Mark Bittman on what's wrong with what we eat | Video on TED.com

This talk might be a few years old, but he brilliantly breaks down the history of food in North America.

Mark Bittman on what's wrong with what we eat | Video on TED.com

Birke Baehr: What's wrong with our food system | Video on TED.com

The kids are alright....

Birke Baehr: What's wrong with our food system | Video on TED.com

I can cure ham!

I may have jumped the gun a little early, but after about 6 months of curing, I cut into the ham.

It's pretty salty, but the consistency is right and there is a hint of the curing spices. Best of all, I didn't get sick after eating pork that's been hanging around for half a year!

It won't win any awards, but I look forward to pulling out the meat slicer and a melon.

I'd definitely do it again, with a larger, rounder cut of meat so that the salting is more uniform. Might be worth trying to find some wild boar, blame any inconsistency on the 'gamey' flavour of god's wild creatures.

Barton Seaver: Sustainable seafood? Let's get smart | Video on TED.com

Barton Seaver: Sustainable seafood? Let's get smart | Video on TED.com

Great little talk (~9min) on the need for "restorative" seafood. Going beyond just maintaining the current situation with 'sustainable' practices, we must decrease our impact and give the oceans a chance to heal. Chalk one up for urban fish farming...

Weekday Vegetarian

My dad had sent me this TED Talk by the creator of treehugger.com on why he had become a weekday vegetarian. He has lot's a good points to make. I asked Kate if she would be interested in trying it with me once we are both back in Vancouver. She was excited! Will you try it with us?

Mark Bittman on what's wrong with what we eat | Video on TED.com

Mark Bittman on what's wrong with what we eat | Video on TED.com

Prosciutto and mozzarella

It has been one month since I started the process of making prosciutto ham. Well, it's not really a 'ham', it's a fatty loin roast. I'm also not allowed to call it 'prosciutto' either because it's a PDO product, protected by the EU.

Whatever I'll call it, it is certainly starting to look like delicious prosciutto. I have been taking it out on cool windy days to hang in the open air. The white you see on the bottom is the salt crystalizing out of the curing meat. The recipe I loosely followed mentioned this would happen and to brush it off as it forms. It is a much smaller piece than a whole 25 lb. leg (which is usually used) and I am worried the whole curing time will result in too much drying. I originally dropped the estimated time from 9 months in the recipe down to 6 months (180 days), but it may still be ready before that.

I've been inspired by Brendan who recently tried 3 year old dry-cured ham, "it was butter in my mouth" *drool*. Maybe it will be worth the wait...

I also got around to making mozzarella last week. We had finally made our way to Famous Foods in east van. Kate and I had so much fun walking through every aisle. It's an old-school grocer with organic produce, bulk foods and a mean meat selection. Plus specialty goods that you can't get anywhere else; like rennet and citric acid!

After we picked up a kitchen thermometer, I followed a combination of another eHow.com recipe and a YouTube video that can make cheese in 30 minutes using the stove and microwave. It was lot's of fun and everything went as planned! I got a little out of control and overworked/stretched the cheese and it came out too firm. It was fine on homemade pizza, but will now need to be perfected!

Andrea has made it before and it came out too soft, so if we combine our skills, the ideal cheese should be created... then I'll post pictures!

Inspiring People in sustainable food movement

List by Fast Company. One day I'll be there.

April Showers

So much has happened in the last month. Kate and I have planted several container gardens. It is still cold and rainy outside, but the sprouts are coming though! We have two composts here now that she has brought the worm bin over when she moved in.

Business with Urban Stream is moving along at a steady pace and we are learning lots about protecting Intellectual Property. I don't want to look at another patent document for a long time!We will be incorporating the company this month and will likely have our first expenses. That means we will need some money soon!

There are so many Venture Capital and investment firms out there that focus on sustainable ideas, but we will need to find start-up capital for a company that doesn't have revenue yet. Not sure how to get around that yet. Anyways, that will keep me busy...

Last night was a culinary feast as Kate celebrated finishing her essay and I got to cash my tax refund cheque! We had surf and turf with some rock lobster tails from the freezer and local AAA NY Strip Steak(at 2" thick, it feels like an insult to call it a steak), gnocchi a la putanesca with olives, sun-dried tomatoes and water cress in a tomato cream vodka sauce.

Getting serious, seriously.

I ate KFC. I didn't want to put it in the blog, it's nothing to be proud of in any way, shape or form. The meal was our reward for getting all the rest of the furniture moved into the apartment (without implicating Kate too much in the KFC event).

The confession made me feel better, and I now promise to not eat that shit for a long, long time. It really shouldn't be consumed or supported, must show more restraint...

While my Year of Food has found greater appreciation of food, I lack the restraint that is pivotal in making this a respectable endeavor. It's weird because I know the negative aspects of fast food, but I'm like an addict, mid-injection, warning how dangerous heroin is. (Maybe I've been watching too much Intervention). So I clearly need to move to the next stage, I'm past denying the consequences of bad food, and need to take serious action in controlling the habit and retrain my brain.

New goal: more vegetables! Cheaper, more sustainable and healthy, healthy! It is early spring and I should make a more concerted effort to find out what will soon be in season locally.

I already feel better.

2 months in.

Its nearly the end of February and I guess the Year of Food is progressing at a medium pace...

Working from home means I have more time for slow cooking. The crock-pot has gotten lots of use for beef and pork roasts, chili and stews. It has certainly allowed us to appreciate our meals a little bit more, and because it is always available, we are able to buy when the best deals are on. I am definitely eating out less often, taking the time to bake bread is something new and challenging.

The drawbacks of working for myself also mean a much tighter budget, which does conflict with my desire to buy organic food, which comes at a higher price.

Urban Stream is getting off the ground, though it feels slow. I figure this is normal and I shouldn't get too hung up on the pace. We are making progress each week and have decided to focus on building a research facility to test the recirculating aquaponic greenhouse.

I have been able to find freshwater prawn only at Safeway and it is regularly available for $18 per pound. It is often confused with Tiger prawns and goes on sale for $9.99 per pound and thats the only time I'll pick it up. I have been trying to serve the prawns to potential partners/investors and the product sells itself. Too bad it comes from Bangladesh and it likely grown in overstocked ponds dug into clear-cut forests. I probably shouldn't even be supporting this industry, but nobody is aware that there are freshwater prawns and they can get quite large too! Still better off than going with tiger prawns which are grown in saltwater ponds where the Mangroves used to be, flooding arable land with salt water, causing nearly permanent damage.

Intro: Fuck your food. This is real food.

This is my first entry! This particular blog will be used for me to document 2010 as my Year of Food. The title of 'Fuck your Food" comes from an initial thought of slogans to use for my new venture, Urban Stream. It is in the early stages and get explained later in this post. We want to redesign the food industry from the ground up, take on the giant corporations that tell us what we should eat. One day, I can say to them, " No, fuck your food. This is real food." One day...

I'll copy my first thoughts I created in january:

"A rough beginning to the year it has been. It's January 5, 2010 and that means I'm five days late on my plans for this year. Reflecting on the holidays in Edmonton and all that I want to accomplish in 2010, I'll take this time to jot it down while I wait for my delayed flight back to where I live, Vancouver. The holidays back home are great for the soul, surrounded by family and friends, time to relax and that vacation feel of freedom. The holidays however, are rough on the body. Late nights filled with too much booze, pot and exorbitant amounts of food, delicious food made with love, but unhealthy favorites and piles of it. Not the best way to start the year.

2010 will be my year of food. I will need to be more involved and aware of the food I consume for monetary, environmental and health reasons. I will have less money to buy food, a renewed desire to support sustainable food production and I want to have a healthy diet. Professionally, it will also be a year of food. I have left my job at a hydrogen fuel cell company and will be starting a new venture called Urban Stream Inc. Our business will be to take food waste from Restaurants, Farmer's markets and grocery stores. We will compost this waste on the main floor of our Urban Vertically Integrated Microfarm (UVIM) and turn it into natural fish meal, fertilizers and pesticides. We will use these products to grow vegetables, herbs, mushrooms and freshwater prawns in the upper greenhouse levels of the facility. We will take these high-end, organically grown products and sell them back to the restaurants, farmers markets and grocery stores."

I'm also starting to blog with my girlfriend, Kate as we embark on an adventure to get more out of life.