12 Foods That Pack On The Pounds

According to a Harvard study conducted over twenty years, these 12 foods have been linked to a significant increase in weight... and combined, contributed to an increase in 17lbs. over 20 years. Sounds not-so-bad, however, the study was performed on 120,877 non-obese people. For each four-year period, food choices contributed to an extra four pounds while exercise cut less than two pounds. 

1 = an increase of less than 1lb. a year

12 = an increase of ~2lbs. a year

1 - butter

2 - fruit juice

3 - fried food

4 - refined grains (white rice)

5 - sweets & desserts

6 - potatoes

7 - trans fats

8 - processed meat (bacon, hot dogs, etc)

9 - unprocessed red meat (beef, steak, hamburger)

10 - sugar sweetened soda

11 - potato chips

12 - french fries

Naturally, I'm upset because french fries (ranked #12 here) are the worst food you can eat and simultaneously one of my favorite foods of all time. I just hope that pairing it with an unnatural amount of ketchup keeps my heart and waistline safe.

Farmers Market Fresh

It's your first week in Berkeley, California and you're surrounded by all the amazing food choices you could possibly imagine, and you're asked to cook dinner -- what do you do? Well, the reason those innumerable food choices exist in such abundance in the East Bay of San Francisco, is the availability of the freshest, hand-picked, organic produce around. So... why not give local restaurants a run for their money? It's easy.

Step 1: Head over to one of the many Farmer's Markets and pick up anything and everything that looks good to you. In my case it was Gourmet Ghetto's Thursday Farmer's Market that took the cake.

Step 2: Think of some fun dish and interesting pairing side-dishes you've never tried, using all of that fresh food you just bought. Tonight I made - (organic) basil mayo chicken sandwiches on (organic) ciabatta - a balsamic vinaigrette beet salad with walnuts and goat cheese - and beet greens, sauteed with garlic and onion.

~ Now eat... and enjoy. 

Note: I got - the onions, bread, basil, lettuce,  and beets (including greens) - from the market!

Step 3: After washing dinner down with Anchor Steam's: Anchor Summer Beer, (and letting some time pass..) go back to your Farmer's Market shopping basket and dish out a simple dessert. In my case, I just so happened to pick up some super sweet peaches and delectable strawberries, so stepping out of culinary complexity, I sliced them up, threw them (literally) together, and forked them out of the bowl... and into my mouth. Better even than a cherry on top, this fruit combo closed up the palatal shop perfectly.

Spaghetti - My Way

So as simple as spaghetti can be... I seriously think that it can also taste simple, too simple even. The noodle, beef, and tomato sauce of my past has always left me with a "where in the world is the flavor?!" feeling while also reminding me of soup... that you-can-put-the-entire-contents-of-your-leftovers-in-me appeal that soup has, spaghetti has. So tonight, without further ado, I'm introducing my whole wheat spaghetti with roasted red pepper, sauteed onion, and mushroom garlic beef sauce, topped with mozzarella.


I won't go into cooking detail, but some things I like to do that haven't been explicitly pointed out to me:

When sauteing the vegetables, cook them slowly, so that you can pull them off while they have some crunch in them (don't worry, the warm sauce will soften them up, too). Add the onions a little bit after any other vegetables you have, because it's likely they'll need more time than the onions. When done with the veggies - move them into the sauce and immediately replace them with your beef. You can lean down your beef by doing a 1/2 ground beef - 1/2 ground turkey combo. The result is still juicy, flavorful, and actually does a better job of soaking up the sauce. The very last thing to go into the mix... is the garlic. I like to add it to the beef right after draining, and letting it sit for a minute or two before putting it in the sauce. Garlic loses flavor fast, so cooking it too long makes it a nearly pointless ingredient.

This is also a great time to use that "cooking wine" (the stuff you never got around to drinking, but can't seem to throw out of the refrigerator) you've been waiting to impress with. Throw it in with the veggies, or if you have a stockpile of white, be risky and throw it in your pasta boiling water, the results might surprise you. 


So the end result, as you blend the meat, sauce, and veggies together, should be a thick sauce with lots of texture and some different colors. Every-now-and-then I like to toss a large spoonful of cut up olives (I like green, many like black) on top as I serve, and I rarely let the plate go without a piece of garlic toast.

Chicken.... but what to make?

       From time-to-time there comes a night where I have one major ingredient to use, a handful of sides, but no central mission for my meal. Tonight is one of those nights. I have chicken... and a spice rack to be proud of; onions, potatoes, rice, blah, blah, blah. So what do I do? I've consulted my usual cookbooks (even Cooking for Geeks) and may or may not have put Julie & Julia on so as to channel some culinary energy that way.

Results: I'm gonna use butter.

   Drying the chicken (as instructed by so many) and preparing a "marinade." I believe a "rub" is in order... something lemony with a mild spice.

Halloween News Prep

Pelosi's Health Care Plan

My thoughts: I think the house did a great job of pleasing both sides of the party, though I think the surtax on the wealthy is going to put some added pressure on the GOP to push back on the plan.

Google&Motorola Open Verizon to new ideas via Droid

Me: I think the Droid is going to send a shockwave through the AT&T world, with customers hoping to gain everything they're "lacking" with the iPhone. A shockwave that may be short-lived and underpowered. Once people realize the glamor of the Droid is merely glamor and the integrated GPS with turn-by-turn directions isn't quite worth the switch... Droid will go into the Palm Pre category and fizzle out.

Cnet's review makes my case. Lots of cool, nothing ground (or iPhone) breaking.

Bing's homepage is pretty this morning.

Swine Flu epidemic triggers mass response from SanFran women and children

Me: I think taking precautions and having a regulations system (see "who gets the vaccine first) is imperative in times like this. I think the general Swine Flu paranoia is there, but not too many people (at least in our region) are panicky about the outbreak. Personally, I'm not too worried, at least, I won't worry until I need to.

Other news (not worth linking to, but worth knowing):

~ China gets the iPhone, costing at or around $700/unit.

~ MJ's "This is is" gets IMAX attention

~ Secretary Hillary Clinton is urging Pakistan to join forces with the US mentioning "joint concerns over terrorism"

~ Consumer spending was down in September, but the economy shows major signs of rebounding.

Overweight Antivirus?

If you're like me and cringe when your anti-virus icon notifies you that it's starting a "full scan," then you may be happy to hear the phrase "Cloud Antivirus." InfoSec 2009 brought around some great ideas, but to me, the coolest (and most useful, of course) is a bamboo eating virus killer. Panda Security has recently released it's Panda Cloud Anti-Virus software. Lightweight and stable, Panda does most of it's processing on the cloud (aka - Panda's internal servers). Installation proves that there's a tiny sliver of space used on your harddrive and running it up is smooth and quick. The idea of constant connection with a server gives me a sense of security regarding viruses that can update and modify themselves according to which PC it's attacking.

Try it out, tell me what you think. And oh yeah, the kicker? It's free.

Republican no more

Senator Arlen Specter has announced that he will be leaving the dark side, er, the Republican party and joining the Democrats saying:

"I now find my political philosophy more in line with Democrats than Republicans,"

 This change brings the Democratic party one stop closer, and only one senator short, of being able to overturn Republican attempts to block legislation.

Swine Flu widespread

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control said on Tuesday it had confirmed a total of 64 human cases of swine flu across the country.

The CDC's web site said the new total included 10 cases in California, 2 in Kansas, 45 in New York, one in Ohio and 6 in Texas. It did not include an additional case reported by Indiana state authorities.

Verizon vs. AT&T; Apple vs. Microsoft

This battle was bound to happen. Apple has in the works not one, but two devices that would work on Verizon’s wireless network. The two companies have been in talks for some time. Not to worry, big bidder Microsoft is opening a dialogue as well:

Microsoft Corp. is in discussions with Verizon Wireless to launch a touch-screen multimedia cellphone on the carrier's network early next year, in a bid to compete with Apple Inc.'s iPhone, people familiar with the matter say.

Microsoft's project, which is code-named "Pink," is aiming to produce a phone that extends the tech giant's Windows Mobile cellphone operating system, adding new software capabilities. It would also likely include Microsoft's new Windows Marketplace for Mobile, a mobile application store along the lines of Apple's, these people say.

WOLVERINE

You may not be a crazy X-Men fan like I am, but this newest film is on track to be a big blockbuster hit. After it’s premier in Arizona, the Wolverine hype is up full throttle – pairing with the Swine flu that kept theaters in Mexico from opening, thus stopping Hugh Jackman’s premier showings there.  To top it all off, a surprise ending will be shown after the credits run (no surprise unless they give Xavier his body back). This time, though, there’s a twist. There is more than one surprise ending. The catch: The different endings appear on different cuts of the film, meaning – if you wanna see all of the endings, you’ll have to see the movie at different theaters, at different times. Cool marketing strategy and money-making scheme, huh.