blog

Pretty in Pink?

April 11th, 2012

I heart me some Mark Bittman! He knows how to stir the pot in all the best ways and questions me to think about where food comes from.

http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/04/03/the-pink-menace/

Who doesn’t love a good burger? Hamburgers are one of the most popular foods in America–studies show each of us eats about 150 burgers per year.

Unfortunately, not all hamburgers, or even turkey or veggie burgers, are created equal. Cooking method, portion size, and choice of bread and toppings can mean the difference between a relatively harmless lunch and a day’s worth of calories, fat, and sodium.

Before you take a bite out of that hamburger you’ve been craving, you might want to know whether it contains “pink slime” — the phrase that has become shorthand for the filler also called “lean finely textured beef.”

Add to that the knowledge the so-called pink slime is composed of mechanically-separated beef trimmings — parts of the cow that once were only used for dog food, not human consumption. And those trimmings are whipped together in a centrifuge and then treated with ammonium hydroxide (ammonia combined with water) to eliminate possible pathogens, particularly E. coli and salmonella, and you have cooked up a perfect stew of controversy.

DON’T ALWAYS COUNT ON LABELS

If you examine a label at the grocery store, it is unlikely to tell you whether a package of ground beef contains the filler as an additive. The U.S. Department of Agriculture has not required such labeling. The USDA also does not require manufacturers to include ammonia treatment on labels, because it says it is a “process,” not an ingredient.

After a major backlash, the whole “pink slime” thing has done a number on ground-beef processors nationwide — causing one to suspend operations at three out of four plants and another to seek bankruptcy protection.

The nation’s leading fast-food chains and supermarkets spurned the product, even though U.S. public health officials deem it safe to eat. Hundreds of U.S. school districts also demanded it be removed from school lunch programs.

WHERE’S THE BEEF?

What people may not have known is that ammonia – often associated with cleaning products – was cleared by U.S. health officials nearly 40 years ago and is used in making many foods, including cheese, baked goods, and chocolate products. Now that little known world is coming under increasing pressure from concerned consumers who want to know more about what they are eating.

SO WHAT TO DO?

Next time you crave a burger, create a healthy one at home. Use 4 ounces (quarter-pounder) of 95 percent lean beef and grill or broil. Enjoy on a whole wheat bun, for fiber, and top with fresh vegetables such as tomato and romaine lettuce leaves. Skip the mayonnaise, but top with low-calorie pickles, ketchup and mustard. Make your own baked fries for a side dish to satisfy your cravings without all the fat and calories.

A hamburger isn’t, by itself, a terrible nutritional choice. Topped with some lettuce and tomato, ketchup and mustard, and a relatively small bun, a burger is a high-protein treat that shouldn’t pack too much fat or too many calories. Unfortunately, the good, old-fashioned American burger has evolved from lean and simple to very fat and very complicated. Stay away from the 1,000+ calorie burgers like the six dollar burgers (some of these burgers has as much as 62 grams of fat or about 560 calories from the wrong kind of fat). Get a regular burger for 300 – 500 calories and add extra lettuce and tomatoes on your burger. The worst part of a burger is actually the bun, the white bread. Try it with a whole wheat bun or even without the bun wrapped in a lettuce leaf “protein-style”.

December 13th, 2011

Before working with me on a food television show, commit these phrases to memory to get a leg up on the competition!

Breakdown: The culinary script written for all shows, webisodes and live action events that chefs, food stylists and production teams follow to get the cooking action accomplished. Breakdowns include recipes, techniques and specific cooking or prep support needed to get the recipe demo across to the viewer.

Talking Points: Points of discussion that the chef must convey about recipes, techniques, ingredients, etc. Usually written by culinary production staff, talking points are also helpful to the talent who need to fill on-air time while cooking.

Swapouts: Food items, dishes or ingredients used on-air to stay within the time constraints (i.e. 30-minute shows) and undo mistakes. Behind the scenes, food stylists will cook along with the talent to be ready for potential mishaps (burns, over-cooking, undesired final results). The swapouts are used whenever needed – whether it’s partially browned onions to swap for burned ones, or a completed apple pie coming out of the oven just five minutes after it went in – swapouts are the real “magic” of food TV!

Mise en Place: The French phrase for “everything in its place.” Learned the first day of culinary school, this phrase means being organized and ready to go before action begins. Whether you’re cooking in your own kitchen or prepping ingredients for a food show, this is crucial. For a culinary producer that means having breakdowns, talking points and recipes written, having lists of all equipment needed, lists of swapouts and schedules of the day. If you’re testing a recipe or cooking dinner, having all your vegetables chopped, spices measured out, and ingredients at the ready is the first step to culinary success.

Purchasing: To the average eye, purchasing may seem like simply going grocery shopping. But when you’re purchasing for a food show, you have to think about more than just your list of ingredients. Segments of shows can be shot as many as 4 times, including mistakes the talent makes and shots of just their hands moving/chopping/washing. As a purchaser, you have to anticipate how much of each ingredient you’re going to need to make it through all those passes. You never want to be on set and have your director say, “can we take that again?” and have your reply be, “that was our last chicken…”

 

September 10th, 2011

My view from Brooklyn

Being born on September 11th was changed forever 10 years ago.

I temporarily relocated to NY June 2001 to write Tyler Florence’s debut cookbook, Real Kitchen. This was only my second book, and in looking back, was an important transition in my career——crazy to imagine that a decade later I have a total of nine cookbooks published.

Ty and I worked together on the FTV series Food 911 for 3 years and we considered each other family. To this day, he is like a brother to me. Through a series of circumstances, I ended up moving in with he and his girlfriend at the time, Evyn— a Jack Tripper, Three’s Company situ of sorts. I bunked in his five year old son Miles’ room, with a trunk full of toys, a blue Big Wheel, and a bird’s eye view of Flatbush Avenue. Spending the summer in Park Slope, Brooklyn and writing a “celeb-chef’s” first cookbook is in and of itself a memory.

As the hot summer in the city progressed, I rediscovered my New York soul. I moved to LA after college and while I visited the tri-state area often to see my parents and friends over the years, this was the first time I lived in the greatest city on earth as a woman. I was in a different place in my life than when I was going to NYU and bopping around the Village.

Tuesday morning September 11, 2001——day one of food photography for Real Kitchen. Big Day! It was also my birthday and Tyler and I intended to celebrate at Mesa Grill, at the invitation from fellow Food Network chef Bobby Flay.

Renowned photographer, Bill Bettencourt and his assistant are due to arrive at 9:30 am. All food and props were purchased and organized the day before. I wake at 7:30 am to find Tyler already prepping the beauty dishes in the kitchen. “JoJo, we need better baby bok choy for the Hong Kong Crab Cake shot.” “I’ll go down the street to the Korean market on 7th Avenue”, I reply. “No, the produce is better in Chinatown, it won’t take you long to run into the City and come back,” he says. With that, I hop on the orange F train to Manhattan’s lower eastside to procure and purchase photogenic Asian cabbage from an authentic Chinese grocer. In a flash, I jump back on the subway to return to the 718 area code.

After walking up three steep flights of stairs with beautiful bunches of bok choy, I find Tyler in front of the Today Show with a concerned Matt Lauer, talking about how a plane has “accidentally” crashed into the Twin Towers. This had to be around 9:00 am. The fact that I was on a train when the first plane hit, and moreover, that I was within the immediate vicinity of Wall Street while this all was happening is chilling to me. Three minutes later, I could have been potentially stuck underground like a rat in a hole, as MTA closed the downtown subways shortly after. I am forever aware and thankful that timing was on my side.

Ty is a photog at heart, and is always taking pictures and wanted to get up and out. He and I climbed the fire escape to the roof. It’s alarming how close Brooklyn actually is to downtown. We gravely watched as the first tower burns, listening to the radio commentary from a neighbor’s boom box. With a zoom on the lens, Tyler hands me his camera for use as binoculars, as the telephoto provides an upclose view. As I am watching the smoke, I see, what I think is a helpful helicopter hover…then Bam! I see through the magnifier the second plane fly into the second tower and explode into flames right before my eyes. “Holy Fuck!” Is all he and I could mutter! I truly could not believe the flames and smoke; like nothing I’d ever seen.

Then we watched as the towers came crashing down, imploding on themselves like the Sands Hotel or a Jerry Bruckheimer movie. This could not be real?! I was shaking, full of sadness and devastation, not knowing the facts and watching the News for any morsel of information.

The smoke, the white powder debris that covered seemingly everything, the putrid bitter smell of electrical fire, the constant sirens, the singed piece of paperwork I still have from a lawyers desk in tower 2 that floated all the way to Brooklyn and into my hands.

I will never forget how small I felt on that day. Or how I watched an army of commuters trek for miles on foot across the Williamsburg Bridge to their homes and families. Or how my birth was an accident, while innocent people and firefighters lost their lives. My birthday will forever be known as 911——tainted with terrorism, death, and the day my city and the nation were attacked.

Ten years later, it has not gotten any easier to “celebrate” my birth. I have been intentionally out of the country for at least 5 of the last 10 September 11ths because I end up watching the news; grieving and crying. How can I celebrate? What I have learned is that I am meant to mourn. I am meant to greet each morning with joy.  I am meant to create, and write, and cook, and share a smile, and be a friend, and in so many ways be a gift to the world.

But I will never forget.