Kiko's Food News, 11.8.13

The FDA has been busy trying to keep our food supply safe! They released a study finding that about 12% of spices brought to the US are contaminated with insect parts, rodent hairs and other impurities: (New York Times)

And they may soon require food makers to ease out artificial trans fats, the artery-clogging ingredient that increases shelf life in processed foods; eliminating trans fats could prevent about 20,000 heart attacks and 7,000 deaths a year: (Reuters)

A growing number of food and drink companies are quietly removing the “natural” claim from their packages, due to lawsuits and the acknowledgment that "natural" has no clear meaning; though many Americans still want natural products, only 47% view the claim as trustworthy: (Wall Street Journal)  

The New York Times challenged an ad agency to design a game-changing campaign for broccoli that rivals the campaigns packaged food giants routinely pull off with their mega budgets; this kind of consumer-facing produce marketing could be a new approach to getting people to eat healthier: (New York Times)

Kraft Foods’ mac and cheese will soon lose its neon orange glow as the artificial dyes are replaced with colors from spices such as paprika, annatto and turmeric; this demonstrates the power of public pressure, mounted through an online petition asking the company to stop using the dyes: (NPR)

Kiko's Food News, 11.1.13

How cool that Cropmobster, one of the startups working to divert food waste around the U.S., just launched Food Waste News, a website dedicated to aggregating info about food waste from all segments of the industry! (Food Waste News) 

A study on the effects of race and poverty on food access found that living in a poor, mostly black neighborhood presents "a double disadvantage", as poor black neighborhoods not only have fewer supermarkets than wealthier black neighborhoods, but also fewer than poor white neighborhoods: (Los Angeles Times)

José Andrés and other restaurant tycoons have been pioneering ipad tablets as menus; not only can they display unlimited content and be updated in real time, but they offer apps like one that allows diners to get the server’s or chef's attention through the touch of a button (not sure this would be my approach to “empowering the diner”!): (NPR)

San Francisco may become the first U.S. city to curb the consumption of sugary drinks with a 2-cents-per-ounce soda tax; Supervisor Scott Wiener, who proposed the ballot measure, estimates this could bring in an estimated $30 million in tax proceeds annually: (Reuters)

Danny Bowien, the Mission District sweetheart chef made famous by his Mission Chinese Food, will soon have more restaurants in NYC than in SF; Mission Cantina, the second restaurant he’s opening on the Lower East Side, will serve its own Oaxacan-style cheese and nixtamalize its own corn! (New York Times)

 

Kiko's Food News, 10.25.13

A recent study shows that Oreo cookies can be as addictive in lab rats as cocaine or morphine: (Los Angeles Times)

Meanwhile, new research suggests that bombarding people with ads for junk food may not be brainwash them as critics thought; it finds that people who look at too many pictures of food will find it less enjoyable and eventually, stop buying it due to satiation: (Fast Company) 

Mark Bittman argues that to avoid and handle salmonella outbreaks like the recent one from Foster Farm, the F.D.A. must disallow the use of prophylactic antibiotics in animal production, and the U.S.D.A. must consider salmonella an “adulterant” whose presence on foods is sufficient to take them off the market: (New York Times) 

More than $1 billion in compensation is going out to black farmers who faced discrimination by the U.S.D.A. in the past, when they were denied loans for farm operation, ownership, and equipment: (NPR)

A McDonald’s employee of ten years was arrested recently for asking the president of the company to talk about why wages are as low as they are; she's a leader in the movement to get a raise in the minimum wage: (Upworthiest)

Japan’s Prime Minister wants to turn the nation's reputation for expensive but high-quality foods into a new export opportunity to combat a shrinking domestic market; just as France exports fine wine, his aims for Japan to become world famous for its painstakingly cultivated fruit, rice, beef and sake: (Wall Street Journal)

Kiko's Food News, 10.11.13

Do you shop at Cracker Barrel or Whole Foods, and what does that say about your politics? Interesting to think about why the businesses we patronize may correlate with our allegiances: (NPR)

California’s cities will have a new policy tool to support urban agriculture come January, thanks to the new Urban Agriculture Incentive Zones Act: (CUESA)

The juicing trend has officially passed the tipping point, with Starbucks opening a $70-million factory to churn out 140,000 gallons of juice a week for their Evolution Fresh brand: (Los Angeles Times)

The UK’s food and drink federation is requiring manufacturers to open their doors to school children as part of its new “see inside manufacturing” program; the production line at Coke, Mars, and Nestle should open some eyes! (Food Navigator)

Speaking of Nestle, the one that ends with a short “e”--public health advocate and famous school lunch lady Marion Nestle--has written a new book, Eat, Drink, Vote, in support of a national food system that prioritizes health and the environment over corporate profits: (Civil Eats)

P.S. I know I sound like a broken record, but please consider donating to Civil Eats! Less than a week to reach their Kickstarter goal, and I truly believe that future Americans will eat better if they survive: (Throw em a bone HERE)

Kiko's Food News, 10.4.13

Wondering what the governmental shutdown could mean for food safety and access, for farmers, and for the environment? (Civil Eats)

That article, along with many of my most juicy food headlines, comes from Civil Eats, a food policy news source that's raising money to sustain; please consider donating so my friends Naomi and Paula can keep up their reporting!(Kickstarter)

Once we understand what expiration date language really means, we may be able to throw out less food while still eating safely; the "better-safe-than-sorry" blanket rule can be wasteful, so this glossary will help: (Businessweek)

I've got to get my hands on the new Working Class Foodies' Cookbook; not only does it include tasty, affordable recipes for under $8/person, but also info on how to stock a $40, $60, and $100 pantry: (Nab it!)

It may seem obvious that Americans' obsession with size, where volume equals value in supermarkets and restaurants, is making us bigger...but I like how Frank Bruni puts it here: (New York Times)

Philabundance, America's first non-profit grocery store, is ready to open its doors;  shoppers with annual incomes equal to or less than twice the federal poverty level can accrue store credit each time they shop: (Philadelphia Inquirer)

Kiko's Food News, 9.27.13

Crazy but possible that in our lifetime, instead of cooking up dinner, we may be able to print it!? (New York Times)

A report showed how food that's allowed to rot is creating billions of tons of greenhouse gases, with an interesting spotlight on what kind of foods are wasted in various regions of the world: (NPR)

It's this kind of information that has led the former president of Trader Joe's to open an inspiring new market that will prepare and repackage produce that's slightly past its sell-by date--but still edible!--at deeply discounted prices: (NPR)

Drones (aka unmanned aerial vehicles), formerly a thing of military use, will soon be used by farmers to see their corn, wheat and other crops from a new angle and thereby react to changing conditions more quickly: (Fast Company)

A Gallup study showed that lack of access to food in and of itself doesn't matter when it comes to obesity; having a lower income is the dominant factor in an American's increased likelihood to be obese: (Gallup)

The world's most celebrated chefs met with seed breeding specialists at what might go down in history as the genesis of the seed-to-table movement; the ability of these breeders to create nutrient-rich, flavorful new breeds could be an old-school alternative to genetically modified plants: (New York Times)

Pics: Partner Yoga with Knowledge Commons

We got Naylor Court buzzing Sunday morning with a partner yoga class I taught through the amazing Knowledge Commons DC, a self-described "free school for thinkers, doers, and tinkerers – taught anywhere, by anyone, for everyone." Ten brave yogis descended on the historic alleyway outside of my house in Shaw, and together we stretched and massaged our partners silly.

KCDC operates on a couple key principles, one being the idea that everyone has something to teach. This is particularly true for yoga, where we are always our own teachers. We commit to focusing our attention on the sensations of our own body to guide our movement, and heeding our own limits. Second, KCDC thrives by making new use out of public spaces. Our class had a great time looking up at the clouds as we opened our chests in ustrasana (camel pose), hearing the church bells from the many steeples that pepper our neighborhood while lying in savasana, and holding our poses strong as onlookers peeked down the alley and wondered what was UP!

Personally, I felt that while teaching, I was in a mode of flow as layed out by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, one of the founders of Positive Psychology. In this state, we are fully immersed in something that make us feel happy, alive and engaged, so much that it gives us sensation of time standing still. In order for a flow state to occur, you must see the activity as voluntary, enjoyable (intrinsically motivating), and it must require skill and be challenging (but not too challenging) with clear goals towards success.

Next up: getting more neighbors on board! If you're reading this and you like practicing yoga outside, please add your email in the signup field. That way, when I start teaching more Naylor Court yoga come spring, you'll be the first to know.

Kiko's Food News, 9.20.13

Habits like eating more fruits and veggies, meditation and yoga were found to reverse signs of aging; these lifestyle changes increase the length of telomeres, the ends of chromosomes linked to aging: (Bloomberg)

But we yogis who love our homemade kombucha also gotta laugh at ourselves sometimes: (Huffington Post)

House Republicans narrowly pushed through a bill that slashes billions of dollars from the food stamp program, dashing hopes for passage this year of a new five-year farm bill: (New York Times)

Michelle Obama is convening the first White House summit on food marketing to children; she also kicked off a campaign to encourage people to drink more plain water! (Time)

I get knocked for my blanket preference for eating food cold, but maybe I’m not so crazy: studies on taste nerves demonstrated that the perception of taste decreases when the temperature rises beyond 95° F: (The Guardian)

And one more study found that football fans’ saturated-fat consumption increased by as much as 28% following defeats of their favorite team and decreased by 16% following victories; the association was particularly pronounced in cities with the most devoted fans, and nail-biting defeats led to greater consumption of caloric, fatty foods than lopsided ones: (New York Times)

Kiko's Food News, 9.13.13

Trader Joe's is dropping health benefits for part-timers and will instead cut each of them a check for $500 to apply towards Obamacare's new insurance exchanges; is this precisely what's supposed to happen with Obamacare? (Huffington Post)

Tips, a custom that originated from the acronym T.I.P. for "to insure promptitude", are a part of dining out that we take for granted; now a spate of restaurants are doing away with tipping: (Los Angeles Times)

If lobster were super cheap, would it taste as good? This case study explores the link between food price and value perception: (New Yorker)

This fun roundup of young chef trailblazers who learned their work ethic and taste for great food from chef parents includes a couple of my favorites in San Fran (the Lee brothers of Namu) and DC (Nic Jammet of Sweetgreen): (New York Times) 

Technology continues to creep into grocery stores, from digital signs that update prices and offer promotions, to fingerprint scanners for checkout, to self-propelled "smart" shopping carts; in an industry built on human interaction, could this be too much tech, too fast? (Los Angeles Times)

Kiko's Food News, 9.6.13

Anyone fancy a Union Jack made of scones, cream and jam? Flags are always fun to look at, but best when constructed from food characteristic of its country: (Visual News)

To explain how chefs pair ingredients, scientists created a flavor map with lines connecting foods with common components; it shows that Western chefs tend to pair ingredients with shared flavor compounds, while recipes from East Asia tend to combine ingredients with few overlapping flavors: (Scientific American)

This guy took the US map, pinged Google Maps for the nearest grocery store at regular intervals, and drew lines ending at the nearest; long lines denote areas with fewer grocery stores, a sign of food deserts: (Flowing Data)

Google is using data analysis to get its employees to drink more water and eat less M&Ms; even though management believes food brings people together, they don't want staff to eat so often that it reduces their efficiency! (Daily Mail)

Cultures throughout history have ritualized the food that should be eaten at funerals; this is an interesting tour of "sad food", from Belgian dark chocolate cake to Amish raisin pie: (Utne Reader)

Yoga with Kiko for National Yoga Month

Since September is National Yoga Month--everybody go take advantage of a free week at a new studio!--guess it's now or never: teachers gotta be teachin'!  

Aww yeeeeah breathe into that front body!

The timing couldn't be better for this girl--I'm settled into DC, and have begun teaching classes in Naylor Court, the historic alleyway around the corner from my place. I've also been able to line up a few yoga classes around town in some unique venues, where I hope you'll join me as I cut my chops as a new teacher:

• Monday 9/16, 7 pm on Naylor Court (email me if you want to join)
• Sunday 9/22, 11 am: Ooooh Yeeeeah: Stretching Together with DC Knowledge Commons on Naylor Court
• Wednesday 9/25, 6:30 pm: Weeknight Yoga for Neighbors, at Glen's Garden Market, the awesome new Dupont grocery store 

More info about my yoga offerings is here.

Seeing each other from a different angle!

I'm doing what I can to demystify yoga for people, by trying to make it more accessible to those who have never taken a class or have heard of it but have no idea what goes on in that mysterious incense-perfumed studio. This is why I teach classes in a public alleyway--the faces on people who turn the corner and stumble upon us in cat/cow breathing postures are priceless!

I'm also looking into teaching in some other new places around DC, including the brand new, gawgeous YMCA on W St NW, and at Shaw neighborhood library (of which I'm proudly a member as of yesterday!)...if you have any ideas for a venue I might not have thought of, please holler in a comment!

P.S. Thanks to my brother John and our friend Hilary for modeling the partner stretches for this post :-) 

Kiko's Food News, 8.30.13

Will burger prices go up if fast food workers' wages are increased? I think they darn well should, as they've been artificially low when you consider the lesser known costs that go into putting food on our plates: (Los Angeles Times)

Walmart will soon offer full benefits to its employees' domestic partners, including those of the same sex, in all 50 states; as they control about 35% of the American grocery market, I say this qualifies as Food News, and even if this is a "business decision", I'll take it! (Forbes)

As cities start banning foam containers, Dunkin Donuts is getting with the program and taking action to replace their horrific styrofoam cups with ones that have a better environmental footprint while, of course, keeping the price cheap: (San Francisco Chronicle) 

Colleges are beginning to offer fitness- and wellness-themed dorms that offer exercise, nutrition and substance-free pledges: (Washington Post)

A look at how five current international food insecurity emergencies have the potential to impact hundreds of millions of people and dramatically escalate complex emergencies: (Devex)

As summer winds down and we look to squeeze the best out of its produce bounty, this article came in with a good dose of inspiration, such as cutting the greens off so they stop drawing moisture from the veggie: (Greatist)

Kiko's Food News, 8.23.13

A recent survey found that 20% of Aussie kids think pasta comes from animals, and 27% think yogurt comes from plants....shocking, but when I stop to think about it, I had no food education in school either! The people behind Jamie Oliver's Foundation and Food Day (Oct. 24) are working to put food education in every school: (Huffington Post)

Whole Foods is shifting its strategy to shed its "whole paycheck" reputation by emulating discount tactics used by traditional supermarkets; will this train customers not to buy on full price? (Wall Street Journal)

Oakland-based Revolution Foods, which supplies school cafeterias with healthier prepared foods, has entered the grocery sector with new Meal Kits that differentiate themselves through ingredients standards; as opposed to Lunchables, their Ham and Cheddar can claim to be made with ham from animals raised without antibiotics, no artificial colors, flavors, preservatives or high-fructose corn syrup: (New York Times)

If the goal of food stamps is to eat as well as one can on a low budget, its understandably hard to imagine our tax dollars going towards buying Ho Hos and Ding Dongs; shockingly though, a recent online poll found that more Americans are annoyed by the idea of food stamps being used to buy expensive food than to buy junk food: (Huffington Post)  

Could labeling eggs for what they really are cause way more people to buy cage-free? New proposed legislation would require eggs from caged hens in the U.S. to be labeled just like they are in the E.U., with one of three choices: “eggs from caged hens”; “barn eggs”, or “free-range”: (Take Part) 

Kiko's Food News, 8.16.13

Do you enjoy "tooth-rattlingly crunchy" chips or "chewy" drinks? If so the Big Food companies are on to you, as they're learning that texture is often as important as taste or flavor in consumers' food choices: (Wall Street Journal) 

The first non-profit grocery store, operated by a food bank, has opened in Santa Rosa, CA and hopes to give low-income customers a more "dignified" shopping experience at prices that beat major grocery stores: (Press Democrat)

If you're already on the amaranth train, you're ahead of the curve: this bushy plant, which Science Magazine named "crop of the future" in 1977, has nutritious seeds that can be made into a flour and may help reverse Mexico's trending obesity: (National Geographic)

The Obama administration released long-awaited proposals aimed at ensuring that food imported to the US--up to 15 % of our food supply--meet U.S. safety standards; domestic importers would for the first time have to vouch for the food-safety practices of their overseas suppliers: (Press Telegram)

A juicy deep dive into how San Francisco's Good Eggs runs business, and a preview into a new market that will have roaming cashiers like an Apple store: (SF Weekly)

The Irony of the Ball Jar

This week I played pickle apprentice while staying with my good friend and former Bi-Rite co-worker Rosie's family in the centuries-old tavern house that has become their home in upper Vermont. Their front door opens directly onto the cozy kitchen, and it's there that most of our time was spent, baking bread or perfecting cocktails or toasting their amazing family granola, heavy in coconut, almonds and seeds. Rosie's mom Johanna was raised in Kansas by a mother who sounds like she was a force to be reckoned with, especially in the kitchen. Johanna clearly inherited her depth of recipes and natural ability to effortlessly work any food that comes through the door into a dish, with a propensity to teach those of us around her through the process. I watched she and Rosie in their much-practiced kitchen rhythm intently, and was able to bring my pickling expertise to a new level as they guided me through a big batch of bread and butter pickles and watermelon rind pickles. 

I have surface level experience with pickling, having experimented with beets, turnips, and other roots, and having over the past three years worked on perfecting my kimchi technique.  But it's easy to get out of the habit, so it felt good to be playing with brininess, sweetness, and acidity again in the name of putting up summers' high supply of cukes and melons. It was simple, really--make sure the jars are clean, then heat up a brine made with some combination of vinegar, salt, a couple spices and a sweetener (we did a batch of watermelon rinds with Vermont Maple syrup to really seize the moment). Add the veggie or fruit to be pickled, and after a slow simmer, jar and cool. 

Admiring the rainbow of pickles cooling in their Ball jars, I thought about how easy the process had been...and then I remembered back to a less "savory" pickling moment that happened last month.

I had gone to the hardware store to grab yet another case of Ball jars--the kombucha and kimchi production in our house lately has us whipping through them--and when I unwrapped the jars at home, I found a curious little seed-like packet tucked beneath. Well ain't that neat, I thought upon first glance. The Ball company, America's trusted brand for anything that goes in a glass jar, is demystifying pickling by providing us with a spice blend to make the process that much easier! 

But then I turned the packet over to take a closer look, which revealed an ingredient list containing not just the usual lineup of dill, garlic, and other spices, but a laundry list of additives like calcium chloride, dextrose, maltodextrin and silicon dioxide! Apparently the folks at Ball have gone ahead and patented this chemists' dream of a pickle mix--sorry folks but don't even think of naming your own blend of pickle spices "Pickle Crisp Granules"!!

 GREAT. Now people who are pickling for the first time are going to think they need all of these chemicals, or this exact ratio of spices, in order to make the crunchy pickles of their dreams. This is disempowering people from thinking they can do it on their own with classic household spice staples. What happens after we finish this little spice and chemical packet? Will our pickles be limp and bland if we don't have the special lab formula blend provided by the chemists at Ball? Guess we need to keep buying more and more Ball jars if we want our pickles to come out right!! As an aside, let me just say that this is so par for the course these days. It's like we HAVE TO HAVE the special tool or widget or ingredient for every little thing we do, whether it's a special baby bed or playpen for each phase of the baby's day, or a special gadget for each kind of vegetable or fruit we aim to chop. I was never going to be a Williams-Sonoma customer...

Of all things, now the big manufacturer needs to go and over-process, overcomplicate the pickle?? I don't know what to say.

Kiko's Food News, 8.9.13

Nine years ago Congress asked the FDA to establish a definition for “gluten-free”, and this week they finally detailed the requirements: for a product to be marketed as “gluten-free”, “free of gluten,” “without gluten” or “no gluten” it must contain less than 20 parts per million of gluten: (Washington Post)

A study found that scientists who judge the safety of food additives work for the very additive manufacturers they're supposed to be regulating, and there's no requirement that they notify the FDA when they make a new additive: (USA Today)   

Uber cabs have caught on like wildfire, so what about an “uber” for food delivery? A New York City food co-op startup is scaling up the sharing of homemade food (with no money exchanged) to an entire city; the meal swapping aims to skirt the top-down regulation, processed meals, wasted leftovers, and anonymous relationships of our food system: (The Atlantic)

To see the world through the lens of home cooking, this photographer snapped grandmas in their kitchens alongside the most typical dish they feed to their families (remind me not to go to grandma's house in Iceland or Norway!): (Demilked) 

Picking up a friend at the airport just got a lot more fun: many airports are now allowing food trucks to set up shop in or near their cellphone lots! (USA Today)

Kiko's Food News, 8.2.13

Thousands of fast-food workers across the country have been holding one-day strikes during peak mealtimes to demand much higher wages; none of the nation’s 200,000-plus fast-food restaurants are unionized, and the national campaign is asking for a living wage of $15/hour: (New York Times)

The Chronicle’s restaurant critic of 25+ years reflected on how technology has changed the way diners interact with restaurants and each other to alter the dining scene over the course of his tenure: (San Francisco Chronicle)

The average Frenchman these days eats only half a baguette a day, compared with almost a whole baguette in 1970 and more than three in 1900; to reverse this trend, the bakers’ and millers’ lobby is championing bread as promoting good health, good conversation and French civilization: (New York Times)

Have you noticed limited release ales, house coffee blends, signature oysters and other one-of-a-kind products named and customized for your favorite restaurant? These partnerships with small food makers are the newest way restaurants are brandishing their local chops: (Fox News)

Ever heard of an eggocado? Do avocado pancakes sound as velvety smooth to you as they do to me? Here are ways to get our favorite good-fat laden fruit into places I wouldn’t have guessed: (Huffington Post)

Kiko's Food News, 7.26.13

The yogi in me was struck by a new study which found that performing rituals before eating can enhance the perception of the food being eaten; whether it’s singing “Happy Birthday” or bowing to say a prayer, this can have economic and marketing implications beyond the food world: (Red Orbit)

While visiting Seattle this week (gorgeous!), I learned that their mayor wants to block a non-union Whole Foods from opening because it pays “significantly lower” wages and benefits than other grocery stores, violating the city’s social and economic justice goals: (Grist)

Pepsi’s Naked Juice line has been forced to strip the words "all natural" from its labels after a class-action suit deemed the claim misleading and false; the juices contain Fibersol-2, fructooligosaccharides, and genetically modified soy: (Take Part)

Clearly Pepsi’s feeling the pressure, as they and other industrial food giants are pouring resources into experimenting with ways to make products aimed at children healthier. Ever thought of subbing parsnips for butter and cream in your Alfredo sauce? (New York Times)

Two New York City hospitals have started a new program (developed by Wholesome Wave) whereby doctors will be able to prescribe $2 coupons for fruits and veggies to low-income patients who are overweight or obese to use at 142 farmers' markets throughout the city: (Council & Heal)

Kiko's Food News, 7.19.13

India is in the process of introducing one of the most ambitious school food-aid programs ever attempted, but violent protests have erupted as 22 school children there died from poison by farm pesticides in their school lunch: (Wall Street Journal)

A new book argues that our prehistoric ancestors picked and gathered wild plants that were in many ways far healthier than the stuff we buy today at farmers' markets: (NPR)

McDonalds partnered with Visa to launch a website to help its low-wage workers making an average $8.25 an hour keep a budget, but it's only underscored how hard it is for a low-paid fast food worker to get by: (Think Progress)

The U.S. is the world's largest producer and exporter of corn and soybeans, but domestic farmers growing these crops organically can't keep up with surging demand to sell them as animal feed; this lack of new acres for organic row crops could restrict growth for other organic foods that rely on feed: (Wall Street Journal) 

In the ever evolving debate over what makes a good food city, the latest battle is being waged in our nation's capital; here's my take on how good eats in DC stack up: (Kiko's Food News)  

What's Next for DC Food?

What's missing from DC's food scene? This outsider may have some ideas. 

Two months ago I left my post as Marketing Director for the Bi-Rite Family of Businesses in San Francisco and embarked on a journey back to the East Coast, settling not in my hometown near New York City but in our nation's capital. I was hungry to step out of my San Francisco food bubble. 

Hydroponic lettuces at Dupont farmer's market, wah?? 

I've since chipped away at the google doc I crammed with the names of restaurants, retailers and food makers to try. To get a sense of how the District's food scene measures up against my San Francisco and New York City templates, I've drilled new friends who work in the DC food business about how they engage the community and where they like to eat.

Red currants at Dupont Farmer's Market--haven't seen these in SF!

Mark Furstenberg's critique of the DC food-scape in the Washington Post last week invited me to pause and think about what I've digested here. At this point I'm still an outsider getting my bearings, but now that I'm working with retailers and food makers to strengthen the community around their brands, I want the best for everyone involved in getting good food into Washingtonians' mouths. Having worked for four years telling the story for Bi-Rite, the first business Furstenberg lists as setting a standard, I have some good reference points.

Hadn't run into these in SF either

Here's what I think DC's got going on, where props are due: 

• Un-jadedness. By this I mean that Washingtonians don't need the prospect of eating sea urchin gonads to get them excited--a great foie gras will do just fine. They line up to taste Number 1 Sons' pickles, still appreciating the novelty of kimchi which for New Yorkers or San Franciscans can feel so last year.
• Technologically enhanced systems for handling the dining experience. Somehow San Francisco, a city of web coders, Googlers and Apple staffers, hasn't connected the dots that a restaurant can manage its wait by leveraging the power of the cell phone. When my boyfriend and I put our name on the list at Little Serow we were met with a daunting three hour wait (well worth it!), but the hostess managed us beautifully by sending us texts with updates until we were happily seated. Hostesses successfully use texting to manage the wait at Le Diplomate too, so we could enjoy our campari and soda at the bar knowing where we stood.
• Eagerness. Speaking of Le Diplomate, Furstenberg bashes it as "a Disney World caricature", but after two weeks in France last month I can say there's a lot of authenticity here, and they've hired a staff who will stop short of nothing to endear themselves to the diner. Our server went out of his way to volunteer favorite rock albums that he didn't want us to miss. And whoever Sam Groh has volunteering to peddle his Grohnola at Columbia Heights and other farmers markets knows how to get me excited about the only granola made in DC. (Worth mentioning that Grohnola wasn't even on the list of DC artisan food makers that Sam Hiersteiner compiled in rebuttal to Furstenberg's critique, which leads me to believe many others were probably missed). 
• Ethiopian food. Can we give a holler for eating with our hands?? Things just taste better without a metal spike delivering them to the mouth. And fingers are so good at sopping the right amount of sauce into the crannies of the injera. Plus, when my meal comes with a pulsing dance and singing performance as it does at Dukem, we're really celebrating. There's a quote I love from an Ethiopian text that says "those who eat from the same plate will not betray each other."  It's a blessing that the friendship and loyalty inherent in this style of eating graces our capital, where connection and understanding is so important. Next on my Ethiopian bucket list is Sidamo, where I'll see how this ethos translates to coffee culture.

The artful merchandising at Dupont is like a candy store for the produce eater

• Beauty that comes from smaller scale. Give me the stripes of summer squash lined up in little baskets, mushrooms that look like seashells, and hydroponically grown lettuces so beautiful they could double as a centerpiece at the Dupont Circle farmer's market...I'll take these over the throngs that line up at San Francisco's Ferry Building market any day and jaded sales people who don't have time to engage.
• Patbingsu. Pat is the Korean shave ice dessert that I fell in love with last summer in Seoul and have hunted down across LA, San Francisco, New York and now the broader DC area. The best version I've found state-side is at  Shilla Bakery in Annandale, a haven for everything sweet. This was a perfect interlude between the Korean BBQ at Honeypig and kimchi ingredient shopping at H Mart. 

The Patbingsu at Shilla in Annandale

• Roof decks! Screw any contest between bartenders, mixologists or whatever we want to call people who make our cocktails--I'll take any cocktail they give me up in the open air on a DC summer eve over one I have to drink inside a San Francisco bar, cozied up from the windy, grey winter in July. 

So what are the next steps? How can the food scene get even better here?

• We need to do a better job telling the story behind the great food that is available. I'm getting the sense, for example, that people here don't realize how big of a deal it is that Glen's Garden Market in Dupont sells, aside from a handful of staples, exclusively foods grown or created by farmers and artisans in DC, Virginia, Maryland, West Virginia, Delaware, Pennsylvania and New York. So I'm working with them to spread the word. It takes a LOT more time and energy to buy food directly from the people who produce it than through distributors, so retailers who are going to the trouble to offer such special products need to make sure customers know it.

Mushrooms, or seashells? The artfulness of each crate blew me away. 

• Make a bigger deal of natural, healthy, organic foods, wherever available, than is being made. There's a full on smoothie and juice bar in the Chinatown Walgreen's and no one's talking about it! That's a BIG deal, a nod to health I haven't seen in Duane Reade, CVS, or any other national pharmacy chain--DC media needs to celebrate it. Similarly, I'd heard that Gary Cha's Yes! Organic Market was pioneering a healthier assortment of fresh foods in DC neighborhoods that didn't have access, but after visiting a couple locations I left disappointed that the produce was limited, prepared foods were nil and no cues were given to customers about what to get excited about. A better story needs to be told on the store floor if Yes! is truly selling "all these cereals and breads that you don’t see in Giant", because I didn't notice them. If Cha's product is tastier than what we find at the grocery chain, healthier for the environment, or more unique, he needs to invest in signage that tells that story and a staff who understands how what they sell is special and is enthusiastic about communicating it.
• Large chains need to keep their DC locations up to speed with the globalized character of their audiences. Just like Furstenberg on his own Persian ingredient hunt, I went to Whole Foods, Yes!, and Giant in search of Sumac and left empty-handed. We live in an utter melting pot so stores should help us cook like it.
• Be a leader in combatting food waste. Did you know that about 3.25 billion pounds of food waste from supermarkets was sent to the landfill in 2008, and that's only climbing? It's our responsibility as the nation's capital to push retailers in our city to lead the charge on ground-breaking ways to minimize what they throw out. Retailers should create seamless programs whereby they either use bruised fruit and vegetables, meat nearing expiration, day old bread, and other unsellable but perfectly good food in their kitchens for prepared foods (like the folks at Bi-Rite), or partner seamlessly with local organizations to get it into the mouths of hungry residents.

OK now I'm going to get all yogic on ya. Ever wonder what our favorite Top Chef hostess's last name means? Lakshmi is the goddess of abundance in the Hindu tradition, reminding us of the "enoughness" in both our life and within ourselves. In this spirit, let's keep our attention on the places where the District is innovating and leading the way. There's more international flair in the sandwiches and love in the service at Sundevich, just a pop around the corner from where I live, than in any deli I've walked into in San Francisco. Way to go, all you businessmen in your slacks and collared shirts, sprawling out right on the Farragut Square grass to enjoy your food truck lunch--would not see that in Bryant park, NYC! And the vegan cafe Everlasting Life serves healthy dishes in the African American tradition like I've never tasted before; never before had tahini, blackstrap molasses, spirulina or brewer’s yeast made it into my smoothie, and I was blown away.

My point here is that just as in New York, San Francisco or any other city where one goes in search of the food they consider "good", there are discoveries and appreciation to be had. I look forward to working with retailers and food makers in the District to make sure what they're putting out for us is picked up by (judging from rebuttals to Furstenberg's article like this in City Paper and this in Huff Po), a vast hungry audience.