Tomato Wars Ahead? U.S. Dubious On Extending Mexico Trade Deal

A worker separates tomatoes at a market in Mexico City. The Commerce Department says it might act to end a 16-year-old trade deal governing fresh Mexican tomatoes sold in the U.S.

A worker separates tomatoes at a market in Mexico City. The Commerce Department says it might act to end a 16-year-old trade deal governing fresh Mexican tomatoes sold in the U.S.

Talk of a Tomato War is simmering in agricultural circles, after the U.S. Commerce Department issued a report Thursday that recommends ending an agreement on how fresh tomatoes grown in Mexico are sold in the United States. The issue could create an expanding trade conflict; Mexican officials have said they would retaliate to defend the tomato growers.

Produce news source The Packer says the deal "appears to be doomed." The New York Times says that Mexican officials believe tomato farmers in Florida a swing state might have the Obama administration's ear this election season, as they complain that Mexican tomatoes have too large a share of the U.S. market.

"We cannot sustain an agreement that is tilted very heavily in favor of the import industry," Reggie Brown, vice president of the Florida Tomato Exchange, tells The Packer.

But before fear of a price hike sends you running out to buy all the fresh tomatoes you can find, two things are worth noting. First, the Commerce ruling is only preliminary. And second, it has recommended ending the tomato agreement before. So there's a chance the agency, as well as U.S. and Mexican growers, are merely staking out strong bargaining positions at this point. The team at NPR's The Salt blog say they're following the story.

And it turns out the story is a convoluted one, because the Commerce Department's stance isn't so direct as to say, "This trade deal is now null and void."

Instead, the agency is recommending (bear with me) the end of the suspension of an investigation into Mexican exporters' "dumping" tomatoes on the U.S. market. That inquiry started in 1996, the same year it was suspended and an agreement on prices that were not "lower than fair market value" was reached.

Since then, the agreement has been slated for the chopping block several times, only to be continued under new terms after the antidumping investigation is suspended anew.

When that has happened in the past, a new minimum price per pound of tomatoes is set, for both the warm and cool seasons. For instance, the 2008 agreement lists a minimum bulk price of just over 17 cents a pound for fresh tomatoes during the summer months, and nearly 22 cents per pound from October to the end of June. Once the terms are agreed upon, dozens of tomato growers in Mexico then sign the agreement.

The Commerce Department must allow public comment on its preliminary ruling; it has until May to reach a final decision. In the meantime, U.S. retailers and exporters of goods to Mexico are hoping that their businesses don't suffer from the fallout of a potential tomato dispute.

"I think the fact that groups like Wal-Mart, (the Food Marketing Institute, the National Restaurant Association) and U.S. Chamber of Commerce have weighed in certainly puts the Department of Commerce on notice that everyone is watching," Lance Jungmeyer, president of the Fresh Produce Association of the Americas, tells The Packer.

Does it surprise you that the tomato is covered under its own trade covenants? Consider that back in 1887, U.S. tomato imports sparked what became a Supreme Court case over whether tariffs on "vegetables" also applied to what is botanically a fruit.

According to the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative, agricultural imports from Mexico to the United States totaled $15.8 billion in 2011, making America's southern neighbor its second-largest supplier. In the same year, Mexico was the third-largest market for U.S. agricultural products, at $18.4 billion.

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Bouillabaisse: From Humble Beginnings To High-Class Tourist Meal

The ingredients for a vrai bouillaibaisse at Le Miramar in Marseille, France.

The ingredients for a vrai bouillaibaisse at Le Miramar in Marseille, France.

The southern French city of Marseille on the Mediterranean Sea has long been famous for its spicy fish soup, known as bouillabaisse. The soup started as a poor man's meal, made with leftover fish scraps, but these days, it's evolved to the point that it can run connoisseurs about $75 for a generously sized meal.

"In the first part, you make a soup with all these different little fish. With vegetables, tomatoes, onion, garlic, fennel, olive oil, saffron. And after, we cook the six different fish in the soup. It's very big. But this is a vrai bouillabaisse," says Christian Buffa, owner of Le Miramar, a popular destination restaurant on Marseille's old port for the region's famous soup.

The city is pretty serious about the vrai part. Back in 1980, according to the city's bouillabaisse information website (yes, they have one), local chefs drew up a charter describing the necessary ingredients in order to prevent the soup from being "debased by these tourist traps." And, possibly, to bring a little business their own way.

Buffa gets his fish fresh every day at Marseille's fish market near the docks. He says in the summertime, the restaurant needs some 2 tons of fish a week. He says a true bouillabaisse contains about 3 pounds of fish for one person, and these days, it includes high quality fish like John Dory, monkfish and red snapper. As he speaks to me, the restaurant's 15 chefs are bustling around, preparing for the Saturday lunch rush.

The stew wasn't always so fancy, says waiter Andre Bluck.

"Bouillabaisse was created by the sailors who worked on the fishing boats. All the best fish was sold, so they took what was left over and made a spicy stew of it," he says. It might have been made of shellfish and rockfish that was too bony to sell.

Some Marseillais like to say bouillabaisse was the soup the Roman goddess Venus sent to her husband, Vulcan, so he would sleep while she pursued her lover, Mars, according to the city's website.

Around noon, the Miramar begins to fill up with tourists from around the world, and from not so far away. Parisians Franc and Antoine DuBosc have brought their families down on the train. They came to Marseille for the sun, sea and bouillabaisse, they say.

Finally, my own Bouillabaisse arrives. Waiter Bluck serves up the first part, a thick fish soup, which is eaten with croutons dipped in rouille, a garlicky bread-based sauce that no self-respecting bouillabaisse would do without. Then he presents the six fish, which will be cut up and put in the soup as a sort of second course.

A crisp, dry white or rose is the perfect accompaniment to the spicy delicacy. Diner Elaine Cobbe, who hails from Ireland, is enchanted by the dish and the ritual around it.

"It's very good. I love the two-course idea of the meal. ... There's so much saffron in it. It's so yellow and orange. It's sort of like the sun down here in Marseille," Cobbe says.

I'd have to agree. The taste is spicy, warm and hearty, the soup's smoothness gradually revealing the complexity of the dish. The crunch of croutons and garlic, the joy of rubbing garlic on the croutons and slathering the rouille sauce on it, and finally, the chunky fish flesh. It's a full meal and a spicy appetizer, all combined.

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Grieving Pet Owners Want Imported Dog Treats Pulled From Shelves

Rita Desollar believes chicken jerky treats imported from China killed her German shepherd, Heidi.

The Food and Drug Administration isn't sure, but Rita Desollar of Pekin, Ill., feels she knows what killed Heidi, her 7-year-old German shepherd. She feels it was the chicken jerky strips she bought at her local Walgreen's.

Desollar says on the Wednesday before Memorial Day, she gave two pieces of Waggin' Train jerky to Heidi as a treat. A few days later, Heidi was throwing up and "in a lot of distress," she says. By the time the holiday rolled around on Monday, Desollar says, Heidi was convulsing in her bed. She died that day, before Desollar could even take her to the vet.

"I didn't know what happened or why," she tells The Salt. "I got on the Internet and I typed into Google 'What killed my dog?' What came up took my breath away."

Desollar found dozens of posts on various websites from people who claim their dogs got sick from eating the same types of chicken jerky treats - all of them imported from China. She also discovered that the FDA was conducting an active investigation into these treats, but the agency has not found any direct evidence that the treats are causing a problem, so it has not issued any recalls. It has issued three warnings to consumers about the products, most recently in November of last year.

There haven't been recalls because the FDA hasn't officially concluded that there's anything wrong with these imported pet treats. Though it has received more than 2,000 complaints about them in the past five years, the FDA's tests haven't turned up any contaminant or adulterant in the treats that would give it a reason to issue a mandatory recall. However, the agency has posted some questions and answers about its investigation of the treats.

The FDA didn't respond to our inquiries, but an FDA official recently told a conference of veterinarians that concerns about the treats might be overblown.

"Two thousand complaints since 2007 is an incredibly small subset of the 15 million animals estimated to consume these treats," Dr. Tracy DuVernoy, with the FDA's Coordinated Outbreak Response and Evaluation Network, said last month.

DuVernoy didn't rule out a contamination. But she told the veterinarians that, if there is something wrong with the dog treats, it's something the FDA's scientists haven't been able to pin down. "Since a lot has been ruled out," she said, "it might be a very intricate sort of biological response."

DuVernoy was quoted in the Journal of the American Veterinary Medicine Association's web coverage of the conference.

The Waggin' Train company says its treats are safe. "The FDA has been looking at this since 2007 and they've been very clear that they haven't found any contaminant," says Keith Schopp, a spokesman for the brand.

While the FDA waits and conducts more testing, Desollar doesn't want retailers to wait. A few weeks ago, she created an online petition demanding that Walgreen's, Walmart, Kroger and other retailers yank the treats off their shelves. Within less than a month, the petition has garnered more than 60,000 signatures.

We contacted several of the retailers on Desollar's list. They said they're waiting to take action until the FDA comes to an official conclusion about whether the pet treats are safe or not.

But Desollar says, at the very least, the stores should give their customers full information about what's already happened.

"Just tell me it's under FDA investigation," she says. "I'll make the decision."

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Tomato Wars Ahead? U.S. Dubous On Extending Mexico Trade Deal

A worker separates tomatoes at a market in Mexico City. The Commerce Department says it might act to end a 16-year-old trade deal governing fresh Mexican tomatoes sold in the U.S.

A worker separates tomatoes at a market in Mexico City. The Commerce Department says it might act to end a 16-year-old trade deal governing fresh Mexican tomatoes sold in the U.S.

Talk of a Tomato War is simmering in agricultural circles, after the U.S. Commerce Department issued a report Thursday that recommends ending an agreement on how fresh tomatoes grown in Mexico are sold in the United States. The issue could create an expanding trade conflict; Mexican officials have said they would retaliate to defend the tomato growers.

Produce news source The Packer says the deal "appears to be doomed." The New York Times says that Mexican officials believe tomato farmers in Florida a swing state might have the Obama administration's ear this election season, as they complain that Mexican tomatoes have too large a share of the U.S. market.

"We cannot sustain an agreement that is tilted very heavily in favor of the import industry," Reggie Brown, vice president of the Florida Tomato Exchange, tells The Packer.

But before fear of a price hike sends you running out to buy all the fresh tomatoes you can find, two things are worth noting. First, the Commerce ruling is only preliminary. And second, it has recommended ending the tomato agreement before. So there's a chance the agency, as well as U.S. and Mexican growers, are merely staking out strong bargaining positions at this point. The team at NPR's The Salt blog say they're following the story.

And it turns out the story is a convoluted one, because the Commerce Department's stance isn't so direct as to say, "This trade deal is now null and void."

Instead, the agency is recommending (bear with me) the end of the suspension of an investigation into Mexican exporters' "dumping" tomatoes on the U.S. market. That inquiry started in 1996, the same year it was suspended and an agreement on prices that were not "lower than fair market value" was reached.

Since then, the agreement has been slated for the chopping block several times, only to be continued under new terms after the antidumping investigation is suspended anew.

When that has happened in the past, a new minimum price per pound of tomatoes is set, for both the warm and cool seasons. For instance, the 2008 agreement lists a minimum bulk price of just over 17 cents a pound for fresh tomatoes during the summer months, and nearly 22 cents per pound from October to the end of June. Once the terms are agreed upon, dozens of tomato growers in Mexico then sign the agreement.

The Commerce Department must allow public comment on its preliminary ruling; it has until May to reach a final decision. In the meantime, U.S. retailers and exporters of goods to Mexico are hoping that their businesses don't suffer from the fallout of a potential tomato dispute.

"I think the fact that groups like Wal-Mart, (the Food Marketing Institute, the National Restaurant Association) and U.S. Chamber of Commerce have weighed in certainly puts the Department of Commerce on notice that everyone is watching," Lance Jungmeyer, president of the Fresh Produce Association of the Americas, tells The Packer.

Does it surprise you that the tomato is covered under its own trade covenants? Consider that back in 1887, U.S. tomato imports sparked what became a Supreme Court case over whether tariffs on "vegetables" also applied to what is botanically a fruit.

According to the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative, agricultural imports from Mexico to the United States totaled $15.8 billion in 2011, making America's southern neighbor its second-largest supplier. In the same year, Mexico was the third-largest market for U.S. agricultural products, at $18.4 billion.

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Some Grumble About Change As School Lunches Get Leaner And Greener

Michelle Kloser, School Nutrition Director for the West Salem School District in Wisconsin took this picture of Thursday's lunch, which includes baked chicken and rosemary potatoes.

Michelle Kloser, School Nutrition Director for the West Salem School District in Wisconsin took this picture of Thursday's lunch, which includes baked chicken and rosemary potatoes.

This fall, the more than 38 million kids who get their lunches through the National School Lunch Program are seeing big changes on their trays.

Generally, "it's more fruits, more vegetables, more whole grains, low-fat, no-fat dairy," Jessica Donze Black of the Pew Trust's Kids' Safe and Healthful Foods Project told Talk of the Nation host Neal Conan on Thursday. "The things we know kids need more of."

Federal guidelines governing what and how much kids are served are being phased in gradually over three years, starting this year. But the new kinds of food more salad, less 26-ingredient mystery burgers and fried spuds coupled with the perception that costs are up and calories are down, is making for a bit of a rocky transition. (To hear the full TOTN interview, click here.)

Chef Ann Cooper, also known as the Renegade Lunch Lady, is the food director for the Boulder Valley School District in Colorado. Cooper started out in food service as a "white-tablecloth sort of semi-celebrity chef," but now she celebrates her work as a lunch lady, she tells Conan.

She was changing up school menus before the law required healthier choices. Her menus are full of "all kinds of great things .... [such as] chicken pot pie ... ribs, and ... chicken quesadillas," and everything's made from scratch.

Cooper says it wasn't always easy to get kids excited about healthier foods. First, in Berkeley, California and then in Boulder, "I said, 'We're getting rid of all the trans-fats and high-fructose corn syrup and no more chocolate milk, no French fries, no tater tots, no chicken nuggets.'" There was pushback initially, she says, but eventually the kids came around.

But the unfamiliar foods aren't the only sticking point for some kids. Some complain that their not getting enough to eat. In a parody of the popular song "We Are Young" by Fun., students in the "We Are Hungry" video sing, "My friends are at the corner store/ Getting junk so they don't waste away/ My lover ate her two grams of meat/ Just about to starve." You can watch the YouTube video below:

"We Are Hungry" a parody song about the inadequacy of school lunch.

Donze Black says the caloric guidelines, which cap meals at 850 calories, aren't the problem. "When we look at what students were actually eating on average a couple of years ago, it was around 790 calories in an average lunch," she tells Conan.

Chef Cooper agrees. "The problem is [before] there was never any maximum, so kids used to be able to have two or three pieces of pizza, chocolate milk and a cookie." Now, there's still pizza, but it's served with salad, fruit and low-fat milk. And if that's not enough? In her schools, "we have salad bars K-12 so all of our students can eat as much salad as they want," and the same goes for fruit and milk.

Another common argument against the guidelines is that it's too expensive for schools to offer fresher, less-processed meals.

Kirsten Saenz Tobey co-founded Revolution Foods, which contracts with schools across the country, delivering foods that meet the new guidelines. Lots of what they offer will actually look pretty familiar to students. "We do everything from chicken enchiladas on whole-grain tortillas to a great all-beef grass-fed hotdog on a whole-grain bun," she says, and they've been doing it for more than six years.

She agrees that higher-quality ingredients can be more expensive, but to control costs, her company makes much of the food from scratch, and partners with suppliers. For example, "we partner with a great rice producer here in California, who has planted an entire field of rice for the schools that we serve. And it's an organic brown rice," she says. "It's a wonderful product that we found at a farmer's market originally," she tells Conan.

All three women agree that in time, most kids will be on board with what's on their lunch trays. "Kids who are in kindergarten today are going to start out with school food that is high quality," says Saenz Tobey. "Those kids will grow up knowing that that's what school food is."

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Cheese-Smuggling Ring Is Brought Down In Canada

Cheese that was smuggled into Canada may have brought profits of more than $165,000, according to police. Pizzerias were reportedly a main market for the criminals, who were arrested this week.

Cheese that was smuggled into Canada may have brought profits of more than $165,000, according to police. Pizzerias were reportedly a main market for the criminals, who were arrested this week.

A "large scale Canada-U.S. cheese smuggling operation" has been brought down, after an international investigation tracked criminals who were skirting import duties and Canada's higher cheese prices.

"The investigation revealed over $200,000 worth of cheese and other products were purchased and distributed for an estimated profit of over $165,000," Niagara police said.

The smugglers one current and one former police officer, and one civilian reportedly sought out pizza restaurants to move their merchandise. News emerged this week that charges would soon be announced against what Mark called a "mozzarella mafia".

As Windsor, Ontario, pizzeria owner Bob Abumeeiz told the CBC, he has been asked several times if he's interested in buying cheese smuggled from America, where prices are anywhere from a third to half what they are in Canada.

"Cheese is the white gold in the restaurant business. Cheese is 50 percent of the taste on a pizza," he said. "The price is rising every year two or three percent."

The network operated in Ontario province, where two of the accused have worked for the Niagara Regional Police Service.

According to a police statement, members of a Department of Homeland Security border security task force, the Niagara police, and Canada's border agency have been investigating the case since January. It began with an inquiry into the possible illegal transport of performance-enhancing drugs.

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Health Benefits Of Tea: Milking It Or Not

The Emperor's Himalayan lavender tea is popular at Washington, D.C.'s Park Hyatt Tea Room, but please don't put milk in it.

The Emperor's Himalayan lavender tea is popular at Washington, D.C.'s Park Hyatt Tea Room, but please don't put milk in it.

The idea that milk may diminish the potential heart-health benefits of tea has been a topic of some debate. Lots of us can't imagine black tea without a little dairy to cut the bitterness. But, according to this research going back to 2007, we might want to at least consider trying, say, a nice cup of green tea sans sugar or cream.

Why? Well to get to the bottom of this issue, last week I spent an afternoon at the Fifth International Scientific Symposium on Tea and Human Health, where I picked the brains of lots of researchers.

Turns out, there seems to be a consensus about one thing: Milk proteins can bind with the beneficial plant compounds known as flavonols in tea. (You may have heard these compounds referred to by specific names such as catechins.) And, according to some scientists, the binding may make it tough for the body to absorb the flavonols and get the health benefits.

There are lots of potential health benefits of tea. Take, for instance, weight maintenance. Rick Hursel of Maastricht University Medical Centre in Holland has published a review study that finds green tea may slightly increase metabolism.

"We've shown that green tea is able to increase your energy expenditure, so the amount of calories you burn, and also to increase the amount of fat you are burning," says Hursel.

Now, before you get too excited, it's important to point out that the weight loss effects are small and perhaps only fleeting. But Hursel says the interesting thing is that, in a separate study he published, he found that when milk is added to tea, the metabolic effects are inhibited. "Something happens which we don't want to happen," explains Hursel.

This effect has also been observed among scientists who study tea's influence on blood vessel health. Preliminary studies suggest that flavonols in tea play a role in helping to regulate blood pressure. But, again, the effect seems diminished when milk proteins are present.

Now, not all scientists are convinced that the effects of milk are strong enough to cancel out potential health benefits.

"There's no convincing evidence that milk is a problem," says Alan Crozier of the University of Glasgow in Scotland. He explains that teas are loaded with beneficial flavonols, and typically people only add a little milk to a cup of tea.

"The amount of milk is not going to greatly interfere with the way they're [catechins] absorbed," says Crozier. Milk proteins may slow down the process, "but there's no evidence that they cause irreversible binding." And his hunch is that the milk does not stop the bioactive compounds (catechins) from being absorbed.

There's another reason some people may avoid milk in their tea. For certified tea sommelier Robert Rex-Waller of the Park Hyatt Hotel in Washington, D.C., it's about enjoying the distinct flavors of teas on their own.

Rex-Waller oversees the tea program at the hotel, which serves 50 rare teas from all over the world and showcases the very finest in a glass tea humidor. He's learned to enjoy the taste of pure, green tea.

"There are some teas where I'd cringe a little if someone poured milk in," he says.

He suggests that people take a sip first, before adding any milk. But, he says, tea is for enjoyment people should just prepare their tea the way they like it. "Everyone has their own preferences."

Green tea sans milk and sugar may be a struggle in our society, which seems to have a communal sweet tooth and a penchant for cream. Even Starbucks serves up a sweetened green tea latte with steamed milk.

So here's one idea: If you prefer black tea with milk and sugar, drink it with breakfast.

Then, later in the day, try to add in a cup of green tea nothing added.

---

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Despite Record Drought, Farmers Expect Banner Year

Kansas farmer Luke Ulrich pilots his combine through the last eight rows of this year's ragged crop, which produced far less than half the normal yield.

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September 27, 2012 from KCUR

After one of the driest summers on record, recent rains have helped in some parts of the country. But overall, the drought has still intensified. The latest tracking classifies more than a fifth of the contiguous United States in "extreme or exceptional" drought, the worst ratings.

In some parts of the Lower Midwest, water-starved crops have collapsed, but the farmers have not. Farmers across the country are surviving, and many are even thriving. This year, despite the dismal season, farmers stand to make exceptionally good money, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

"Here in 2012, USDA expects net farm incomes to reach their second-highest level on record," says Jason Henderson of the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City.

There are a few reasons for these incredible gains after the brutal drought. For one, with fewer crops being produced, the prices of those crops skyrocketed.

"Crop prices, grain prices, oilseed prices, wheat prices prices are very, very high," says Dave Swenson, who teaches economics at Iowa State University.

Swenson says that farmers relatively unscathed by the drought, through irrigation or good luck, are having a banner year.

The dairy Eric Neill and his wife operate in Freeman, Mo., nearly went under this summer, crushed by high feed prices from drought-scarce grains. The farm was saved by restorative rains brought by Hurricane Isaac.

The dairy Eric Neill and his wife operate in Freeman, Mo., nearly went under this summer, crushed by high feed prices from drought-scarce grains. The farm was saved by restorative rains brought by Hurricane Isaac.

The Good And Bad Of High Grain Prices

Roy Berghaus, who farms the hills near Farmington, Mo., figures he'll make ends meet, harvesting only a third of his normal corn crop.

"Price is the only salvation," he says. "Hopefully it will keep the operation going."

While those high crop prices meant deliverance for some, farmers with animals got the worst of the drought this year as feed grew scarce and extremely expensive.

"I honestly probably wanted to quit several times, just hang it up," dairy farmer Julie Neill of Freeman, Mo., says of the trying summer months. "But there was a lot to that decision. It was giving up a lifetime of everything that we have made."

These days, Neill and Sons Dairy looks pretty lush after a rain, with happy cows crowding together for a drink of fresh water. But all summer, Neill watched the pastures wither and the business unwind. The Neills had to borrow heavily, about $50,000, just to keep their cows alive. Neighbors lent encouragement, and heavy equipment. The farm was in intensive care.

"Honestly, I think it was more on death row," Neill says. "It just didn't feel like it was ever going to end."

For the Neills, relief came as the remnants of Hurricane Isaac the storm that slammed Louisiana last month quenched large parts of Arkansas and Missouri.

"We had 5 1/4 inches of rain here," says Neill's husband, Eric. "We had no runoff. Within four days, we had grass growing, and the cows started grazing again."

Today, Neill's cows stand in a field of bright green, knee-high grass, gobbling their fill and making milk.

With far less than half of their normal corn yield, the Ulrich brothers are relying in part on government-subsidized crop insurance to keep their farm afloat.

With far less than half of their normal corn yield, the Ulrich brothers are relying in part on government-subsidized crop insurance to keep their farm afloat.

New Hybrids And Good Old Insurance

But 45 miles west of Neill and Sons, near Baldwin City, Kan., Isaac petered out, bringing too little rain too late in the season to help Luke Ulrich's corn crop.

As Ulrich pilots his big, green combine, harvesting the last eight rows of this year's ragged crop, it amounts to far less than half the normal yield typical of what farmers are pulling in across the Lower Midwest where drought destroyed billions of bushels of corn.

Ulrich and his brother Jordan are looking to government-subsidized crop insurance to help make up for some of the havoc the drought wreaked on their farm. The insurance, which most Corn Belt farmers carry, is another major boost for farm income: It will likely pay out upward of $15 billion this year.

"Definitely the crop insurance helps, but everybody's situation's different," Jordan Ulrich says.

The crop insurance will only help the Ulrich brothers so much, because they have especially high overhead: They rent farm land and carry a lot of debt. Crop insurance won't pay the mortgage, though the USDA is offering very low interest emergency loans for farmers in their situation.

But Luke Ulrich says there's another way they're staying afloat: newer hybrid soybeans that hung on and are expected to produce a fairly decent and very lucrative crop. "The only bright spot, and I use that term loosely, [is] we can't figure out how these soybeans stayed alive," he says.

While the drought is far from over, U.S. agriculture seems to be coping better than expected. Farmers aren't being forced off the land in huge numbers, and many will go into next year with the tools they need to keep producing enormous amounts of food, weather permitting.

---

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Who Wants To Eat Jellyfish Omelets? Dolphin Meatballs? Mouse-On-Toast? These Guys

Foodwise, we live in choosy times, mostly choosing, "no thank you."

More and more of us choose not to eat meat or fish or eggs or fatty foods. We don't want anything too sugary, too fried, too raw, too strange. We tiptoe through the grocery as if it's a danger zone, hoping not to be tempted by a glazed donut.

That's the fashion, and I suppose it's a healthy one. Which is why you should know about two men who went wildly, dramatically, the other way. They tried to eat everything, no matter how improbable, how nasty ... well, almost everything. One lived in Rome, the other in Britain. Let's start with the Roman.

The Contender: Marcus Gavius Apicius

Marcus Gavius Apicius had a big house, a big kitchen and a sense of culinary adventure like no one else in first century Rome. He ate dangerously, creating meals so exotic, so daring, years later his recipes (or imagined versions of them) were collected in a cookbook named after him. I found of his dishes in Patrick Faas' 2005 Around the Roman Table. What did Apicius like?

How about dolphin meatballs? Boiled parrot? Jellyfish omelets? Sows' wombs in brine? Or maybe a little stuffed mouse?

If he'd never tasted it, he wanted to. If no one else could afford it, he could. He was very rich and his options were boundless.

The Most Outrageous Ancient Dish

He is said to have created (though no one can prove this) the single most outrageous dish of ancient times, hugely popular in the first century, especially in Rome, probably for its insane expensiveness. I'm talking about Lark Tongue Pie.

A lark, you may know, is a small brown and white bird that rises early and sings just as the sun comes up. It weighs about 2 ounces and has, I presume, a very small tongue, so it's daunting to imagine how one would find enough tongues to make into a meat pie. When I Googled for a recipe, I found this response in a discussion group:

...if you show up at my door with a bucket of lark's tongues I'd probably improvise something. (Actually, I'd probably call the police.)

But not Apicius. He wanted the attention these over-the-top meals could bring. He was such a generous host that Roman statesman Seneca says Apicius burned through his 100 million sestertii fortune until he was down to a mere 10 million. When he realized he would one day have to retrench and eat modestly, he threw one last banquet and then poisoned himself.

That's the danger of any addiction. It can make you mad. But not if you're a little bit wacky in the first place. Which brings me to my other, and in this case I'd have to call him my All Time Champion Eater, a man who lived to be 80-something and systematically tasted everything he could possible swallow, tongue or chew. I am talking about an Englishman named William Buckland.

The Champ

In the early 1800's, Buckland was a biblical geologist, the first trained geologist ever at Oxford. He also was a great admirer of animals. He had an odd assortment of live ones at his home, (a hyena, a monkey, allowed to wander the halls). He also had a collection of stuffed ones. Sometimes he would bring samples to class. By one account, while teaching at Oxford, he dropped a large hyena skull onto the lap of a (terrified) student and asked "What rules the world?" When the student didn't answer, he cried, "The stomach, sir!" It's the stomach that "rules the world. The great ones eat the less, the less the lesser still ..." And therefore, he taught, whoever dominates the world of plants and animals can (and should) eat all the others.

What rules the world? The stomach, sir!

- William Buckland

And to demonstrate, that's what he did. He ate nearly everything. He made it a lifelong project, systematically working his way through all the animals in Noah's ark, snacking on each of them.

A couple of times, he balked. One mole repulsed him. He gagged on a bluebottle fly. But with a little butter, most things went down. Says author (and Radiolab regular) Sam Kean, Buckland ate (and offered his guests) "Crisp mice in golden batter. Panther chops. Rhino pie. Trunk of elephant. Crocodile for breakfast. Sliced porpoise head. Horse's tongue. Kangaroo ham." He also sipped dangerously.

One time he was visiting a cathedral and was shown a miracle: Apparently a beam in the roof was dripping fresh saints' blood to the floor. That, anyway, was the local legend. Buckland, "never one to turn down the opportunity to try a new flavour," says journalist Fraser Lewry, "licked the flagstones and was able to disprove the myth, immediately identifying the mystery liquid as bat urine."

How To Explain Dr. Buckland

Eww. Why did he do it? Sam Kean says Buckland spent a lot of time in the woods or away in the mountains digging and had such "limited dining options" that maybe he learned to eat pretty much anything. Or "[i]t may have been a harebrained scheme to get inside the minds of the extinct animals whose bones he dug up."

"Mostly, though," says Sam, "he just liked barbequing ..."

That's why he's my champ. He wasn't as rich as Apicius. He wasn't as inventive. But he had a joy in him, more than a hunger; he had a mission to taste, to explore, to dare.

His craziest moment may be apocryphal, but it was a story his friends told at the time. One day, he was visiting a friend who wanted to show off a special family treasure. It was sitting in a silver snuffbox. Buckland looked in, and there, cushioned in the box was a desiccated morsel of King Louis XIV's heart. That's the Louis who built Versailles. Louis, the Sun King.

"I have eaten many strange things," Buckland said to his friend. "but have never eaten the heart of a king." With that, before anybody could stop him, he popped the piece in his mouth and swallowed.

And that's why William Buckland wears my crown: Most Daring Eater Ever.

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In his new book, The Violinist's Thumb, Sam Kean tells the story of how changes in our DNA human DNA allowed us to swallow what for other animals is an impossibly rich diet. This is the story of the "meat eating gene," starring, who else? Dr. William Buckland. Aaron Birk, our illustrator on this post, is the author of a graphic novel The Pollinator's Corridor.

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New Anti-Obesity Ads Blaming Overweight Parents Spark Criticism

This week, a new anti-obesity media campaign launched in Minnesota has been getting a lot of attention, and not necessarily the good kind.

One ad (see above) features two kids bragging about how much their dads can eat, and trying to one-up each other. A dad walks up, hears the kids, and looks down guiltily at his tray of burgers and fries. Another ad shows an overweight mom wheeling a cart of unhealthy groceries around the store, eventually noticing that her chubby daughter is wheeling a smaller cart but doing the same thing.

The messaging has sparked fresh debate about going after overweight people in the name of taking on the well-documented public health concerns over the country's growing waistlines. The Atlantic places the ads in the "gray area between educating and shaming."

And Lindy West, a staff writer at the blog Jezebel who is frank about her own weight issues, wrote a tirade about the new ads, called: "It's Hard Enough to Be a Fat Kid Without the Government Telling You You're an Epidemic." The post has garnered more than 63,000 comments so far. (Warning: Parts of West's post are not family fare.)

"The idea that some kids would sit around bragging about their fat dad who's so proud of how fat he is, is just ludicrous," she tells The Salt.

"I just find [the ad campaign] to be really reductive and condescending comes to mind. Fat people know about nutrition. We know that eating four cheeseburgers a day is not the way to go."

For West, the ads are squarely in the shaming category. "Fat people are already ashamed. People are already really unhappy with their bodies, which has a lot to do with the way that other people talk to you, and these preconceived notions that they have about your life.

"Fat people hate being fat, because everyone's mean to you, and you can't find clothes that fit you, and you can't fit into the chair at the restaurant," she says. "We've been shaming fat people for decades, and clearly it's not doing anyone any good."

The ads were created by Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota. Marc Manley, the vice president and chief prevention officer, says he was very involved with the creation and messaging behind the ads.

"Our intent in creating these ads was really just to show good parents having moments of realization that they needed to change their own behavior in order to send the right message to their kid," Manley says.

He says the nonprofit used to put out PSAs that were more positive, like this one encouraging people to get up and dance. But, he says, the problem of obesity in Minnesota and nationwide is so tough, they needed a new, more dramatic approach.

Rebecca Puhl at Yale's Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity, has spent over a decade studying attitudes toward weight.

She recently headed a nationwide study that looked at attitudes toward different anti-obesity messages.

"What our research shows is that people feel much more motivated and empowered to make healthy lifestyle changes when campaign messages are supportive and encourage specific health behaviors," she says. "But when campaign messages communicate shame or blame or stigma, people report much less motivation, and lower intentions to improve their health behaviors."

Manley says he stands by the new ads. "Just because people like an ad doesn't mean it moves them to action," he says. These ads are just part of a range of efforts his organization is undertaking to address the obesity issue.

The goal of the ads, he adds, is "to trigger some thinking and some dialogue about this very serious health problem."

It's fair to say they've certainly done that.

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Greek Credit Crisis Forces Winemakers, Food Canners To Adapt

Winemakers like Stellios Boutaris, shown near his vineyard outside Naoussa, Greece, and other business leaders have been forced to pursue new financial tactics because credit is hard to come by.

Winemakers like Stellios Boutaris, shown near his vineyard outside Naoussa, Greece, and other business leaders have been forced to pursue new financial tactics because credit is hard to come by.

When the economic crisis erupted in Greece and the bottom fell out of the domestic wine market, the Kir-Yianni vineyard outside picturesque Naoussa decided to adapt. Like other wineries in Greece, it has increasingly tapped the export market, successfully marketing and selling wine in Europe, the United States and even China.

"If you ask me, this crisis has been good for us," says Stellios Boutaris, the son of the company's founder. "It's going to make us stronger."

But there's one big problem that poses a threat, even to the most competitive Greek companies right now, he says. It's become virtually impossible to borrow money in Greece.

"There's no credit. How can you do business without credit?" he asks.

Greek banks have little money to lend out, while foreign lenders, which once flooded Greek businesses with loan offers, no longer want to do business in the country. The possibility that Greece might leave the eurozone, however slim, makes lending money there too risky.

It's a huge challenge for companies like Kir-Yianni, which have to import virtually all of the materials and equipment they use in their production. Kir-Yianni buys bottles from Italy, paper from Turkey, barrels from France and cork from Portugal.

"Unfortunately, Greeks are very much traders, not producers," Boutaris says. "It's crazy, when there's not a single glass factory in Greece. It makes you upset that you have to bring in bottles from Italy."

Because credit is so tight, companies like Kir-Yianni have to pay cash for virtually everything they buy. In a capital-intensive business, where growing times stretch for years, that can be an enormous challenge. Boutaris has had to delay projects, like building a new wine cellar.

Grapes ripen on the vine at Kir-Yianni vineyard outside Naoussa, Greece.

Grapes ripen on the vine at Kir-Yianni vineyard outside Naoussa, Greece.

"You're squeezed from both sides," he says. "You have trouble collecting money from the markets, because some of the wholesalers have gone out of business, so it's very, very difficult to sell. So you try to get cash from them, but not everyone can afford it."

Meanwhile, he says, "your suppliers want to be paid in cash. So really, the circle has completely broken. The chain of business has completely broken."

It's a huge change from a few years ago, when a loan was as easy to get as a suntan in Greece. Successful Greek business owners were regularly flooded with offers of credit. Banks "would beg you" to borrow money, says Olga Panagopoulou, financial manager at Conex, a canned fruit company in Athens. "They would say, 'You just have to pay 3 percent. What's 3 percent for you?'"

Conex ended up borrowing money to upgrade its factory, which will produce 27,000 tons of canned peaches this year, exporting virtually everything it produces.

The credit crunch has greatly complicated life for Conex.

The company has a narrow window of time each year to process and can fruit, and needs tons of supplies, everything from sugar and citric acid, to tin cans and fuel oil. But canned fruit can sit on store shelves for years, so customers are slow to take delivery of their orders and even slower to pay what they owe.

In the past, Conex could borrow money to get by until it was paid for what it produced. But today, the credit flow has run dry.

But now that the banks won't lend, Conex has had to press its customers to pay what they owe sooner. It has also tried to persuade its shareholders to put more money into the company.

The company laid off some permanent employees over the years, but it can't afford to lose too many workers, especially during canning season, Panagopoulou says.

Conex's troubles are ironic, because for the most part the company is quite competitive. With production down in parts of the United States, demand for canned fruit is very strong right now, she says. But without credit, it has difficulty filling the orders it gets.

"Greece can export enough, and more," Panagopoulou says. "But the problem is not to export or produce. The problem for Greece is to find the funds in order to produce. This is the real problem, and the big problem now."

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If Genetically Modified Apples Don't Brown, Can You Tell If They're Rotten?

Soon after slicing a conventional Granny Smith apple (left) starts to brown, while a newly-developed GM Granny Smith stays fresher looking.

Soon after slicing a conventional Granny Smith apple (left) starts to brown, while a newly-developed GM Granny Smith stays fresher looking.

In the fairytale world, a shiny red apple can lead to a poisonous end. But some see two genetically engineered green apple varieties, poised to become the first to gain U.S. Department of Agriculture approval, as similar harbingers of doom.

Okaganan Specialty Fruits, Inc., the company that has developed Granny Smith and Golden Delicious varieties that don't go brown when you slice them, says the fears are overblown and the apples are safe to eat.

Now, we've reported extensively on the heated debate over labeling genetically engineered food, and there's no denying that genetically-modified (GM) foods are a polarizing issue. But, would an apple that doesn't turn brown prevent us from telling whether it's rotten? The short answer is no. For the long answer, read on.

The non-browning trait aims to please consumers who don't like brown apples or the off taste from the preservatives frequently used to maintain color and fresh appearance in packages of pre-sliced apples, says Neal Carter, Okanagan's president. "Ultimately, we just want people to eat more apples," he says. Carter also argues the innovation would help apple slice producers, who can lose up to half of their product due to browning during production.

Nevertheless, as the public comment period on a petition to approve these apples closed last month, many consumers worry are they safe to eat?

First let's look at the physical properties of apples. No matter how you slice it, every apple turns brown eventually. "When their flesh is cut, the oxygen in the air interacts with chemicals in the flesh of the apple," says Susan Brown, a plant scientist at Cornell University in Geneva, N.Y. An enzyme called polyphenol oxidase (PPO) makes melanin, an iron-containing compound that gives apple cells a brown tinge. The same type of "oxidative" browning happens in the browning of tea, coffee, or mushrooms, explains Brown.

Within five minutes of slicing, browning can alter the taste and might not be as aesthetically pleasing, but it doesn't mean the apple is old or rotten.

To prevent oxidative browning, the GM apples developed by Okanagan stop PPO production with a man-made gene containing pieces of four natural PPO genes. An insertion with gene fragments is an automatic red flag for the apple cell usually the first step of viral attack so it chops up every sequence of DNA that looks like the suspicious fragment, and the apple flesh stays light.

"The beauty of this [process] is it's a natural plant defense mechanism," says Carter. Even when sliced, these apples stay clear of browning for about two weeks that's roughly the same extended lifespan as apple slices from McDonald's and Burger King, which use lemon juice and calcium ascorbate to prevent browning.

But if the apple doesn't go brown, then how do you tell if it's rotten? An apple with just oxidative browning isn't automatically rotten. Rotting comes from a fungal or bacterial infection - which causes the apple to go either mushy or dry. Infecting spores, not melanin, also give the flesh a dark brown hue. So, taking PPO out of the equation won't make a rotten apple appear pristine. "'Bad' apples will still be evident," says Brown. Rotting GM apples look rotten and turn brown from a bacterial or fungal infection the same as a conventional apple.

But, Bill Freese, a science policy analyst at the Center for Food Safety, notes that some studies in tomatoes have shown that silencing PPO impacts a plant's susceptibility to diseases and invasive insects because the enzyme may play a role in plant defense reactions.

Since we already have hybrid "low-browning" varieties and successful preservative treatments, some people wonder if we really need an apple that doesn't go brown. "We fully support genetic and genomics research," says Mark Gedris, the US Apple Association's director of communications. "But we haven't heard customers calling for a non-browning GE apple."

From nutrient value to taste, these apples are indistinguishable from a normal one, say Carter and Brown. If they do gain USDA approval, whether people will buy them is another story. "It's up to the consumer to decide," Brown says.

As we've reported before, much of our processed foods that contain soy or corn are genetically-modified, but fresh produce has been a tougher sell - anybody remember the Flavr Savr tomato?

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