Tag Archives: Sustainable Seafood

Where to Eat Local? A City-by-City Guide

Tastemakers

Regardless of their politics, most folks across the country today want to support their neighborhood food producers. Locally sourced and prepared foods boast superior nutrition because regional ingredients are picked when they’re ripe, take a shorter trip from farm to table and — for the small businesses in this guide — are prepared without a barrage of preservatives, artificial flavorings or chemicals. In other words, it’s real food.

But where does one find these butchers, bakers and popsicle makers preparing delicious products and creating local jobs? Check out the 100 Tastemakers across the country. Continue reading →

Weekly Round Up, 10.5.12

Natural Foods

Here are some of the best food stories we came across this week:

  • Take the October Unprocessed (Food) Challenge – Popular food blogger Andrew Wilder of Eating Rules! hosts a challenge for his readers each October: Can they eschew processed foods for one whole month? The parameters are flexible and forgiving instead of rigid; past participants have reported feeling better physically and becoming more conscious of their food choices.
  • Trader Joe’s is Focus of Antibiotic-Free Meat Campaign – The Meat Without Drugs campaign set its sights on Trader Joe’s, the innovative grocer known for its affordable gourmet foods and fair business practices. The national retailer already sells some antibiotic-free meats, prompting the campaign to encourage TJ’s to sell only drug-free. Over 500,000 people have signed a petition urging the chain to make the switch. Continue reading →

Weekly Round Up, 9.7.12

Red Cherry Shrimp

Here are some of the best food stories we came across this week:

  • A Guide to Sustainable Shrimp Dining – Northwest Atlantic Marina Alliance volunteer (and shellfish lover) Pamela Flash chronicled her journey, “An Inconvenient Shrimp” through New York City area restaurants to determine if the shrimp on her plate were wild-caught and local. She discovers fresh, local wild shrimp are being served, and provides tips for how diners can find out at their favorite restaurants too.
  • Weight-Loss Heavyweights Back NYC Soda Ban – Presidents, founders and CEOs of weight-loss empires are lining up to endorse New York City Mayor Bloomberg’s proposed soda ban. Weight Watchers North America, Jenny Craig, Picture Perfect Weight Loss, the French Dukan Diet, the South Beach Diet and Oprah Winfrey’s personal trainer have all announced their endorsement.
  • Hunter-Gatherer Lifestyle Doesn’t Affect Energy Expenditure – Scientists who studied the Hadza people of Tanzania, one of the few remaining cultures who live a true grass hut, hunter-gatherer lifestyle, found that they burned about the same amount of calories per day as typical, more sedentary adults in Europe and the U.S., according to the study published in PLoS ONE.
  • Farm Use of Antibiotics Goes Untracked – Livestock for the American food supply receive 80% of the antibiotics sold in the U.S., but producers of poultry and meat are not required to track or report their use of the drugs in any particular animal, what type is used or how much is administered. The lack of data impedes the ability to document the relationship between animal antibiotic use and antibiotic-resistant infections in humans.
  • Chemical in Green Tea Actually Grows Brain Cells – A study published in Molecular Nutrition & Food Research found that the chemical epigallocatechin-3 gallate (EGCG), present in green tea and known to contain anti-oxidants, also directly increases the production of neural progenitor cells — these cells have the capacity to develop into different types of cells within the brain.

What did we miss? Let us know in the comments below, and follow us on Facebook and Twitter for links like these all week long.

Photo courtesy of Xbeckie boox .

Weekly Round Up, 7.13.12

Perfectly Ripe Produce

Here are some of the best food stories we came across this week:

    • Bomb Sniffing Technology Used to Detect Ripe Produce – The same lab at MIT’s Institute for Soldier Nanotechnologies that developed dog-level ultra-trace-sensing equipment for detecting the chemicals used in bombs is now being used to sniff out the chemical vapor signatures of ripe produce by measuring the trace amounts of ethylene gas being emitted, thus reducing food waste for grocers and other retailers.
    • First Global Standards for Salmon Farming – A consortium of scientists, environmental agencies, governments and commercial fishing executives has developed the first set of universal standards for salmon farming. The process took eight years and a great deal of discussion and research. It entails 100 fish-farming standards, from the construction of cages to antibiotic use. These standards would allow certified aquaculture farms to use a label on packaging declaring the fish A.S.C. Certified.
    • “Big Organic” has Become Unnatural – Has the organic movement become a victim of its own success? Organic food has become a wildly lucrative business for Big Food and a premium-price-means-premium-profit section of the grocery store. The industry’s image — contented cows grazing on the green hills of family-owned farms — is mostly pure fantasy. Or rather, pure marketing. Big Food, it turns out, has spawned what might be called Big Organic.
    • Researchers Plot Roadmap for Protein-Induced Satiety – A study published in Cell has mapped out the complex chain reaction of signals that travel from the gut to the brain to cause feelings of satiety in the body after a protein-rich meal. It found stimulating certain receptors in a major blood vessel connected to the gut enhances food intake, while blocking them suppresses food intake; the researchers hope to use the data in the battle against obesity.
    • Eating Smaller Pieces of Food Effects Consumption – A study presented at the conference in Zurich for the Society for the Study of Ingestive Behavior found that in college students and rats, after consuming food cut into smaller pieces, later calorie consumption decreased by about 25%. Some speculate eating smaller pieces tricks the mind into believing the body has consumed multiple portions.

What did we miss? Let us know in the comments below, and follow us on Facebook and Twitter for links like these all week long.

Photo courtesy of Wonderlane.

Weekly Round Up, 5.4.12

Now That's a Fish Counter

Here are some of the best food stories we came across this week:

    • Greenpeace Releases Its Fish Counter Scorecard – For the first time since the inception of Greenpeace’s Carting Away the Oceans ratings, two retailers actually received a “good” score for sustainable seafood practices: Safeway and Whole Foods Market. In last place was BI-LO/Winn-Dixie.
    • USDA Ending Pathogen Testing for Produce Via Budget Cuts – The Microbiological Data Program that tests about 15,000 fruits and vegetables for E. coli and other dangerous pathogens will probably end in the fiscal year 2013. The Senate Appropriations Committee decided not to fund the $5 million program, which provides close to 90% of all bacterial pathogen data about produce.
    • Californians Poised to Vote on Prop to Label All GMO Food – The Right-to-Know campaign has gathered enough signatures on its petitions to get a prop on the Nov. 6, 2012, ballot that would require manufacturers to label all foods containing GMO ingredients sold in California.
    • Anti-Bottled Water WeTap App Finds Closest Water Fountains – As part of a commitment to stop landfills from overflowing with water bottles, Evelyn Wendel created an app that allows users to bookmark drinking fountains using GPS and Google Maps, rate the quality of the faucets, and share the news with other users.
    • Study Details Which Countries Consume the Most Meat – The Economist reported that overall worldwide consumption of meat is on the rise. Surprisingly, the country that eats the most is not the U.S. (which came in second). Luxembourg leads the globe, at 136.5kg per person. India was last, at 3.2kg each.

What did we miss? Let us know in the comments below, and follow us on Facebook and Twitter for links like these all week long.

Image courtesy of HarshLight.

It’s Getting Real at the Whole Foods Fish Counter: No More Red-Label Seafood

Five Fish

In celebration of Earth Day, Whole Foods Market made a big change at the fish counter: The stores no longer sell seafood with red warning labels, as part of their commitment to ocean-friendly seafood.

Whole Foods initially partnered with the Blue Ocean Institute and Monterey Bay Aquarium to create a color coded system with green, yellow and red labels to help buyers become aware of the sustainability of their prospective dinner. The red-rated seafood denoted unsustainable fishing practices or overfishing of a species. Continue reading →

Weekly Round Up 4.27.12

Corn

Here are some of the best food stories we came across this week:

  • Dow’s GMO “Agent Orange Corn” Seeks USDA Approval – Dow AgroSciences is seeking approval for it’s “Enlist” corn, which has been genetically modified to be resistant to 2,4-D, an ingredient used in Agent Orange and a Dow herbicide — this corn would allow farmers to spray the herbicide without harming corn crops. More than 365,000 missives against approval have been submitted to the USDA by numerous groups.

Weekly Roundup 4.13.12

Brown cows

Here are some of the best food stories we came across this week:

One Fish, Two Fish: Choose Sustainable Fish with the Blue Ocean Institute

school of fish

As you learned in our recent story, many Clean Plates-approved chefs have found purveyors of sustainably sourced seafood, but what about individuals? How can you ensure the fish you buy or dine on is sustainable and safe? Kate McLaughlin, Seafood Program Director at Blue Ocean Institute, is here to help.

How do you define “ocean-friendly” seafood?
Ocean-friendly seafood can be wild-caught or farmed. If wild-caught, it should come from a healthy population and be caught with minimal impact on other populations and the marine habitat. If farmed, it should be raised using methods that cause little damage to the environment and have minimal impact on wild populations. Few of the farmed fish should be able to escape, and they shouldn’t be fed large quantities of wild fish. Continue reading →

Weekly Roundup 4.6.12

Noble Chickens

Here are some of the best food stories we came across this week:

  • New Technology May Help End Food Waste – New RFID tags, replete with GPS, monitor temperature and location as produce is shipped to stores, which allows grocers to sell the most perishable items before they spoil.
  • Chicken with Arsenic? – Two new studies discovered poultry on factory farms are routinely fed caffeine, active ingredients of Tylenol and Benadryl, banned antibiotics and even arsenic. Continue reading →