Guess how many years it took planet Earth to get from a population of 6 billion to today’s figure of 7 billion.  Only 13 years!  With population growth speeding along at that rate, the news media keep asking how we’re going to have enough food for all these folks.  Considering the seriousness of the matter, it’s more than disconcerting to read the statistics on how much food is wasted in the U.S.  And there’s even more concern about discarded food because it’s been linked to greenhouse gas emissions and global warming. The following piece gives you some figures that document how food waste affects global warming.  We can assume that as the population grows, so will the impact of food waste on global warming increase—unless we can manage to discard less food. At the end of this article, there’s a link to a Shelf Life Advice article on how to do just that.

You want to know exactly how many calories are in the meal you’re about to eat?  Here’s how to get an exact answer:  Grab your plate, hop into your car, and speed over to the nearest lab that has a bomb calorimeter. A scientist will put your meal into a machine containing a water jacket, burn the food, and measure the increase in water temperature, which indicates how much heat the food produced. When that figure is converted into calories, you’ll have it—the exact number of calories you would have eaten if your meal hadn’t been incinerated. 

What’s the point?  Outside the lab, calorie counts--whether on a paper bag of McDonald’s fries, packaged cookies, or any other edible--are an ESTIMATE.  Even at Wendy’s no one is counting the exact number and size of fries in your bag.  Still, you may be surprised by just how inaccurate these restaurant estimates can be. By the end of 2012, you should find calorie info at all the large restaurant chains, that is, if the date on which this information becomes required (by the Food Safety Modernization Act of 2010) is finally set in stone. Meanwhile, you can check the calorie counts of many chain restaurants online, but don’t expect these to be exact either.

Some folks have put on their thinking caps and come up with two interesting methods for cutting down on the cutting up of animals: growing meat in the lab instead of in pastures or on factory farms and observing Meatless Monday.  Will either of these newsworthy ideas work?  Let’s find out.

Lab-Made Meat

The headline of a recent Chicago Tribune article reads this way:  “Meat from a petri dish: credible or inedible?” Yep, you got it right.  A molecular biologist named Nicholas Genovese is working on this plan at the University of Missouri, as are scientists in other countries. Basically, the goal is to grow muscle meat “multiplying endlessly a single cow, pig or chicken cell to create ton after ton of meat.”  The result would be just meat, no hooves, snouts, or other parts of the animal.

Cantaloupes:

October 1 update on listeria outbreak caused by cantaloupe:

The death toll from the multistate listeria outbreak caused by tainted cantaloupe has now reached 15, and, so far, 84 people in 19 states have become ill. The CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) said that it is expecting additional illnesses and perhaps more deaths because listeria has a long incubation period.  Symptoms can appear any time from 1 week to 2 months after contaminated food is consumed.  The microorganism is particularly deadly for the elderly, young children, and those with weakened immune systems.