Omnivore Atlanta

Those eighth-graders spelled some serious food words last night at the National Spelling Bee finals. NYC blog The Life Vicarious put up some of the highlights. They include:

Neufchatel: a soft cheese from Normandy.

Palatschinken: The Austrian and Central Bavarian name for a central European pancake.

Simnel: a light fruit cake covered in marzipan.

Check out the whole list at The Life Vicarious, but take their quiz first to see if you can match the food names to their pictures.

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Cheese find: Whole Foods on Ponce de Leon was selling Parrano for only $9.49 a pound today. That’s less than half what I’ve seen it usually priced around town. It’s great with the organic Fuji apples, my obsession, that are on sale at Kroger for $1.69 a pound….

Are you a hyperlocavore? Of course you are. Check out this great site….

Nick Setty writes to recommend the new Cuban Diner in Marietta. It’s getting positive reviews on Yelp….

For Women: Chef Asata Reid seems to be here, there and everywhere. She was recently featured in the Emory University student newspaper.  Check out her website. She will be conducting two classes at Sevananda Natural Foods Market in Little Five Points: “Natural Foods 101″ on May 6, 12 noon-2 p.m. and “Celebrate Women’s Wellness” on May 9, 10 a.m.-12 noon. Cost is $10 or Sevananda members and $12 for non-members. She’s also conducting classses through Spicy Wifey….

“Can we afford to eat ethically?” asks Salon.com. Writer Siobhan Phillips establishes her task:

So last year, when global food prices began to soar, I devised an experiment: My husband and I would eat conscientiously for a month, not just on our regular grocery allotment but on the government-defined, food-stamp minimum: $248 for two people in our hometown of New Haven, Conn. We would choose the SOLE-est products available — that is, the sustainable, organic, local or ethical alternative. We would start from a bare pantry, shop only at places that took food stamps and could be reached on foot, and use only basic appliances. The test would mean some painful changes; gone was my husband’s customary breakfast of Honey Nut Cheerios and our favorite dinner of pepperoni pizza. But it would answer that nagging question: When shopping for food, did I have to choose between my budget and my beliefs?…

Sex and McDonald’s: I recently wrote a post about two Domino’s employees who posted a YouTube video of themselves having unsanitary fun with a sandwich one of them was making. While looking for background information about it, I found an incredible story about a video of the sexual assault of an 18-year-old McDonald’s employee by co-workers that was broadcast by ABC and is now on the Internet too. If you want to (see and) read about it, check out my personal blog, Sacred Disorder.

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I mentioned recently that I bought a chunk of aged goat cheese coated in rosemary at Via Elisa. It’s called “Eden” and is produced by Sweet Grass Dairy in south Georgia.

It didn’t last long and when I was at Whole Foods on Ponce de Leon Ave. this weekend, I stopped by the cheese counter and asked if they sell the addictive stuff. The answer was “no” but the cheese peeps urged me to try the goat cheddar from Cypress Grove. Sorry, guys, it doesn’t come close — not just because it lacks the herbs. The cheese itself just isn’t as rich and flavorful. I didn’t like it’s $19.99 per lb. price, either.

I also bought a chunk of (cow’s milk) Parrano, which is technically a gouda, made in the Netherlands. It’s described as “Italian-like” and has some qualities of parmesan about it. It’s on sale at Whole Foods for only $9.49 per lb. right now. I’m going back tomorrow for more, lots more. It made even a mealy, over-priced, organic Braeburn apple from Whole Foods enjoyable. Honestly, it’s a delicious bargain.

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Yay! Cheese is good for you! Eat it all day long! So says Men’s Health:

If you’re worried about your cholesterol, chew on this: Danish scientists found that when men ate a whopping 10 daily 1-ounce servings of full-fat cheese for 3 weeks, their LDL (bad) cholesterol didn’t budge. Which isn’t to say you should live on the stuff–just that you don’t need to fear it. Full-fat cheese can be a healthy snack and a great way to make a bland meal taste better. “Cheese is the new wine,” says Terrance Brennan, chef and owner of Artisanal Fromagerie, Bistro & Wine Bar and Picholine restaurant, both in New York City. “There are thousands of different aromas, textures, and flavor profiles.”

Read the whole story, which includes some (good-to-boring) recommendations, here.

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Frank Bruni of The New York Times recently started a regular feature in his “Diner’s Journal” blog called “That costs WHAT?!?” His first target was a $7 cup of tea at BLT Market.

I’m sure I’m not the only one having such moments in Atlanta too. The latest was during a visit to Alon’s to buy my favorite cheese, Drunken Goat, from Spain. I didn’t even notice the price until the cheese man handed me my wrapped sliver — $20 per lb.

“Holy crap,” I said. “You’ve been charging $16 for this.”

“Well, you’ve been getting a bargain,” he said. “We finally had to go up, thanks to the economy and the Euro. It was inevitable.”

As it happens, I’d been paying even less than $16 at Whole Foods. The Ponce store has been charging $12.99. Out of curiosity, I called to find out if they’d gone up too. Hurrah! The price there is still $12.99.

That’s a $7.01 difference!

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I’ve written frequently about my addiction to the Spanish cheese called “Drunken Goat.”

“If you like Drunken Goat, you need to try this,” Brad, one of the cheese people at Whole Foods, told me last week, handing me a sample of a new product from Cypress Grove, the goat-cheese company based in Arcata, Calif. The company won the “Outstanding Product Line, 2007″ award at the International Fancy Food & Confection Show in July.

The company is best-known for its Humboldt Fog, a creamy chevre bisected by a line of edible ash. But the cheese Brad handed me — and handed me again — is a new product that drew raves at the IFFCS and has just made it to our city. It’s called “Truffle Tremor” — a goat-milk cheese with specks of black truffle. When fully ripe and brought to room temperature, the cheese is amazingly fragrant.

I found this description on the blog Christine Cooks, and I fully concur:

Truffle Tremor fills my senses with an almost barnyard-y perfume that dances on my tongue in a pas de deux with the creamy-then-crumbly-then-back-to-creamy, slightly tangy, black truffle-flecked chevre, all enrobed in a gently ripened exterior the texture of which is sublime in and of itself.

I’m not sure I want to call the fragrance “barnyard-y,” but Christine assures her readers that a barnyard odor is a “good scent.” I’d call it at once earthy and floral. But you can come up with your own adjective.

One word of caution: It’s essential to let the cheese ripen. My first purchase of it had not fully ripened when I devoured it and the flavor and texture were not primo.

(Photo from Venissimo Cheese)

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