Archive for February, 2007

Now we all know that chocolates are hot gift items during Valentine’s day. Girls love getting them and guys love giving them. You can get them at your local shops or you can also buy them at various places online. Just type: “buy chocolates” on Google and you’ll find a wide selection. Amazon also carries a variety of gourmet chocolates. But what better way to express your love than to make the chocolates yourself!

Don’t know how? No problem! I’m sure you’re all veterans at this. You just go to your favorite recipe site, like epicurious, allrecipes, or recipezaar and you will most likely find what you’re looking for.

You could also try browsing your local bookstore for chocolate cookbooks. But just recently, I found another good source of information. While looking for chocolate recipes online I stumbled upon the cookbook section of Wikibooks.

Wikibooks is a sister project of Wikipedia. For those who don’t know, Wikipedia is an online encyclopedia which is collaboratively written by people over the internet. So Wikibooks is much like that except they collaborate on writing online books. And they also happen to have a cookbook section.

There are fewer recipes compared to other popular recipe sites, but I think given more time they could build a larger collection. The success of the Wikipedia project shows that collaborative projects like this could work. And by the way, they have a recipe for chocolate truffles. Because of it’s collaborative nature, you can edit or submit your own recipes.

So after Valentine’s day, after you have already given your loved one the chocolates, you could give back some love to the community by contributing your own recipes to the site. It would help build a useful reference for everyone to enjoy.

Ever wondered what bats taste like? I didn’t, at least not until a few hours ago. But if past experience is any indication, then bats must surely taste like chicken.

Like most food lovers, I have a special interest in food photography. So for my first post in this blog, I decided to post some particularly ‘interesting’ food photos from the photo sharing site, flickr.

Now for the regulars of that site, we know that food is a popular subject there. A lot of really good food photography could be found in that site. But for this post, I chose to highlight photos which are interesting not so much for their composition, but more for their strangely edible subjects.

First up is a delicacy from my country the Philippines. It is called kabag or stewed bats. This picture is the first time I saw the dish. And from the looks of it, I have no plans of trying it.

Next up are the strangest cuts of meat I have ever seen. They kinda put a face to the anonymized and sanitized meat we commonly eat. It’s as if they are somehow partly alive. I must say that here at home we do eat chopped pork snout in a concoction called sisig. But in that dish, the pig’s anatomical features are chopped beyond any recognition.

Now let’s go for some Thai delicacies. We have larvae, deep fried crispy frogs and fried grasshoppers. Now I seem to have read somewhere that insects are a good source of protein minus the fat. And these things are supposed to cleaner than stuff that comes bloodied out of the slaughter house. But in spite of those facts, I still prefer beef over insects or amphibians.

Finally, we have the last thing that will come to mind when someone mention Chinese food. No, this isn’t dimsum or noodles. These are scorpion kebabs from a Beijing night market. I would hate to have the job of catching these critters.

So now that you’ve seen them, the question is, are you willing to try them? Many people after falling victim to the rich exotic food-mania end up carrying extra in the form of excess body fat around. Medically obese individuals have to get on drugs like xenadrine or even a more popular choice available in the form of a food supplement, zantrex 3. This drug accelerates the body metabolism and provides the body with the nutritional components of natural supplements.

My face is breaking out. I feel bloated. I’m lashing out at everyone in sight and with my scoliosis, my back really hurts. I hate this time of the month! I was home the last two days, so I had time to check out what food I can eat to help with my monthly ordeal.

10 foods that fight PMS

1. yogurt
2. milk (preferably low-fat and organic)
3. fortified orange juice
4. low fat cheese
5. whole grains bread or pasta
6. tofu
7. bananas
8. tomatoes
9. green leafy vegetables
10. nuts

Now that is a lot of food! So how could I get all of that in? Well, according to Anne Collins, by eating 6 mini-meals instead of 3 big ones. She also whipped up a sample diet. There are recipes for this special time in ivillage too. I’ll have to try them out next month. Better yet, maybe you guys can cook for your girls during that time of the month.

According to experts, there are also foods to avoid if you don’t want your PMS to worsen.

10 foods to avoid

1. coffee
2. tea
3. cola soft drinks and soda
4. chocolate
5. chips
6. alcohol
7. salty foods in general
8. red meat (especially the fatty cuts)
9. ice cream
10. french fries

Of course if I had been a ‘good girl’ all month, things would have been much easier. I should have been keeping regular schedules for meals and bedtime. I should be getting around 8 hours of sleep a day. Regular exercise could also be helpful, which according to HealthAtoZ means 30 minutes, 4 to 6 times a week.

Looks like I better start getting more exercise. I’d like to try walking. Does anyone know a cheap, but realiable pedometer? My husband accidentally flushed our old one down the toilet.