna ranching, but actual farming, baby fish hatched in captivity and everything, and my personal jury is still out, to put it mildly. I wanted to come to some kind of conclusion about this latest development in time to add it to this post, but it will have to wait for another time. In the meantime, I will continue my tuna-free streak. Luckily, the last time I ate tuna was so fantastic that it’s given me an even better motivation not to crack open the canned stuff — simply put, it’s going to be very hard to find another tuna meal this good. Behold:
I’m guessing that’s a good quarter kilo of fish, at least.
Monkey Monday: belated Thursday thanks. 18 May 2009 2:01 pm
Posted by Tracy in : cooking,good news,health,kitchen gear,Marion Nestle,monkeys,nutrition,school,sustainability,thank you Thursday , 1 comment so farSo first of all: thanks for being over, spring semester! I am getting way too old and cranky to stay up like I did last Wednesday night/Thursday morning to finish my vitamin C paper, but I did get it done, even if I forgot to cite any of Dr. Nestle‘s books in it (sigh). The fortification chapter of Food Politics would’ve been particularly appropriate for examples of how ascorbic acid is a great way to give junk food a health aura — and on top of that, it’s a preservative! Double whammy! On the other hand, I came in at exactly the 10-page limit (after severely truncating my Works Consulted section, which is where all of Dr. Nestle’s books should’ve gone if I’d had the pages), and I’d lost enough sleep without shoehorning in yet another chunk of information. So I’m going to hope everything’s all for the best.
Next, one more item related to the vitamin C paper: big thanks to Andrew for pointing me at a very recent study about vitamin supplements and exercise. So perfect for the “discuss a current paper about your nutrient” requirement!
Let’s see, what else? (more…)
Four ways of looking at Trader Joe’s 5 February 2008 10:34 am
Posted by Tracy in : convenience,environment,fangirl,friends,politics,responsibility,sustainability , add a commentI’ve mentioned repeatedly that I’ve been a month or so behind on all kinds of stuff since my trip to Nepal, which is why it was January before I caught up to the fact that it was open season on Trader Joe’s in early December, and I’ve been concocting a reply ever since. Today I’ll finally be discussing the two blog posts that got my attention, and sharing a few other pieces from even more way back in the day, just to add to the fun. (more…)
Book review: “Animal, Vegetable, Miracle” by Barbara Kingsolver and family. 7 June 2007 1:33 pm
Posted by Tracy in : books,cheese,eating,garden,local food,milk,recipes,reviews,seasonality,sustainability , add a commentWhat can I say about this book that has not already been said? Local food is a hot topic right now, what with this book coming out at almost the same time as Plenty by Alisa Smith and J.B. MacKinnon of the 100-Mile Diet, and so I started reading articles about Animal, Vegetable, Mineral even before I got my hands a copy. I’m reluctant to write anything that just repeats all the responses already in print (or online, as the case may be). Instead, I will give just a brief summary before proceeding directly to my personal responses, with a minimum of the general analysis that’s already been done in many other places. (more…)
