Search Results for: food

The Honey Launderers: Uncovering the Largest Food Fraud in U.S. History

Longreads Pick

How a food-trading company based in Germany illegally imported Chinese honey into the U.S.—”the largest food fraud in U.S. history”:

“ALW relied on a network of brokers from China and Taiwan, who shipped honey from China to India, Malaysia, Indonesia, Russia, South Korea, Mongolia, Thailand, Taiwan, and the Philippines. The 50-gallon drums would be relabeled in these countries and sent on to the U.S. Often the honey was filtered to remove the pollen, which could help identify its origin. Some of the honey was adulterated with rice sugar, molasses, or fructose syrup.

“In a few cases the honey was contaminated with the residue of antibiotics banned in the U.S. In late 2006 an ALW customer rejected part of Order 995, three container loads of ‘Polish Light Amber,’ valued at $85,000. Testing revealed one container was contaminated with chloramphenicol, an antibiotic the U.S. bans from food. Chinese beekeepers use chloramphenicol to prevent Foulbrood disease, which is widespread and destructive. A deal was made to sell the contaminated honey at a big discount to another customer in Texas, a processor that sold honey to food companies.”

Source: Businessweek
Published: Sep 19, 2013
Length: 10 minutes (2,747 words)

Walter Willett’s Food Fight

Longreads Pick

Harvard professor Walter Willett is one of the most influential nutritionists in the world whose studies tracking hundred of thousands of health professionals have resulted in data shaping what we eat and how it affects our health:

“He’s tasting an almond-and-grape gazpacho when someone brings over a woman named Cindy Goody and, by way of introduction, says, ‘Walter, she’s trying to do good work at McDonald’s.’

“He phrases his greeting in the form of a question, ‘Why can’t you make a good veggie burger?’

“Goody, the senior director of nutrition for the 14,000 US outlets, appears taken aback. ‘We tried it,’ she says tentatively.

“‘Aw, that was a setup!’ Willett complains, waving his hand. He tasted one many years ago in an airport McDonald’s, and it was so awful he couldn’t finish it. ‘I’m convinced you guys made it bad to turn off people from veggie burgers.'”

Source: Boston Globe
Published: Jul 28, 2013
Length: 17 minutes (4,420 words)

The Extraordinary Science of Addictive Junk Food

Longreads Pick

How snack-food company executives help perfect our addiction to junk food—and whether Americans can reverse course on a dangerous diet of salt, sugar and fat:

“The food technicians stopped worrying about inventing new products and instead embraced the industry’s most reliable method for getting consumers to buy more: the line extension. The classic Lay’s potato chips were joined by Salt & Vinegar, Salt & Pepper and Cheddar & Sour Cream. They put out Chili-Cheese-flavored Fritos, and Cheetos were transformed into 21 varieties. Frito-Lay had a formidable research complex near Dallas, where nearly 500 chemists, psychologists and technicians conducted research that cost up to $30 million a year, and the science corps focused intense amounts of resources on questions of crunch, mouth feel and aroma for each of these items. Their tools included a $40,000 device that simulated a chewing mouth to test and perfect the chips, discovering things like the perfect break point: people like a chip that snaps with about four pounds of pressure per square inch.”

Published: Feb 20, 2013
Length: 38 minutes (9,693 words)

Thought for Food

Longreads Pick

How a second-generation Chinese daughter of two doctors in Birmingham, Mich., became one of New York City’s finest chefs:

“Wanting to expand her culinary outlook to include more Eastern flavors, Lo moved to a French-Vietnamese restaurant, Can, where she met Scism, who was working as a grill cook. But it was when Lo took the helm of a Korean restaurant called Mirezi that she caught the attention of the New York Times restaurant critic Ruth Reichl, who praised her inventive dishes and ‘beautifully arranged food’ in a glowing review. After Mirezi closed in 1998, Lo and Scism spent a year traveling the world.

“‘Anita will eat anything,’ says Scism, recalling a day in Bangkok when a vendor challenged Lo to eat a cockroach. ‘At one point, I told her she had a wing stuck in her two front teeth,’ says Scism with a laugh. ‘The thing about Anita is, she didn’t try the bug because she was challenged; she tried it because she really was curious about how it would taste.'”

Published: Aug 1, 2012
Length: 11 minutes (2,901 words)

Chow vs. Chow: The Story of an Epic New York City Food Fight

Longreads Pick

A New York Chinese restaurant loses a former member of its kitchen staff—who then opens his own, very similar restaurant. Inside the legal battle:

“In essence, the suit claimed, they’d tried to become Mr Chow—the Invasion of the Body Snatchers of haute Chinese cuisine. ‘They want to not just clone me, they want to take the whole thing,’ Mr. Chow testified on the stand, sporting his trademark owlish glasses and a bespoke Hermés suit. ‘They want to wipe me—just replace me completely, including my personal identity.'”

Author: Aaron Gell
Published: Feb 28, 2012
Length: 15 minutes (3,893 words)

The New Geopolitics of Food

Longreads Pick

Welcome to the new food economics of 2011: Prices are climbing, but the impact is not at all being felt equally. For Americans, who spend less than one-tenth of their income in the supermarket, the soaring food prices we’ve seen so far this year are an annoyance, not a calamity. But for the planet’s poorest 2 billion people, who spend 50 to 70 percent of their income on food, these soaring prices may mean going from two meals a day to one. Those who are barely hanging on to the lower rungs of the global economic ladder risk losing their grip entirely. This can contribute — and it has — to revolutions and upheaval.

Source: Foreign Policy
Published: Apr 26, 2011
Length: 16 minutes (4,048 words)

How Carrots Became the New Junk Food

Longreads Pick

Crispin had done its own behavioral research, lurking in kitchens around the Boulder area. Staffers had watched suburban moms unpack their groceries and studied where kids looked for snacks when they got home from school. Kids seldom went to the refrigerator; instead, they went straight for the cupboards or the pantry. If they did go to the fridge, baby carrots were at least visible, out on a shelf. Full-size carrots, though, always went in the vegetable drawer. “The drawer of death,” one kid called it. Adults weren’t particularly fond of the vegetable drawer either. They tended to associate it with all the vegetables they buy and forget, and then discover weeks later, limp and leaking. A strategy began to emerge. Let regular carrots be the vegetable.

Source: Fast Company
Published: Mar 23, 2011
Length: 9 minutes (2,437 words)

Peter Smith: The Best Food Longreads of the Year

Peter Smith: The Best Food Longreads of the Year

How food and water are driving a 21st-century African land grab

Longreads Pick

An Observer investigation reveals how rich countries faced by a global food shortage now farm an area double the size of the UK to guarantee supplies for their citizens

Author: John Vidal
Source: The Guardian
Published: Mar 7, 2010
Length: 26 minutes (6,573 words)

Food Fighter

Longreads Pick

Does Whole Foods’ C.E.O. know what’s best for you?

Source: The New Yorker
Published: Jan 4, 2010
Length: 42 minutes (10,583 words)