Advantage France

By Roger Cohen

CHERENCE, FRANCE — Arrival is usually defined as reaching a destination, but of course it’s more than that, it’s the moment when you have shed enough of where you came from to be present at the place you’ve reached. This offloading of layers takes time, like peeling an onion.

My French arrival this year was time-consuming. Iran, which is another story, had me. But the moment came, and when it came, it was not the dawn swooping of starlings, the softness of the dusk light through the sycamores, or the chiming of a village bell that delivered me to “la douce France,” but the sight of glistening guts.

The guts in question were being coaxed by a hand — ungloved — from the belly of a four-pound sea bass — unfarmed — at the market in the Norman town of Vernon, which has one stand devoted solely to watercress. The fish, iridescent, its gills bright scarlet, was fresh from the waters off Dieppe.

My friend Marcel Bossy, who had made the pre-dawn drive from the coast with his glossy load, had his hand deep in the fish. He was laughing about something as the guts slithered onto a scale-coated chopping board.

My 11-year-old daughter, Adele, covered her eyes, but I was riveted. Marcel’s wife, Sandrine, also laughing — something ribald between them — was gutting firm mackerel with swift incisions and finger movements, when one dropped to the ground. She scooped the fish up and resumed work on it, putting me in mind of Julia Child’s famous statement about a miss-flipped potato pancake: “You can always pick it up.”

Since Child, in “Mastering the Art of French Cooking,” and in her groundbreaking 1960’s television show “The French Chef,” brought Gallic secrets to riveted Americans, the shameless gutting and picking-up of real food in ungloved hands has given way to the hurried-hermetic-hygienic U.S. fever of plastic gloves, processed foods and precooked meals.

Those fish guts delivered me to France because, although this country has its share of fast-food outlets, it has preserved a relationship to food distinguished from the American in three essential respects: fear, time and “terroir.”

If Americans want their fish pre-filleted, their chicken breasts excised from surrounding bone and conveniently packed, their offal kept from view and the table, and any hand that touches a slice of ham or lox sealed inside a glove, it is because fear of the innards that will not speak their name, the guts that reek of life, and the germs we all carry has become rampant.

By contrast, the French don’t believe what they’re eating is genuine unless they’ve seen gritty proof of provenance. They like the alchemy of the peasant hand that does the pâté grip.

American anxiety is related to the American perception of time, which is always short in a land that prizes efficiency above all. Precooked meals — food divorced from its origins, food without guts — is faster to prepare and therefore attractive.

I bought a couple of the female ducklings the French call “canettes” the other day. It took 15 minutes for the cutting-off of head, feet and wing-tips; for the innards to be removed; for the placing in the cleansed insides of the liver, kidneys and neck; for singeing over a gas burner; and for discussion as to whether I wanted the plump ducks trussed for rotisserie cooking (I did not.)

Most stores in New York don’t bother selling ducklings — they’re inefficient birds in that the meat-to-size ratio is low — and if they did such protracted preparation would be unthinkable. Time bows at the altar of gastronomy in France. In the United States time is the altar.

The third fundamental difference relates to “terroir,” the untranslatable combination of soil, hearth and tradition that links most French people to a particular place. France sees American mobility with a sacred immobility; attachments trump restlessness.

These are attachments of the gut, which brings us back to why the French take such pleasure in those hands at work cleansing a sea bass or a duckling, and why a stand selling watercress (with the unique taste of a particular patch of soil) is viable.

The French Paradox, so-called, is really the French self-evidence. Change your relationship to fear, time and place, and you change your metabolism. This has less to do with the specific foods eaten, or the specific wine drunk (although of course they count) than it has to do with how food is approached.

According to the 2009 C.I.A. World Factbook, the estimated average life expectancy in France is 80.98 (84.33 for women and 77.79 for men), against 78.11 for the United States (80.69 for women and 75.65 for men.) France ranks 9th in the world; America ranks 50th. There’s something to be said for ungloved hands picking mackerel from the ground.

The American healthcare debate is skewed. It should be devoting more time to changing U.S. culinary and eating habits in ways that cut the need for expensive care by reducing rampant obesity, to which anxiety, haste and disconnectedness contribute. France has much to teach, guts and all.

*****
[From The New York Times]

That’s a Basal Cell Carcinoma (BCC) on the Tip of My Snoz

Read the inspiring story of the search for and use of an alternative medication to treat, and god willing be a total cure, for my friend Bill O’Leary’s carcinoma.

*****
[From Billo's web site, tagged below]

Steampunk Cellphone

Totally impractical and unlikely to fit into my trouser pocket – not that that has got anything to do with it – but I want one…

*****

[Via Slashgear]

Wing Man

By Paula Marantz Cohen:

What is it that drives some members of the human community to defy their physical limits, to exceed the norms of logic and reason, and to stand alone on the frontier of the impossible? I had occasion to contemplate these questions at the first bi-annual Hot Wing Challenge, held the other weekend at the Grand Marketplace, a suburban bazaar in Willingboro, New Jersey.

The event was hosted by Mild to Wild, Curly’s Creations, and Stolzfus Meats — the last supplying the wings, the first two the sauce. The Mild to Wild store stocks a variety of sauces including “F” Milk, Larry’s Hot Pussy Sauce, Salvation, and Neal’s Hairy Ass. But Curly’s Creations is the local brand, and Curly was there to fine-tune the sauces for the competition.

First round: super hot.

Second round: super-duper hot.

Third round: hottest on the planet.

Possible final elimination round: capable of blinding you if you rub your napkin in your eye.

There were 13 contenders. Most were on the youngish side, used to abusing their bodies on the playing field and at the keg party. There were a handful in the 40-something range who’d had long-term practice in unhealthy eating. And there was the Veteran, positioned at the end of the table in a motorized wheelchair. He looked to be about 65, had a serious beer gut, and a complexion the color of dirty putty. In other words, he’d been around the block where hot wings were concerned.

The judges explained the rules: no leaving the table during the contest, no drinking during the round, no “wiping” of the wing. Two contestants, raring to get started, were discussing their fondness for Curly’s Fire Alarm Sauce.

“Love that shit.”

“Broke myself in with some this morning.”

The absence of women in the competition was noted.

“My wife likes hot, but she wouldn’t sign up,” someone complained.

“Women can take the heat, but they can’t do the speed,” explained the Veteran sagely.

Rules stipulated that you had to eat the first set of six wings in five minutes. There was a crush of spectators, including a nice showing of Amish from the bakery next door and a number of irritated-looking wives. The wings were distributed and the countdown began. 3-2-1-Go! The 13 dove in. When the first round was over, everyone had finished.

“Good appetizer,” boasted one.

“Bring on the heat,” said another.

The second round began. Three wings apiece with super-duper hot sauce, five minutes to clean them to the bone.

“Paramedics!” called out one of the judges. A young guy, second from the left, had his head back with a nose bleed. Two paramedics who had been standing with the bunch of Amish near the Mild to Wild store entrance pushed through and tended to the bleeder.

Some of the guys had turned green and were sweating buckets.

At the end of the second round, it was two out, 11 remaining.

“Enough already!” screamed the wives, “You’re gonna kill yourself!” But no one listened.

Wings were positioned for the third round: two apiece with sauce hottest on the planet. Countdown — Go! Sweat was running down cheeks; eyes rolling back in sockets. Two guys put up their hands; they were out. “It’s the breathing gets you,” said one. “I tried to hold my breath, but what you gonna do? You gotta breathe.”

Everyone was struggling, except the Veteran. He’d finished first in the last two rounds, and he finished first again now, barely a drop of sweat on him.

“That guy’s an alien,” one of the young guys said in awe.

Time was up and the judges inspected. A few contestants were eliminated for not cleaning their wings (decision final, no arguing).

There were six left for the overtime round, and Curly went back to concoct something special. It was quiet. No one looked relaxed, except the Veteran.

The final wings emerged — only two per contestant this time, but you could smell the heat. The purveyors had put on plastic gloves and warned bystanders to stand back. Countdown — Go! Six guys, teeth tearing at chicken flesh, heads down and about to explode. One of the older guys, with years of hard eating and drinking behind him, put up his hands; he was out. So too the young guy with the earring. But by then the Veteran had already cleaned his wings. In victory, he wiped his mouth gingerly with a napkin, and pushed aside his plate. A slight sweat dotted his upper lip. “Not half as hot as my mother-in-law’s scalding breath,” he pronounced.

The remaining four battled it out for second place. The black guy with the baseball cap, tears streaming down his face, pushed through a coughing fit and finished up to a roar of applause from his family. Third place was still a contest between a cool-looking dude with a mane of black hair and a bald guy who looked like a stockbroker. The cool dude was getting red but he was breathing through his nose and eating fast; the stockbroker was falling behind.

“I was only a bite away,” he bemoaned later. But in hot wing competition, a bite is as a good as mile. It was over. Nickel-plated trophies with chickens on top were distributed.

“Give the guys some milk,” someone in the crowd bellowed. But it was beers they wanted; then, maybe more hot wings.

*****
[The Smart Set]

The Oily Truth

By Jennifer Fisher Wilson

Just what makes the Mediterranean diet so healthy has been a matter of debate for years. The diet is recognized for significantly reducing the risk for stroke and heart disease, certain cancers, and dementias such as Alzheimer’s disease. Although not a uniform diet, it typically features an abundance of grains, fruits, and vegetables, and also fish and moderate amounts of wine. And don’t forget olive oil, an ingredient often overlooked when the diet is translated in butter-loving American kitchens. In true Mediterranean diets, olive oil is the main fat, and there is lots of it. “Olive oil is the central pillar of the diet, a major source of calories in what is overall a low calorie diet,” says Paul Breslin, sensory scientist at the Monell Chemical Senses Center in Philadelphia.

Breslin and his colleague Gary Beauchamp, are involved in work that just might end the healthy diet debate. Their work has revealed that olive oil — which was already well-regarded for being monounsaturated and high in anti-oxidants — has remarkable anti-inflammatory effects as well.

The two started studying olive oil after Beauchamp attended a tasting in Sicily and discovered that it caused an unusual irritation at the back of his throat. This was noteworthy because it reminded him of the characteristic sting of ibuprofen, an irritant that also only affects the pharynx in the back of the throat — and a compound that, serendipitously, he already studied in his lab. Most irritants like peppers, mustards, gingers, and strong alcohols are different in that they affect the whole mouth with their burn or sting.

Breslin and Beauchamp began to search for a connection between the sensory and pharmacological properties of ibuprofen and olive oil. They found it in a naturally-occurring chemical in olive oil that inhibits the activity of cyclooxygenase (COX) enzymes, and they named it oleocanthal: oleo=olive, canth=sting, and al=aldehyde. COX inhibition is also the key action of ibuprofen and some other painkillers that confers their anti-inflammatory effect. The COX-blocking activity in three tablespoons of olive oil equals about 10 percent of the ibuprofen dose recommended for pain relief in adults.

Today, as medical research increasingly reveals inflammation as the cause of chronic diseases, the discovery of oleocanthal sheds additional light on how olive oil improves health and reduces risk. Just any old olive oil, however, will not do the trick. Fresh, cold-pressed extra-virgin or virgin olive oils contain much more oleocanthal than refined — so-called “light” — olive oils from later pressings. In fact, the irritating intensity of an olive oil — how much it stings the throat and induces coughing — is directly related to how much oleocanthal it contains.

Researchers at various institutions are currently investigating the direct impact of olive oil consumption on cancer and other diseases, while the Monell researchers are now doing physiology and biological studies to better learn how olive oil works its magic.

In the meantime, Breslin and Beauchamp have taken to using premium olive oil in their home kitchens, drizzled liberally on salads, pizzas, pastas, and sandwiches. Inspired, I went out and spent $26 on a small bottle of extra virgin olive oil from an Italian specialty store. It felt like too much, but if the science is to be trusted, this is one case where spending extra for the best is worth it. • 12 February 2008

SOURCE: “Ibuprofen-like activity in extra-virgin olive oil.” Beauchamp GK, Keast RSJ, Morel D, et al. Nature, 2005;437:45-6. “The Effect of Polyphenols in Olive Oil on Heart Disease Risk Factors: A Randomized Trial.” Covas M-I, Nyyssönen K, Poulsen HE, et al. Ann Intern Med, 2006;145:333-341. “Olive oil and longevity.” Trichopoulou A & Dilis V. Mol Nutr Food Res. 2007;51:1275-8.

*****
[Via The Smart Set]

The Dollar’s Fate

By Paul Kennedy:

There is a most interesting debate going on at present about the longer-term fate of the U.S. dollar as the supreme reserve currency for foreign-exchange transactions and, more importantly, for the currency holdings of national governments, global companies and the producers of oil, gas and other raw materials.

This attracted attention at the time of the G-20 meeting in London this past April, when the International Monetary Fund received a fresh allocation of $250 billion in special drawing rights (SDRs).

Two months later, the issue came up again at Yekaterinburg, Russia, where the meeting of the BRICs — Brazil, Russia, India and China — suggested to commentators that a coalition of rising states might pull Uncle Sam down to size, in part by shifting their currency holdings from the dollar into these I.M.F. units of account.

A generous interpretation of all of this talk is that it actually is rather better for the world to have its monetary exchanges based upon some international “spread” of currencies rather than upon a single one that, if it toppled due to domestic mismanagement, could bring ruin to many innocent players. Had not the great economist John Maynard Keynes proposed this with the creation of the “bancor” in 1944, to head off a dollar-denominated world that would in the end meet its fate of carrying too much on its shoulders?

This would have been good for the international community and, actually, good for America. Why should the Weary Titan have to stagger under the too-vast weight of its single-currency burden? But Washington vetoed Keynes’ scheme. It’s nice to feel you are Top Dog. Besides, if you possess the world’s leading foreign currency, you can run enormous trade and current-account deficits without being punished for it.

The nastier interpretation of this move toward ending the dollar’s preeminence is, let there be no doubt, an anti-American one. It seems to be in the nature of things that the leading power in world affairs is always resented by countries further down the totem pole, even when that hegemon is fairly successful at distributing what economists term “public goods.”

If, therefore, the rising economies of Brazil, Russia, India and China decide to have their own get-together, it is scarcely surprising that they would discuss the international trading and financial system, and how to become less dependent on America’s capacity (through sub-prime mortgages, lousy banks, currency dominance) to wreak damage upon it.

To some, a weakened dollar might also be good as a blow to U.S. arrogance, and a reminder that even top dogs can be tripped up. Removing the dollar’s “unfair” advantage as the primary reserve currency has always seemed agreeable to French intellectuals and, the record shows, to French presidents from de Gaulle to Sarkozy.

So why not, then, push for a more equitable “basket of currencies” to grease the world’s commercial exchanges or, as a variant of that, try to arrange trade through the medium of the I.M.F.’s special drawing rights?

It turns out that there all sorts of reasons why those SDRs cannot at present function as a common currency — that is, as something you would price a Toyota car in, or as a wad of bills you could withdraw from a cash machine. Their function is intergovernmental by nature and not at all like, say, Barclay’s foreign-currency departments.

This was well explained recently by the financial writer Swaminathan S. Anklesaria Aiyar of the Cato Institute, in Washington (see www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=10331). It should be noted that Aiyar is not like certain nationalist American commentators on this topic who seem to regard a reduction in the dollar’s world role as something like a threat to one’s masculinity.

In fact, Aiyar cold-bloodedly argues that the dollar’s relative fall will much more likely come as a result of the continued growth of China’s G.D.P. and the future arrival of the yuan as a fully convertible currency — and not as a recourse by the governments of the world to some artificial I.M.F. instrument like the special drawing rights. With the yuan joining the euro, the yen and the dollar as the four biggest foreign currencies by far, there will be even less pressure and logic for substitution of the traditional means of money exchange.

*****
[Read the full article in the New York Times]

The Seabreacher

Move over jetskis, the Seabreacher dolphin submarine is here. It looks like a dolphin – and acts like one too – with the ability to jump and roll and submerge for lengthy periods. The 1,500cc, 215 hp marine engine allows it to reach speeds up to 45 mph on the surface. This 15-foot sweetheart comes in various colors and starts at $48,000.- for the basic model.

To see more photographs, visit the Telegraph on-line.

*****
[Via Ken Why]

LRO – a giant leap for data transfer from the moon

How is it that my cell phone still loses connection in the city and my laptop barely gets the Internet in the mountains, yet NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) can keep in touch with Earth from 238,800 miles away, 24 hours a day? Additionally, LRO can transmit 461GB of data per day (the equivalent amount of information found in a huge library), sending this information at a rate of up to 100Mb/s, while my so-called high-speed Internet service struggles to provide about 1-3Mb/s. Obviously, it’s not what you know but who you know!

When NASA engineers designed the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO), they knew it would pointless blasting it to the moon if it couldn’t send and receive information. So they created an extraordinary communications system, one robust enough to send back all the information NASA’s robotic scout will collect about the moon’s surface and environment over the next 12 months – far more than any previous mission.

At the hub of the space-age communications system is a 13-inch-long tube, called a Traveling Wave Tube Amplifier. It is the first high data rate K-band transmitter to fly on a NASA spacecraft, making it possible for scientists to receive massive amounts of images and data from the orbiter at an unusually fast rate.

The new amplifier lets the LRO transmit 461GB of data per day at a speed of 100Mb/s – so much faster than a typical broadband connection.

L-3 Communications Electron Technologies built the amplifier under the guidance of NASA’s Glenn Research Center in Cleveland. The device uses electrodes in a vacuum tube to amplify microwave signals to high power, making it perfect for sending large amounts of data over long distances because it provides more power and more efficiency than its alternative, the transistor amplifier.
LRO’s job

LRO’s communication system transmits all the information it collects about the moon’s geography, climate and environment, and transmits it to a receiver at a Ka band antenna network at White Sands Test Facility in New Mexico. The large amount of data is needed in order for scientists to compile high-resolution, 3D maps of the lunar surface.

“We’re sending back more data than ever, faster and it’s nearly real time,” said Glenn project manager Todd Peterson.

Traveling Wave Tube Amplifiers have been used for other planetary missions, such as Kepler and Cassini, but previous designs weren’t as powerful as this one, according to Rainee Simons, chief of Glenn’s Electron and Optoelectronic Device Branch. He said engineers had to redesign the internal circuitry of the amplifier.

“In order to provide the power and frequency needed to send communications from the vicinity of the moon, it had to be custom designed and handmade,” he said.

The redesign also made the device lighter, which makes it more energy efficient – a heavier spacecraft requires more fuel, especially at take-off.

The amplifier was subjected to vigorous spaceflight testing – including vibration, thermal vacuum, radiation and electromagnetic interference tests – to ensure that it could withstand the intense conditions of launch and lunar orbit.

LRO is a said to be a vital step toward returning humans to the moon, but the data is also being analyzed to see if it can be used to improve life on Earth. No wonder Glenn team members were delighted when LRO entered its final orbit and began transmitting data.

It’s hoped that if the amplifier can be used on communication satellites, it could allow for much better tracking, monitoring and control of transoceanic flights and ships traveling beyond the reach of radar.

It also could enable real-time data transfer from future Earth-orbiting satellites. Such satellites will study climate change, track migratory animals, endangered species, icebergs, volcanic eruptions and forest fires, and aid in search and rescue operations.

*****
{From Nasa; www.nasa.gov via Gizmag]

Digital Photo Frame That Takes Photos

Like other digital frames it displays your photos, but it also takes pictures with a built-in 2 MP autofocus camera. By turning the frame into a camera, you get instant gratification without the need of a computer or syncing with an online gallery service.

The 7-inch touchscreen also displays videos and you can even record narration to photos. Good little retractable magnetic stand.

From designers Mintselect@Mintpass; www.mintpass.com

*****
[Via Yanko Design]

Etihad Airways First Class – A Suite Way to Travel

Luxury travel is reaching new heights every day with prestigious airlines vying to woo the elite travelers by offering more in-flight luxuries for effortless travel. In the news is Etihad Airways, which installed its current first class seating in 2006, but have now gone for another opulent makeover with their new suite all in a short span of three years. The executive treatment includes a private cabin with sliding doors with Arabic-style detailing for privacy, and even more room than the existing Diamond First Class. The seat now extends into a fully-flat bed (80.5 inches in length), and comes equipped with a built-in massager, lumbar support and adjustable headrest, as well as power sockets, an Ethernet port and audio jack.

*****
[Via BornRich.org]