Core Dump

This is my modification of a recipe I found on the web.

Use three or four skinless chicken breasts (or whatever quantity you want, but a pan holds four large ones).

- Make crumbs from 1/3 to 1/2 a box of Ritz crackers.

- Add spices (basil, pepper, parsley - whatever you want).

- Pour the crumbs into a large ziplock bag.

- Put about 1/3 of a container of sour cream on a plate and add some chopped garlic (the commercial type in jar mixes well).

- Roll the chicken in the sour cream and then transfer into the bag to cover with the crumbs.

- Place in a shallow oiled or sprayed baking pan.

- Sprinkle the chicken pieces liberally with Parmesan cheese.

- Bake for an hour at 350

This recipe has the Ed and Rosalie Soltys seal of approval.

Labels: food

It's been a while since I've had anything to eat at McDonalds. I try to avoid fast-food joints, and they're down near the bottom of my favourites list, but sometimes they're the only option. So what's on the menu that won't kill you? LifeHacker has kindly put together a guide that shows you the best and worst choices on the menu. None of the best choices are great, but they're far better than the worst five, any of which could cause serious problems for anyone with high cholesterol or high blood pressure (check out the sodium levels!).

Labels: food

It hasn't been a good year for tomatoes, at least on this side of the continent. Tomatoes like hot, sunny, and not too wet weather, which is exactly what we haven't been getting. Our tomato plants are about half the size they should be, and only a few have flowered, which means we probably won't get much of a crop at all. (Our zucchini are doing just fine, on the other hand). Part of the problem is that our garden gets a lot of shade from our neighbours' trees, but short of chain saw surgery, there's not much we can do about that.

But the wet, humid, and cool growing season isn't affecting just us. It's perfect weather for plant diseases, and tomato growers across the northeast have been hit with a widespread outbreak of late blight, a fungus that can lay waste to a tomato patch in a matter of days. And as this New York Times article points out, modern industrial farming and retailing practices are contributing to its spread.

But weather alone doesn’t explain the early severity of the disease this year. We’ve had wet, cool summers in the past, but it’s never been this bad. Instead we have to look at two other factors: the origin of the tomato plants many of us cultivate, and the renewed interest in gardening.

According to plant pathologists, this killer round of blight began with a widespread infiltration of the disease in tomato starter plants. Large retailers like Home Depot, Kmart, Lowe’s and Wal-Mart bought starter plants from industrial breeding operations in the South and distributed them throughout the Northeast. (Fungal spores, which can travel up to 40 miles, may also have been dispersed in transit.) Once those infected starter plants arrived at the stores, they were purchased and planted, transferring their pathogens like tiny Trojan horses into backyard and community gardens. Perhaps this is why the Northeast was hit so viciously: instead of being spread through large farms, the blight sneaked through lots of little gardens, enabling it to escape the attention of the people who track plant diseases.

Labels: environment, food

LifeHacker has been running a lot of posts about food and cooking recently, and they've collected the best of them in a couple of summary posts. First is the Lifehacker Cookbook, with many interesting recipes. I'm going to have to try some of these - the healthier pizza recipes look particularly good. Then they've collected their 10 favourite cooking videos - I'm going to have to try the scrambled eggs.

Labels: food