Food Sampling Quotes

We walked on the beach, fed blue corn ships to the seagulls, and munched on blue jelly beans, blue saltwater taffy and all the other free samples my mom brought home from work. I guess I should explain the blue food. See, Gabe had once told my mom there was no such thing. They had this fight, which seemed like a really small thing at the time. But ever since, my mom went out of her way to eat blue. She baked blue birthday cakes. She mixed blueberry smoothies. She bought blue-corn tortilla chips and brought home blue candy from the shop.

Ordinary folk prefer familiar tastes - they'd sooner eat the same things all the time - but a gourmet would sample a fried park bench just to know how it tastes.

The Romans always wanted bread and circuses-food and entertainement! As we destroy their city, I will offer them both. Behold, a sample!" Someething dropped from the ceiling and landed at Percy's feet: a loaf of sandwich bread in a white plastic wrapper with red and yellow dots. Percy picked it up. "Wonder bread?" "Magnificent, isn't it?" Ephialtes eyes danced with crazy excitement.

Free samples are fine, but if you give people too much for-free, whether it’s clothes or food or information, they come to expect it.

Breast milk and amniotic fluid carry the flavors of the mother’s foods, and studies consistently show that babies grow up to be more accepting of flavors they’ve sampled while in the womb and while breastfeeding.

...Maybe it's low-wage work in general that has the effect of making feel like a pariah. When I watch TV over my dinner at night, I see a world in which almost everyone makes $15 an hour or more, and I'm not just thinking of the anchor folks. The sitcoms and dramas are about fashion designers or schoolteachers or lawyers, so it's easy for a fast-food worker or nurse's aide to conclude that she is an anomaly — the only one, or almost the only one, who hasn't been invited to the party. And in a sense she would be right: the poor have disappeared from the culture at large, from its political rhetoric and intellectual endeavors as well as from its daily entertainment. Even religion seems to have little to say about the plight of the poor, if that tent revival was a fair sample. The moneylenders have finally gotten Jesus out of the temple.

most cherished desires of present-day Westerners are shaped by romantic, nationalist, capitalist and humanist myths that have been around for centuries. Friends giving advice often tell each other, ‘Follow your heart.’ But the heart is a double agent that usually takes its instructions from the dominant myths of the day, and the very recommendation to ‘follow your heart’ was implanted in our minds by a combination of nineteenth-century Romantic myths and twentieth-century consumerist myths. The Coca-Cola Company, for example, has marketed Diet Coke around the world under the slogan ‘Diet Coke. Do what feels good.’ Even what people take to be their most personal desires are usually programmed by the imagined order. Let’s consider, for example, the popular desire to take a holiday abroad. There is nothing natural or obvious about this. A chimpanzee alpha male would never think of using his power in order to go on holiday into the territory of a neighbouring chimpanzee band. The elite of ancient Egypt spent their fortunes building pyramids and having their corpses mummified, but none of them thought of going shopping in Babylon or taking a skiing holiday in Phoenicia. People today spend a great deal of money on holidays abroad because they are true believers in the myths of romantic consumerism. Romanticism tells us that in order to make the most of our human potential we must have as many different experiences as we can. We must open ourselves to a wide spectrum of emotions; we must sample various kinds of relationships; we must try different cuisines; we must learn to appreciate different styles of music. One of the best ways to do all that is to break free from our daily routine, leave behind our familiar setting, and go travelling in distant lands, where we can ‘experience’ the culture, the smells, the tastes and the norms of other people. We hear again and again the romantic myths about ‘how a new experience opened my eyes and changed my life’. Consumerism tells us that in order to be happy we must consume as many products and services as possible. If we feel that something is missing or not quite right, then we probably need to buy a product (a car, new clothes, organic food) or a service (housekeeping, relationship therapy, yoga classes). Every television commercial is another little legend about how consuming some product or service will make life better. 18. The Great Pyramid of Giza. The kind of thing rich people in ancient Egypt did with their money. Romanticism, which encourages variety, meshes perfectly with consumerism. Their marriage has given birth to the infinite ‘market of experiences’, on which the modern tourism industry is founded. The tourism industry does not sell flight tickets and hotel bedrooms. It sells experiences. Paris is not a city, nor India a country – they are both experiences, the consumption of which is supposed to widen our horizons, fulfil our human potential, and make us happier. Consequently, when the relationship between a millionaire and his wife is going through a rocky patch, he takes her on an expensive trip to Paris. The trip is not a reflection of some independent desire, but rather of an ardent belief in the myths of romantic consumerism. A wealthy man in ancient Egypt would never have dreamed of solving a relationship crisis by taking his wife on holiday to Babylon. Instead, he might have built for her the sumptuous tomb she had always wanted. Like the elite of ancient Egypt, most people in most cultures dedicate their lives to building pyramids. Only the names, shapes and sizes of these pyramids change from one culture to the other. They may take the form, for example, of a suburban cottage with a swimming pool and an evergreen lawn, or a gleaming penthouse with an enviable view. Few question the myths that cause us to desire the pyramid in the first place.

Increasingly today, archaeologists are circumventing this problem by a new technique termed accelerator mass spectrometry, which permits radiocarbon dating of tiny samples and thus lets one directly date a single small seed, small bone, or other food residue. In some cases big differences have been found between recent radiocarbon dates based on the direct new methods (which have their own problems) and those based on the indirect older ones.

Do you want to hurt yourself?' 'No. I'm trying to get a grip. Have a more normal life.' Scribble, scribble. 'The number of suicides in the area has recently escalated,' she commented. 'The train track suicides. Yes, I know. And yet, here I am. Thrilled to be in counseling. Weren't we supposed to be focusing on a healthy expression of my grief?' Scribble. 'You seem disoriented. Have you been drinking?' 'I have too few brain cells naturally to waste any on a temporary buzz.' Scribble. 'Drugs?' 'Just write See Above-the same philosophy applies. Look, I had a really lousy lunch. Food poisoning of epic proportions. Its messed me up.' 'I'd like to get a urine sample.' 'Give me your coffee cup.' Scribble, scribble, scribble.

Romanticism tells us that in order to make the most of our human potential we must have as many different experiences as we can. We must open ourselves to a wide spectrum of emotions; we must sample various kinds of relationships; we must try different cuisines; we must learn to appreciate different styles of music. One of the best ways to do all that is to break free from our daily routine, leave behind our familiar setting, and go travelling in distant lands, where we can ‘experience’ the culture, the smells, the tastes and the norms of other people. We hear again and again the romantic myths about ‘how a new experience opened my eyes and changed my life’. Consumerism tells us that in order to be happy we must consume as many products and services as possible. If we feel that something is missing or not quite right, then we probably need to buy a product (a car, new clothes, organic food) or a service (housekeeping, relationship therapy, yoga classes). Every television commercial is another little legend about how consuming some product or service will make life better. Romanticism, which encourages variety, meshes perfectly with consumerism. Their marriage has given birth to the infinite ‘market of experiences’, on which the modern tourism industry is founded.

At Sandwich, in 1579, she paid the magistrates’ wives a great compliment when, without employing a food taster, she sampled some of the 160 dishes they had prepared for her and even ordered some to be taken to her lodgings so that she could eat them later.

A nationwide study published by the USDA in 1996 found that 7.5 percent of the ground beef samples taken at processing plants were contaminated with Salmonella, 11.7 percent were contaminated with Listeria monocytogenes, 30 percent were contaminated with Staphylococcus aureus, and 53.3 percent were contaminated with Clostridium perfringens.

Inferiority intentions are sample chapters of defeated stories... Courageous beginnings are examples of true leadership values!

These investigations also revealed that corporate inspectors were unable to recognize infections unless there was pus oozing out of an abscess. In fact, it appears that in our nation's meatpacking plants, contaminated meat is the rule, rather than the exception; researchers from the University of Minnesota found that in over a thousand food samples from numerous retail markets, 69 percent of the pork and beef and 92 percent of the poultry were contaminated with fecal matter that contained the potentially dangerous bacterium E. coli, and according to a recent study published in the Journal of Food Protection fecal contamination was found in 85 percent of fish fillets procured from retail markets and the Internet.52

She showed you how to make her special adobo recipe- proper adobo, with soy sauce and vinegar and spices- and it tasted exquisite, better than any other grandmother would have made. She offered both meals for free to the carinderia's clientele that day, much to their delight. Sampling your casserole brought them no perceptible changes; eating Lola's adobo left them fresh, eager, and thrumming with energy, exhaustion falling away like a cloak.

dinner. I would climb over the farmer’s fence and toss back to my father samples of the crop I was harvesting. It could be ears of corn or tomatoes or whatever was in season. That’s what you had to do to get by and put food on the table. But the farmers weren’t any too happy with our ideas about sharing in nature’s bounty. Some nights they’d be waiting for us with shotguns. Some farmer would chase me, and I’d jump over the fence and get hit in the butt with birdshot. One

She bought me betta fish when I was six, after I kept telling her the same story, every day, about the tanks we had in my class at school, the betta fish, red and purple and blue and green, swimming lazily in the tanks, flashing brilliant and then dull. She came home with one on a Sunday, after she'd been out all weekend. I hadn't seen her since Friday, since she told Mam she was going to the store to buy some milk and some sugar and didn't come back. When she came back, her skin was dry and flaking at the corners of her mouth, her hair stuck out in a bushy halo, and she smelled like wet hay. The fish was green, the color of pine needles, and he had stripes down his tail the color of red mud. I called him Bubby Bubbles, since he blew bubbles all day, and when I leaned over his tank, I could hear him crunching on the fish food Leonie had brought home in a sample-size bag. I imagined even then that one day I could lean over his bowl, and instead of crunching, little words would pop out the bubbles that fizzed up to the surface. Big face. Light. And love. But when the sample size of fish food ran out, and I asked Leonie to buy me more, she said she would, and then forgot, again and again, until old day she said: Give him sold old bread. I figured he couldn't crunch like needed on some old bread, so I kept bugging her about it, and Bubby got skinnier and skinnier, his bubbles smaller and smaller, until I walked into the kitchen one day and he was floating on top of the water, his eyes white, a slimy scrim like fat, no voice in his bubbles. Leonie kill things.

Dr. Rush made patients ingest the solution until they drooled, and often people’s teeth and hair fell out after weeks or months of continuous treatment. His “cure” no doubt poisoned or outright killed swaths of people whom yellow fever might have spared. Even so, having perfected his treatment in Philadelphia, ten years later he sent Meriwether and William off with some prepackaged samples. As a handy side effect, Dr. Rush’s pills have enabled modern archaeologists to track down campsites used by the explorers. With the weird food and questionable water they encountered in the wild, someone in their party was always queasy, and to this day, mercury deposits dot the soil many places where the gang dug a latrine, perhaps after one of Dr. Rush’s “Thunderclappers” had worked a little too well.

People like what they eat, rather than eat what they like.” The phenomenon starts early. Breast milk and amniotic fluid carry the flavors of the mother’s foods, and studies consistently show that babies grow up to be more accepting of flavors they’ve sampled while in the womb and while breastfeeding. (Babies swallow several ounces of amniotic fluid a day.)

A study of New York City seafood done by scientists at nonprofit marine conservation group Oceana found fraud in 58 percent of retail outlets and 39 percent of restaurants. The one especially scary finding that would have my father turning over in his grave was that every sushi restaurant from which samples were collected—100 percent of them—served fake fish. Obviously,

How contaminated are U.S. pork products? Consumer Reports magazine tested nearly two hundred samples from cities across the country and found that more than two-thirds of the pork was contaminated with Yersinia.129 This may be because of the intensification and overcrowding that characterizes most of today’s industrial pig operations.130 As noted in an article in National Hog Farmer entitled “Crowding Pigs Pays,” pork producers can maximize their profits by confining each pig to a six-square-foot space. This basically means cramming a two-hundred-pound animal into an area equivalent to about two feet by three feet. The authors acknowledged that overcrowding presents problems, including inadequate ventilation and increased health risks, but they concluded that sometimes, “crowding pigs a little tighter will make you more money.”131

Don’t Burn the Food (SDL) In a sample of thirteen African countries between 1999 and 2004, 52 percent of women surveyed say they think that wife-beating is justified if she neglects the children; around 45 percent think it’s justified if she goes out without telling the husband or argues with him; 36 percent if she refuses sex, and 30 percent if she burns the food. And this is what the women think. We live in a strange world.

A few minutes later Agnes had reached the market and was battling through the throng. She stepped over rotting offal and cabbage leaves to prod breasts of pheasant and partridge. She sniffed oysters and herrings and asked the prices of oranges, shouting her requirements over strident cries of "New mackerel!" and "White turnips and fine carrots, ho!" and "Fine China oranges and fresh juicy lemons!" She watched a juggler with blackened teeth catching knives in his mouth, then sampled a corner of gingerbread so spicy tears welled in her eyes. The street child had slipped from her thoughts. Within the hour, Agnes had arranged deliveries with half a dozen tradesmen whose goods she could not carry, and jotted every item and its price in her notebook for Mrs Tooley's accounts. In her basket she had carefully stowed sweet oranges, Jordan almonds, two dozen pullet eggs, a pickled salmon, half a pound of angelica, the same of glacee cherries.

This might not matter to much of anyone but a confirmed Slow Foodie, eager to save and sample endangered food traditions, except for one notable fact: Medical researchers are coming around to the startling conclusion that, in order to be healthy, people need more exposure to microbes, not less; and that one of the problems with the so-called Western diet—besides all the refined carbohydrates and fats and novel chemicals in it—is the absence from it of live-culture foods.

The goal is to be as neutral, as analytical—as “Mr. Spock”—as possible. This perhaps explains how it was possible for a team of Canadian researchers to find nine men and women willing to create a canned-cat-food flavor lexicon and a set of tasting protocols. For humans. Tasting cat food. And they couldn’t be shy about it. The protocol for evaluating the “meat chunk” portion (“gravy gel” having its own distinct protocol) stipulated that the sample be “moved around mouth and chewed for 10 to 15 seconds, [and] a portion of the sample swallowed.

Just as the online mystics suggest, I have been makkng offerings to vultures in thanks for their guidance. The freezer, for me, is the place where good food goes to die, it lies in state, with occassional viewings, until a major power outage thaws it and gives me permission to toss it out to the middle of the field, where Turkey vultures have a field day sampling sausages, steaks, roasts, chicken thighs, and breaded nuggets. For the record,even a turkey vulture won't eat a chicken nugget. I stopped buying them when I saw the vultures picking around them.

Al and Lou had arrived at the Wisconsin State Fair by nine in the morning for fresh egg omelettes in the Agriculture Building and some apple cider donuts. They'd nibbled their donuts and wandered the stalls celebrating various products grown and raised in Wisconsin. You could sample and buy anything, from honey-filled plastic sticks to ostrich steaks to cranberry scones. They followed up their breakfast with a stop at the milk barn, where Lou had forced him to try root beer-flavored milk. While he'd been skeptical, it tasted delicious and precisely like a root beer float.

Lost In The World" (feat. Justin Vernon of Bon Iver) [Sample From "Woods": Justin Vernon] I'm up in the woods, I'm down on my mind I'm building a still to slow down the time I'm up in the woods, I'm down on my mind I'm building a still to slow down the time I'm up in the woods, I'm down on my mind I'm building a still to slow down the time [Chorus 2x:] I'm lost in the world, I'm down on my mind I'm new in the city, and I'm down for the night Down for the night Said she's down for the night [Kanye West:] You're my devil, you're my angel You're my heaven, you're my hell You're my now, you're my forever You're my freedom, you're my jail You're my lies, you're my truth You're my war, you're my truce You're my questions, you're my proof You're my stress and you're my masseuse Mama-say mama-say ma-ma-coo-sah Lost in this plastic life, Let's break out of this fake ass party Turn this into a classic night If we die in each other's arms we still get laid in the afterlife If we die in each other's arms we still get laid [Chorus:] (I'm lost in the world) Run from the lights, run from the night, (I'm down on my mind) Run for your life, I'm new in the city, and I'm down for the night Down for the night Down for the night I'm lost in the world, been down for my whole life, I'm new in the city but I'm down for the night Down for the night Down for the night Who will survive in America? Who will survive in America? Who will survive in America? [Chorus:] I'm lost in the world, I'm down on my mind I'm new in the city, and I'm down for the night Down for the night Said she's down for the night I'm lost in the world, I'm down on my mind I'm new in the city and I'm goin' for a ride Goin' for a ride I'm lost in the world, been down for my whole life I'm new in the city but I'm down the for the night Down for a night, down for a good time [Gil-Scott Heron:] Us living as we do upside down. And the new word to have is revolution. People don't even want to hear the preacher spill or spiel because God's whole card has been thoroughly piqued. And America is now blood and tears instead of milk and honey. The youngsters who were programmed to continue fucking up woke up one night digging Paul Revere and Nat Turner as the good guys. America stripped for bed and we had not all yet closed our eyes. The signs of truth were tattooed across our open ended vagina. We learned to our amazement the untold tale of scandal. Two long centuries buried in the musty vault, hosed down daily with a gagging perfume. America was a bastard, the illegitimate daughter of the mother country whose legs were then spread around the world and a rapist known as freedom, free doom. Democracy, liberty, and justice were revolutionary code names that preceded the bubbling bubbling bubbling bubbling bubbling in the mother country's crotch What does Webster say about soul? All I want is a good home and a wife And our children and some food to feed them every night. After all is said and done build a new route to China if they'll have you. Who will survive in America? Who will survive in America? Who will survive in America? Who will survive in America?

All my hard work had come to fruition that day: the new fireplace housed a might Yule log that warmed the room, casting reflections across the crystal and silver. I admired the forest green of the brocaded furniture, and the holly gathered in red ribbons hung about the walls. I decided that whatever temper Michael might be in, I would not let him spoil our first Christmas. The new damask cloth was spread with a fine repast: Peg's own Yule cakes looked even daintier than those I had already sampled. A great wheel of cheese had pride of place, beside magnificent pies of game and fruit. On a great round platter was a salamagundy salad as fresh as a bouquet of flowers; concentric rings of every delight: eggs, chicken, ham, beetroot, anchovies, and orange.

This was the gastronomic heartland of Italy, where every inch of the fertile soil was cultivated. In Parma he visited shops festooned with hams, each one postmarked with the stamps of a dozen different inspectors---the regions of Italy are fiercely protective of their produce, and only a handful of towns between the Enza and Stirone Rivers are allowed to designate themselves as true producers of prosciutto di Parma. Because the huge lofts in which the hams are aged are always left open to the wind, the villages of the Enza valley seemed scented with the aromatic sweetness of the meat as he drove through them. In the valley to the north of Parma, he sampled culatello di zibello, perhaps the greatest of all Parma's pork products and for that reason almost never exported, even to other parts of Italy: a pig's rump, marinated in salt and spices, then sewn inside a pig's bladder and aged for eighteen months in the humid air of the flat river basin, a process so delicate that almost half the hams are spoiled before they are ready, but which leaves the rest incomparably delicious.

Alcohol is the great impersonator, fooling at least four different receptor molecules. In a quick survey of the functions of these victims, we can see exactly how alcohol works its magic. 1. It slows us down, “relaxing” our neurons. By blocking receptors for our brains’ chief excitatory neurotransmitters, alcohol coats the brain in a bit of molasses, slowing reaction times and slurring speech. We could probably do without this effect. 2. It gives us a pleasant buzz. Acting like cocaine —but much weaker —alcohol blocks dopamine reuptake, increasing the concentration of the happy neurotransmitter in the key parts of our brains. 3. It blocks pain. By stimulating the release of endorphins, alcohol lets us sample the “runner’s high” without even putting on our running shoes. Resembling morphine and heroin in this respect, but again at a greatly reduced magnitude, alcohol spurs our body to produce a little opiate-like high. 4. Alcohol makes us happier, at least while it’s in our system. Like a “do-it-yourself Prozac kit,” alcohol modifies and increases the efficiency of our serotonin receptors.

I want more, I said, putting a hand to my stomach, which rides higher than most know. Closer to the heart. I want the jiang bing that vendor will make when she runs out of nut butter. I don't think she's arrogant. I think she's right. I want to sample jian bing from every cart in Beijing, and I want to taste what those kids are eating at home, what they don't teach in cookbooks at Le Cordon Bleu. There's so much out there--- Helplessly, I said, I haven't even told you how much I love foods wrapped in other foods. Then tell me. I tried. I tried. Banh xeo in Hanoi, I said, and duck folded in the translucent bing of northern China. I spoke of tacos in Mexico City: suadero, al pastor, gringas. South Indian dosas as long as my arm, thinner than a rib of a feather. Oh, Aida, I said when I fumbled the names of the chutneys. How can I know all I've ever want? Something will get left out. I was wrong about cilantro. Tlayudas, she said stubbornly, as if she hadn't heard. Blini. Crêpes. They're basically French jian bing, I said with a strangled laugh. Pita sandwiches. Pickle roll-ups. Calzone. Bossam! I yelled, and the dogs barked and the children cheered and the streets of old Milan rang with the imported memory of pork kissed by brine, earthy with Korean bean paste, safe in its bed of red leaf lettuce.

Over the next two hours, we sampled from cheese plates, charcuterie platters, salads, roasted vegetables, tarts, and two risottos. I knew we were nowhere near done, but I was glad I'd worn a stretchy, forgiving dress. Next came the pastas, spring vegetables tossed with prawns and cavatappi, a beautiful macaroni and cheese, and a lasagna with duck ragù. It didn't end there---Chloé began to bring out the meats---a beautiful pork loin in a hazelnut cream sauce, a charming piece of bone-in chicken breast coated in cornflakes, a peppery filet mignon, and a generous slice of meat loaf with a tangy glaze. My favorite was the duck in marionberry sauce---the skin had been rubbed with an intoxicating blend of spices, the meat finished with a sweet, tangy sauce. It tasted like summer and Oregon all at once. We planned to open in mid-August, so the duck with fresh berries would be a perfect item for the opening menu. While I took measured bites from most of the plates, I kept the duck near and continued to enjoy the complex flavors offered by the spices and berry. Next came the desserts, which Clementine brought out herself. She presented miniatures of her pastry offerings---a two-bite strawberry shortcake with rose liqueur-spiked whipped cream, a peach-and-brown-sugar bread pudding served on the end of a spoon, a dark chocolate torte with a hint of cinnamon, and a trio of melon ball-sized scoops of gelato.

But this isn't standard Japanese picnic fare: not a grain of rice or a pickled plum in sight. Instead, they fill the varnished wooden tables with thick slices of crusty bread, wedges of weeping cheese, batons of hard salamis, and slices of cured ham. To drink, bottles of local white wine, covered in condensation, and high-alcohol microbews rich in hops and local iconography. From the coastline we begin our slow, dramatic ascent into the mountains of Hokkaido. The colors bleed from broccoli to banana to butternut to beet as we climb, inching ever closer to the heart of autumn. My neighbors, an increasingly jovial group of thirtysomethings with a few words of English to spare, pass me a glass of wine and a plate of cheese, and I begin to feel the fog dissipate. We stop at a small train station in the foothills outside of Ginzan, and my entire car suddenly empties. A husband-and-wife team has set up a small stand on the train platform, selling warm apple hand pies made with layers of flaky pastry and apples from their orchard just outside of town. I buy one, take a bite, then immediately buy there more. Back on the train, young uniformed women flood the cars with samples of Hokkaido ice cream. The group behind me breaks out in song, a ballad, I'm later told, dedicated to the beauty of the season. Everywhere we go, from the golden fields of empty cornstalks to the dense forest thickets to the rushing rivers that carve up this land like the fat of a Wagyu steak, groups of camouflaged photographers lie in wait, tripods and shutter releases ready, hoping to capture the perfect photo of the SL Niseko steaming its way through the hills of Hokkaido.

Now, there are a few dryadologists who could resist the opportunity to sample faerie food, the enchanted sort served at the tables of the courtly fae---I know several who have dedicated their careers to the subject and would hand over their eye teeth for the opportunity. I stopped at a stand offering toasted cheese---a very strange sort of cheese, threaded with glittering mold. It smelled divine, and the faerie merchant rolled it in crushed nuts before handing it over on a stick, but as soon as it touched my palm, it began to melt. The merchant was watching me, so I put it in my mouth, pantomiming my delight. The cheese tasted like snow and melted within seconds. I stopped next at a stand equipped with a smoking hut. The faerie handed me a delicate fillet of fish, almost perfectly clear despite the smoking. I offered it to Shadow, but he only looked at me with incomprehension in his eyes. And, indeed, when I popped it into my mouth, it too melted flavorlessly against my tongue. I took a wandering course to the lakeshore, conscious of the need to avoid suspicion. I paused at the wine merchant, who had the largest stand. It was brighter than the others, snow piled up behind it in a wall that caught the lantern light and threw it back in a blinding glitter. I had to look down at my feet, blinking back tears, as one of the Folk pressed an ice-glass into my hand. Like the food, the wine smelled lovely, of sugared apples and cloves, but it slid eerily within the ice, more like oil than wine. Shadow kept growling at it, as he had not with the faerie food, and so I tipped it onto the snow. Beside the wine merchant was a stand offering trinkets, frozen wildflowers that many of the Folk threaded through their hair or wove through unused buttonholes on their cloaks, as well as an array of jewels with pins in them. I could not compare them to any jewels I knew; they were mostly in shades of white and winter grey, hundreds of them, each impossibly different from the next. I selected one that I knew, without understanding how, was the precise color of the icicles that hung from the stone ledges of the Cambridge libraries in winter. But moments after I pinned it to my breast, all that remained was a patch of damp.

The Enchanted Broccoli Forest. Oh, what a pleasure that was! Mollie Katzen's handwritten and illustrated recipes that recalled some glorious time in upstate New York when a girl with an appetite could work at a funky vegetarian restaurant and jot down some tasty favorites between shifts. That one had the Pumpkin Tureen soup that Margo had made so many times when she first got the book. She loved the cheesy onion soup served from a pumpkin with a hot dash of horseradish and rye croutons. And the Cardamom Coffee Cake, full of butter, real vanilla, and rich brown sugar, said to be a favorite at the restaurant, where Margo loved to imagine the patrons picking up extras to take back to their green, grassy, shady farmhouses dotted along winding country roads. Linda's Kitchen by Linda McCartney, Paul's first wife, the vegetarian cookbook that had initially spurred her yearlong attempt at vegetarianism (with cheese and eggs, thank you very much) right after college. Margo used to have to drag Calvin into such phases and had finally lured him in by saying that surely anything Paul would eat was good enough for them. Because of Linda's Kitchen, Margo had dived into the world of textured vegetable protein instead of meat, and tons of soups, including a very good watercress, which she never would have tried without Linda's inspiration. It had also inspired her to get a gorgeous, long marble-topped island for prep work. Sometimes she only cooked for the aesthetic pleasure of the gleaming marble topped with rustic pottery containing bright fresh veggies, chopped to perfection. Then Bistro Cooking by Patricia Wells caught her eye, and she took it down. Some pages were stuck together from previous cooking nights, but the one she turned to, the most splattered of all, was the one for Onion Soup au Gratin, the recipe that had taught her the importance of cheese quality. No mozzarella or broken string cheeses with- maybe- a little lacy Swiss thrown on. And definitely none of the "fat-free" cheese that she'd tried in order to give Calvin a rich dish without the cholesterol. No, for this to be great, you needed a good, aged, nutty Gruyère from what you couldn't help but imagine as the green grassy Alps of Switzerland, where the cows grazed lazily under a cheerful children's-book blue sky with puffy white clouds. Good Gruyère was blocked into rind-covered rounds and aged in caves before being shipped fresh to the USA with a whisper of fairy-tale clouds still lingering over it. There was a cheese shop downtown that sold the best she'd ever had. She'd tried it one afternoon when she was avoiding returning home. A spunky girl in a visor and an apron had perked up as she walked by the counter, saying, "Cheese can change your life!" The charm of her youthful innocence would have been enough to be cheered by, but the sample she handed out really did it. The taste was beyond delicious. It was good alone, but it cried out for ham or turkey or a rich beefy broth with deep caramelized onions for soup.

. The Truth: In this case the negative effects completely outweigh the positive. Sure, GM crops may be “no-till,” but we have effectively increased the amount of toxic chemicals released into the environment while simultaneously creating a new breed of “superweed” that is resistant to “safe” herbicide. Myth 7: Monsanto's glyphosate, known as Roundup, is a nonthreatening, biodegradable herbicide. The Truth: Roundup was forced to remove the term biodegradable from its packaging.  Roundup persists in the environment and has toxic effects on wildlife. During crop growing season, the toxin known as Roundup was found in 60-100% of air and rain samples taken from the Midwest. Yuck. Myth 8: GM and Non-GM crops have

I made a sticky mock ambrosia cake from honey and apples, to be served by one of the prettiest slaves, dressed as a handmaiden to Venus. I hoped when people left they would be raving about both the atmosphere and the food. "I came to go over the menu," Apicius said, jolting me out of my thoughts. He was like an eager child just given a fresh plum. Sotas settled on a stool near the door and raised a hand in greeting. "Of course. I can make a variety of dishes and cut them up for easy sampling. I wanted to start with roasted hyacinth bulbs, some soft cheese drenched in raisin wine with bread, and slices of sow's udder with garum and lovage. I thought we could serve the Lucanian sausage I made earlier this week. And remember my hard egg mice with the almond ears and the clove eyes? I think those might go over well." "Perfect! The mice will delight the ladies!

I follow her into the kitchen where she begins unloading the two brown paper bags onto the butcher-block island. I stand there watching as she pulls out a huge, freshly smoked mozzarella, which, by the way she handles it, I can tell is still warm. She sets it down on the cutting board along with the loaf of ciabatta. While I'm considering my next line of questioning, Renata explains, "Jake called to tell me he forgot to show you the postcard I sent out last week listing some new specialty vinegars I'm offering. He asked me to tell you he's interested in sampling some of the blood orange." I stand there looking puzzled, having been only momentarily distracted by the salad possibilities afforded by the aforementioned specialty vinegars. Perhaps a mild goat cheese, encrusted in herbs, baked and drizzled with a fruity olive oil and blood orange vinaigrette.

One genuinely distinctive aspect of Englishness had long been a decidedly uncontinental taste in food. George Orwell, trying to explain the English character in 1944, wrote, ‘The difference in habits, and especially in food and language, makes it very hard for English working people to get on with foreigners. Their diet differs a great deal from that of any European nation, and they are extremely conservative about it. As a rule, they will refuse even to sample a foreign dish. They regard such things as garlic and olive oil with disgust, life is unliveable to them unless they have tea and puddings.

He inquired with the confidence of anyone trying free samples at a grocery store and putting on an Oscar-worthy performance of a person that was going to come back and buy it all later.

He said wouldn't it be brilliant to have a food emporium on the ground floor of Fenton's, like Harrods, but have everything organic and locally grown." Diana paused to let the idea sink in. "I said not the ground floor of course, Fenton's isn't a supermarket, but the basement has been a dead zone for years. A whole floor dedicated to stationery when no one writes letters anymore." "A food emporium," Cassie repeated. "Fresh fish caught in the bay, oysters, crab when it's in season. Counters of vegetables you only find in the farmers market, those cheeses they make in Sonoma that smell so bad they taste good. Wines from Napa Valley, Ghirardelli chocolates, sourdough bread, sauces made by Michael Mina and Thomas Keller. Everything locally produced. And maybe a long counter with stools so you could sample bread and cheese, cut fruit, sliced vegetables. Not a true cafe because we'd keep the one on the fourth floor. It would have more the feel of a food bazaar, with the salespeople wearing aprons and white caps." Cassie closed her eyes and saw large baskets of vegetables, glass cases filled with goat cheese and baguettes, stands brimming with chocolate-covered strawberries.

Acres of spice-covered almonds, blackberry and lavender honey, chocolate-covered cherries, their young saleswoman reaching forward with samples, her low-cut shirt selling more than fruit. The seafood shop, crabs lined up like a medieval armory, fish swimming through a sea of ice. Her ultimate goal was at the end of the aisle- a produce stand staffed by an elderly man who, some people joked, had been at the market since its beginning a hundred years before. George's offerings were the definition of freshness, corn kernels pillowing out of their husks, Japanese eggplant arranged like deep purple parentheses.

Sample your soils Good garden soil contains 30 to 50% sand, 30 to 50% silt, and 20 to 30% clay, with 5 to 10% organic matter. You can find out how close your soils come to this ideal, loam. All it takes is a quart jar, two cups of water, and a tablespoon of a water softener, such as Calgon liquid. You will also need soil from the top 12 inches (30 centimeters) of the areas you want tested, be it your vegetable garden, flower bed, or lawn. Mix each soil sample with two cups of water and a tablespoon of water softener. Put it in the jar, close the jar, and shake it vigorously, so that all the particles become suspended in the water. Then put the jar down and let things settle. After a couple of minutes, any sand particles in your soil will have settled out. It takes a few hours for the smallest silt particles to settle on top of this sand. Much of the smallest clay-sized particles will actually stay in suspension for up to a day. Organics in the soil will float to the top and remain there for an even longer period. Wait 24 hours and then measure the thickness of each of the layers with a ruler. To determine the percentages of each, divide the depth or thickness of each layer by the total depth of all three layers and then multiply the answer by 100. Once you know what percentages of each material are in your soil, you can begin to physically change it if need be. How to do this is discussed in the second half of the book.

The CDC found that 42 percent of packaged meat products sold at three national chain grocery stores sampled contained toxin-producing C. diff bacteria.136 The United States, it turns out, has the highest reported levels of C. diff meat contamination in the world.137

But peanuts are hardly representative of the average food. Everyone knows—via “visual observation of stool samples,” to use the New England Journal of Medicine’s way of saying “a glance before flushing”—that chunks of peanuts make their way through the alimentary canal undigested. Nuts are known for this. Peanuts (and corn kernels) are so uniquely and reliably hard to break down that they are used as “marker foods” in do-it-yourself tests of bowel transit time*—the time elapsed between consumption and dismissal.

It had been a long time since she had been served such exquisite food. The lukewarm offerings at the London soirees and parties couldn't begin to compare to this feast. In the past few months the Peyton household been able to afford much more than bread, bacon, and soup, with the occasional helping of fried sole or stewed mutton. For once she was glad not to have been seated next to a sparkling conversationalist, as it allowed her long periods of silence during which she could eat as much as she liked. And with the servants constantly offering new and dazzling dishes for the guests to sample, no one seemed to notice the unladylike gusto of her appetite. Hungrily she consumed a bowl of soup made with champagne and Camembert, followed by delicate veal strips coated in herb-dressed sauce, and tender vegetable marrow in cream... fish baked in clever little paper cases, which let out a burst of fragrant steam when opened... tiny buttered potatoes served on beds of watercress... and, most delightful of all, fruit relish served in hollowed-out orange rinds.

It's barely 8:00 a.m., but my train mates waste little time in breaking out the picnic material. But this isn't standard Japanese picnic fare: not a grain of rice or a pickled plum in sight. Instead, they fill the varnished wooden tables with thick slices of crusty bread, wedges of weeping cheese, batons of hard salamis, and slices of cured ham. To drink, bottles of local white wine, covered in condensation, and high-alcohol microbews rich in hops and local iconography. From the coastline we begin our slow, dramatic ascent into the mountains of Hokkaido. The colors bleed from broccoli to banana to butternut to beet as we climb, inching ever closer to the heart of autumn. My neighbors, an increasingly jovial group of thirtysomethings with a few words of English to spare, pass me a glass of wine and a plate of cheese, and I begin to feel the fog dissipate. We stop at a small train station in the foothills outside of Ginzan, and my entire car suddenly empties. A husband-and-wife team has set up a small stand on the train platform, selling warm apple hand pies made with layers of flaky pastry and apples from their orchard just outside of town. I buy one, take a bite, then immediately buy three more. Back on the train, young uniformed women flood the cars with samples of Hokkaido ice cream. The group behind me breaks out in song, a ballad, I'm later told, dedicated to the beauty of the season. Everywhere we go, from the golden fields of empty cornstalks to the dense forest thickets to the rushing rivers that carve up this land like the fat of a Wagyu steak, groups of camouflaged photographers lie in wait, tripods and shutter releases ready, hoping to capture the perfect photo of the SL Niseko steaming its way through the hills of Hokkaido.

I don't know where to begin on my plate. Everything looks so unfamiliar, yet appetizing. I decide to aim for the starch first, and settle my fork into a generous portion of what turns out to be risotto with bite-sized pieces of suckling pig. I'll take creamy risotto over that vile poi any day. The pork, so tender and juicy, has me humming Mele Kalikimaka, cause it feels like a Hawaiian Merry Christmas gift. I next try the entrée, a tender, flaky and surprisingly un-oily mackerel sprinkled with feta cheese and olives and cloaked in taro leaves. I have to give Telly some credit, I didn't know how this place could pull off merging three such divergent flavors, but somehow it works despite itself. "I can't believe how fantastic this food is," Jess mumbles through a bite of her pineapple-balsamic glazed wild boar spare ribs with tzatziki sauce. "Who'd have thought you could actually assemble a menu with Italian, Hawaiian and Greek food? I honestly thought it was a joke." "Joke's on us, cause this stuff is amazing." After dinner ends, Telly returns with a selection of desserts (including a baklava made with mascarpone cheese, coconut and pine nuts), a tray with sample shots of grappa, ouzo and okolehao, and a somewhat excessive appreciation for his customers.

While I waited for my food I padded in my slippers down the hallway to my studio and turned on the equipment. First the power strips, then the synths and samplers. Then I loaded the discs into my Akai samplers, listening to them whir and click quietly as they took code from the discs and loaded it into their Japanese sampler brains. I climbed under a table and turned on my Soundcraft twenty-four-channel mixing desk, and finally I turned on the power amplifier for the speakers. My studio was up and running and making the calm hum that is the quiet background noise of a studio, like distant traffic or a beach at night. I didn’t know what I was going to work on, so I loaded up some old gospel samples I’d had for years but never figured out how to use. Years ago I’d written a fast euro track called “Why Does My Heart?” that used these samples. Luckily I’d never released it, as it was pretty bad.

Gerald and I saw the Azore Islands, Talcahuano, Tumbez, San Francisco, and Nome from afar while the captain and officers rowed to shore for fresh food and fresh whalers. Even at Nome, not two days ago, Gerald and I watched the Alaskan town from the ship. We saw Talcahuano at night, the town alive with lights and torches. We heard music across the water. People celebrated an event on shore. We thought it might be a wedding. We imagined walking the clay, brick roads, ordering crabs and clams near the sea, sampling the local exotic fruits and plants growing in their vibrant colors and prickly skins, and of course, seducing the dark- skinned indigenous women emanating macadamia oil, musk, and leafy air. Merihim laughed at our children’s eyes and said to act like men, not like guttersnipes at a bakery window.

Cubby’s one of the best pitmasters in the world. His brisket is so falling-apart tender you’d swear it was cooked in butter. Folks would travel miles to sample Queen’s house-made sausage, her vegan portobello sandwiches with creamy remoulade, and her Texas sheet cake.

From Shanghai, Meyer had sent seeds and cuttings of oats, millet, a thin-skinned watermelon, and new types of cotton. The staff of Fairchild's office watched with anticipation each time one of Meyer's shipments were unpacked. There were seeds of wild pears, new persimmons, and leaves of so-called Manchurian spinach that America's top spinach specialist would declare was the best America had ever seen. Meyer had delivered the first samples of asparagus ever to officially enter the United States. In 1908, few people had seen a soybean, a green legume common in central China. Even fewer people could have imagined that within one hundred years, the evolved descendants of soybeans that Meyer shipped back would cover the Midwest of the United States like a rug. Soybeans would be applied to more diverse uses than any other crop in history, as feed for livestock, food for humans (notably vegetarians), and even a renewable fuel called biodiesel. Meyer also hadn't come empty-handed. He had physically brought home a bounty, having taken from China a steamer of the Standard Oil Company that, unlike a passenger ship, allowed him limitless cargo and better onboard conditions for plant material. He arrived with twenty tons, including red blackberries, wild apricots, two large zelkova trees (similar to elms), Chinese holly shrub, twenty-two white-barked pines, eighteen forms of lilac, four viburnum bushes that produced edible red berries, two spirea bushes with little white flowers, a rhododendron bush with pink and purple flowers, an evergreen shrub called a daphne, thirty kinds of bamboo (some of them edible), four types of lilies, and a new strain of grassy lawn sedge.

Trying to decide---I can't say if you should wait in line at Salt & Straw or Voodoo Doughnuts. Do you have a preference?" "Not waiting in line? Portlanders are surprisingly willing to wait for their food." "They're willing to wait when the food is worth their time. I think Salt & Straw. And really, they've got a smart setup to keep your wait as short as possible, and they give out samples while you're in line. At least, they did when I was there." "And this is... artisanal salt? And straw?" "It's ice cream," I said with a laugh. "Really good ice cream, with fun, inventive flavors. And even if you don't want inventive, the basics are worth the wait." "Well, if you're sending me to ice cream, then you have to get Cat to take you to Black Dog Gelato. Once you're back in Chicago, at least.

Cook had seen an avocado before, but not like this---so smooth, so green. The fruit took an express route to the greenhouse, where workers propagated the seeds, first in soil, and then suspended slightly in water. Fairchild had included written instructions that only mature trees would fruit, after several years, not months. He advised that as soon as the seedlings grew reasonable roots, they should be shipped to experiment stations in California to be shared with farmers interested in experimental crops. Cook complied, and then mostly forgot about the avocado. In California, that single shipment helped build an industry. Other avocados turned up as well, from travelers or tourists who packed the oversized seeds as souvenirs. There were one-off stories that avocados had been spotted in America before, in Hollywood in 1886 or near Miami in 1894. But none were as sturdy as Fairchild's Chilean variety, prized for its versatility, color, and flavor---résumé of strong pedigree. Fairchild's avocado would turn out to be a mix of a Guatemalan avocado and a Mexican avocado and to have been only a short-term tenant in Chilean soil before Fairchild picked it up. But as with most popular fruits, the true geographic origin faded into irrelevance. Farmers and early geneticists dissected this sample and ones that came after it to create newer cultivars attuned to more specialized climates or tastes. This work yielded a twentieth-century variety called Fuerte, Spanish for "strong," growable in the coldest conditions ever tested on an avocado. It fell from favor after proving unable to ship even modest distances without bruising.

The grape, of a variety known as sultanina, would ultimately grow best in the wet and temperate soil of California. America's region most climatically similar to the Mediterranean. Fairchild's sample from Italy was the Sultanina rosea seedless raisin grape, which was a stronger specimen than a green sultanina that had already made it to California as nursery stock. Regardless of who was first to lay eyes on the sultanina, the variety took little time to grow into the most popular grape in America, adored by winemakers, raisin producers, and people who ate grapes by the fistful.

Dinner passed with surprising rapidity. Harry tried to sample at least a little of all the weird new foods he saw. His curiosity couldn't stand the thought of not knowing how something tasted. Thank goodness this wasn't a restaurant where you had to order only one thing and you never found out what all the other things on the menu tasted like. Harry hated that, it was like a torture chamber for anyone with a spark of curiosity: Find out about only one of the mysteries on this list, ha ha ha!

As soon as we emerge from the tube and walk through the limestone archway on Borough High Street, we are bombarded by purveyors of everything from fresh vegetables and buttery pastries to goat's milk ice cream and soft, eggy strands of pasta. Hugh lets me wander up and down the aisles, and I stop to watch one vendor stir a three-foot-wide paella pan, offering up piping hot bowls of tender prawns and rice to a throng of hungry customers.

In a classic study published in 1992, the New England Journal of Medicine reported an important breakthrough about where these antibodies may be coming from. Researchers had taken blood samples from 142 children with type 1 diabetes. Every single child had antibodies to proteins in cow’s milk. Further study showed that these antibodies were capable of attacking the insulin-producing cells of the pancreas.

In the bottom right is the grilled fish of the day--- in this case, teriyaki yellowtail. Top left is a selection of sashimi and pickled dishes.: Akashi sea bream, Kishu tuna, and flash-grilled Karatsu abalone. Seared Miyajima conger eel, served with pickled cucumber and myoga ginger. And in the bottom left is the matsutake rice--- the mushrooms are from Shinshu, and wonderfully fragrant. I'll bring some soup over shortly. In the meantime, enjoy!' Nagare bowed and turned back to the kitchen. 'Let's tuck in,' said Tae, joining her hands together in appreciation before reaching for her chopsticks. 'It's delicious,' said Nobuko, who had already reached into the bento and sampled the sea bream. 'The sashimi looks wonderful, but these appetizers are simply exquisite. Let's see... rolled barracuda sushi, dash-maki omelette, and those look like quail tsukume balls. And this simmered octopus--- it just melts on your tongue!

as Daschle’s bill was still being drafted, a meat industry lobbyist named Sara Lilygren sent out an e-mail. Lilygren worked for the American Meat Institute, the biggest and oldest lobbying firm for meatpackers. But her e-mail wasn’t sent only to those in the meat business. The address list for this message was a broad cross-section of the industrial food system. It included lobbyists and employees of major food companies like ConAgra, Cargill, and Monsanto, along with lobbyists for industry groups like the National Chicken Council and The Turkey Federation. Lilygren included several of her coworkers at the American Meat Institute on the address list.4 The e-mail’s goal was simple. All the corporate food lobbyists had to work together to stop Daschle’s effort, which would rein in the market power of IBP, Tyson, and Smithfield. The e-mail included a sample letter that was to be sent to U.S. senators, helpfully pre-addressed to “Senator xxxxxxx.” This sample letter urged senators not to cosponsor Daschle’s bill. In other words, it was urging lawmakers to back off from the measure before it was even proposed, winnowing away the number of lawmakers who might help bring it to the Senate for debate. The letter acknowledged that the bill wasn’t even finished yet but still declared that it was an assault on the rural economy itself.

The propaganda worked, not just on my mother, but across the region. It was, we know now, a global scheme engineered by Nestlé to get mothers hooked on formula and to give up breastfeeding. Mothers were taught the risks of breastfeeding and discharged from hospitals armed with sample boxes of formula and baby bottles, ready to rear their children like their wealthy, wondrous, Western counterparts who had already bought into the marketing. But when my grandfather examined the ingredient list on the back of the Nestlé tin can, he flung it across the room. “What is this nonsense?” Dada Abu raged. This was not milk from a living creature. Not from a goat or cow or buffalo or sheep. It was dead milk, made from dead, fake ingredients. And no way was his granddaughter going to be drinking this trash.

The pink ingredient in your fried rice: it had to be these." Nagare produced a packet of fish sausages from a plastic bag at his side. "You must have noticed them in the rice?" "Oh yes," said Hatsuko. "You know, I think I remember seeing something like that in our fridge." "I picked these up in Yawatahama. A local butcher told me this brand was the closest you could get to the type Aihachi Foods used to make." Nagare set the sausages to one side, then produced another packet from his bag. "Now, this was the other reason for that pink color." "What's that?" asked Hatsuko. "A Yawatahama specialty. Kamaboko flakes. Just like bonito flakes, except made from kamaboko fish cake instead of tuna. They were invented back before people had fridges, as a way of making kamaboko last longer. Normally you'd sprinkle them over things like chirashi-zushi, but your mother decided they'd be a good addition to her fried rice. They make a pretty decent drinking snack too, by the way." Nagare opened the packet and retrieved a handful of the flakes, which he began to nibble on. "So it wasn't just the fish sausage, then," said Hatsuko, also sampling the flakes. "That's right," said Koishi, grabbing a handful for herself. "Given what they're both made from, it's no wonder you remembered the fried rice having a fishy flavor." "As for the all-important seasoning," continued Nagare, "I imagine she used a mix of shredded shio-kombu and sour plum. That's where that tart aftertaste you mentioned came from. Then I realized: sour plum is pink too. It all fits the color scheme, see?" He showed her a can of the shredded kelp and sour plum mix. Hatsuko gave a deep, appreciative nod.

1. Sri Lanka’s Cultural and Historical Richness "Sri Lanka is a place where history lives in harmony with the present. From ancient temples to colonial fortresses, every corner of this island tells a story." Sri Lanka’s history stretches over 2,500 years, featuring incredible landmarks like the Sigiriya Rock Fortress and Anuradhapura's ancient ruins. The country is also home to the famous Temple of the Tooth in Kandy, an important religious site for Buddhists around the world. Each historic site tells a different story, making Sri Lanka a treasure trove of cultural and spiritual experiences. Find out more about planning a visit here. ________________________________________ 2. Nature’s Bounty and Biodiversity "In Sri Lanka, nature isn't merely observed; it's experienced with all the senses — from the scent of spice plantations to the sight of vibrant tea terraces and the sound of waves on pristine beaches." Sri Lanka’s national parks, like Yala and Udawalawe, are among the best places to see elephants, leopards, and a diverse range of bird species. The island’s ecosystems, from rainforests to coastal mangroves, create an incredible array of landscapes for nature lovers to explore. For those planning to visit these natural wonders, start your journey with a visa application. ________________________________________ 3. Sri Lankan Hospitality and Warmth "The true beauty of Sri Lanka is found in its people — hospitable, welcoming, and ready to share a smile or story over a cup of tea." The warmth of Sri Lankans is a common highlight for visitors, whether encountered in bustling cities or quiet villages. Tourists are frequently invited to join meals or participate in local festivities, making Sri Lanka a welcoming destination for international travelers. To experience this hospitality firsthand, ensure you have the right travel documents, accessible here. ________________________________________ 4. Beaches and Scenic Coastal Areas "Sri Lanka’s coastline is a place where sun meets sand, and every wave brings with it a sense of peace." With over 1,300 kilometers of beautiful coastline, Sri Lanka offers something for everyone. The south coast is famous for relaxing beaches like Unawatuna and Mirissa, while the east coast’s Arugam Bay draws surfing enthusiasts from around the globe. To enjoy these beaches, start by obtaining a Sri Lanka visa. ________________________________________ 5. Tea Plantations and the Hill Country "The heart of Sri Lanka beats in the hill country, where misty mountains and lush tea plantations stretch as far as the eye can see." The central highlands of Sri Lanka, with towns like Ella and Nuwara Eliya, are dotted with tea plantations that produce some of the world’s finest teas. Visiting a tea plantation offers a chance to see tea processing and sample fresh brews, with the cool climate adding to the serene experience. Secure your entry to the hill country with a visa application. ________________________________________ 6. Sri Lankan Cuisine: A Feast for the Senses "In Sri Lanka, food is more than sustenance — it’s an art form, a burst of flavors that range from spicy curries to sweet desserts." Sri Lankan cuisine is a rich blend of spices and textures. Popular dishes like rice and curry, hoppers, and kottu roti offer a true taste of the island. Food tours and local markets provide immersive culinary experiences, allowing visitors to discover the flavors of Sri Lanka. For a trip centered on food and culture, start your journey here.

I pulled into the parking lot, went inside, turned down a free sample of nasty-looking Bourbon chicken from a vendor in the food court, and proceeded to Gamer's Castle. "Hi," said the gawky teenager behind the counter. I nodded and briefly looked through the racks of role-playing game merchandise. There was Dungeons and Dragons stuff out the wazoo, and even kits for hosting your own murder mystery parties, should I ever grow weary of having my murder mystery needs satisfied by real life.

Can you picture the fly alighting on the plant as the teenager sampling their first shandy? Can you visualize the lager lout just about to throw up as the bloated fly before it tries to take off? And when the alcoholic can no longer close his eyes to the fact that his life is being dominated and ruined by drink, doesn’t he try to cut down and control his intake, rather like someone who is grossly overweight attempts to cut down on food. But does dieting make food appear less precious? Quite the contrary. The more you cut down, the more hungry you get, the hungrier you get the more deprived you feel, the more deprived you feel the more precious each morsel becomes. Exactly the same happens when you try to cut down on your drinking. At the times when you won’t allow yourself to drink, you feel miserable because you can’t drink, and when you do allow yourself to drink, you still feel miserable because you can’t drink enough. Aren’t the struggles of the fly similar to the abortive struggles of the alcoholic who is trying to control his intake? Drinking hasn’t become less precious to him. On the contrary, it now dominates his whole life. The more both the fly and the alcoholic struggle to escape, the more imprisoned they become. Are the semi-digested insects not comparable to the down-and-out meths drinkers of skid row, whose entire existence is now confined to begging or stealing the next fix, and trying to find somewhere warm to sleep off the effects? Does the fact that the fly can see the partially digested bodies prevent it from joining them? Who knows?

Long before the metal-using civilizations had taken form, early man had identified the most useful varieties of plants, animals, and insects out of the thousands of species-themselves singled out of hundreds of thousands of species-that he must have sampled. All man's food resources and most of the material for clothing, shelter, and transportation were identified and utilized before the introduction of metallurgy. Though bitter tastes are repulsive, early man experimentally learned ways of depriving potentially useful foods of their poisonous alkaloids or acids; and though starchy, hard-husk grains are not digestible in their raw state, our neolithic predecessors learned to pulverize them and make a paste for baking a digestible bread on a flat stone.

carrots

sampled the tasty food until, appetites sated,

1. Give your toddler some large tubular pasta and a shoelace.  Show her how to thread the shoelace through the pasta. 2. Take an empty long wrapping paper tube and place one end on the edge of the sofa and the other end on the floor.  Give him a small ball such as a Ping Pong ball to roll down the tube.   3. Give her some individually wrapped toilet tissues, some boxes of facial tissue or some small tins of food such as tomato paste.  Then let her have fun stacking them.     4. Wrap a small toy and discuss what might be inside it.  Give it to him to unwrap. Then rewrap as he watches.  Have him unwrap it again.    5. Cut  such fruits as strawberries and bananas into chunks.  Show her how to slide the chunks onto a long plastic straw.  Then show her how you can take off one chunk at a time, dip it into some yogurt and eat it.   6. Place a paper towel over a water-filled glass.  Wrap a rubber band around the top of the glass to hold the towel in place.  Then place a penny on top of the paper towel in the centre of the glass.  Give your child a pencil to poke holes in the towel until the penny sinks to the bottom of the glass.   7. You will need a small sheet of coarse sandpaper and various lengths of chunky wool.  Show him how to place these lengths of wool on the sandpaper and how the strands stick to it.   8. Use a large photo or picture and laminate it or put it between the sheets of clear contact paper.  Cut it into several pieces to create a puzzle.   9. Give her two glasses, one empty and one filled with water.  Then show her how to use a large eyedropper in order to transfer some of the water into the empty glass.   10. Tie the ends/corners of several scarves together.  Stuff the scarf inside an empty baby wipes container and pull a small portion up through the lid and then close the lid.  Let your toddler enjoy pulling the scarf out of the container.   11. Give your child some magnets to put on a cookie sheet.  As your child puts the magnets on the cookie sheet and takes them off, talk about the magnets’ colours, sizes, etc.   12. Use two matching sets of stickers. Put a few in a line on a page and see if he can match the pattern.  Initially, you may need to lift an edge of the sticker off the page since that can be difficult to do.    13. You will need a piece of thin Styrofoam or craft foam and a few cookie cutters.  Cut out shapes in the Styrofoam with the cookie cutters and yet still keep the frame of the styrofoam intact.  See if your child can place the cookie cutters back into their appropriate holes.        14. Give her a collection of pompoms that vary in colour and size and see if she can sort them by colour or size into several small dishes. For younger toddlers, put a sample pompom colour in each dish.   15. Gather a selection of primary colour paint chips or cut squares of card stock or construction paper.  Make sure you have several of the same colour.  Choose primary colours.  See if he can match the colours.  Initially, he may be just content to play with the colored chips stacking them or making patterns with them.

Melba comes over and takes our baskets away, interrupting the conversation. Once she’s gone, my eyes drop to the table. Holy crap. The only things left are two placemats, mine and Dev’s. His looks brand new, but mine, on the other hand, is covered in a sample of every bit of food that passed through my lips. Fish? Yes. Fish coating? Yes. Hushpuppy guts? Yes. Coleslaw? Of course. It’s like a Chicken Licken bomb went off at our table, but only left shrapnel in front of me. How embarrassing! Now he knows I eat like a total warthog! Dev doesn’t say a word. Instead, he lifts his placemat up, reaches over and slides my placemat to his side of the table, and then places his down in front of me. Now he’s the warthog, and I’m the princess who wouldn’t dare drop a speck of hushpuppy anywhere but on her napkin. I know it’s crazy, but tears well up in my eyes. This has to be the single most chivalrous, charming thing a man has ever done for me. Forget opening doors and throwing jackets over puddles. When a man covers for me, taking the heat for my horrible table manners, he wins my loyalty for life. When Melba returns with sweet tea refills, she looks down at the table and smiles. She doesn’t need to say anything; she just looks at me and winks. My heart feels like it’s filling up so full with happiness that it’s going to explode. “You

Above a certain size and level of prosperity, regional cities in Japan look alike. To discover what makes each one different, one has to sample the food and the sake, and stay long enough to see the patterns of life under the surface. Otherwise it can be hard to tell them apart. Wealth tends to smooth out the differences in the way people live. Life becomes standardized. Only in nature, in the mountains and valleys beyond the hand of man, are the real differences, the real uniqueness, preserved. There is something about the air in Hokkaido, a kind of richness that will never change. For better or worse, the only thing that really changes is people.

The problem is that they don’t even realize that they’re walking a new road every day. They don’t see that the fields are new and the seasons change. All they think about is food and water.

Various factors in the changed environment were studied critically. Samples of foods were gathered for chemical analysis; and the changes in the modern diet from that which was characteristic of the primitives were studied. When the teeth of the primitives and the teeth found in the skulls that had been assembled in the museums were examined, it was found that dental caries or tooth decay was exceedingly rare among the isolated groups. Those individuals, however, who had adopted the foods of the white man suffered extremely from tooth decay as did the whites. Where they had no opportunity to get native food to combine with the white man's food their condition was desperate and extreme

The police had assumed that Tony Samples had murdered the health inspector for some reason given that the murder method, which was rather unusual, matched the one used on his father.

As I study routinely the sample dietaries being used by people suffering from dental caries, usually associated with other disturbances, I find large numbers who are not getting in their food even half the minimum requirements of calcium, phosphorus and magnesium and iron and usually only a fraction of the minimum requirements of the fat-soluble vitamins. These latter have a role which in many respects is like the battery of an automobile which provides the spark for igniting the fuel. Even though the tank is filled with gasoline there is no power without the igniting spark

Dear sweet Grace," Meg began, "men are like a buffet. There are all sorts of different 'flavors,' if you will, for you to sample. Exotic, spicy, foreign, sweet. However, you tend to keep going to the comfort food section of the buffet. How many times can you eat fried chicken before it make you sick?

When my hunger grew to the point of distraction, I climbed onto buses and rode to the Marina, Fillmore Street, or Pacific Heights. I toured high-end delis, lingering at polished marble countertops and sampling an olive, a slice of Canadian bacon, or a sliver of Havarti. I asked the questions Elizabeth would have asked: which olive oils are unfiltered; exactly how "fresh" was the albacore, the salmon, the sole; how sweet were the season's first blood oranges?

called in sick. Ironically, the reason was food poisoning, perhaps caused by sampling one of the hospital’s entrées.

So уоu ѕit dоwn аnd make a рlаn. This dоеѕn’t rеԛuirе muсh еnеrgу, and уоu can spread thе work оut оvеr many dауѕ. Yоu idеntifу all thе vаriоuѕ targets уоu’ll need to strike if уоu wаnt tо hаvе a chance оf ѕuссеѕѕ. First, аll thе junk fооd nееdѕ to lеаvе your kitchen, inсluding аnуthing you hаvе a tеndеnсу tо оvеrеаt, and уоu need tо rерlасе it with foods thаt will help уоu lоѕе wеight, like fruitѕ аnd veggies. Sесоndlу, уоu knоw уоu’ll bе tеmрtеd to gеt fаѕt fооd if уоu come hоmе hungrу аnd dоn’t have аnуthing rеаdу tо eat, ѕо уоu dесidе to рrе-сооk a wееk’ѕ wоrth of food in аdvаnсе еасh wееkеnd. Thаt wау you always have something in thе refrigerator. Yоu ѕеt aside a blосk of ѕеvеrаl hours еасh weekend to buу grосеriеѕ and сооk аll your food fоr thе wееk. Plus уоu gеt a dесеnt сооkbооk of hеаlthу recipes. Gеt a decent ѕсаlе thаt саn measure wеight and body fаt %. Mаkе a liѕt оf sample mеаlѕ (5 brеаkfаѕtѕ, 5 lunсhеѕ, аnd 5 dinnеrѕ), аnd роѕt it on уоur rеfrigеrаtоr. And ѕо оn…. At thiѕ роint аll оf thiѕ gоеѕ intо thе writtеn рlаn. Then уоu еxесutе — hаrd and fast. Yоu can рrоbаblу implement thе whole рlаn in one day. Purge thе unhealthy fооd frоm the kitсhеn. Buу thе nеw grосеriеѕ, thе nеw сооkbооk, and the new ѕсаlе. Post thе wеight сhаrt аnd thе sample mеаlѕ liѕt. Sеlесt recipes аnd сооk a batch of fооd fоr thе wееk. Whew! By thе end of the day, you’ve uѕеd your willpower nоt tо diеt dirесtlу but tо еѕtаbliѕh the соnditiоnѕ that will mаkе уоur diеt еаѕiеr tо fоllоw. When уоu wаkе uр thе next mоrning, уоu’ll find your environment drаmаtiсаllу changed in ассоrdаnсе with уоur рlаn. Yоur fridge will be stocked with рlеntу оf pre-cooked hеаlthу fооd fоr you to еаt. Thеrе wоn’t bе any junkiе рrоblеm fооdѕ in уоur home. Yоu’ll hаvе a rеgulаr blосk оf time ѕеt аѕidе for grосеrу shopping and food prep. It will ѕtill require ѕоmе discipline to follow your diеt, but уоu’vе already сhаngеd thingѕ ѕо much thаt it wоn’t bе nearly аѕ diffiсult аѕ it wоuld bе withоut thеѕе changes.

Bok Choy Seitan Pho (Vietnamese Noodle Soup) After sampling pho at a Vietnamese noodle shop in Los Angeles, I was on a mission to create a simple plant-based version of this aromatic, festive noodle dish in my own kitchen. My recipe features seitan, a wonderful plant-based protein found in many natural food stores. My whole family loves the interactive style in which this soup is served. In fact, you can plan a dinner party around this traditional meal. Simply dish up the noodles and bubbling broth into large soup bowls, set out a variety of vegetable toppings, and let your guests serve it up their way. MAKES 4 SERVINGS BROTH 4 cups reduced-sodium vegetable broth ½ medium yellow onion, chopped ½ cup sliced shiitake mushrooms 1 medium carrot, sliced 4 garlic cloves, minced 8 thin slices peeled fresh ginger root 1 tablespoon reduced-sodium soy sauce 1 tablespoon rice wine vinegar 1 tablespoon agave syrup ¼ teaspoon ground black pepper 2 cinnamon sticks 2 star anise pods ½ teaspoon whole coriander 6 sprigs of fresh basil 6 sprigs of fresh cilantro NOODLES One 8-ounce package flat rice noodles TOPPINGS One 8-ounce package seitan (wheat gluten) strips, thinly sliced 2 small bunches of fresh bok choy, sliced thinly 1 cup fresh bean sprouts ½ cup coarsely chopped cilantro ½ cup coarsely chopped basil 1 small lime, cut into wedges 1 small jalapeño pepper, seeded and diced 4 green onions, sliced TO PREPARE THE BROTH: 1. Combine all the broth ingredients in a large pot, cover, and bring to a low boil. Reduce the heat and simmer for 30 minutes. Strain the broth, discarding the vegetables and seasonings. Return the strained broth to the pot, cover, and keep warm (broth should be bubbling right before serving time). While broth is cooking, prepare noodles and toppings. TO PREPARE THE NOODLES: 1. Bring a medium pot of water to a boil. Add the rice noodles, cover, and cook until just tender, about 5 minutes, or according to package directions. Drain the noodles immediately and rinse with cold water. Return the drained noodles to the pot and cover. TO PREPARE THE TOPPINGS: 1. Arrange the toppings on a large platter. 2. To serve the soup, divide the noodles among four very large soup bowls. Either garnish the noodles with desired toppings or let your guests do their own. Ladle boiling broth over the noodles and toppings, and serve immediately. Allow hot broth to wilt vegetables and cool slightly before eating it. PER SERVING (ABOUT 2 OUNCES NOODLES, 2 OUNCES SEITAN, 1 CUP VEGETABLE TOPPINGS, AND 1 CUP BROTH): Calories: 310 • Carbohydrates: 55 g • Fiber: 4 g • Protein: 17 g • Total fat: 2 g • Saturated fat: 0 g • Sodium: 427 mg • Star nutrients: Vitamin A (39% DV), vitamin C (23% DV), iron (11% DV), selenium (13% DV)

Plant proteins are not only free of animal fat and cholesterol; they are also free of two problems caused by animal proteins. First, animal protein is linked to osteoporosis, apparently because it causes the kidneys to lose calcium in the urine. If you were to check urine samples from people following meaty diets—especially high-protein Atkins-style diets—you would find that they lose calcium rapidly.3 Sodium does the same thing, as we’ll see below. Second, animal protein is also linked to gradual loss of kidney function. Harvard researchers studied a group of women who had already lost some kidney function, as many people do, due to high blood pressure, diabetes, urinary infections, or other factors. As the years went by, the researchers found that those women who tended to get their protein from animal products were much more likely to experience continued loss of kidney function.4 Protein from plants did not have this effect. So if you get your protein from beans, grains, vegetables, and other foods from plant sources, your kidneys will breathe a sigh of relief.

The following day, Kiva and Naari set out to collect samples involving food storage and preparation.

When promoting Grandpa Po’s Originals at Whole Foods Market in West Hollywood, a young man attempted to down the entire sample cup of the crunchy golden nuggets in one gulp and started choking. I leaned in and whispered, “You’re gonna kill my business if you die here. Can you do it over in produce?” He burst out laughing and spit out a hull. I saved his life, and he bought two bags in gratitude.

Hold your horses,” I said. “What do you know about fairies? Aside from how they taste?” Eric looked at me with clearer eyes. “They’re lovely, male and female both. Incredibly tough and ferocious. They aren’t immortal, but they live a very long time unless something happens to them. You can kill them with iron, for example. There are other ways to kill them, but it’s hard work. They like to keep to themselves for the most part. They like moderate climates. I don’t know what they eat or drink when they’re by themselves. They sample the food of other cultures; I’ve even seen a fairy try blood. They have a higher opinion of themselves than they have any right to. When they give their word, they keep it.” He thought for a moment. “They have different magics. They can’t all do the same things. And they are very magical. It’s their essence. They have no gods but their own race, for they’ve often been mistaken for gods. In fact, some of them have taken on the attributes of a deity.” I gaped at him. “What do you mean?” “Well, I don’t mean they’re holy,” Eric said. “I mean that the fairies who inhabit the woods identify with the woods so strongly that to hurt one is to hurt the other. So they’ve suffered a great drop in numbers.

had the Number One Dinner—buff-colored fish soup with the pasty American bread on the side, followed by a sandwich of ground meat and raw vegetables doused with a tomato sauce and served on a soft, oily roll. To tell the truth, I did not much enjoy the meal; but it seems a sort of duty to sample more of the American food than I have thus far.

Hugh just dropped off the cheese selection for the week. I thought you'd like to sample?" I perked up immediately. Sampling cheese sounded fun. I was starving. The Hobnobs hadn't been particularly filling. The light, airy dining room was a beehive of activity. Four servers buzzed around, readying tables, wrapping silverware. Outside someone was watering the ornamental cabbages. I sat at a table with Chandice and tasted a half dozen local cheeses. A sharp English cheddar with a bite that lingered just at the hint of your jaw, a creamy goat cheese lavished with a sweet onion chutney. Stuffing the last of a very toothsome local blue cheese into my mouth, I looked around at the happy bustle with satisfaction. This is what I had always dreamed of, this bright hive of positive energy.

There was butternut squash soup from Providence, crispy rice and sour-pork salad from Lum Ka Naad, prawns with black vinegar dressing from Kato, Wagyu beef prepared by n/naka, crispy fried chicken from Dulan's, duck tartare from Animal, barrio tacos from Teddy's and miniconchas from La Favorita Bakery that were so small and delicate that it was hard to just eat one... or six.

The crowd trails us through the park as we play games at the Penny Arcade and ride Pirates of the Caribbean. Eriku insists on sampling all the foods available. In between Splash Mountain and Big Thunder Mountain, we eat Ukiwaman, shrimp in a doughy bun in adorable Donald Duck packaging. We have curry rice and then a milk tea drink with berries on the bottom and whipped cream and nuts at the top for lunch.

After collecting a stool sample from its customers, Viome (which Peter and I invested in through his venture firm, BOLD Capital Partners) uses its genetic sequencing technology to identify trillions of microbes in the gut and analyze their activities, including their biochemical interactions with the foods you eat. (Another great company that does biome analysis is called GI Map.) “There wasn’t even a supercomputer that was built ten years ago that could have analyzed this massive set of data,” says Viome’s CEO, Naveen Jain. Using advanced artificial intelligence, Viome crunches that data to offer individualized advice on which foods and supplements may positively or negatively affect your microbiome.

The first proper sample-based census was not carried out until 1949, so demographers have to reconstruct population totals from micro-level data on food supply, settlement patterns, village counts, birth records, and the like. The most sophisticated modeling by French and Belgian demographers variously suggests a population of 8 to 11 million in 1885 and 10 to 12 million by 1908. The Belgian Jean-Paul Sanderson, using a backward projection method by age cohorts, found a slight decline, from 10.5 million in 1885 to 10 million in 1910. This estimated change in total population governed by changing birth and death rates over a 25 year period represents a negligible annual net decline in population.

In what is considered to be one of the toughest foot races on earth, competitors run the equivalent of six regular marathons over six days in the Sahara Desert, during which they are required to carry their own food. Blood samples were taken from runners 72 hours after completion of the race, with researchers noting a “significant alteration of the blood antioxidant defense capacity” and concluding that “such extreme competition induced an imbalance between oxidant and antioxidant protection.

So single serving, “fun sized,” etc. samples are great lead magnets. It’s how Costco sells more food than other stores–they give out samples!

The ship circled the dome cluster like a mosquito who’d shown up at an orgy and was trying to decide which buttock to sample first.

Oh, hell, Khrisen, what do you want?” Mama questioned, looking over at us. “The food isn’t done and won’t be for a little while longer. And before you ask, hell no, you can’t get a sample of shit.” “Man.” He sucked his teeth and shook his head. “Mama, I am a growing boy; you can’t keep starving me like this.” “Bye, Khrisen.” She laughed and shook her head. “Nobody is worried about all that crying you're about to start doing. You should’ve eaten lunch.” “Lunch was six hours ago,” he argued. Mama cut her eyes at him, and I chuckled. Khrisen stayed on Mama’s nerves the most out of all of us. I walked over to Mahogany and stepped into her

Fourteen Ways To Tame Pharma 1. No more direct-to-consumer advertising on TV, in magazines, or on the internet 2. No more drug company-sponsored junkets, dinners, promotional gifts, or continuing medical education for doctors or medical students 3. No more financial support for medical professional organizations 4. No more beautiful salespeople congregating in the doctors' waiting room 5. No more free samples 6. No more off-label marketing 7. No more co-opting of thought leaders 8. No more drug company funding for the Food and Drug Administration 9. Bigger fines and criminal penalties for malfeasance that are directed against the executives as well as the companies 10. Shortened patent protection for companies that break the law 11. No more financial aid for consumer advocacy groups 12. No more disease-awareness campaigns 13. No more unlimited and undisclosed contributions to politicians 14. A three-year quarantine before politicians, staffers, and bureaucrats involved in setting or monitoring drug company regulations can join a drug company as officer or employee

When she found unfamiliar edibles, she would slice them with her knife and touch her tongue lightly to the fresh flesh. If nothing happened—no tingling or burning—she would carry the morsel with her and, a few hours later, take a tiny bite. Only after several samplings over a period of time would she dare to start consuming a new food.

I had a pretty good, though untrained, palate and sense of smell, and Adeena was forever coming up with little tests to see if I could determine what was in certain food and drinks. I didn't mind--- these tastings had fast become a ritual with us, a fun way to start the day and keep my senses sharp. Plus, I did enjoy showing off a bit. I was pretty sure I knew what spices were in the honey I'd just sampled, but just in case, I took another healthy bite of the honey-topped scone and chewed slowly, letting the contrasting textures and flavors permeate my mouth. The crisp crust of the scone yielded to a soft, fluffy interior that melted in the mouth. The clotted cream added body and richness and perfectly complemented the sweetly spiced honey. "Star anise, cinnamon, cardamom, cloves, black pepper, and just a touch of ginger," I pronounced.

Yogurt is good for you. And it’s just one spoon,” Sharpcot had replied, but this stack summoned a billion voices, all of them saying in a chorus, “Just one spoon.” From kids’ lunches and store shelves and desk drawers and airline meal packs, in every country of the world: Canada and the United States and Nicaragua and Uruguay and Argentina and Ireland and Burkina Faso and Russia and Papua New Guinea and New Zealand and very probably the Antarctic. Where wasn’t there disposable cutlery? Plastic spoons in endless demand, in endless supply, from factory floors where they are manufactured and packaged in boxes of 10 or 20 or 100 or 1000 or individually in clear wrap, boxed on skids and trucked to trains freighting them to port cities and onto giant container ships plying the seas to international ports to intercity transport trucks to retail delivery docks for grocery stores and retail chains, supplying restaurants and homes, consumers moving them from shelf to cart to bag to car to house, where they are stuck in the lunches of the children of polluting parents, or used once each at a birthday party to serve ice cream to four-year-olds where only some are used but who knows which? So used and unused go together in the trash, or every day one crammed into a hipster’s backpack to eat instant pudding at his software job in an open-concept walkup in a gentrified neighbourhood, or handed out from food trucks by the harbour, or set in a paper cup at a Costco table for customers to sample just one bite of this exotic new flavour, and so they go into trash bins and dumpsters and garbage trucks and finally vast landfill sites or maybe just tossed from the window of a moving car or thrown over the rail of a cruise ship to sink in the ocean deep.

I'd wanted to travel through Asia most of my life, sample all the incredible street food in Thailand and Vietnam, tour Japan's famous convenience stores that sold food as good as their restaurants, slurp cumin lamb hand-torn noodles in China.