Flavourful Saskatoon, November 21, 2016

9 Mile Legacy Brewing Company 
Saskatoon’s own 9 Mile Legacy Brewing Company has made the list of 5 excellent Canadian small-batch breweries. Congratulations!

Canada Food Guide Consultation 
Canada’s Food Guide is being updated to meet new evidence and Health Canada is looking for our input through an online questionnaire from now until December 8. There will be a further online consultation regarding the draft guidelines in 2017.

Healthy Hospital Food? 
If you end up in hospital, don’t expect to eat healthily. But a group of New York City hospitals have been trying to adopt healthier eating standards:

“Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center is one private hospital that has taken the program to heart, converting all aspects of its food and beverage program. In addition to complying with all the standards, Memorial has started a Meatless Mondays initiative, with multiple vegetarian dishes on the cafeteria menu every Monday. Memorial also purchases locally grown produce and serves sushi from fisheries that they claim ‘follow sustainable practices.’ 

“Montefiore Medical Center has four different hospitals in the Bronx, all of which have followed suit. Dr. Andrew Racine, Montefiore’s chief medical officer, told CBS News, “We took ice cream out of the cafeterias and began serving more whole grains. We changed white rice to brown rice.” 

“Queens Hospital Center, which is now a part of New York Presbyterian, is offering multiple vegetarian and vegan dishes every weekday.”

The Perfectly Coloured Egg Yolk 
If you buy your eggs at a farmers’ market, you probably expect richly coloured eggs. But beware. That deep rich colour may not signify much of anything. “if you bring home the cheapest eggs at the supermarket, only to discover yolks blaring like the sun from your pan, you’ll know those yolks are the equivalent of a sprayed-on tan . . . . By the same token, if a carton of eggs billed as ‘free-range’ contains pale yolks, that could mean that the eggs were produced in a way that barely satisfies the minimum requirement to merit the free-range label.”

Should Humans Drink Cow’s Milk? 
“The consumption of cow’s milk is in decline as lactose intolerance does for dairy what gluten intolerance has done to bread . . . . People may have ethical issues about exploiting cows for their milk, but it isn’t true to say we aren’t meant to drink it – because in northern Europe, we are genetically modified to do so.”

Fresh Ground Flour 
Night Oven Bakery is part of a growing trend in milling its flour in-house. I knew this added flavour and nutrition to bread. What I didn’t know was that there are some relatively simple ways you can grind your own flour at home.

Flavourful Saskatoon is a weekly Monday feature. I also post articles about food that is good, clean and fair; travel; and books. You may also enjoy EcoFriendly Sask profiling Saskatchewan environmental initiatives and events. 

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