Over the course of two decades, Sue Conley and Peggy Smith created a beloved California brand – and helped redefine our relationship to food
When Sue Conley and Peggy Smith announced their retirement last month from Cowgirl Creamery – the cheese company they grew from plucky startup to leader in the modern farm-to-table movement – the tributes came in thick and fast.
To their devoted followers, this was no surprise.
Continue reading...Five years ago, Swedish designer and stylist Linda Ring experienced total burnout. After a few months doing nothing, she tried to adopt a slower lifestyle. “I started baking sourdough, but as it’s my nature to try to make everything beautiful, I began experimenting.”
Ring’s loaves became canvases for portraits and landscapes, scored into the raw dough. “You never know how the bread or the pattern will turn out, it’s enormously satisfying when I take it out of the oven and see.”
Continue reading...Exclusive: US chains Walmart, Costco and Kroger selling Brazilian beef produced by JBS linked to destruction of Brazilian rainforest
Three of the biggest US grocery chains sell Brazilian beef produced by a controversial meat company linked to the destruction of the Amazon rainforest, an investigation has revealed.
Food giants Walmart, Costco and Kroger – which together totalled net sales worth more than half a trillion dollars last year – are selling Brazilian beef products imported from JBS, the world’s largest meat company, which has been linked to deforestation.
Continue reading...The unit, which supplies the Herta brand, had been cleared by French state vets and claimed to be addressing concerns
French veterinary officials have been accused of publishing “falsely reassuring” inspection findings after undercover footage at a farm appeared to show pigs in conditions that continued to breach regulations following allegations of abuse in December.
The farm is a supplier for the Herta brand of frankfurter, part-owned by Nestlé, which is sold by most major UK supermarkets.
Continue reading...Report says pollution, parasites and fish mortality rates cost an estimated $50bn globally from 2013 to 2019
Salmon farming is wreaking ruin on marine ecosystems, through pollution, parasites and high fish mortality rates which are causing billions of pounds a year in damage, a new assessment of the global salmon farming industry has found.
Taken together, these costs amounted to about $50bn globally from 2013 to 2019, according to a report published on Thursday.
Continue reading...Whether it’s squid salad, pork belly or a chocolate cake, almost anything can be jazzed up with some heat. Here are some fabulous recipes from top chefs
Chillies come in such a bewildering array of shapes and colours these days that it doesn’t pay to be too specific: if a recipe calls for a particular sort, you are bound to be unable to find it. In any case, the difference between any two chillies is largely a matter of heat, and heat is largely a matter of taste. So forget about size or colour (green ones are generally hotter than red, but then they turn red anyway if you leave them sitting about) or intimidating varietal names such as yellow death-inducing toxin. Just taste one. If it’s not hot enough, use two or three. If it’s too hot, scrape out the seeds and, specifically, the white membrane they’re attached to, which is the hottest bit.
The most obvious thing to make with chilli is probably chilli, and the least obvious person to rely on for a solid, no-nonsense chilli con carne recipe is probably Heston Blumenthal. Nevertheless, I make his version almost exclusively. While it’s about as fussy as you’d imagine, it’s also pretty forgiving. The fragata pimiento piquillo peppers he tells you to add at the end, for example: I never have any – I don’t even really know what they are – so I just skip that bit, and it’s fine. The spiced butter is the most labour-intensive aspect, and the most counterintuitive, containing as it does ketchup, marmite, Worcestershire sauce and, well, butter. But it makes all the difference.
Continue reading...Nutri-Score system fails to take account of health benefits of meats like jamón ibérico, say farmers
Spain’s Iberian pork producers are hoping their famous meats will follow in the wake of olive oil and be excused from a new traffic-light food labelling scheme, arguing it fails to take account of what they claim are the health benefits of jamón ibérico.
Spain is in the process of implementing the Nutri-Score system, which grades foods from a green A to a red E on packaging. The voluntary scheme has been billed as a way to help EU countries advance towards bloc-wide food labelling by the end of 2022 as part of the European commission’s “fair, healthy and environmentally friendly” Farm-to-Fork strategy.
Continue reading...Anyone can make pizza from scratch, but these expert tips will make an everyday dish outstanding
A lot has changed in the past year. What has not is Britain’s love of pizza. From the spike in sales of wood-fired ovens to Pizza Express’s new home pizza kits, the nation’s appetite for hot crust continues to develop like 48-hour fermented sourdough.
According to cookware retailer Lakeland, 33% of people in the UK have made their own pizza from scratch. More than one-fifth of those who had done so own a pizza oven. There exists a coterie of foodies who, armed with portable Ooni or small clay pizza oven (both renowned for hitting the 500C required for Neapolitan-style pizza), are geekily absorbed in Italian flour grades and kiln-dried fuel options: fast-burning, hot birch wood for pizza; ash for lower, slower roasting.
Continue reading...A three-course showpiece to prep in advance, so you can spend more time with your better half: burnt aubergine with feta and harissa oil, prawns in vanilla and rum butter, and a chocolatey coffee mousse to finish
This time last year, many of us were looking forward to a special, one-to-one supper with a loved one. The partner we live with, for example, but perhaps forget to go on dates with; a special meal, quality time, stories saved up to be shared. The past year has, of course, brought a whole new meaning to the idea of “quality time”, and I’m not sure anyone has any great stories they’ve saved for this Valentine’s dinner. Be kind and cut yourself some slack: forget about the top new chat and focus instead on a top new meal. Pat yourself on the back for making it this far, and raise a large glass of something you adore.
Continue reading...I have been obsessed with the sugar-free soda since I was four, spending £500 a year on up to seven cans a day. This is what happened when I tried to quit
The greatest love story of my life has been with a carbonated beverage.
I can’t remember a time when I wasn’t addicted to Diet Coke. Some memories: I am sitting at the kitchen table at my grandmother’s house in northern Cyprus, screaming because my mother won’t refill my yellow-and-green patterned glass. I am four or five years old. My grandmother looks on, disturbed, as I wail disconsolately. My mother does not give in.
Continue reading...Readers explain whether they looked, felt and slept better – or if they turned back to alcohol to cheer up a miserable month
I don’t drink every day, but I do drink every weekend and I usually drink a fair amount. I did dry January (and February) two years ago when my wife was eight months pregnant with our son, but I’m finding it much easier this year because I don’t have the opportunity to go out and socialise. The thing I miss most about drinking is visiting the pub with some friends – without that it’s certainly easier. Duncan Ward, operational resilience manager, West Sussex
Continue reading...The mealworm market is expected to boom after the EU ruled them safe to eat. Insects are a popular food in most countries, so can Europeans get over the yuck factor?
It’s a bit … well, mealy. Dry (because it’s been dried), a little crunchy, not strongly flavoured, neither pleasant nor unpleasant. Salt would probably help, or chilli, lime – something, anything, to spice it up a bit. And definitely a beer, if I was going to consume much more, to help wash it down.
I’m eating mealworms. Dried yellow mealworms, the larvae of the beetle Tenebrio molitor. Why? Because they are nutritious, made up mainly of protein, fat and fibre. Because there are potentially environmental and economic benefits, as they require less feed and produce less waste and carbon dioxide than other sources of animal protein. And because Efsa, the EU food safety agency, has just declared them safe to eat.
Continue reading...Billions of unwanted male chicks are slaughtered by the farming industry. Now a startup claims to have found a surprising solution to the problem
The eggs we eat have a hidden cost. About 7bn male chicks are killed worldwide every year to produce them. Farmers need to replenish their supply of egg-laying hens but, by nature, half the chicks that hatch are male and growing them for meat is uneconomic – that industry uses faster growing breeds. In many countries they are tossed into shredding machines, although in the UK they are gassed.
But what if those male chicks could instead hatch out as functional females, able to grow into egg-laying birds? That’s the vision of Israeli startup Soos Technology. Founded in 2017, the company, which has received $3.3m in investment and prize winnings, wants to make commercial hatcheries kinder and more economic by changing the effective sex of poultry embryos as they develop.
Continue reading...From cake to pudding to panna cotta to pork ribs, this seasonal treat is endlessly flexible. And let’s not forget the cocktails …
We may never know how many surplus jars of marmalade were created during the lockdown year, just for something to do. There is, however, still time for one final push: marmalade – as detailed in this masterclass recipe from Felicity Cloake – is traditionally made with sour Seville oranges, which have a notoriously short season, due to end in just a few weeks’ time.
You don’t have to use Seville oranges, of course. You can make perfectly serviceable marmalade from regular oranges, or even from spent orange rinds, following Tom Hunt’s example. Non-traditional marmalades can also be derived from other fruits, such as pink grapefruit, as Nigel Slater demonstrates.
Continue reading...Do you have to be so precise when measuring ingredients? After all, what difference does 5g of flour actually make?
• Got a culinary dilemma? Email feast@theguardian.com
A recent Feast recipe uses three types of flour: two requiring 55g and one 50g. Surely 5g won’t make a difference? US cups are less accurate than British pounds and ounces, and American cooks get by on those. Why not use teaspoons for smaller quantities and round figures otherwise?
Judy, Leamington Spa
“I get Judy’s frustration,” says Feast perfectionist Felicity Cloake. “It often doesn’t make that much difference at all.” In fact, Nigella Lawson writes about this very predicament in her latest book, Cook, Eat, Repeat: “I struggle, as many food writers do, with just how precise to be, and my books reflect how I feel at any given time about what is helpful and what is confining.” Lawson might specify “a large onion”, give an approximate weight or simply call for “an onion”. “The truth is, the weight of an onion, or the size of it, is not always critical.” However, as Cloake points out, “Yotam Ottolenghi says that if one of his recipes stipulates an eighth of a teaspoon of ginger, that’s because it has been tested with that – and with more and less, too – and that’s what works.”
Continue reading...From Asma Khan’s saag paneer to Lopè Ariyo’s suya lamb, our exploration of the wider world of curry takes in recipes from south Asia, Nigeria and Japan
It was dal that done it, in Luton, Lucknow, London. When the raisin-studded school dinners of my childhood were replaced with sophisticated south-Asian cooking. Here we also celebrate some of the wider world of curry: recipes from Nigeria, Japan, Vietnam, the Caribbean. From Uyen Luu’s ginger duck to Shuko Oda’s keema curry, and Asma Khan’s saag paneer to Lopè Ariyo’s suya lamb. There is a pumpkin curry, a prawn curry, a black-eyed bean curry; Vivek Singh’s perfect vindaloo, Meera Sodha’s tomato curry and Madhur Jaffrey’s peerless chicken korma. In short, the 20 best curry dishes from some of the finest cookery writers around.
Continue reading...Making a hearty bowlful is easier than you might think. Here are 10 warming recipes from Michael Caines, Ollie Dabbous, Jessica Rosval and more
It is cold, there is nothing to do – and you may want to hang on to all your tinned food in case things get even worse. This points towards one thing: getting really good at making soup. Although it can seem complicated and time-consuming, soup-making is immensely satisfying and much easier than you think. We asked 10 chefs to share their best recipes for the simple soups they make at home.
Continue reading...Celebrate the life and work of Robert Burns on 25 January with a traditional scotch. But there’s more you can do with whisky than drinking
Traditionally, Burns Night ,which takes place on 25 January, celebrates the life and work of the poet Robert Burns. With Covid restrictions in place, the usual gatherings full of poetry, revelry and haggis will have to be curtailed, but it is still a convenient excuse to drink whisky on a weeknight.
Continue reading...Restaurant ONA in the city of Ares rewarded after initially struggling to get funding to open its doors
A vegan restaurant in south-west France has won a Michelin star, the first for an establishment serving only animal-free products in France.
Claire Vallee runs the restaurant ONA – which stands for Origine Non Animale – in the city of Ares, near Bordeaux, which she launched in 2016 thanks to crowdfunding from supporters and a loan from a green bank.
Continue reading...Whether it’s fish fingers or a fancy restaurant chicken salad, what we eat can help us through hard times
Lockdown 3.0. My plan, before this exciting new iteration was announced, was to write about Francis Bacon’s cooking: I’ve been reading a new biography of the artist, and on every other page is a description of the wondrous meals he would produce for friends, seemingly out of nowhere (oysters, fish, cheese, grapes). But all that will have to wait. We must be practical. I’ve had a good look around the place in which we find ourselves, and I’m pretty sure that this is it: the Slough of Despond. It is, I think we can all agree, a grim spot: not quite the bog of Bunyan’s imagining, but nevertheless somewhat dark and dank – and strangely depopulated, too, when you consider how many of us now loiter here, quietly catastrophising. On the plus side, though, it comes with a small kitchen. Will this help to see us through? Perhaps. We can only try.
It’s absolutely fine to eat a slice of toast for supper – we all of us have our picky bread-and-cheese nights
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