| Council May Step Into Fight Over Fast Food
The City Council has a beef with soon-to-be implemented nutritional requirements for thousands of restaurants. The chairman of the council's Health Committee, Joel Rivera, is introducing legislation on Wednesday to water down a rule recently approved by the Board of Health mandating that eateries post calorie counts and nutritional information on menu boards or near cash registers. "People going to Burger King are not the kind of people who care about the calorie count," a senior adviser to Mr. Rivera, Michael Nieves, said yesterday in a telephone interview. Mr. Nieves said patrons who do care about eating low-calorie foods naturally opt for lower-calorie items on menus, such as salads. Like other opponents of the measure, he said complying with the menu board requirement would be too onerous and expensive for businesses, particularly because of the endless combinations of ingredients.
Low-fat mac 'n' cheese makes a winning dinner
In a food popularity contest, macaroni and cheese would be one of the winners. Kraft reports that it sells more than 1 million blue boxes of the stuff every day. But because it's so high in fat and calories, macaroni and cheese wouldn't win a blue ribbon from dietitians. One cup of Kraft macaroni and cheese has 410 calories and 18 fat grams – and those numbers pale in comparison to some made-from-scratch versions. Celebrity chef Emeril Lagasse's recipe contains 550 calories and 31 fat grams per cup. That's cold comfort for people who want to eat healthier. But if you make a few adjustments to a typical recipe, you can keep this dish on the dinner table and still lose weight. This recipe is adapted from Cooking Light. Instead of regular macaroni, use Barilla Plus, a multigrain pasta.
‘Farmer’ stars refine recipe for food talk
Billy Bob Thornton, born and raised in Arkansas, lived for a while as a young man in Tomball, Texas. In those days, the town was known for a café that served chicken-fried steak in two sizes: dinner-plate and serving-platter (the latter favored by highway road crews and construction workers). Thornton never ate at Goodson's Café because, as a struggling musician, he had no money for fine dining. The mention of the legendary eatery gets him talking about food – even though he and co-star Virginia Madsen are on tour to talk about "The Astronaut Farmer." "I was so broke then," Thornton says, "that the only fried chicken I ever had was in a Swanson's TV dinner. It came with mashed potatoes, with that little thing of butter in the middle, and that little cobbler thing." Madsen laughs.
Fast Food Part 1 (Paper for Eng213x)
A tax has been proposed in August 2006 comparing health facts with cigarettes. On every corner there is a McDonalds or a Burger King. Should those companies not be allowed in our schools? “FAST foods, processed snacks and sugary drinks can cause as much ill health as cigarettes, and should be taxed like tobacco and banned from schools and public institutions, obesity experts say."(Julie Robotham) In Australia, “They advocate strict physical activity rules for school students, a ban on all heavily processed fast foods and snacks from public schools and hospitals, unambiguous color-coded labels to denote nutritional quality, taxation for unhealthy products balanced with subsidies for fresh foods, and prohibition of all food marketing aimed at children." (Julie Robotham) This seems like an extreme action being taken toward ridding our system of unhealthy food but those same companies put out labels with calorie and food content and a separate menu of healthier options.
Arctic Ocean Gets a Nervous System
March 2, 2007 — Remote and often locked in ice, the Arctic Circle is one of the most variable, sensitive ecosystems on the planet. Now, several Norwegian institutions are joining forces to set up a network of sensors to monitor the underwater environment there and its renewable resources. The network — piggybacked on oil pipelines, seafloor platforms, cables and research vessels — could yield some of the best data yet on even the smallest changes in the ecosystem. The information will inform scientists about marine resources from fuel to food. .
Business news briefs
A Lancaster-based direct marketing firm is expanding operations into Fayette County with a division that will create 168 jobs within three years. Vision Marketing Services received a state financial package valued at $344,000 to create a 72-seat call center in the Laurel Mall in Uniontown. The total cost of the expansion is $620,000. Vision Marketing has 305 employees at locations in Lancaster and Johnstown. Expenses a drag on Del Monte
Del Monte Foods Co. reported a 10 percent drop in net income for the fiscal third quarter as expenses cut into gains from the pet products division. The San Francisco company with operations in Pittsburgh said net income was $46.5 million, or 23 cents per share, in the three months ended Jan. 28, vs. $51.9 million, or 26 cents, a year ago. In continuing operations, earnings per share would have been 22 cents, matching analysts' projections.
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