Is It Even Possible to Focus on Anything Right Now?

This article was recently shared in a recent Institute of Food Technologists Update. Intuitively we know it's not just ourselves that are stressed, but I'll admit it made me feel better knowing for certain I wasn't the only one.

TTFN, Fred.

Quote of the week: "Cherish all your happy moments: they make a fine cushion for old age." - Christopher Morley (American journalist, novelist, essayist and poet, 1890 - 1957)

Is It Even Possible to Focu... by fredwine on Scribd

Science! based information available about COVID-19 and food safety.

Simply put, this is some of the best science based information available about COVID-19 and food safety. 

https://foodsafety.ces.ncsu.edu/covid-19-resources/

Be safe.

TTFN, Fred.

Quote of the week: "Content makes poor men rich; discontentment makes rich men poor." - Benjamin Franklin (Founding Father and a polymath, inventor, scientist, printer, politician, freemason and diploma, 1706 - 1790)

Be Safe

It's times like these I'm thankful for my obsessive-compulsive nature and the need to washing my hands ten times a day working in the food industry.

Stay safe, wash your hands, and practice social distancing. There is plenty of historical evidence showing it works, dating back just over 100 years to the last time a pandemic swept the globe.

TTFN, Fred.

Quote of the week: "Do not weep; do not wax indignant. Understand." - Baruch Spinoza (Dutch philosopher of Portuguese Sephardi origin, 1632 - 1677)

How the Government Came to Decide the Color of Margarine

Food has color. Some bright, some pale, but the colors are distinct. For decades everyone wanted a deep, mahogany red Delicious apple because it looked nice. It was mushy and mealy, but it looked nice. Those days are in the past for apples, which come in many different shades and taste much better than the previous standard.

I remember my mother describing how they kneaded in the color to margarine. It seemed strange, considering I grew up with neon colored candies, to think you had to add your own color to margarine. Everything has its own tale, as they say, and margarine is no exception.

This week, a look at how the government got into the color of margarine

TTFN, Fred.

Quote of the week: "Happiness depends upon ourselves." - Aristotle (Greek philosopher and polymath, 384 BC - 322 BC)

   How the Government Came to Decide the Color of Margarine by fredwine on Scribd

It's All Greek to You and Me, So What Is It to the Greeks? Part 2 - Chinese

The phrase “it’s all Greek to me” (meaning “I don’t understand it, it’s unintelligible”) is a common enough one in English to be the name of an awful lot of Greek restaurants. Quite a few other languages also use Greek as the stereotypical hard-to-understand language – mostly European languages like Portuguese, Spanish, or Norwegian, but also Persian/Farsi.

A Greek person, on the other hand, would express the same meaning with the phrase “It’s Chinese to me” – as would speakers of various other languages including French, Dutch, Russian, and various Eastern European languages; it’s an alternative option to Greek in Spanish and Portuguese, too. In fact Greek and Chinese seem to be the most popular choices of “unintelligible” languages. A few others choose Arabic or Hebrew; Dutch seems to be unique in having a phrase “That’s Latin for me”, while English, of course, also has “double Dutch”. Pleasingly, the constructed language Esperanto has a phrase “it’s all Volapük [a rival constructed language] to me”.

This week, well, you get the idea.

TTFN, Fred.

Quote of the week: "Happiness arises in a state of peace, not of tumult." - Ann Radcliffe (English author and pioneer of Gothic fiction, 1764 - 1823)

   It's All Greek to You and Me, So What is It to the Greeks Part 2 - Chinese by fredwine on Scribd

It's All Greek to You and Me, So What Is It to the Greeks? Part 1 - Greek

That's Greek to me or it's (all) Greek to me is an idiom in English, expressing that something is difficult to understand.

The idiom is typically used with respect to something of a foreign nature, however it may be considered an insult to some. Complexity or imprecision of verbal or written expression or diagram, often containing excessive use of jargon, dialect, mathematics, science, symbols, or diagrams. The metaphor makes reference to Greek (either ancient or modern), as an archetypal foreign form of communication both written and spoken. Technically, the phrase is classified as a dead metaphor, meaning that its components cannot be used separately, unlike for example the dormant metaphor "foot of the hill", which permits saying "that hill has a tree at its foot".

This week, if it's all Greek to you and me, what is it to the Greeks?

TTFN, Fred.

Quote of the week: "The happiness of a man in this life does not consist in the absence but in the mastery of his passions." - Alfred Lord Tennyson (British poet, 1809 - 1892)

   It's All Greek to You and Me, So What is It to the Greeks Part 1 - Greek by fredwine on Scribd

This Is What Fruit Looked Like Before Humans Intervened

Fruit. It's good for you, filled with dietary fiber, vitamins (especially vitamin C), and antioxidants. In botany, a fruit is the seed-bearing structure in flowering plants (also known as angiosperms) formed from the ovary after flowering. Fruits are the means by which angiosperms disseminate seeds. Apricots, bananas, and grapes, as well as bean pods, corn grains, tomatoes, cucumbers, and (in their shells) acorns and almonds, are all technically fruits. Popularly, however, the term is restricted to the ripened ovaries that are sweet and either succulent or pulpy.

But they don't look and/or taste like they used to. In some cases, that's probably good.

This week, what some fruit looked like before humans intervened.

TTFN, Fred.

Quote of the week: "You do your best work if you do a job that makes you happy." - Bob Ross (American artist and TV presenter, 1942 - 1995) 

This is What Fruit Looked Like Before Humans Intervened by fredwine on Scribd