Tuesday Megalinks: Longest. Ever. Edition.

Oh my gosh, there were so many good posts this week. It was difficult to get them all in and make this less than a a 30,000-word, Dostoyevsky-type tome, so I kept the commentary to a minimum. Behold!

AM New York: New York waiter's worst nightmare? Europeans
Ah, tipping. Different the world over. I tried tipping a bartender in Dublin once, and she almost decapitated me with her eyes. (Thanks to Eater for the link.)

60 in 3: Rule #1 of Healthy Eating – The Variety Counts Rule
Oh man, is this ever true. Salad only goes so far. (Thanks to Get Fit Slowly for the link.)

Being Frugal: Grocery Shopping for a Month and Month of Menus – Recipe Links
To combat rising gas and food prices, shoppers like Lynnae are cutting down on their trips to the supermarket. Look and learn, my sweets!

Chow: Drinking While Pregnant
“Should the partner of a pregnant woman give up drinking as a gesture of support?” My heart says yes, but my "take pity on the men" lobe says no.

Consumerist: America’s Most Unhealthy Drinks Exposed
Dude. Jamba Juice? Just have a chocolate sundae instead.

Consumerist: Now It’s Serious – Shrink Ray Hits Beer
To quote Darth Vader, “NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!”

Culinate: Feeding the Allergic
POST OF THE WEEK. No doubt.

The Digerati Life: Cutting Food Costs – Consumers Switch to Spam
Hm, after reading this, I believe I’ll have and order of spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, beaked beans, spam, spam, spam, and spam. Lovely!

Frugal Hacks: Cheerful Frugality Cooks Breakfast
Lots of nifty links to wholesome day-starters. Meredith rules. (Again.)

Get Fit Slowly: Food, Drink and Decadence – How the French Stay Thin
Cheese? Wine? Chocolate? ALL THE TIME? Yarg. This is way more infuriating than that Jerry Lewis thing.

Get Rich Slowly: How to Make Your Own Small-Batch Strawberry Jam
Nice! JD’s wife Kris (love the name) is getting busy with some pectin. Hm. That sounds way lewder than I meant it to.

Get Rich Slowly: Unit Pricing – Get More Food for Less Money
Super guest-post breakdown on the wonders of math. Seriously kids, stay in school.

Gothamist: A Night of Food and Feting: The 2008 James Beard Awards
The Night of 1000 Cooking Stars! And Kim Cattrall.

Health Assist: The See-Food Diet
I’ve seen these before, but this is the best pictoral representation of 300-calorie foods yet. Definitely worth a look. (Thanks to Get Fit Slowly for the link.)

The Kitchn: Cooking Without Recipes - Understanding Flavor
Witness the roundess! Observe the mid notes! BEHOLD THE UMAMI!

The Kitchn: What Was the Best Wedding Meal You Ever Had?

Absolutely mouth-watering. Incidentally, the best was a six-foot sushi, shrimp and crab bar at my friend J’s wedding. I dream of it like, every night.

Martha Stewart Living: 10 Takes on Potato Salad
PHENOMENAL POTATO POWER! Itty bitty mayonnaise. (Thanks to The Kitchn for the link.)

MSNBC: Joy’s Fit Club
I am a total, 100% wuss for Before-and-After weight loss stories. Seriously, these people are inspiring. Check out the One Family’s Mission entry, and I swear you’ll want to be adopted by them.

New York Magazine: The 100-Cereal Taste Test
Did you ever notice how some cereals look like rabbit food? Or rabbit poop? Just sayin’.

New York Times: Finding the Hits, Avoiding the Errors
The best ballpark food from around the country. Note: Avoid Yankee Stadium pretzels at all cost. They’re mass-produced by Satan.

New York Times: Recipe Deal Breakers: When Step 2 Is ‘Corral Pig’
How complicated does a recipe have to get before you’re all like, “Forget this. I’m getting Chinese”?

Serious Eats: Ed Levine’s Serious Diet
Food writer/lover/conqueror shares his best tips for eating well. Hint: bananas are involved.

Serious Eats: Favorite summer food – now and from childhood
Oo! Oo! Freezer pops! How can anyone not love a blue tongue?

Serious Eats: What Lunch Box Did You Have? What Was in it?
PB&J, raisins, and milk. Everyday. Six years. I had great digestive health as a kid.

Vegan Teacher Fired Over Peeps Lesson
Chick-loving (as in “chickens” not “hot ladies”) vegan gets a little militant with his anti-meat lectures.

(Photos courtesy of Jupiter Images, dailyllama, Elegant Eating, and scrivenings.)

Curried Chickpeas and Black Beans with a Side of FAQ

Hey folks – before today’s recipe, I’d like to answer a few really good questions that have come up about CHG lately. Please bear with them, and then WITNESS THE WONDER of Cooking Light’s Curried Chickpeas and Black Beans.

Q: What’s the point of the Comments of the Week?
(submitted by: reader Sarah)

A: Well, between the feed and random hits, CHG is currently pulling in about 2600 daily readers (whee!). Y’all have a TON of stellar recipe suggestions and strategy ideas – lots of stuff that doesn’t occur to me in my tiny corner of Brooklyn. My hope with CotW is to highlight the best tips, and hopefully encourage readers to submit even more creative, thoughtful, funny comments. (Which, everyone’s been doing beautifully.) If you commenters have sites of your own, I try to link, so you’ll see some traffic/get mad props, as well.

Q: I’m a PR person for a startup website. Will you link to this article I send you?
(submitted by: PR people for startup websites.)

A: If it’s a generic piece promoted by a generic pitch letter, fuggedabouhdit. If it’s a personalized pitch and the post content is truly relevant to the cheap/healthy/good theme, I’ll definitely take a look. If the pitch and/or article mention Anthony Bourdain, The Office, or the smooth sounds of “Purple Rain,” then yes.

Q: Can I e-mail you my favorite recipes, articles, or posts from other sources?
(submitted by: a few wonderful e-mailers)

A: OH HECK YES. Please. Seriously, I need all the help I can get. Special thanks to reader Becky for her efforts on the recipe front.

Q: Why does CHG concentrate so much on supermarket shopping? Aren’t farmers markets, CSAs, and gardens the way to go these days?
(submitted by: my own guilty brain)

A: Ooo. Ouch. Yes. Yes, they are. Alas, CHG reflects my cooking and shopping experience, which is pitifully limited by location and budget. I DO make it a point to avoid most packaged and convenience products, and my goal over the next year is to move away from Key Food and toward fresh, locally-picked produce, grains, and meat. But in the meantime, I’m making do with what I have.

Q: Is there a site redesign in the future? Can I do it? Will you pay me in sandwiches?
(submitted by: The Boyfriend)

A: Yes, yes, and possibly. Also, I like your new haircut.

Q: I’m a Nigerian Prince begging you to claim $200,000,000 in American money, payable entirely in $100 bills. All you have to do is give me your name, date of birth, and credit card number. Won’t you please respond?
(submitted by: Prince Nbubu of Niger)

A: Umm … mommy?

And with that - today’s recipe! I haven’t been grocery shopping in awhile, but have the good fortune to own 12,000 cans of cabinet-clogging beans. A quick Cooking Light search yielded this totally slamming legume-heavy recipe. It took less than a half hour, made two additional lunches, and smell-ified my apartment in wondrous, curryesque fashion. If you make it:

1) Curry powders are vary widely the world over. Mine is particularly spicy and potent. (NOTE: The way I like my men.) If your powder doesn’t have quite the power, feel free to double the spices and/or add a dash or two of cayenne.

2) The original recipe asks you to simmer for five minutes, but a commenter or two suggested 15. I went with the latter, and it was aces.

3) Pair it with brown rice for the most complete, filling, fiber-y meal you’ll ever eat. Seriously, your colon will thank you for it.

If y’all have anymore questions about CHG or suggestions for this recipe, I’d love to hear ‘em. Fire away!

Curried Chickpeas and Black Beans
Makes 4 heaping 1-cup servings
Adapted from Cooking Light.

2 teaspoons vegetable oil
1 cup chopped onion
1 tablespoon minced peeled gingerroot
4 teaspoons curry powder
¼ tsp ground cumin
1/8 tsp cayenne
1 (14.5-ounce) can diced tomatoes, undrained
1/8 teaspoon salt
1 (15-ounce) can black beans, rinsed and drained
1 (15-ounce) can chickpeas (garbanzo beans), rinsed and drained
2/3 cup chopped fresh parsley (or cilantro)
1 tablespoon lemon juice

1) In a large nonstick pan, heat oil over medium heat. Add onion and ginger. Cook 3 minutes, or until onion starts to soften. Add curry. Stir. Cook 1 minute. Add tomatoes. Stir. Cook until a tiny bit thick, about 1 minute. Add salt, black beans, and chickpeas. Stir. "Cover, reduce heat, and simmer 15 minutes." Kill heat. Add parsley and lemon juice. Stir. Serve.

Approximate Calories, Fat, and Price Per Serving
277.5 calories, 4.4 g fat, $0.82

Calculations
2 teaspoons vegetable oil: 88 calories, 10 g fat, $0.04
1 cup chopped onion: 67 calories, 0.1 g fat, $0.16
1 tablespoon minced peeled gingerroot: 5 calories, 0 g fat, $0.06
4 teaspoons curry powder: 13 calories, 0.5 g fat, $0.20
¼ tsp ground cumin: negligible calories and fat, $0.01
1 (14.5-ounce) can diced tomatoes, undrained: 82 calories, 0 g fat, $0.89
1/8 teaspoon salt: negligible calories and fat, $0.01
1 (15-ounce) can black beans: 328 calories, 1.6 g fat, $0.50
1 (15-ounce) can chickpeas: 507 calories, 4.9 g fat, $0.50
2/3 cup chopped fresh parsley (or cilantro): 14 calories, 0.3 g fat, $0.66
1 tablespoon lemon juice: 6 calories, 0 g fat, $0.25
TOTAL: 1110 calories, 17.4 g fat, $3.28
PER SERVING (TOTAL/4): 277.5 calories, 4.4 g fat, $0.82

The Beautiful Black-Eyed Pea Salad of Marvelous Martha

I won’t lie: Martha Stewart intimidates me. It could be her resemblance to my college landlord, a small-town Leona Helmsley who should be strung up by her Brooks Brothers mom jeans. It could also be that she’s from New Jersey, the home state of not one, not two, but THREE ex-boyfriends. But really, I think it’s her WASPy, spotless mastery over all things home-based. If domestic situations are Northern Africa during World War II, she is their perfectly-coiffed, pearl-bedecked Patton.

Yet, while Stewart’s knack overwhelms and frightens me (Unfrozen Caveman Blogger?), I also want her power: her oft-lauded ability to organize, design, and prettify. Because? Occasionally? I crave matching blue toile napkins. I need to spread silver-embossed sugar beads on my immaculately-leveled, seafoam-green cake fondant. I MUST align my freshly-picked gladiolus centerpiece with the beachgrass placemats I’ve woven with my antique Colonial loom.

Don’t get me wrong - I adore my ramshackle 110-year-old apartment building and Rancor table decorations, but sometimes a lady’s gotta stop swilling Brooklyn Lager for a sec and lose herself in monogrammed Hamptonian dreams.

That’s why, when Miss S. publishes cookbooks like Everyday Food, I secretly go nuts. All of a sudden, without resorting to Marthabduction, her authority and competence are in my grasp. Take the Black-Eyed Pea Salad, for example. It’s healthy, soul-fulfilling, and gorgeous to gaze at, like an edible Norman Rockwell painting. Actually, it won’t cost nearly as much, so maybe it’s more like a Rockwell first draft. Either way, it will make you think, “Wow. I’m awesome.”

Things to know:

1) Like EF’s Turkey Burgers from earlier in the week, these servings dwarf most mountain ranges. The salad will make six sides (instead of four) pretty easily, especially if you have kids. It’d knock the calculations down to about 136 calories, 4 g fat, and $0.60 per person, too.

2) I cut the oil and vinegar by a quarter, which didn’t affect the taste and saved a few grams of fat.

3) This takes about ten seconds to assemble.

Even if it’s not this salad, I encourage readers to indulge your inner Martha, if only for a single meal. Because, while a constant stream of handmade gift wrap and artisanal clay garden gnomes might be too much, they’re pretty darn satisfying in small doses.

Black-Eyed Pea Salad
Serves 4 generously
Adapted from Black-Eyed Pea Salad.

1 teapsoon Dijon mustard
1-1/2 tablespoons cider vinegar
1-1/2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 can (15 ounces) black-eyed peas, drained and rinsed
1 package (10 ounces) frozen corn kernels, thawed
1 red bell pepper, ribs and seeds removed, finely diced
2 scallions, thinly sliced
Coarse salt and fresh ground black pepper

1) Combine wet ingredients (mustard, vinegar, oil) in a medium bowl. Whisk together. Dump all the veggies in and stir thoroughly to combine. Salt and pepper to taste. Serve at room temperature or cold.

Approximate Calories, Fat, and Price Per Serving
204 calories, 6 g fat, $0.92

Calculations
1 teapsoon Dijon mustard: 5 calories, 0 g fat, $0.06
1-1/2 tablespoons cider vinegar: 5 calories, 0 g fat, $0.02
1-1/2 tablespoons vegetable oil: 185 calories, 21 g fat, $0.09
1 can (15 ounces) black-eyed peas: 315 calories, 0 g fat, $0.89
1 package (10 ounces) frozen corn kernels: 267 calories, 2.1 g fat, $0.69
1 red bell pepper: 31 calories, 0.4 g fat, $1.72
2 scallions: 9 calories, 0 g fat, $0.19
Coarse salt and fresh ground black pepper: negligible calories and fat, $0.03
TOTAL: 817 calories, 23.5 g fat, $3.69
PER SERVING (TOTAL/4): 204 calories, 6 g fat, $0.92

(Photo courtesy of Wired Magazine.)

Veggie Might: Eww…That’s Not Vegetarian 101

Penned by the effervescent Leigh, Veggie Might is a weekly Thursday column about the wide world of Vegetarianism.

My roommate is a waitron at the same restaurant at which I slung (sling/slung/have slung?) eggs and sandwiches from the mid-90s through the earliest aught. We are both vegetarians and quickly learned what we could and could not eat on the menu. The owner is generous with her vegetarian soups and sandwich offerings, so the place is a nice respite from the Curse of the Veggie Burger found at most diner-style joints.

Last week, The Roomie (hereinafter to be known as TR) came home in a rage. To put this in perspective, let me give you a little background. Dude is very laid back. The angriest I’ve ever seen him was the time … three minutes have passed and I still couldn’t think of an example, so I guess this was it.

In a nutshell, the owner tried to make TR taste an appetizer even though she had made a special point of telling him earlier that it contained beef stock. There was a snippy exchange along the lines of, “Here, taste this.” “No, I can’t.” “It’s just a little meat.” “No, I can’t.” “It’s just a little meat.” “No, I can’t.” “It’s just a little meat.” “You’re an idiot.” I may have fantasized TR’s last response.

Then he told me that she just revealed there is Worcestershire sauce in several of the vegetarian soups and Thousand Island dressing, which they slap on the many of the signature sandwiches. One of them is even called the Vegetarians, We Love You, Now Eat This Melt. Or something like that. Oh, sweet Rosalind Russell! Every time I ate that dressing, I was eating fish paste. Ugh.

And for years, I not only ate it myself, but as a helpful waitron, I encouraged my fellow veggies to nosh on the fish paste too. This can be chalked up to ignorance on my end, but that would be giving madame owner too much credit. She did try to make TR eat the meat after all. Who’s a veggie to trust?

I guess I just have to continue to be diligent and do the best I can. So in the spirit of education and my love of lists, I present a primer to help you stop the mystery meat.

• Worcestershire sauce has anchovies in it. With a dash of Worcestershire on your burger, you have the original surf and turf. And if you put it in your vegetarian black bean soup, you may as well have used ham. There are several vegetarian versions of Worcestershire sauce out there that work great in your sauces and soups—or try soy sauce. It’s a winner!
  
• Beano, a drug-store brand digestive enzyme, contains fish bits and gelatin. Beano is heavily marketed to vegetarians to keep things from getting too windy if you catch my drift. They used to advertise in Vegetarian Times for the love of Julie Christie! It never occurred to me to read the label until a couple of years ago and then, I don’t know, something made me turn the bottle around. Quel horror! A lie. I’ve been living a lie. (Don’t worry; there are alternative vegan enzymes out there, which take care of things, allowing me to retain my friends and job.)
• Other sources of hidden fishiness: Caesar dressing, barbecue sauces, papaya salad and almost anything in Thai restaurants, vitamins – particularly Omega-3 supplements (flax seed, linseed, and hemp oil are stellar subs)
• Gelatin: You do not want to know what’s in there. Okay, fine. “Gelatin is made from the bones, skins, hoofs [sic], and tendons of cows, pigs, fish and other animals. It is animal protein used especially for its thickening and gelling properties.” Many vegetarians believe that kosher gelatin is, well, kosher, but it does not square with most veg heads. Now you have a great reason to pass on Aunt Jessie’s congealed salad other than good taste. But if you insist on suspending pineapple and pistachios in gelée, agar agar is the suggested vegetarian substitute.
• Marshmallow is one of the many confectionary delights cursed by gelatin. That means more rendered animal parts for your culinary enjoyment. That’s right. Rice Krispie treats might have pork rinds in them. Mmmm. Try your marshmallow treats with Marshmallow Fluff. They’ll be veg and just as delish.
• Other sources of hidden gelatin: Altoids (I know!), chewing gum, candy, especially the gummy kind (Swedish fish are okay), ice cream, yogurt, vitamins, coated pills, and gel-capsule medications—read those labels; it’s insidious.
• Meat (that includes fish) stock and broth is everywhere: soups, sauces, pastas, rice dishes. If you’re not sure ask your waitron. If you’re not sure read the label. Packaged foods are notorious for sneaking in the chicken stock somewhere in the middle of the ingredients list. You’re already back there reading the calories, fat, and fiber; give the contents a quick scan, and you’ll feel better.
• Good old-fashioned lard and tallow (rendered beef fat): Mmm...it just sounds delicious, doesn’t it? Lard is a slippery one. Watch out for it in canned refried beans and packaged bakery goods. It’s also in stuff you’d never think about. Twinkies used to have it. They still might, but I haven’t checked in a while. Anybody want to confess to having a Twinkie in their desk drawer? Let me know if there’s beef fat in there, ’k?

This list is designed to be helpful, not to make you go crazy. Everyone has to pick his or her own battles. One thing I’ve learned after years of vegetarian living is that I’m an imperfect human being. I try to live my values in this mad, mad, mad, mad world, but a girl’s gotta take a deep breath and have some fun too. We all get an A for effort.

(Photo courtesy of Flickr members thekidds.)