I don’t understand the seemingly global push to create “fake foods” of all kinds. To me it’s all a lot of expensive hooey, spending money that could be put to better use growing more and improved foods the old fashioned way — through agriculture and animal husbandry.
Not a day goes by that a person can’t find news stories about some start-up or supposed development advance in the “fake foods” arena. There are stories about fake beef, fake pork, fake chicken, fake veggies, fake milks, and insects for human food.
The newest “fake food news” comes from Israel, where Israeli food-tech startup Finally Foods claims it has developed the world’s first genetically engineered potatoes containing cow-milk protein, a breakthrough that, it claims, could revolutionize dairy production. The company is set to launch its first field trial next month in southern Israel, where the modified potatoes will be cultivated.
Once harvested, the potatoes will be processed to extract casein protein powder, a key component in milk. Casein, which makes up 80% of milk proteins, is essential for cheese-making and provides melting, stretching and foaming properties in dairy products. The company says it’s using potatoes as natural bio-reactors to produce casein protein. The company sees plant-based dairy proteins as a solution to global climate and food security challenges.
Potatoes were chosen as the host crop due to their high yield, ease of protein extraction and global availability. Unlike fermentation-based dairy alternatives, which rely on yeasts, bacteria and fungi, but struggle to replicate real casein, this method is claimed to offer a cost-effective and scalable approach to producing identical dairy proteins.
The Israelis may or may not be successful in making “fake milk.” But, for me, I’ll stick to regular old cows milk — not potato milk — for soaking my cereal, dunking my do-nuts, and making my milk shakes. Potatoes are best for baking and frying as side dishes for real meat.
***
Well, for the Kansas City Chiefs the Super Bowl turned into the Sewer Bowl. The team stunk it up. But, it didn’t keep ol’ Nevah and me from enjoying a couple of Super Bowl parties.
The first wuz billed as a Fish Fry and Other Edibles Party. It wuz hosted by ol’ Barry D. Messe and his extended family in his shop building. There wuz a bounty of grub including fried and smoked fish fillets, smoked ribs, burnt ends, smoked brisket, and deep-fat fried potatoes, olives, and jalapeno peppers.
When I asked Barry if he’d caught all the fish the crowd wuz eating, he said and his fishing buddies had. But, then he told me a really sad story if you like fish fillets like I do. Barry said that sometime early in the winter, he had a deep freezer filled with fish fillets that quit working and all the fillets spoiled. He said it wuz just one big horrific stinking mess — so much so that he said he dug a hole on his property and buried the whole mess as a unit — deep freezer and fillets.
I didn’t ask how big the freezer wuz, but regardless of size, it wuz a lot of fish fillets to go a’wasting.
The second party wuz at our daughter’s home. However, what started out as a happy-go-lucky event ended up more like a wake.
My only advice for the Chief is that it’s best to win your third Super Bowl in a row before you start planning the victory parade and get legal permission to use the term “Three Peat.”
***
The topic at the Old Geezer gab-session yesterday turned to paying taxes. Seems that every one of us have at some time in our long lives had a bad experience with the tax collector.
The story I thought wuz funniest came from ol’ “Dub” L. Dee, who said while serving in the Air Force he wuz stationed in California for a time.
Dub said he paid and mailed in his federal and California taxes. He wuz pleased that he wuz due a small refund from the state. A few weeks after remitting his state tax, he received a letter from the California tax office that said the agency needed his mailing address so it could send him his tax refund.
He saw humor in the situation and wrote back that the address on the letter the agency sent to him was to the correct mailing address — and to send his refund to the same address.
Well, a few weeks later, he got another letter asking for his correct mailing address. He responded rather curtly, but with the same message. They had the right address.
But, when Dub received a third letter from the same agency asking for his correct address, his reply wuz more direct. His reply wuz in poster-size capital letters that the agency had sent him three letters — all to the same CORRECT address. His post script notation was something to the effect that the California tax folks must be dumbest in history.
Dub said that after his third reply, the state send him his refund — one day before it would have started owing him interest for being late with the refund.
From Dub’s story, it doesn’t seem like California government has gotten any smarter or any more efficient since his experience decades ago.
***
A couple of weeks ago, I got a call from my old friends at the Saffordville Gentle Men’s Breakfast Club in Chase County. The news in the call wuz both good and scary.
The scary part wuz that a few weeks ago when the cooks arrived at 6 a.m. to start cooking breakfast, they all started feeling strange, and one cook thought he might be having a heart attack and passed out.
Long story short, it turns out that the ancient furnace in the old Saffordville School, which is now used as a community center, had started emitting carbon monoxide. The cooks barely realized that fact in time to escape. And, still, one cook had to spend the day recovering at the hospital in Emporia. Everyone else recovered quickly.
As a result of the carbon monoxide scare, the building how has a brand new modern furnace. I’m just glad I wuzn’t cooking there any more.
***
Nugget of humor for the day: “I accidentally dropped and broke an egg in the kitchen this morning. My insurance agent said he’d send out an adjuster as soon as possible to determine the cost of replacement.”
Have a good ‘un.
