Meat

For decades, those with high cholesterol have been given a list of don'ts when it comes to their diet: Don't eat cholesterol-rich eggs; don't eat butter; don't eat red meat or regular ice cream. Well, now researchers have identified a list of do's for the diet that may work to lower cholesterol levels better than avoiding those don'ts. In a study published last week in the Journal of the American Medical Association, researchers found that eating cholesterol-lowering foods like nuts, soy protein, and certain fiber-rich items result in bigger drops in "bad" LDL cholesterol than avoiding...

Chocolate dog food. Old garden hose. Weirdly fishy. Take a panel of seven foodies and ply them with with exotic versions of popular American snacks from around the world, and these are the reactions you get. Tentative nibbles and scrunched noses. The taste testers gathered recently at the headquarters of The Associated Press in New York and represented varying levels of culinary pedigree. They included food bloggers, famed French pastry chef Jacques Torres and Marilyn Haggerty, an 85-year-old North Dakota newspaper columnist whose high praise of the Olive Garden went...

WAYLAND - Even the July heat could not keep Mary Smucker-Priest from her goal: some locally raised ground beef and Italian sausage for a chili dinner for her family. At the farmers' market at Russell's Garden Center in Wayland one recent Wednesday afternoon, the Waltham resident said she was drawn back to the booth run by David Petrovick of Barre-based Caledonia Farm after an encounter last week with his short ribs and London broil at an outdoor market in her hometown. Petrovick's animals - mainly cows and pigs - are raised in his own pastures, eating grass, for much of their lives, as opposed to animals...

WASHINGTON - The government plans to speed up the process for tracking E. coli in meat, a move that will help authorities more quickly find the source of bacteria outbreaks and hasten recalls of tainted food. The Agriculture Department said Wednesday that it would begin tracing the source of potentially contaminated ground beef as soon as there is a positive test. Current procedures require officials to wait until additional testing confirms E. coli before starting an investigation.

While in town Monday for the opening of Wahlburgers, the burger joint he's launching in Hingham with brothers Donnie and Paul , we're told Mark Wahlberg will be spending some time with Anderson Cooper for a piece to air on the CNN anchor's new talk show, "Anderson. " This is not exactly new ground. "60 Minutes" correspondent Lara Logan did a similar piece a year ago.

Makes 2 heaping cups, enough sauce for 1 1/2 pounds pasta Ragu, as the Bolognese call their celebrated meat sauce, is characterized by a mellow, gentle, comfortable flavor that any cook can achieve by being careful about a few basic points. The meat should not be from too lean a cut; the most desirable cut is the neck portion of the beef chuck. Cook the meat in milk before adding wine and tomatoes to protect it from the acidic bite of the latter. Let it barely simmer, uncovered, no less than three hours.

Round steak is an inexpensive cut ideal for thrifty cooks. Some markets sell it for $6 or $7 per pound, but sales can bring the price down even lower. The lean beef does not lend itself well to grilling or quick cooking. The trick to a tasty round steak is patience. Begin by pounding the meat between 2 slices of plastic wrap until it is thin. This tenderizing method utilizes a meat bat to "Swiss" the steak - a name with no connection to the Alpine country, but rather to the process of softening the meat.

The new Microplane Easy Prep Meat Tenderizer ($19.99) looks like a medieval weapon, but this half-moon-shaped tool attacks tough cuts of meat using little force. By rolling it back and forth a few times, the extra-sharp spikes finely sever muscle fibers and can make a flank or skirt steak fork-tender. The utensil is lighter and quieter to use than a kitchen mallet, and does not change the shape of the meat. A plastic cover protects you from the stainless steel spikey side when you store it, and fits right into the handle when you get rolling.

Our world is one hopping place, and for all the talk about slowing down to savor meals together, the snack food, street food, food trucks, and take-away joints are proof that we're not really listening. We're on the move. Our food will just have to keep up. There's nothing modern about food with legs. The moment early pastoralists learned to string bits of lamb on a spit, grill it over live coals, and hastily hit the trail again, a culinary technique for the ages was born. Today the kebab remains one of the most popular and versatile foods the world has ever known.

WASHINGTON - Target Corp. yesterday said it's working to add labels that warn consumers when meat is treated with carbon monoxide to make it look fresh. Federal regulators faced criticism for allowing the practice, which critics call unsafe. Hormel Foods Corp. and Cargill Inc. also said they would be willing to add similar labels. For years, the industry has used carbon monoxide in packages to help meat retain its color, with government approval. But consumer advocates say the practice misleads people by making meat look fresh after its expiration date.

MINNEAPOLIS - Pat LaFrieda Jr. can't get enough chicken thighs. If his family business, which is featured on the Food Network series "Meat Men," orders 100 cases of boneless, skinless thighs, his supplier might deliver only 60. That's because consumers have discovered something chefs have long known about dark meat: "It was always the least expensive protein that you could buy, but it had the most amount of flavor," LaFrieda said. Thighs and drumsticks are selling briskly as Americans join consumers abroad in seeking flavor that isn't found in ubiquitous, boneless, skinless...

Pat LaFrieda Jr. can't get enough chicken thighs. If his family business featured on the new Food Network series "Meat Men" orders 100 cases of boneless, skinless thighs, his supplier might deliver only 60. That's because consumers have discovered something chefs have long known about dark meat: "It was always the least expensive protein that you could buy, but it had the most amount of flavor," LaFrieda said. Thighs and drumsticks are climbing the pecking order as Americans join consumers abroad in seeking flavor that isn't found in ubiquitous, boneless, skinless...

The new Microplane Easy Prep Meat Tenderizer ($19.99) looks like a medieval weapon, but this half-moon-shaped tool attacks tough cuts of meat using little force. By rolling it back and forth a few times, the extra-sharp spikes finely sever muscle fibers and can make a flank or skirt steak fork-tender. The utensil is lighter and quieter to use than a kitchen mallet, and does not change the shape of the meat. A plastic cover protects you from the stainless steel spikey side when you store it, and fits right into the handle when you get rolling.

They call this place the Back of the Yards, a neighborhood in the middle of the city once filled with acres and acres of stockyards. In their heyday, those stockyards gave Chicago a reputation as the world's meat-packing capital — but also as an environmental and health horror brought to life in the stark images of Upton Sinclair's novel "The Jungle. " A few remnants of that industry remain here today. But the stockyards are long gone, replaced by an industrial park and a mindset that, from now on, Chicago will try to move past those images.

Serves 6 MEAT 4pounds boneless leg of lamb2cloves garlic, cut into sliversOlive oil (for sprinkling)Salt and pepper, to taste2tablespoons Dijon mustard2tablespoons chopped freshrosemary 1. Snip off any lamb netting, trim the excess fat from the meat, and retie with kitchen twine at 1-inch intervals. Make slits in the meat, insert the garlic all over. Sprinkle with oil, salt, and pepper. Rub the meat with mustard and sprinkle with rosemary. Set the meat in a roasting pan. 2. Set aside for 30 minutes.

BROOKLINE - A large cylinder of meat topped with half a pineapple turns slowly on a vertical spit at Anna's Taqueria, while glowing heat from two burners sears the outside to a rusty brown. Manager Carlos Castellon, wielding an extremely sharp knife, cuts slivers of the glistening pork in a gentle shaving motion. He quickly cooks red onion on a griddle, adds the chunks of meat and lets them crisp slightly, then places the mixture on a corn tortilla with a few bits of pineapple. This is tacos al pastor, a Mexican specialty and a relative rarity in the Boston area.

At least three national supermarket operators have decided to stop buying ground beef that contains the filler now known as "pink slime. " Federal regulators say the filler, known in the industry as "lean, finely textured beef," meets food safety standards. But critics say the product could be unsafe and is an unappetizing example of industrialized food production. Supervalu Inc. — which operates owns stores under the Acme, Albertsons, Cub Foods, Farm Fresh, Hornbacher's, Jewel-Osco, Lucky, Shaw's/Star Market, Shop 'n Save and Shoppers Food & Pharmacy banners — said...

WASHINGTON -- The first case of mad cow disease in the United States is generating an "I told you so" from some lawmakers, but the initial concern doesn't appear strong enough to reopen a huge spending bill financing much of the government. Fear that the disease might surface here prompted the Senate to vote last month to halt the marketing of meat from animals too old or too ill to stand or walk unassisted, such as the mad cow-infected Holstein slaughtered in Washington state Dec. 9. But Republican leaders on Capitol Hill that same day stripped the...

Supermarket chains Kroger Co. and Stop & Shop said Thursday they will join the growing list of store chains that will no longer sell beef that includes an additive with the unappetizing moniker "pink slime. " Federal regulators say the ammonia-treated filler, known in the industry as "lean, finely textured beef," meets food safety standards. But critics say the product could be unsafe and is an unappetizing example of industrialized food production. The Kroger Co., the nation's largest traditional grocer with 2,435 supermarkets in 31 states, also said it will stop buying the...

WARNER, N.H. - In this tiny town, about 30 minutes northwest of Manchester, the steep and winding driveway off the main road easily could be missed. It looks at first like a typical New England scene. There's a farmhouse and a farm store, a few chickens in a coop, goats, and a large fenced-in field filled with grazing - wait, are those buffalo? Yankee Farmer's Market is full of surprises, from the shaggy behemoths snorting in the yard to the unorthodox offerings inside the shop.