The City That Eats

The Stress Releaser

As a longtime tea drinker, I am certainly happy to read this news:

Scientists have evidence behind what many tea drinkers already know - a regular cuppa can help you recover more quickly from everyday life stresses.

The study of black tea - instead of green or herbal varieties - found it helps cut levels of the stress hormone cortisol circulating in the blood.

They found people who drank tea were able to de-stress more quickly than those who drank a tea substitute.

The University College London study is in the journal Psychopharmacology.

In the study, 75 young male regular tea drinkers were split into two groups and monitored for six weeks.

They all gave up their normal tea, coffee and caffeinated beverages, and then one group was given a fruit-flavoured caffeinated tea mixture made up of the constituents of an average cup of black tea.

The other group was given a caffeinated placebo identical in taste, but devoid of the active tea ingredients.

All drinks were tea-coloured, but were designed to mask some of the normal sensory cues associated with tea drinking (such as smell, taste and familiarity of the brew).

This was designed to eliminate confounding factors such as the 'comforting' effect of drinking a cup of tea.

Both groups were subjected to challenging tasks, while their cortisol, blood pressure, blood platelet and self-rated levels of stress were measured.

In one task, volunteers were exposed to one of three stressful situations (threat of unemployment, a shop-lifting accusation or an incident in a nursing home), where they had to prepare a verbal response and argue their case in front of a camera.

The tasks triggered substantial increases in blood pressure, heart rate and subjective stress ratings in both of the groups.

However, 50 minutes after the task, cortisol levels had dropped by an average of 47% in the tea-drinking group compared with 27% in the fake tea group.

Blood platelet activation - linked to blood clotting and the risk of heart attacks - was also lower in the tea drinkers.

In addition, this group reported a greater degree of relaxation in the recovery period after the task.

Subversion

You know, to be perfectly honest, eating foie gras does not sound like it is--or should be--at the top of my "Things To Do" list. I have never had foie gras, and to be perfectly honest, I imagine that if I never had it, I would not miss it.

However, I really can't stand officious meddling. And as eating foie gras seems to be the new "in" thing to do in order to show one's distaste (pardon the cheap attempt at a pun) for officious meddling, I might have to find some way to engage in a little bit of civil disobedience of my own.

All in the name of freedom, of course.

The Unique Nature Of American Food

Quoth Tyler Cowen:

The better pure ingredients in Paris include amazing cheese shops, perfect bread, and fresher strawberries.  On the macro scale, this translates into superior haute cuisine.

America, in contrast, excels in multi-dimensionality.  Move away from refined Michelin-style cooking, and New York City is usually better than Paris.  We have better Indian food, Columbian food, Afghan food, Chinese food, sushi, burger joints, street pretzels, and so on. Yet there is probably no single cuisine where NYC is #1 in the world, precisely because American ingredients are not up to scratch.

It is no accident that France specializes in uni-dimensional food competition, whereas the United States scatters its culinary energies in many directions.  By choosing food networks which emphasize speed, reliability, and cheapness over perfection, the U.S. makes possible many more ethnic cuisines, and it also guarantees a better shot at cheap prices.  In short, New York offers more choice.

I would add to this by saying that America excels at offering fusion cuisine. It is all the rage nowadays on the restaurant scenes and does wonders at shaking up the ossified restaurant establishments. And Chicago does quite well in the fusion market, I should add.

The Great Chicago Foie Gras Feud

I have never tried foie gras. I may at some point try foie gras because of my desire to try something at least once--assuming that there isn't a high chance of it killing me instantaneously. But whether or not I try foie gras, I find this to be bizarre:

In the city once known as the world's slaughterhouse, restaurants, politicians and animal rights activists are worked up over a goose liver delicacy.

A proposed ban on foie gras has divided Chicago's fine restaurants and stirred a two-pronged debate: whether it is humane to force-feed geese and ducks to plump up their livers, and whether politicians should be telling diners what they can and cannot eat.

"Our laws are reflection of our culture, and in our culture it's not acceptable to torture small animals," said Alderman Joseph Moore, whose proposed ordinance would affect at least 19 restaurants in Chicago, by one count.

Chicago was once "hog butcher for the world," as the poet Carl Sandburg so famously put it. The vast Union Stock Yards were the setting for Upton Sinclair's muckraking novel "The Jungle," about conditions in turn-of-the-century meatpacking plants.

While that era is long gone, Chicago is still very much a city of carnivores, with its steakhouses and its Chicago-style hot dogs with all the trimmings.

"I never thought this would happen in my lifetime. It feels so politically driven," said Rick Tramonto, the chef and owner of the four-star restaurant Tru. "We're the meatpacking part of the country. We're the Midwest. We're farming states. It's strange to me that this is happening."

A City Council committee approved the ordinance last month, and the full council could vote this month. But Mayor Richard M. Daley has made it clear he does not like the idea of banning certain foods, grumbling, "Pretty soon, you can't drink."

Hmmm, let's see: We send cows to the slaughterhouse. We kill chickens and eat them. We consume lamb. We digest all sorts of pork consumables (unless, like me, we keep a semblance of kosher). And yet, somehow a fracas has emerged regarding foie gras. Mais pourquoi?

Rich and buttery, foie gras, pronounced fwah-GRAH and French for "fat liver," often is served sliced and pan-seared, frequently with fruit or atop greens or a cut of steak or veal.

To fatten the liver of waterfowl, a tube is inserted into their throats twice a day and partially cooked corn is pumped down the esophagus. Only three foie gras farms -- two in New York and one in California -- operate in the United States.

"Force-feeding birds to have livers up to 10 times their size is appalling and most citizens are shocked to learn this," said Gene Bauston, president of the animal rights group Farm Sanctuary, which is part of a worldwide movement against foie gras.

But Guillermo Gonzalez, who owns operates Sonoma Foie Gras, a foie gras producer about 80 miles east of San Francisco, contends the process is not abusive.

"The images using a tube to feed is duck is not pretty, but the fact of the matter is the anatomy of ducks and geese are perfectly adaptable," he said.

Let us assume arguendo that the process is appalling. So then would the aforementioned acts of killing cattle, fowl, lamb and porcine creatures. Have we just tired of focusing on these acts and have decided to turn our attention to goose liver? Je ne sais pas.

And of course, the following is predictable:

In October, a restaurant that serves foie gras, Cyrano's Bistrot, was vandalized after its owner testified against the proposed ban. A window was smashed and a door was smeared with a blood-red liquid.

Needless to say, if such tactics get repeated, you can conceivably kiss your steaks, your chickens, your lamb chops and your pork roasts goodbye. I don't think it will happen tomorrow. It may never happen. But it is worth noting anew that your tastes are subject to the extreme dictates of political correctness, and that political correctness may not be content with influencing only one portion of your diet.

And While We Are Discussing Health Benefits Of Certain Foods . . .

Consider those of curry:

The spice that gives many curries a yellow colour could help halt the spread of breast cancer, research suggests.

Scientists found that curcumin, the main ingredient of turmeric, appeared to stop tumours spreading to other parts of the body.

It proved particularly effective when combined with an existing chemotherapy drug.

Researchers described their findings as 'exciting' and said they hoped patients would be able to benefit from the discovery within a few years.

Scientists took 60 mice with breast cancer and, after removing the tumours, gave some curcumin and others a normal, drug-free diet.

The rest were given a common chemotherapy drug called Taxol, or a combination of curcumin and Taxol. The team found that 96 per cent of those on a normal diet with no medication developed tumours in the lungs that were visible without a microscope.

By contrast, none of those given curcumin and Taxol developed clearly visible tumours.

Even when examined under a microscope, only 28 per cent of the mice given a combination of curcumin and Taxol showed signs that the cancer had spread.

Mice given only curcumin also saw a 'significant reduction' in the number of visible lung tumours.

Scientists think that the spice helps shut down a protein that plays a key role in the spread of cancers.

Get thee to an Indian restaurant. Here's a list of Indian restaurants in Chicago.

Confirming The Health Benefits Of Fish

We've noted this before, but it is worth noting again that fish is very good for you:

Eating fish at least once a week slows the toll aging takes on the brain, while obesity at midlife doubles the risk of dementia, a pair of studies concluded on Monday.

Omega-3 fatty acids contained in fish have been shown to boost brain functioning as well as cutting the risk of stroke, and eating fish regularly appears to protect the brain as people age, the six-year study of Chicago residents said.

"The rate of (mental) decline was reduced by 10 percent to 13 percent per year among persons who consumed one or more fish meals per week compared with those with less than weekly consumption," wrote Martha Clare Morris of Rush University Medical Center in Chicago.

"The rate reduction is the equivalent of being three to four years younger in age," she added in the report published online by the Archives of Neurology.

The protective effect from eating fish was evident even after researchers adjusted for consumption of fruits and vegetables.

Now, if only fish weren't so expensive to obtain . . .

Everything They Told You Is True

Green tea does a body a good:

An ingredient of green tea may help to protect the brain against the ravages of Alzheimer's disease, research in the US suggests.

University of South Florida scientists found the component prevented Alzheimer's-like damage in the brains of mice bred to develop symptoms.

The component - EGCG - is already strongly suspected of offering protection against certain cancers.

The study is published in the Journal of Neuroscience.

It provides evidence that EGCG decreases production of the beta-amyloid protein thought to play a key role in the development of Alzheimer's symptoms.

It is this protein that forms the characteristic plaques found in the brain of Alzheimer's patients which are thought to lead to nerve damage and memory loss.

After treating Alzheimer's mice for several months with daily injections of pure EGCG, the researchers observed a dramatic decrease - as much as 54% - of brain-clogging Alzheimer's plaques.

Lead researcher Dr Jun Tan said: "The findings suggest that a concentrated component of green tea can decrease brain beta-amyloid plaque formation.

"If beta-amyloid pathology in this Alzheimer's mouse model is representative of Alzheimer's disease pathology in humans, EGCG dietary supplementation may be effective in preventing and treating the disease."

But a caveat of sorts is in order:

Green tea contains many antioxidants, including those known as flavonoids, that can protect against damage to the brain caused by charged particles called free radicals.

However, the Florida team showed that other flavonoids in green tea actually block EGCG's ability to prevent the harmful build up of beta-amyloid.

Thus drinking green tea alone would not likely have a beneficial effect.

Dr Doug Shytle, who also worked on the study, said: "This finding suggests that green tea extract selectively concentrating EGCG would be needed to override the counteractive effect of other flavonoids found in green tea."

"A new generation of dietary supplements containing pure EGCG may lead to the greatest benefit for treating Alzheimer's disease."

Food That Does A Body Good

Fans of olive oil should be happy about this news:

Freshly pressed olive oil can ease the pain of living too well — literally — researchers said Wednesday.

The throat-stinging squeezings of the pulped olive — the only vegetable oil that can be consumed without processing — contains a compound that has the same pain-relieving effect as ibuprofen, scientists at the Monell Chemical Senses Center in Philadelphia reported in research published in the journal Nature.

The discovery of a natural anti-inflammatory agent in extra virgin olive oil offers a reliable biochemical insight into the well-documented but puzzling health benefits of a Mediterranean diet, which appears to lower the risk of cancer, heart ailments and some chronic diseases even though it is high in fat and salt.

In the kitchen of Chez Panisse in Berkeley, where chefs drizzle, dip and splash $10,000 worth of Tuscan extra virgin olive oil every month, and the chic corporate corridors of Gourmet in New York, this newest finding about the pharmacology of food prompted bemused looks, skepticism and more than one deeply satisfied smile.

"It is always reassuring to hear that something so good has a health benefit," said cafe chef Russell Moore at Chez Panisse. "But it does seem strange that there would be whole cultures of people eating an anti-inflammatory all the time."

However, only the freshest — and usually most expensive — olive oil has significant amounts of the pungent compound, called oleocanthal, the researchers said. Aging and cooking destroy it.

The irritating intensity of the taste of a fresh extra virgin olive oil turned out to be directly related to how much oleocanthal the oil contained.

The highest levels are found in the olives grown in Tuscany and the lowest in many California olive groves.

Liquid Intelligence

I have a feeling that this link is going to make me a lot of friends.

You're welcome.

Warning The Populace

The Taste of Chicago begins this weekend in my beloved hometown, and I urge all and sundry to go out and have themselves a grand time at this venerable institution. At some point during the Taste, you may very well see me there as well. Try to pick me out amongst the throngs.

But when you go, for Heaven's sake, be careful of what you eat:

A company convicted of running a rat-infested warehouse where 22 million pounds of meat and poultry were condemned by federal investigators was ordered Thursday to pay $10.2 million in fines and restitution.

U.S. District Judge Harry Leinenweber imposed a fine of $2 million, four times what lawyers for LaGrou Distribution Systems Inc. had hoped for, saying it was clear that "food was being held under unsanitary conditions."

Leinenweber also ordered LaGrou Distribution Systems to pay $8.2 million in restitution to companies whose food was destroyed because the Agriculture Department feared it had been contaminated by the rodents.

The 500,000-square-foot warehouse, now shuttered, had furnished food to stores and restaurants throughout the Chicago area.

"It was a real nail-biting experience," said Christian Brix, president of C.K.F. Foods Inc. of Mount Prospect, who was in court to watch.

Brix said the decision to destroy food he had stored in the warehouse forced him to seek new financing to keep his business going. "I had the pleasure of having a million pounds condemned," he said.

At the trial in January, Assistant U.S. Attorney Eric Sussman described the warehouse as "an amusement park for rats and a house of horrors for the city of Chicago."

Well.

Naturally, this story is disgusting. I doubt that it will prevent me from going to the Taste of Chicago and having myself a good time. But it is worth noting.  Watch what you eat, folks. Watch what you eat.