After a dinner over steak on Friday night, the conversation turned to the difference in taste between Grass Fed and Grain Fed cattle. This was brought on by the waitress telling us of the delights of eating "hop fed" beef, an idea that many of us at the dinner table found silly.

There is much to be said for the value of grass fed cattle. Grass is a low-starch, high-protein fibrous food, in contrast to carbohydrate-rich, low-fiber corn and soybeans. When animals are 100% grass-fed, their meat is not only lower in saturated fats but also slightly higher in omega-3 fatty acids.

Also important to note is the fact that, unlike feed lot cattle, raised on grain and stuck in a small cubicle for much of its life, those who advocate for grass fed cattle also tend to let their cattle go out to the field and graze. The result? Muscles that are grown naturally, rather than artificially induced growth done through the use of hormones.

Let's set aside the ethics of the practice, and focus on the resulting taste of each practice. Let's presume that the quality of rotational grazing is high. as is the breed of cattle for the grass fed beef. For the grain fed, the cattle would have to been bred for its lifestyle. Also, let's compare one of the pinnacle cuts - prime rib.

The major difference, from what I can tell, comes from the additional levels of omega-3 fatty acids, which can impart everything from a nutty, buttery flavor, to gamey, to even some reports of a fish-like taste. Let's not discount the texture of the cut of beef either. Cattle that is mobile may result in beef that is denser, and tougher to chew.

Ultimately, my guess is that the flavor of grass fed beef comes down to the quality of care given given to the cattle by the rancher. What makes feedlot cattle such benefit to those in the beef industry is its resulting consistency of product. There's profit to be had when beef tastes the same in Arizona as it does in Oregon, even if that taste is mediocre at best.

Grass Fed cattle, it seem, enters several new variables to taste that must be accounted for in some way or another. And if the rancher chooses to ignore one of them, the resulting taste of beef may be less than ideal to a consumer.

More research is needed.

Nielsen, the data group which counts everything from web page views, to how many people watch American Idol, have determined the top 10 beer holidays in the United States in 2009, based on sales of cases of beer in the two weeks prior to the Holiday. The results may surprise you a bit.

10. St. Patrick's Day - Sales: 48.7 million cases

9. Easter - Sales: 50.7 million cases

8. Halloween - Sales: 50.9 million cases

7. Christmas - Sales: 52.8 million cases

6. Thanksgiving - Sales: 52.9 million cases

5. Cinco de Mayo -Sales: 54 million cases

4. Father's Day - Sales: 57.7 million cases

3. Labor Day - Sales: 60.2 million cases

2. Memorial Day - Sales: 61.0 million cases

1. Fourth of July - Sales: 63.5 million cases

For the record, they don't count Super Bowl Sunday as a Holiday, but if we were, it would end up in between St. Patrick's Day and Easter, with 49.2 million cases sold.

Recently, the Obama administration implemented regulations requiring career college programs "to better prepare students for "gainful employment" or risk losing access to Federal student aid".

What does this bit of governance have to do with culinary schools? A great majority of those places are for-profit, and have a business plan that includes getting a slice of that Federal student aid.

I've never been a big fan of for-profit education, less so when it comes to culinary schools. The problem is two-fold.

1) Some of the institutions are more keen on selling the glamourization of the restaurant industry, providing a rudimentary of set of kitchen skills, and then completely avoid discussing the real world of restaurants.

2) As this article in the Seattle Weekly points out : "many prospective chefs believe the $40,000 tuition fee collected by for-profit trade schools entitles them to a cushy executive-chef position upon graduation. They're unwilling to accept a $12-an-hour prep-cook job or wash dishes.

In other words, the schools tell the students that they are going to be stars, make loads of money, and love the work.

What really happens is more akin to this:

Rick Park started working at a Jack in the Box in Austin, Tex., when he was 18. He moved on to sub shops, pizza parlors and chain restaurants, turning out hundreds of meals during a shift.

But Mr. Park wanted to be a chef. So like tens of thousands of other young people who grew up in the age of kitchen celebrities like Bobby Flay and Emeril Lagasse, he enrolled in culinary school.

Two years after graduation, all the “Bam!” has been drained from the dream. Mr. Park makes $10.50 an hour at a bistro in Austin best known for its French fries, trying to pay down his student loans. While he dodges phone calls from the bank, his mother helps him make his $705 monthly payments, almost twice his weekly take-home pay.

What do these culinary schools get out of this? An increase to their bottom line and no accountability for their role in this case of, let's face it, borderline fraud.

Yes, some of these schools are of quality, and yes, some of the more unethical schools have their success stories. But these are the exceptions, and not the rules.

And yes, the students have some level of responsibility here. But when institutions cajole new applicants by obfuscating, misdirecting, and in some cases, out right lying about loan obligations and the reality of the restaurant industry, how much responsibility ends up on the shoulders of the individual?

Simply put, selling a degree for tens of thousands of dollars for a job that averages $10 an hour is unethical. Period. Full stop. If these new rules and regulations make the people selling these degrees go away, this is ultimately a good thing.

Who knew that pie, of all things, has turned slate.com into a frothing werewolf of hate.

The pie, because it is a pie, does not so much "slice" as volcanically erupt under the pressure of the knife, oozing its livid fluid everywhere; your own piece, when it comes, is a miniature apocalypse of broken pastry parts and heat-blitzed fruit. You demur, mumbling about having eaten too much cornbread. Someone's aging, wild-eyed mother stares you down. "It's pie," she says. You are handed a fork. You start to peck at a morsel of fruit. Your plate is promptly whisked away again: Because it's hot outside, you're told, you're supposed to enjoy your dessert "a la mode." The pie is warm; the ice cream melts at once. You contemplate what now looks like a slice of jammy toast that has been soaked in milk for half a day and masticated by a dog. You work your fork into the only structure still intact, the woody, crenulated crust, beating and twisting this bumper of dough against each leverageable surface on your plate, trying to break it up. Your fork loses a prong. Abandoning all hope, you finally drive your broken-fork-with-giant-crust-piece through the mire of sloppy dough and heft the entire, dripping mass into your mouth. "Mmm," someone says. "Isn't it so great to have pie?"

America, let's be honest on this point: It is not so great to have pie.

Isn't hating on pie akin to hating on puppies? C'mon Slate! What did pie every do to you? It's not like pie shot a man in Reno, just to watch him die!

The post is one of provocation, to be sure. The main case against pie, as far as I can tell, is that "Its past is unremarkable and un-American" and that sometimes, it can be poorly made. On the first points, guilty as charged. Cooking anything in a pastry shell can be prosaic, especially when it comes to encasing mutton. That the author seems surprised that sweetened fruits inside of pastry dough is a relatively new concoction ( he notes that "Pie culture grew with the advent of modern pastry dough during the 16th century, at which point cooks in more ambitious kitchens started to experiment with sweeter fillings"), sounds surprising until one recognizes that the key ingredient in sweetened pie (sugar) didn't really grow in popularity in Britain until the 1500's. The story of sugar in pies isn't a story of innovation, it's one of trade. People weren't putting sugar in pies because they didn't like the taste. They weren't' putting sugar in pies because they didn't have sugar.

As far as the author's personal preference is concerned, he's entitled to it. But I do wonder where he's getting his pies. Because the first thing a quality pie-maker works upon is their crust, and second, the quality of the filling. A good pie doesn't turn fruit into "mush". Such pies deserve disdain. A good pie seeks to maintain the best aspects of the filling.

But of all of confusion of his post, this is the bit that throws me off my horse:

Who would labor over flaky pastry crust that's destined to get soaked before it's ever tasted? Unlike the tart, which sits low and topless in a shallow pan with a svelte layer of topping, pie requires a hefty piece of bakeware with outward-sloping sides, practically dooming the pastry to collapse. And unlike a torte—a short and modest cake combining fruit and nuts in balanced proportions—most modern pies rely on giant reservoirs of loose filling or inches of piled custard and whipped cream. A slice of strawberry tart with coffee is the perfect overture to a postprandial drink, a late conversation, or a night of love.

Isn't a tart little more than a pie done in miniature? Isn't a tart little more than a tiny-pie missing the top crust? Isn't the tart...

....oh wait. Hold on. This just in from Slate -

They just found out that the great American past time of eating hot dogs actually is actually a German tradition. More on this breaking story at Slate as it unfurls.

At the moment, my favorite food in the world is Dim Sum. This will undoubtedly change over time. But for now, I'm enjoying moments such as this.

America's Federal Government has decided to do away with the horrible, horrible, food pyramid that came out a few years back (in 2006!! Sheesh, time flies!) Here, in their new design, simplicity reigns supreme, with no references to sugar, beans and meat, or fats and oils. Instead, we have five categories: fruits, vegetables, grains, protein and dairy. And while the serving sizes is still a little ambiguous in the graphic above, it is clear that they are recommending that the majority of one's diet should be consist of vegetables and grains. If one goes to the website at choosemyplate.gov, they clarify their points with only 7 specific recommendations in 3 seperate categories:

Balancing Calories
● Enjoy your food, but eat less.
● Avoid oversized portions.

Foods to Increase
● Make half your plate fruits and vegetables.
● Make at least half your grains whole grains.
● Switch to fat-free or low-fat (1%) milk.

Foods to Reduce
● Compare sodium in foods like soup, bread, and frozen meals ― and choose the foods with lower numbers.
● Drink water instead of sugary drinks.

Overall, while there are flaws, it's much better that this:

... which was clearly a result of politicking from various lobbying groups. If forced to grade the USDA, I'd give them a solid 'B' with an added note of "Much Improved!"

Wanderlust - that German word which has now become synonymous for the "joy of traveling" - is a real thing. It's a desire so strong that it motivates you to do anything you can to get out of your day-to-day routine.

I have a simple test that can easily demonstrate whether you are afflicted with wanderlust. After arriving at a new destination, take a look at a person, place, or thing that, in your every day life, would seem mundane. When you look upon this object in this new and distant land, is it now imbued with a aura of charm about it? Does this object seem new and/or magical, simply because it is somewhere that you've never been before? If so, then you are likely to have wanderlust.

In my case, it was a hill in Ireland, lush with green fields, and dotted with sheep. Prior to this journey, I have seen hills dotted with sheep before, as there is plenty of farmland in Western Pennsylvania that could double as locations as Central Ireland if some location scout in Hollywood wanted to save some money. But the mere fact that I was someplace else, someplace new, had given this scene a romantic quality about it that made it seem exotic.

Deep within my cynical heart is an area that is a romantic. Wanderlust is an extension of that. Wanderlust isn't a rejection of the commonplace. It's isn't a critique of the everyday. It's a celebration of the new, of the undiscovered. It's the understanding that somewhere, out there, is a scene that we have yet to see that will fill us with awe.

I'm of the belief that wanderlust is also an extension of our childhood, a feeling that harkens back to that time in our life when everything we experienced was new and exciting. This desire of travel is a call to that innocence. It is an optimistic hope that there are places in the world that will still surprise us, that will still teach us, even as we enter our mid-life and beyond.

Wanderlust is a joyous thing. I hope to never lose mine.

I love articles such as this one, as they tend to affirm my own experiences and world-view. Its basic thesis is this:

A survey of hundreds of drinkers found that on average people could tell good wine from plonk no more often than if they had simply guessed.

In the blind taste test, 578 people commented on a variety of red and white wines ranging from a £3.49 bottle of Claret to a £29.99 bottle of champagne. The researchers categorised inexpensive wines as costing £5 and less, while expensive bottles were £10 and more.

The study found that people correctly distinguished between cheap and expensive white wines only 53% of the time, and only 47% of the time for red wines. The overall result suggests a 50:50 chance of identifying a wine as expensive or cheap based on taste alone – the same odds as flipping a coin.

If there's one I've pulled from this, it is as follows - Taste, as always, is subjective.

Yes, yes. there's a vast difference between poorly made foods and those that have been made adequately. But that line between good and great? First off, trying to define that line is difficult unto itself. After all, there's a reason why there are hundreds of recipes for bolognese out there; there's more than one, proper way to do things. How do you or I or anyone else state emphatically that there's only one way to make wine, whiskey, or any number of other of the hundreds of thousands of recipes out there?

So, if we can't determine the one and only way to make something, then there will be variations introduced. Variations of technique, variations of ingredients, and variations of portion size. Hell, even presentation matters when it comes to how we interact with our food. And once variation is introduced, all bets are off as to what can claim to be "better than" good enough. One variation is introduced, what matters to taste can be boiled down to the two words that are a bane to marketers and publicists everywhere - personal preference.

Why does personal preference create even more turbulence when trying to define taste? Because it is influenced by things far out of control of the food producer. Things such as country of origin, or which socio-economic class one was born into all play their part in determining what a person likes and doesn't like.
So when a person drinks a glass from a £3.49 bottle of Claret, and goes "That's delicious!", it's as valid of an opinion as someone who can taste the nuances in a $100 bottle of Grand Cru Burgandy.

I'm not trying to diminish those who have a refined palate, and can tell the differences between good wines and great ones. Life is made grander by those who seek out the best and have the skill to do so.

Ultimately it doesn't matter that much when it comes to putting the glass to the lips. Most people haven't put in the time and effort to refine their palate to make such distinctions in their food or wine, and will rely upon others to tell them what is "great". But remove those influences, be they experts in the field, or advertisers on the television, and your typical consumer is left to their own devices. And what we find out, time and time again, is that refinement of the palate cannot be bought. Remove the price tags and we find that most people cannot tell the difference between what is simply good and what is a work of utmost craftsmanship.

As a follow up to yesterday's post, I give you Obama's proper response to a Guinness.

(And yes, I know that the Queen is bound by social graces and etiquette in the same way that American Presidents are not. I just find the whole idea of heads of state being offered a pint of stout both telling and amusing.)

This is reason alone to view the British monarchy with suspicion.