Sharing the love: Tiny microbuses make a big splash on the Tillamook Cheese Loaf Love Tour

How do you celebrate 100 years of making great cheese? By taking it on a year-long road trip. Tillamook’s Loaf Love Tour is the subject of my latest post on the USA Character Approved Blog.

In the post above, you saw how seriously Tillamook takes its cheesemaking. Here’s how they have fun. Their cheeses are available in all 50 states, but they’re not universally known everywhere. So to kick off their 101st year in the business, they decided to spread the word—and the love—with the Loaf Love Tour. And what better way to do that than with the official vehicle of the Summer of Love, the 1966 VW Microbus?

Cute as the original was, though, it wasn’t quite cute enough. So the Tillamook team chopped their trio of microbuses to a diminutive Continue reading “Sharing the love: Tiny microbuses make a big splash on the Tillamook Cheese Loaf Love Tour” →

To get kids eating healthier, Jamie Oliver launches Jamie’s Home Cooking Skills

Jamie Oliver is on a mission to get everyone to eat better. His new website, Jamie’s Home Cooking Skills, is the subject of my latest post on the USA Character Approved Blog.

A recent study shows Americans aren’t eating their vegetables. I know you’re as shocked as I am. But I was shocked at just how much we’re not eating them. The study, released this month by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, concludes that “only 26 percent of the nation’s adults eat vegetables three or more times a day,” according to The New York Times.

Part of the problem is that too many of us just don’t find vegetables interesting. But British-born chef/cookbook author/TV personality Jamie Oliver thinks that’s because no one is learning to cook anymore. Continue reading “To get kids eating healthier, Jamie Oliver launches Jamie’s Home Cooking Skills” →

A bicycle built for treats and getting hammered in America’s Heartland

Fruity freezer pops sold from a bicycle in LA and silky smooth vodka in Indiana, both made with local ingredients, are the subjects of my latest posts on the USA Character Approved Blog.

These days, it seems everything is getting a gourmet makeover. Burgers, cupcakes, s’mores… One of the biggest hits this year is reimagined Popsicles, the iconic brightly colored and flavored summer treat for countless generations (and a fiercely guarded registered trademark of Unilever, as some hapless artisanal frozen treat makers have discovered). And perhaps no one is remaking them as deliciously or selling them as charmingly as Michelle Sallah and John Cassidy.

Together, they are Popcycle Treats. Sarah makes the inventively flavored freezer pops from seasonal produce and some interesting surprises. Continue reading “A bicycle built for treats and getting hammered in America’s Heartland” →

Want healthier meat and dairy? You’ll find it at “Home on the Range”

Pasture raising the animals we count on for meat and dairy products is healthier for everyone. A website that helps you find grass-fed food locally is the subject of my latest post on the USA Character Approved Blog.

The picture above, of cattle grazing in an open pasture, used to be how all farming was done. Livestock fed in pastures—or in the case of ranches, out on the range. No feedlots, no penning animals in and fattening them with corn. It’s not that farmers and ranchers were more humane back then. They just had a lot of common sense. Cattle (and goats and sheep) ate readily available grasses and supplied the, um, fertilizer that helped more grasses grow. There was no need for chemical fertilizers or the fossil fuel to make them and spread them. And there were no truckloads of manure to be gotten rid of.

Jo Robinson thinks we need to be doing more farming that way again. To help consumers find farmers who are raising grass-fed animals, she writes a website called Eatwild. The name comes from studies Continue reading “Want healthier meat and dairy? You’ll find it at “Home on the Range”” →

Medium Raw: Anthony Bourdain revisits Kitchen Confidential, 10 years later

Chef/author/TV personality Anthony Bourdain was in Chicago recently promoting his new book. I’m still starstruck from getting to see him speak. He’s the subject of my latest post on the USA Character Approved Blog.

Anthony Bourdain is the man who scared me out of the restaurant business. Not that I was ever in it or even seriously considered trying my hand at it. But like most food-loving home cooks, I’ve had my fantasies about running a bustling little neighborhood bistro where regulars would turn up night after night to ooh and ahhh over my simply prepared meals.

Bourdain’s Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly, published ten years ago, quickly disabused me of any notion that I could—or even wanted to—cook professionally. Reading this fascinating, profane peek behind the culinary curtain into the world of restaurant kitchens was like sitting down with a brutally frank career counselor: Continue reading “Medium Raw: Anthony Bourdain revisits Kitchen Confidential, 10 years later” →

Colorful news for your kitchen: Green cutting boards and black garlic

Dishwasher-safe cutting boards made from sustainable bamboo and fermented garlic that delivers subtle flavors and a striking appearance are the subjects of my latest posts on the USA Character Approved Blog.

Despite what a certain famous frog says, being green is easy, at least when it comes to cutting boards. TruBamboo has introduced handsome, durable cutting boards made from bamboo, the quintessential green renewable resource. And best of all, they’re dishwasher safe.

I mean, let’s face it—we all want to be greener in our daily lives, but not if it means using green products that require special care or, worse, don’t work well (I’m talking to you, eco-friendly window cleaners). Continue reading “Colorful news for your kitchen: Green cutting boards and black garlic” →

Biking across America in search of local food

On April 24, two friends set out on bicycles from Hardwick, Vermont, to explore the local food movement. As they approach their final destination—Portland, Oregon—my post on the USA Character Approved Blog shares some of what they found.

To our grandparents and great-grandparents, local food was just food, something grown by them, their neighbors or maybe a farmer a few miles away. Anything that had to be shipped from someplace more distant—an orange, for instance—was deemed exotic, something to be reserved for a holiday gift.

Fast forward to today, though, and local is the new exotic. Increasingly, “locally sourced” is the new mantra for restaurant chefs, home cooks, community activists, environmentalists… But what does local food really mean, to those who produce it and those who consume it? Friends Aaron Zueck and Robert DuBois decided the best way to study local was to go national, biking across America, hosting potluck dinners along the way and talking to people about food, over food. They named their epic project Bikeloc. Continue reading “Biking across America in search of local food” →

Green .000367 Acres: Farming in Manhattan on a very, very small scale

The urge to grow your own food can strike in even the most urban environments. My post on the USA Character Approved Blog this week shows how one person answers that urge in the wilds of Manhattan.

Peter Bazeli and his wife Lisa Nathan live the big city dream—certainly my big city dream. Their apartment on the Upper West Side faces New York’s green jewel, Central Park. But old habits die hard. Peter grew up helping his parents in their large family garden in the Midwest. Gradually, he took it over and even put in a fish pond. Moving to the big city did nothing to stifle his desire to dig in the dirt. So he rents a tiny plot in a Manhattan community garden, where he and Lisa raise heirloom tomatoes, broccoli, peppers, eggplants, lettuce and spinach.

“Farming” a four-foot by four-foot garden plot in the heart of New York City is not without its challenges. Continue reading “Green .000367 Acres: Farming in Manhattan on a very, very small scale” →

USA Network’s Character Approved Blog launches—and I’m writing for it!

USA Network just created a blog in support of its Character Approved Awards celebrating the people, places and things that are making a mark by positively influencing our cultural landscape—and I’m writing weekly food pieces for it!

It’s getting harder to avoid me. A couple of weeks ago, I mentioned that I was 1/55th of the new eBook 55 Knives. Well, as of this past Monday, I’m 1/10th of the writing staff for an exciting new blog. It’s in soft launch mode right now; they’re expecting an official launch this summer.

Cable channel USA Network has just launched the USA Character Approved Blog. Every day, you’ll find stories of people and places and things having a positive influence on the way we live now. To create these stories, they’ve assembled a team of 10 writers to “discuss the ideas and trends impacting the cultural landscape around us.” The areas the blog covers include architecture, art, design, fashion, Continue reading “USA Network’s Character Approved Blog launches—and I’m writing for it!” →