Most Liked Food Blogs (316)

I was shocked to read on the second page of Wall Street Today to find that for:

"every American about 429 pounds of food was wasted in 2010"

Now this is terrible. United Nations reported that about 87 percent of the world live in poverty, devastation and hunger and the first and second world are so wasteful.

I have personally taught my children not to be joining this bad habit of being insensitive to wasting food.

but I have worked in refugee camps and the videos of the guys stealing the food from the van, I have seen this before in other camps. The operative word is gangs.

They take the food, horde it and give it out only to those who pay for it. They do the same thing for clothes and other stuff. They can be violent too. Any person going into a refugee camp has to recognize the camp is basically without laws. The strong rule. The weak beg on the sidelines.

In America how many remember the Hearst family food giveaways when Patty was captive? The same scenario. That was street gangs seizing an opportunity. Nothing more. Quite literally at the US refugee camps I have worked in each delivery truck came with a second truck full of MPs with big truncheons they used to keep the gangs off the food truck. Of course this was a wasted effort because the gangs would stay outside the circle and just steal the food from the women and children and weaker men when they exited the crowd. I have a friend who worked with OAS at the camps in Somalia and he told me the behavior is the same.

In any country where the government has collapsed or a civil war rages, one of the standard tactics of criminal gangs and rebels is to free all the prisoners in local jails (except for a select few they kill in the cells along with the guards) who then merge with the general population and later become refugees, if profit is seen in doing so. Except they arrive off the boat as an already organized gang mixed in with the innocent. If it is a civil war driving them, rest assured, mixed in with the women and occasional child you may find a whole company of fighters wearing refugee clothing but only pretending to be refugees. They will see to it that they eat first and that they are the ones who decide who else gets to eat. Such is the reality of life in refugee camps and shelters.

Don't look to the camp staff for help. They are usually terrified. At Ft. Chaffe, Indian Town Gap and Ft. Mcoy (3 I worked at) many of the staff lock themselves inside their little office with barricades on the door. Those who ventured out were often beaten and sometimes killed. I know of one case at Indiantown Gap where one of the camp workers had witnessed something. She had time for one panicked phone call before the gentle refugees ripped down the phone line on the building outside, smashed the door open and dragged her out. Many months went by before her dried out corpse was finally found in a barracks attic on the other side of the camp. Jimmy Carter's DOJ declared everything that happened in his Refugee camps to be Secret, but I saw it. Many of the refugees are not good people, although some are. The reality of life behind the barbed wire is not pretty in the least.

Foods


Seasoned rice



Ingredients:

4lb brown or white rice
1 1/2 pumpkin
4 stalks escallion
Pinch of salt
2 green sweet pepper
Sprigs of thyme
1/4lb ripe tomatoes
1 hot large pepper
1 cup of coconut milk
1lb broadbean (green bean)
1 large chocho
Half medium cabbage
Few stalk of calaloo
1lb of carrots
1 packet chicken noodle soup
1/4lb salt fish
3 garlics


Preparation and oooking:

1. Cut pumpkins, cabbage, calaloo, carrots, sweet pepper, hot pepper, escallion, tomatoes, garlic, saltfish and sprigs of thyme into fine pieces.
2. Add beans to boiling water, boil for 5 minutes
3. Beans almost cook, add coconut milk and other finely chopped ingredients stir and allows to boil.
4. Boils for 4 minutes max.
5. Add rice
6. Allow to cook for 20 minutes with high flames.
7. Cut heat, allow to steam for 10 minutes.
8. All water has been dried out rice is tender.
The dish is done!

Jamaican Rice and peas

Ingredient:

2lbs rice
1/2 pint kidney beans or Gungo peas
1 large coconut or tin coconut or powder coconut
1 glove garlic
5 stalk escallion
3 sprigs thyme
2 table spoon sugar (optional )
Salt to taste
1 green pepper
pieces of ginger to add taste


Preparation and cooking:

1. Cook peas and garlic to an almost tender state.
2. Grate coconut and extract the milk through a sieve (strainer).
3. Add this prepared milk cream to peas
4. Allow to boil for 10 minutes
5. Add pepper, thyme, salt, sugar, ginger, escallion
6. Boil for three minutes
7. Taste your pot, does it need more salt, set desired taste
8. Then you add rice
9. Allows to boil for 3 minutes high heat
10. Now min the heat
11. Allow to steam for twenty minutes or until rice is tender
12. Alright rice is done!

In S.A. we make a delicacy, called Biltong:-

My dad, and granddad would use mainly beef strips from the back around the spine, cut into around 30cm x 8cm strips.

These strips then get marinaded in ur own special recipe, which varies from person to person, for a while.

U then put a hook at the one end of strip of marinated raw beef meat, and hang it up in a well ventilated room, up high.

Now depending on ur taste, these strips are taken down at varying degrees of dryness (it shrinks during the drying process) and cut up as u like, with a special tool and eaten.

It has a rubbery tangy texture, depending on the marinade used.

Will u eat it?

Actually, a fruit salad.

Well, mostly grapes.

OK, all grapes.

Fermented grapes.

Wine.

I've got wine for dinner.







(not my own - thanks to Elephant Food on Facebook)

when you are browsing around the local shop and come across the chockie counter.

Are you into those wonderful BIG slabs of chocolate or are you a mouse and go for the nibble size?

So yesterday, somewhere around 10am I woke up to the sound of turkey clucking. Little bastards. Still in my underwear I slipped on some flip-flops, walked to the front door and grabbed the loaded shotgun (Stevens 311 (1940s vintage) I had placed there just for them.

I went out and with a single shot convinced the flock survivors waking me wasn't their smartest move. Returning inside I unloaded the gun, found some pants and logged onto VA;'s Dept of Game and checked the new acquisition into their system.

I then texted my 'step daughter' as she had asked to be notified when I got a turkey. In a little while she called back. She wanted to know how to clean it and also wanted me to bring it by so she could cook it for me. She was at classes right then, but suggested if I could be at her BF's place around 5ish that would be perfect.

Next I found a good video about how to field dress a Wild Turkey in about 3 minutes. I texted this to her.





bless you youtube.

So I checked my email and oh golly there was a work assignment in it. Visit a foreclosed upon property 20 miles away, see if the former owner had snuck back in, check for any signs of vandalism if he hadn't (notifying the local sheriff dept as the bank's contracted representative if either one was found), and confirm that the realtor had placed a for sale sign up as he said he had.

So after a slow leisurely breakfast I go outside with a plastic bag and place the turkey hen in it (letting the cats out in the process) and secure the bag in a place the cats can't get to while I was gone. Then I putter around on the PC a bit. I check FB and watch a friends Halloween video (nicely done, ), print off the information needed for work assignment, pictures, address, directions, phone numbers, etc., then around noonish I let the cats back in and depart for the work.

Yes, the for sale sign was there. A lovely $4,000 sq. foot home stuck 20 miles further back into the rurals. Eighty acres of private woods around it. Similar properties all around, each with their own forest. Gravel road to it in decent shape. A gravel driveway to an immaculate palace. The usual real estate combo padlock on the door. I call the realtor and tell him who I am then open the padlock and get the key and do my walk through. The whole backside of the place is spectacular mountain view as the property is high up that mountain. I wish I had brought my binoculars. I confirm the electricity is still on and the faucets all work and are off. I check the heat pump and the hot water system for signs of sabotage or vandalism. Nothing found. The place is gorgeous. A swimming pool in back. Paved walkways. A pool house, a 4 car detached combination garage (the house has an attached 2 car as well) and garden tools shed, etc., etc. I didn't ask the Realtor, nor did the bank paperwork specify, but I am guessing somewhere around 2 million. Money comes & money goes. Nothing amiss found I lock up and thank the realtor and depart for home. A quick and easy $75 thus made.

I stop off at Sheetz and grab a large steak and cheese sub with fixings, then sit on their patio and attempt a chat with the woman at the next table. It starts, but then her ride shows up and with a wave she departs. Seemed like a nice lady. Ah well...

So I get back home around 3ish. The cats are waiting for me at the front door. I let them in, log onto my PC then fill out my online report and submit it to my handlers with time/date stamped photos attached.

Then after making sure the cat food bowls are full I grab the plastic trash bag full of turkey and depart for MD. I arrive there just about 5 and she bids me enter.

Who wants coconut? :)



One of my favorite drink ^_^