CNN EATOCRACY LAUNCHED

Check out CNN's new food blog, headed up by former AOL Food Staffer Kat Kinsman. Promises to be a great ongoing read.


http://eatocracy.cnn.com/2010/06/17/eatocracy-an-introduction/

Yummy! It's the 4th Annual Food Film Festival

The 4th Annual NYC Food Film Festival - June 23rd-27th, 2010

The 4th Annual NYC Food Film Festival is happening the June 23rd-27th, 2010 in Manhattan, Brooklyn and Queens. This is a great way to experience the abundant culinary Taste and see some amazing films that focus all on food.
Click the link for more details: http://www.nycfoodfilmfestival.com/index.html

The Vegetable Menace

In case anyone wants to read this:

Vegetable Menace

My first food memory

My mother told me that I was very picky about food as a child. She would tell people I would only eat “white food”. Not just any white food but particularly tofu, rice and Japanese white noodle. That explains why I have very few food memories from childhood and the only vivid one was about “Somen”-the Japanese angel hair pasta. I remember the soft gooey sticky white thin Japanese noodles tangling between my short fatty baby fingers. At first it felt chilled and smooth from the cold water, but gradually, my little worm fingers heated them up and made them gluey. My squishing fingers turned the noodles into ugly smashed chunks of white wheat which were originally shiny and tender. I do not recall the taste but guessing it now, it must have been nasty dried paste of wheat powder.

Cheesy Toasts, My First Food Memory

A few years ago I ate a savory pie in Kansas City, it was the best pie I had eaten on the "Pie Across America" tour I was on. You can imagine on a pie tour I'd be eating lots of pie, so it being my favorite and the one I can still taste is impressive. It reminded me of a snack I loved as a kid. My mom made these bite sized treats and froze them so that I could pop them in the oven and "cook" them myself. She started with white bread, the real squishy kind, cut into circles, no crust. Those were toasted until a little brown and awaited the yummy cheesy top. The topping, best I can recall, was made of cream cheese and green onions (scallions, as New Yorkers would say) whipped into a creamy spread with a little bite from the onion. She would put a dollop on each of the rounds and freeze them. When I wanted this tasty snack, I would heat up the oven, put them on a metal tray and wait. The cheese would get warm and soft, the toasts would stay a little crisp. They were the fancy kid's version of the gourmet goat cheese and onion pie I had in Kansas City!

My first food memory

Growing up I remember that my fourth generation Irish parents were still close enough to their ancestors to think Italian food was 'exotic'. Case in point, my maternal grandmother's favorite incarnation of spaghetti featured ground beef, minced onion, Old English cheese and Campbell's Tomato Soup.

There was a moment though, when I realized there were foods I'd never seen, let alone tasted before. I was around five years old, sitting in front of the TV watching Sesame Street. On the screen a girl, about my age, was home with her mother making lunch or maybe dinner. I sat transfixed as they filled these flat circles (which I now know to be tortillas) with cheese and then rolled them up before taking an enthusiastic bite.

Intrigued I moved to the refrigerator and desperately searched for something similar. Being so small, the closest thing within my grasp was the drawer where we kept the makings for sandwiches. As a result, my first attempt at constructing a burrito consisted of a slice of Oscar Meyer bologna with a single slice of Kraft American cheese torn to bits by my tiny hands and tucked inside.

It was neither spicy nor remotely Mexican but I think it just might be the first meal I ever made for myself.

My first food memory

I had no idea what my first food memory was until I visited home, sifting through old pictures. Family vacations and birthdays were all there, but one of me in my high chair truly brought me back. "Margot, 1988." I was three years old and grinning from ear to ear with a faceful of ketchup and a handful of chicken. I could suddenly taste the salty shredded chicken with the sweet, tangy ketchup as if I was back in the highchair. And then I tasted sweet, and sure enough there was a bowl of mashed sweet potatoes on the highchair as well. I looked ecstatic to be surrounded by all these different flavors, like I owned that little patch of space that was my highchair and kitchen table.