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Post by circumspice on Jun 29, 2012 16:59:32 GMT -5
Yep! Very true. Even so, truffles are under ground and have a very limited season. There are clear and obvious signs of the season, but very few people are aware of what they are and as you point out, you get MUCH better results with a trained dog. Dogs are better than piggies because doggies won't eat your million dollar crop ;o) I've read that even trained pigs are hard to restrain from eating the crop, once located. That's probably why people eventually decided to train dogs to sniff out truffles. Then they probably served roasted pork with a truffle sauce!  |
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Post by caledonian on Jun 29, 2012 19:28:39 GMT -5
Truffles aren't a calorie crop, and their value as flavoring is a little... esoteric. Unless they're especially nutritious, I wouldn't think they'd be worth it except as a luxury. I suspect there are other, easier-to-acquire foods that would be just as micronutrient rich.
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Post by circumspice on Jun 30, 2012 10:52:14 GMT -5
Truffles aren't a calorie crop, and their value as flavoring is a little... esoteric. Unless they're especially nutritious, I wouldn't think they'd be worth it except as a luxury. I suspect there are other, easier-to-acquire foods that would be just as micronutrient rich. Cal ~ Sometimes the ability to produce a simple luxury is far more valuable in terms of morale than the actual nutrient or even monetary value of the luxury item. I will probably never be able to afford to buy such luxuries as truffles, thus the ability to grow it would be morale boosting in & of itself. Note: I probably can't grow truffles... I don't have the right climate, soil conditions or trees to grow them successfully. |
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Post by caledonian on Jun 30, 2012 11:20:54 GMT -5
I agree with you on the issue of morale, CS, but the descriptions I've come across of truffle's culinary merits basically work out to: slightly mushroom-flavored rubber bands.
I suspect they're something like caviar - food that no one else would want, so rich people can perceive them to be luxuries.
Lobsters and oysters were once considered food for the poor. Then overharvesting and pollution caused the populations to drop - and what was formerly plentiful became scarce and expensive. *Then* people recognized their taste value, and began attributing aphrodesiac properties to them - probably due to awareness they were eating a pricy and valued food.
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Post by blueadzuki on Jun 30, 2012 15:34:07 GMT -5
I agree with you on the issue of morale, CS, but the descriptions I've come across of truffle's culinary merits basically work out to: slightly mushroom-flavored rubber bands. I suspect they're something like caviar - food that no one else would want, so rich people can perceive them to be luxuries. Lobsters and oysters were once considered food for the poor. Then overharvesting and pollution caused the populations to drop - and what was formerly plentiful became scarce and expensive. *Then* people recognized their taste value, and began attributing aphrodesiac properties to them - probably due to awareness they were eating a pricy and valued food. A part of me still giggles when I remember that fresh Salmon in Scotland used to be so common and so cheap a food that a standard clause in servant contracts and tenant leases (in those odd areas where the local laird was actually responsible for feeding his tenants) prohibited lairds from serving it more than three times a week, to prevent abuses by the miserly. |
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edwin
gardener
Posts: 141
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Post by edwin on Jul 2, 2012 16:18:10 GMT -5
Like Lobster sandwiches. There were rules on how often you could send your children to school with lobster sandwiches in a week in Newfoundland - or so I have heard.
Ferdzy has a recipe somewhere on how to remove the maple flavour from maple syrup.
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Post by steev on Jul 2, 2012 21:29:08 GMT -5
When I was in El Salvador, the protein of the poor was fish and the cheapest was a sort of small shark. Filleted, skinless, boneless, caught that day and not at all fishy, it was $.30/lb. I ate that at least three times a week. I don't much like fish, but that was great. Price and status are poor measures of value. So many "weeds" are excellent food for the cost of learning about them and the effort to gather them.
I can't imagine why anyone would want to expend the effort to remove the mapleness from maple syrup, but I'm not surprised that someone has; chacun a son gout!
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Post by mnjrutherford on Jul 3, 2012 5:35:07 GMT -5
Truffles, given proper local, happen. Just like everything else. They grow all over the world, some are better than others. Some are black, some are white, and there are all kinds in between. The MOST expensive and desirable are white, summer truffles from Italy (if memory serves). The most touted are the early winter harvested black truffles from France. Joseph might want to consider developing a landrace truffle!! Has anyone or DOES anyone have any ideas about the possible uses or consumability of glyphosphate resistant weeds? I've got palmer amarant (pigweed) going crazy in the the part of the corn field that isn't covered with pine needles. Here's an article that suggests growing rye, then rolling over it and planting between the squashed rye: www.npr.org/blogs/thesalt/2012/03/07/147656157/farmers-face-tough-choice-on-ways-to-fight-new-strains-of-weedsThis is supposed to work for cotton, but realistically, it should work for other crops as well. I must add that the pigweed is out growing the field peas that were there originally. Perhaps because it germinates earlier? These folks have lots of data but check out the "sponsors" list. They want to use bigger badder chemicals: www.glyphosateweedscrops.org/This is making me just a tad bit frazzled to be honest. Especially with the farmer next door being as chemical happy as he is... I have 2 young children growing up with this stuff. If they get sick.... or worse.... |
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Post by steev on Jul 3, 2012 10:41:19 GMT -5
Would a pig eat pigweed?
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Post by circumspice on Jul 4, 2012 14:56:51 GMT -5
That's probably just a pejorative term for that plant.
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Post by steev on Jul 4, 2012 23:41:57 GMT -5
Granted, that's likely a pejorative term for an invasive weed, an Amaranth, but people can eat it; I was thinking that if a pig would eat it, penning a pig in an area infested with pigweed might result in it being eradicated, roots and all.
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Post by circumspice on Jul 11, 2012 7:22:55 GMT -5
Is there a commercial source for yacon in the U.S.? When I search it on the internet I find lots of articles about it but haven't found where to buy it yet.
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Post by castanea on Jul 11, 2012 9:28:52 GMT -5
I agree with you on the issue of morale, CS, but the descriptions I've come across of truffle's culinary merits basically work out to: slightly mushroom-flavored rubber bands. I suspect they're something like caviar - food that no one else would want, so rich people can perceive them to be luxuries. Lobsters and oysters were once considered food for the poor. Then overharvesting and pollution caused the populations to drop - and what was formerly plentiful became scarce and expensive. *Then* people recognized their taste value, and began attributing aphrodesiac properties to them - probably due to awareness they were eating a pricy and valued food. Truffles are high in potassium and magnesium and since most Americans are deficient in both, most could benefit nutritionally from eating truffles. Caviar (fish eggs) are extraodrinarily nutritious and a superb source of omega 3 fatty acids which are critical for heart and brain functioning. Cultures in areas with fisheries have long recognized the importance of eating fish eggs. Oysters have high levels of zinc which can act as an aphrodisiac if you are zinc deficient as most Americans are. |
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Post by davida on Jul 11, 2012 13:06:11 GMT -5
Is there a commercial source for yacon in the U.S.? When I search it on the internet I find lots of articles about it but haven't found where to buy it yet. I purchased my yacon from Dr. Alan Kapular at Peace Seeds. Everything that I have purchased from him has been outstanding quality and excellent (near perfect) germination. And he is such a pleasure. There have been several threads on yacon in HG. I am growing it for the first time this year in the Oklahoma heat. So far, it is doing fantastic with a lot of water. It took the 108F weather. It is a long season crop so I would assume that you would want to plant it next year. My best patch of yacon is a raised bed that my daughter and I dug out and installed hardware cloth to keep out the gophers and replaced the soil with approximately equal parts of sand, compost and soil. These plants get the most TLC and water and are responding the best. I certainly would not think of them as a stealth crop in our climate. David |
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Post by castanea on Jul 11, 2012 19:31:50 GMT -5
Is there a commercial source for yacon in the U.S.? When I search it on the internet I find lots of articles about it but haven't found where to buy it yet. I find yacon occasionally in some grocery stores here in California. Not in the major chain grocers, but in the specialized grocers like Berkeley Bowl in Berkeley. |
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