Food News February 2, 2005

Photo: © Sara Deseran. All rights reserved.
Good thing they taste better than they look. Monkfish at the San Sebastian fish market, 01/05.

McSweeny's on Food. Dunkin Donut's Cinnamon Sticks and Deep Fried Haggis are fair game, but Swiss Chard? We love swiss chard!
"I hate you Swiss chard. Oh, how I hate you. I have hated you ever since I figured out why dumpsters smell like dumpsters. It's because of you. I always thought they took on that characteristic stench because long years of bad garbage odors combined together in an unholy stew that for some reason always smelled the same. Kind of like how mixing lots of different paint colors always gives you brown. But no, it turns out that they smell exactly like you did two days after I brought you home from the grocery store. So it was you all along. Screw you, Swiss chard." -- Eric Smith
More from: McSweeney's.

By the way, it's February 1st and we are in the middle of another typical San Francisco winter - it's a balmy 72 degrees on my patio as I sit in the sun working on my laptop - and a quick check of the East Coast weather...bummer dudes.

Paris Hilton, who looked absolutely stunning (seriously) in her photo op for the SF Ballet, probably eats at a few of these of fine dining establishments. The oh-so-chic list includes PEARL (Miami Beach, Florida), LES TROIS GARCONS (London, England), SPOON BYBLOS (St. Tropez, France) and COMERC 24 (Barcelona, Spain). Ok, so she probably wouldn't be caught dead in Comerc 24, where the specialty of the house is Sea Urchin with Quinoa.
More from The Age (Au) [user name=saute, password=wednesday].

The Big Red Book, otherwise known as the Michelin Guide of France, has been yanked from store shelves after a restaurant that had yet to open was given a Bib Gourmand rating (a restaurant awarded a Bib Gourmand does not rank a Michelin Star, but is still included in the prestigious list because of the good food and moderate pricing of the menu). The owner of the restaurant was quoted as saying: "We reached an agreement to appear in the 2005 edition of the Red Guide and to not have to wait a year unnecessarily...".
More from the BBC.

I like French wine. Especially Sancerre, Chablis, and Rhone Reds, but there's one wine I would chop off my little finger just to drink. A Domaine de la Romanee-Conti La Tache, maybe a 1966 or 1988. Considering my current wine budget never exceeds $30/bottle, a Romanee Conti is just a mythical dream, kinda like me kissing Paris Hilton... Speaking of wine, it seems that the French aren't drinking enough of theirs. For the first time in 10 years, France has a 200 million litre surplus of wine, and the EU is set to allow the distillation of over 1 billion litres of excess wine from European countries. The shocker is that the French contribution to this swill will be mostly Appellation d'Origine Controlée (AOC). That's the good stuff, which means alot of Bordeaux's and Burgundies down the drain. French wine consumption has dropped 15 to 20 percent in the last few years, a statistic partly blamed on a tough government campaign waged against drinking and driving. It also seems the French are just drinking less wine than they used to. 40 years ago, they drank an average of about 160 bottles of wine a year per person. Last year, it was around 80 bottles. It's a hot topic in France, and there's plenty of blame to go around. They've taken aim at Australia, as evident in this quote from a recent article by The Observer's Tim Atkin; "How can we compete with the Coca-colonisation of the world of wine?' one exasperated winemaker asked me. 'What Australia makes is closer to fruit juice than wine. Its wines have no soul." Who needs soul when you have screwcaps? The French newspaper Figaro has published 20 ideas on how to save French wine, including allowing supermarkets to display wines by style instead of appellation (rather obvious, but currently not allowed), and to sell more premium AOC wine in supermarkets, where most French consumers purchase their wine. All's I ask is that before all those Burgundies and Bordeauxs are turned into grain alcohol is that they put aside a couple of Romanee-Conti's for me. I'll even pay the shipping...
More from the BBC,
And the Observer UK.

Back to Back to Back coverage of the Madrid Fusion Food Festival. Now where else on the web can you find that? Jordan Mackay covers the new Spanish wine scene. "Welcome to the new Spain. Sparked by the rejuvenation of ancient vineyards and fueled by plenty of European Union investment, new must-try wines are being released faster than Apple geeks can come up with snazzy new I-gadgets. Remember, it was only in the last seven or eight years that people started raving about bright, racy Albariño whites and indelible Priorat reds."
More from the LA Times.