I love popcorn. I pop it fresh at home, and usually can't resist a big bag of it when I go to the movies. As someone who grew up in San Diego County, I've always been impressed with the popcorn I eat at theaters in the Bay Area (and the theaters themselves). In San Diego, pretty much all movie houses are large cineplexes owned by media chains. So in addition to having to sit through endless entertainment trivia questions and facts while we wait for the movie to start, not to mention the interminable canned pop music blaring through the Dolby speakers, the only popcorn available is often stale (because it's pre-popped) and comes with a neon orange "butter" flavored topping. And, to add insult to injury, most large tubs top $7.50 these days. It's enough to make this popcorn-loving girl eat M&Ms instead.

So after 15 years of living in both San Francisco and the East Bay, I'm still thankful each time I walk into my local Grand Lake Theater, with its beautiful decorative ceilings and theme rooms, ample seating, Friday and Saturday Mighty Wurlitzer organ music before the evening shows, and marquee sporting left-leaning political views (or rather, rants). It's pretty much the antithesis of anything you'd find in my home town and I love it. When I lived in San Francisco, I enjoyed going to the Red Vic, the Lumiere, the Castro, the Clay and a variety of other movie houses. Some were renovated, others a little run down, but none blared the latest country music hit from the speakers or had ads before the show started. Even better, all of the small movie houses I liked had great popcorn.

So while watching How to Train Your Dragon with my daughters recently at the Grand Lake Theater, I started to wonder how many local movie houses really pop their corn on site, and also which offer real butter. In an attempt to classify this information, I emailed or called the main movie theaters in San Francisco, Oakland, Alameda and Berkeley. And, just for good measure, I also asked everyone how much they charged for a large tub or bag. I was impressed to find that all but one theater that responded popped their popcorn on site (and the one that didn't sells unique Asian-flavored popcorn). Interestingly, even large chains that truck their popcorn in for other non-Bay Area locations pop it fresh in their San Francisco, Emeryville and Berkeley theaters. I was also excited to find that all but one of the independents offer real butter as a topping. What surprised me, however, was how much cheaper the popcorn at independent movie houses was in comparison to the chain theaters (often 2/3 the price and in one case almost half the cost), especially considering that the larger chains often use cheaper soy bean or coconut oil "butter" flavored toppings instead of real butter. The admission price is also usually less expensive at an independent house, so you may want to splurge on some Red Vines as well.

Following is a list of my findings. Please note that not every theater responded, so if your favorite isn't on the list, blame the person who answers their email. I tried calling some locations that didn't email me back, but as most only have phone numbers that list movie show times, I couldn't actually speak to anyone. Also, some theaters noted that they offer free refills on their large tub of popcorn, while others simply didn't provide this information.

As you'll see, the state of movie popcorn is pretty good where we live. The popcorn seems to always be popped on site, which makes it fresher. The butter situation, although pretty good, is a bit rockier, with some theaters offering real butter and others that neon orange stuff. But let's just forget about fresh popcorn and butter for a second. Regardless of the quality of these concessions, we're lucky to have so many small movie houses still in existence. Sadly, the day of the independent movie theater is gone in many other parts of the country, but here we can enjoy retrospectives at the Red Vic, walking to the Lumiere or the Presidio on windy nights, seeing a film festival at the Castro, or taking our kids to see the latest 3D movie at The Grand Lake. We're fortunate to have so many old movie houses to choose from, whether you eat popcorn or not.

San Francisco
AMC Loews Metreon 16 -- Orville Redenbacher popped on site. Instead of butter, they offer a popcorn topping that is butter flavored and made from soy bean oil. The person who answered the phone said that a large tub costs $6.75, but their sister theater (Bay Street in Emeryville) says the price should be equivalent to their price (which is $7.50).

Balboa Theater -- Freshly popped with real butter. A large tub costs $5 (including tax) and comes with a free refill. They also offer Kernel Seasons Toppings.

Castro Theater -- The only theater to say they popped organic popcorn. It's popped fresh at the theater and they offer real butter as a topping. A large tub costs $5.75.

Century Theaters (including Century Center 9 and CinéArts @ Empire) -- Fresh Orville Redenbacher popped with canola oil. They offer real butter for a topping and charge between $6.50 and $6.75 for a large size (depending on the location). Free refills are also offered.

Landmark Theaters (including The Bridge, Clay, Lumiere, Opera Plaza and Embarcadero Center Cinema) -- Each Landmark Theater pops their own popcorn on site and offers real butter as a topping. A large tub costs $7.50.

Red Vic -- Fresh popped corn with real butter. A large tub costs $5.

Roxie Theater -- They make fresh popcorn every night, popping it in peanut oil instead of the more commonly used canola oil. They also offer real butter as a topping and charge $4.50 for a large tub, the least expensive tub of popcorn in the survey.

Stonestown Twin 2 -- Popcorn popped on site. Instead of butter, they offer a butter-flavored topping made from coconut oil. At $8.00 for a large popcorn, this is the most expensive popcorn on my list of San Francisco theaters, but you can get a refill.

Vogue Theater -- Fresh popcorn popped on site. They do not offer real butter for a topping. A large bag costs $5.50 and free refills (same visit only).

Viz Cinema -- Viz offers a different popcorn experience than most theaters. They have wasabi, curry, and shichimi (Japanese hot pepper) flavored popcorn that is purchased from an outside baker (no butter or butter flavoring). They sell it in 4 oz bags for $4.00 each.

East Bay

Alameda Theater -- Popcorn popped fresh before each show on site. They also offer real butter as a topping. A large tub is $6.00

AMC Bay Street -- Orville Redenbacher popped on site. No real butter. Instead they offer a butter-flavored topping made from soy bean oil. A large tub costs $7.50.

Elmwood Rialto -- Popcorn popped on site with real butter as a topping. A large costs $5.75.

The Grand Lake Theater -- Popcorn popped fresh on site with real butter as a topping. A large tub costs $5.00.

Jack London Stadium 9, Emery Bay Stadium 10, and Berkeley 7 Theaters -- Popcorn popped on site. Instead of butter, they offer a butter-flavored topping made from coconut oil. Like Stonestown, which is also owned by the same company, they charge a whopping $8.00 for a large popcorn, but you can get a refill.

Landmark Theaters (including Piedmont Theater, Albany Twin, California Theatre, and Shattuck Cinemas) -- -- Each Landmark Theater pops their own popcorn on site and offers real butter as a topping. A large tub costs $7.50.

Science of Taste

Did you know that about 95 percent of what we think is taste is actually smell? Or that the way we perceive flavor comes from a complex relationship between our senses, emotions and memories? As scientists decode how our taste and olfactory receptors work, top California chefs are taking that knowledge and creating alchemy in the kitchen.

Related Links:
Producer's Notes: The Science Of Taste

Web Extra: City Egg, Country Egg

Is there a difference in taste between eggs gathered right from the farm and ones bought at the supermarket? Sebastian Nava, Research Assistant at the Culinary Institute of America, Greystone, presents his ongoing study of store-bought eggs and their country cousins.

Since this is my first go around with BAB I wanted to introduce myself with something short, creamy, cold and sweet. As for me, I'm simply a cook with food dreams and an active imagination. And lucky for me, cooking is also my profession.

Like clockwork, as local strawberries start to trickle in, so do the slew of seasonal recipes that appear in print and in tons of blogs. Timeless dishes such as trifle, shortcakes, pie, creams and custards consume the majority of the recipes indexes. Yes, of course, they all have merit and nothing beats a perfectly ripe strawberry, but what drives my imagination as a cook is coming up with something new and innovative. This concoction came to my mind while recently looking over an image for a strawberry milkshake.

As much as I love fruit milkshakes they sometimes taste weak as the fruit gets lost in sweet dairy notes or in heaps of sugar. So, how do you make something more pronounced and less diluted? Or better put, how do you get a particular ingredient to come to the surface. In the cooking world the techniques we usually apply are centered towards reducing, roasting or dehydrating; this makes foods more complex and sharp. With vegetables and fruits roasting and dehydrating extracts the natural sugars making them more intensely sweet. My good friend Chef Roger Feely turned me on to slow roasting strawberries years ago as something spectacular to garnish desserts with. I have been consumed with them ever since! And just like that, while glancing at that image for the strawberry milkshake this shake idea was born.

I give credit to our pastry chef Juliann for the malt ball idea. She suggest malted chocolate as a complimentary garnish with good symmetry for the shake, but when the words soy lecithin and foam came into the conversation I shut down and decided to go conventional. Great flavor combo, so thanks for the suggestion Juliann!

I'm pretty sure this is an original so I'm very happy to bring it to you fresh on BAB!

Slow Roasted Strawberry Milkshake with Crushed Malt Balls

Makes: 2-3 servings

Ingredients:

For the Strawberries:
1 pound strawberries, tops removed and halved
¼ cup sugar
1 fresh vanilla bean, seeds removed
Pinch salt

For the Shake:
1 pint, super premium ice cream (16% fat, low air)
¾ cup whole milk
¾ of the roast strawberries; save some for garnish

Garnish:
2-3 roast strawberry halves
1 tablespoon of crushed malt balls

Preparation:

1. Turn on oven to 250 degrees, Fahrenheit
2. Scrape out the seeds from the vanilla bean
3. Break up the clump of vanilla seeds with finger tips.
4. Toss the berries with sugar, salt and vanilla bean.
5. Slow cook in oven for 2 hours, uncovered, pull and let cool
6. Crush 6 malt balls with a mallet or heavy pan
7. Place ice cream in blender with milk, strawberries and some reserved syrup. Blend until just mixed. Thin it out with milk if too thick.
8. Pour into glasses and garnish with reserved strawberries, syrup and crushed malt balls

When it springs to life in the old El Herradero space on Mission at 18th, presumably early this summer, Commonwealth will be "a progressive American restaurant, building on California's tradition of showcasing local, seasonal foods while incorporating diverse culinary approaches from around the world." Many, many San Francisco restaurants plaster that sort of thesis statement across their websites. While it's pegged as an "innovative model of benevolent fine-dining...committed to benefiting our community," in which "a set portion of proceeds from [Chef Jason] Fox’s inventive tasting menus will be donated to local non-profits," none of Commonwealth's p.r. literature refers to the eatery-in-process as a charity exactly.

A free, potentially unreliable online dictionary defines charity: "Provision of help or relief to the poor; almsgiving; something given to help the needy; alms; an institution, organization, or fund established to help the needy; benevolence or generosity toward others or toward humanity; indulgence or forbearance in judging others." As applied to the restaurant world, the word takes a lot of different tacks. Jamie Oliver's Fifteen foundation trains disadvantaged youth to run a growing empire of restaurants. Since 1991, San Francisco's Delancey Street Foundation has run a vocational training program around its restaurant staffed by residents (often ex-convicts and former abusers of drugs and alcohol). Plenty of restaurants make a point of donating surplus food to banks and soup kitchens. I also think of Karma Kitchen, the three-year-old Berkeley cafe founded on the concept of pay-it-forward. Every meal is a "genuine gift" paid for by previous customers. The idea is that happy diners will then elect to become donors to allow subsequent visitors to enjoy the same nourishment and hospitality, and to perpetuate the cycle of trust, abundance, and community-awareness.

Though high-end big-ticket establishments occasionally throw a benefit bash situated around one holiday or another, most restaurants focused on helping others aren't overly preoccupied with pushing unique, gastronomically interesting meals. Relatively austere offerings such as dal and rice abound. I suppose that's why Commonwealth feels fresh -- even with brasserie Elmwood Cafe in Berkeley getting off to a good start last month. In an Eater S.F. bit posted the week before last, founder Anthony Myint laid out the mission pretty clearly:

"Basically, we're drawing on some aspects of [Mission Street Food], such as affordability and inventiveness of cuisine, and trying to make this a more consistent and sustainable business, which creates some revenue for local charities...[We're creating an] approachable fine dining atmosphere, focused on value-oriented food...The overall experience will be much more akin to fine dining than the sometimes charming, but often chaotic atmosphere at Lung Shan.”

Given the sprint-like pace at which cultural movements now gather speed, the idea that food can be an agent of positive change is not particularly new; the idea that a fine dining restaurant can -- and not just by sourcing produce from nearby farms or going "green" -- is, on the other hand, somewhat unprecedented. Eager "foodies" inevitably hover like locusts around any waves preparing to crash across the city's dining scene. Once street food emerged as a monster trend, the swelling popularity of carts and stands run not infrequently by unemployment check-cashing hobbyists helped draw positive attention to people with families depending on their fledgling Health Code-flaunting businesses for survival. They may compete with citizens who ten years ago might have worked at a dot com and snapped up SOMA lofts, but at least higher profiles and legitimacy loom closer for all, right? How appropriate to harness that reoccurring phenomenon with the intention of sharing profits with non-profit organizations bent on improving lives, not just lighting up the dining scene. Just as they do for Mission Street Food twice a week, lines will form around the block for Commonwealth when it opens. The lines will form partially because of the city's familiarity with Mission Street Food, but they will only stay if the restaurant is actually really good. Mission Street Food doesn't operate under the same pressure awaiting Commonwealth. It doesn't just appeal to people because it's a pop-up, or because its meals benefit charities. Each dinner is an opportunity to enjoy an unprecedented experience curated by a chef applying his learned techniques, background, and imagination to the concept. The chefs are usually relatively unheralded, and the meals give them an opportunity to garner more attention than they usually enjoy manning the sauce station at a celebrated restaurant with someone else's name on the menu out front. Imagine if Thomas Keller showed up one night with an army of assistants. The line would stretch up to Mount Davidson, but something would be lost all the same. Mission Street Food is a d.i.y. adventure with low prices to match. Dishes are executed with more consistency in a humming three-star kitchen with the same staff every night, but the spirit remains unique, lovably loose, with an invigorating, not unnerving, degree of uncertainty surrounding each dinner.

In this specific sense, Commonwealth can't be as exciting. It might be innovative, but it won't be rough-and-tumble. Instead, with a bar, a regular fleet of servers, a pedigreed designer, and a beloved local chef starting a new gig, it will be more like...a restaurant.

S.F. Weekly online food editor John Birdsall said so much a month ago when he reported on the developing project:

"Commonwealth is no Crossroads Cafe...some scrappy, scrape-together-funding place -- despite a well publicized cash-raising initiative on Kickstarter -- along the lines of the twice-weekly pop-up that put funky, fusty Lung Shan on the map. In a way, Commonwealth promises to reprise an earlier, finer-dining incarnation of Bar Tartine."

I'm excited to see if Commonwealth's business plan in any way influences how it's received. Will Commonwealth's food be assessed like that of any other hotly anticipated Mission District eatery? Given the press and circulating buzz, will its food be taken as seriously as whatever charitable mission diners perceive ? It should be. But even if it sucks -- and it almost assuredly won't -- who would want to savage a restaurant founded on such noble principles? Will Michael Bauer bash away if it doesn't measure up to expectations? Will Yelpers revel in reporting on over-dressed salads, shaky service, and ice-cold plates, or will they hold back? Will Commonwealth's community-bolstering aspirations wilt beneath a barrage of dismissive, incomprehensible tweets?

Stay tuned next week for some Q-and-A with Commonwealth folks.

My sister Rachael and her boyfriend Matt waiting in the showroom for the tour to begin

My mom was right when she mentioned no one was quite as excited about the chocolate tour as I was. I found myself almost elbowing small children to get to the front of the line so my view of the machines and the tempering process wouldn't be obstructed. I tried to keep my cool when they passed around the cocoa butter, assuring myself I'd get a turn to feel it as well. For someone who loves chocolate and who was already a big Theo fan, this was a major afternoon. And my family was kind enough to oblige when I told them that, although we only had two days in Seattle, this was how we were spending our Tuesday afternoon.

The tour began in a small room where our fearless guide led us through a brief history of Theo Chocolate, the only U.S. fair-trade, organic bean-to bar chocolate factory. In addition to many samples and a tour through the factory, we learned all about how Theo actually yields a chocolate bar from the cocoa pod--the beginning of it all.

A cocoa pod is actually a fruit with a leathery rind about 3 cm thick, and is a bit smaller than an American football. It's filled with cocoa seeds and mucilaginous pulp. The pulp kind of looks like wet cotton and it plays a key role in the fermentation of the chocolate (did you know chocolate is a fermented food?). To simplify drastically, with time and heat throughout the fermentation process, the white pulp disappears leaving only the dead heated seeds. The seeds are then dried and become known as beans--the raw material for the Theo magic to begin. There are apparently about 30-50 seeds in each pod, and it takes 80-90 beans to make a 3 oz. bar of chocolate.

The Process: One Hour Distilled Down to a Paragraph

Roasted beans, the Winnower machine, the tempering machine, quality control

In the factory itself, there are a number of machines and steps that are involved in creating the final product. They use a European roaster (there are less than 100 of these left in the world) which drives off moisture. Our tour guide explained that they do a partial roast to begin with and then send the beans into the "Winnower" machine where they are slammed against a steel plate to allow for the husks to separate, and are then moved through different meshes and through an air stream that blows the husk away from the recently smashed nibs. Then the cleaned nibs go back in the roaster to further develop the flavor. After this, off to the Ball Mill which whirls the beans at high speed so that they can be broken down and eventually turned into chocolate liqueur. They add evaporated cane juice, and 6500 pounds of chocolate goes into one holding tank where it is eventually taken to their tempering machines and out into individual molds.

Flavors of Theo Chocolate we Sampled:

Samples, samples, and more samples

I'm not sure that most people are used to describing the nuances of chocolate in the same way that we often do with wine or even with coffee. But our tour guide encouraged us to mention the first word that came to our minds when we sampled different bars. People began to loosen up after a few minutes and really explore their palates and their personal preferences. Here is a sampling of what we tried:

• Lime Coriander Confection: I loved this little square. It had a subtle, spring citrus flavor and just a hint of coriander. I was surprised to learn each confection and caramel is still hand-decorated.
• Pink Salted Vanilla Caramel: My mom bought some of these to take home. I can't honestly say that the pink salt adds any different flavor profile than regular salt, but they sure are pretty.
• Lemon Verbena Confection: Spring time in one bite. Vibrant, bright lemon flavor enrobed in dark chocolate.
• Milk Chocolate Chai Bar: While I much prefer dark to milk chocolate, I ended up falling in love with this bar and bringing one home. At Theo, their milk chocolate has at least 40% cocoa, so it still seems very rich and complex. I loved the warm spice flavor profile.
• Dark Chocolate Toasted Coconut Bar: And I bought two of these. Apparently they are seasonal so I was concerned they may go away forever. If you like coconut, try and get your hands on one.
• Dark Chocolate Cherry Almond: A really classic combination of organic cherries and rich dark chocolate studded generously with almonds.
• 91% Dark Chocolate Bar: This blew me away. I've tried 95% chocolate before and it just screamed baking chocolate--bitter, leaving your mouth with a dry, unpleasant taste. But Theo's 91% bar was not at all bitter (although not all that sweet either). The perfect bar for a dark chocolate purist.
• Nib Brittle (70%): I learned on the tour that people either love or hate cocoa nibs. I happen to love them, but by the looks on the faces of many of the folks around me, that's not always the case. This bar has organic, roasted nibs enrobed in a crunchy, slightly sweet brittle.

The Future of Chocolate in the U.S.

The tour closed with some interesting information that I wasn't aware of. Chocolate production in the U.S. is a really new endeavor--spanning only the last 250 years. And, like anything, the standards are constantly changing in regards to the percentage of cocoa required, fillers allowed etc. I was shocked to learn that currently commercial products only have to be 10% cocoa to call themselves chocolate. Yikes. What comprises the rest? Check out your average grocery store aisle and see if you can locate the chocolate chips often labeled "chocolate baking chips"--they're mostly milk solids and sugar. So Theo's whole point is that life is too short to eat bad quality chocolate and, in remaining firm with such high standards, they'll hopefully help shape the future landscape of chocolate standards and regulation. On their website they note:

At Theo, we believe there is no luxury in products that benefit us today, while jeopardizing future generations ability to meet their needs. When you taste our chocolate you will experience our passion and integrity in every luscious bite.

So like most things, not all chocolate is created equal. And I've become a little obsessed with reading labels and researching the chocolate that I purchase since taking the Theo tour. The name Theo originates from the Greek name of the Cacao tree -- Theobroma Cacao or "Food of the Gods." They're living up to the name.

From graffiti to mural at Free Farm

In a place as densely populated as the Bay Area, one person's bright idea can make a big impact. Just ask Mary Risley, owner of Tante Marie's Cooking School and the founder of Food Runners. As a cooking teacher, Risley loved being part of San Francisco's vibrant food culture. But she also knew that part of the price of perfection for the city's restaurants, bakeries, cafes, and cooking schools was a willingness to toss anything that wasn't 100% great. Which meant a lot of food--good quality, clean, unused but not sellable--was filling up a lot of dumpsters at the end of every business day.

With the city's ever-rising cost of living (and ever-squeezed public and private resources for homeless shelters, low-income families, and crisis centers), how could such food get out of the landfill and into the hands of the hungry? Businesses were busy, nonprofits were stretched; the missing link was just that, a link that would connect the food industry with organizations dedicated to feeding the hungry.

Looking for a way to start giving back to the city that had nourished her and supported her business, Risley went first to the SF Food Bank, but realized she wanted to be doing a lot more than packing bags of canned goods. So the Food Bank got her in touch with Daily Bread, an organization in Berkeley run by Carolyn North, which picked up unused food and spread it around to the city's homeless shelters and crisis centers. She asked North if she could start a similar organization across the bay, and North agreed, so long as she changed the name. So in 1987, Risley started Food Runners, a nonprofit dedicated to feeding the hungry by reducing food waste.

As a businesswoman, Risley wanted to make Food Runners into a professional, easy-to-use system that would be simple and mutually beneficial for both businesses and service organizations. 23 years later, Food Runners relies on a network of 250 volunteers who pick up excess usable food from over 400 sites every weekday, from every type of place from small cafes and big hotels to local schools and corporate cafeterias. The food is delivered by volunteers' car and the company's refrigerated truck to shelters and neighborhood food pantries.

When I managed a cafe in the Ferry Building, I knew that all I had to do was box up our extra pastries at the end of every day. The next morning, a cheerful volunteer would show up, pick up the boxes and sign off on my tax-deductible tally sheet. Later that day, those pastries, made with organic ingredients and fruit from a local family farm, might be feeding parents and kids at a drop-in center for homeless families, or adding a little bit of sweetness to a seniors' lunch.

There are other ways to turn waste into resources. The easiest way to start? Drop that banana peel into your green bin. One banana peel multiplied by over 700,000 residents in San Francisco alone means that many tons of food waste (everything from that four-day-old hunk of burrito at the back of the fridge to orange peels and onion skins) are diverted from the waste stream every day via the city's green-waste bins. All that stinky stuff goes to Jepson Prairie Organics, a composting facility near Vacaville. Over the course of about 30 days, it's transformed into high-quality compost that's ready for use by local farms, nurseries, and vineyards.

Or, what about starting from the very beginning, and growing more food from scratch right here in the city? Even in cities as highly populated as San Francisco, Oakland, and Berkeley, a surprisingly amount of arable land is still available. Just look at the Free Farm, which was started on a vacant lot at Gough and Eddy Streets in January of this year.

Pastor Megan Rohrer, a young Lutheran pastor who works with a variety of homeless communities around the city as the executive director of Welcome Ministry, wanted to expand the work she was doing, going from feeding the hungry of San Francisco to growing food for those same communities. The St. Paulus Lutheran church was willing to offer an empty lot it owned to her and a dedicated community of volunteers to make a garden.

Meanwhile Tree, a longtime food-justice activist and community gardener as well as the founder of the Mission's popular Free Farmstand, was looking for a place to grow more local food to supply the farmstand. Once Megan's church connections met Tree's gardening expertise, the Free Farm was born. With grants from the Mesa Foundation along with several local Episcopal and Lutheran churches, plus a whole lot of wheelbarrow-pushing volunteer labor, the weedy lot has undergone an astonishing transformation.

What was once a trash-strewn, needle-littered eyesore that neighbors called "The Pit" is now a welcoming, mural-lined space full of neatly mounded raised beds planted with salad mix, potatoes, beans, broccoli and lettuce. Bricks salvaged from the St. Paulus church (which stood on the space before burning down in 1995) now form strawberry beds on the hillside and a winding spiral bed planted with flowers, herbs, and vegetables. Cold frames and a newly built greenhouse are filled with trays of tiny seedlings, everything from kale to tomatoes to marigolds started from seeds donated by church communities across the country. Bright garden-themed murals by local artist Leanne C. Miller cover the concrete wall on the west side, and there are plans to bring more artists and sculptors into the garden to create site-specific works.

Volunteers get down and dirty every Wednesday and Saturday from 10am to 2pm, building infrastructure, hauling mulch, manure and compost, planting seedlings, waterings, and more. A volunteer-made vegan lunch, often featuring produce harvested from the garden, is shared by all. Volunteers will also share in the harvest, with excess supplying the Free Farmstand (Rohrer hopes to establish another neighborhood Free Farmstand on the site) as well as providing fresh local produce for twice-weekly homeless dinners organized by Welcome. (For more information on Welcome's additional garden projects around the Bay Area, go to Urban Share.)

At the educational Garden for the Environment in the Inner Sunset, weekend workshops teach everything from composting basics to chicken husbandry. Want to spread the word? If you're a San Francisco resident, you can sign up for a three-month gardening and compost educator program that will give you all the necessary tools to teach the basics of urban green gardening and composting. Just want to do a little digging? Volunteer days are Wednesday and Saturdays, 10am to 3pm, with pizza from nearby Arizmendi Bakery to share. The garden's also a great place to get ideas for your own backyard. Organized by concept, there are examples of low-water gardens, native plants, edibles, and more.

In association with the SF Parks Trust, the Garden for the Environment is also offering Garden City, a three-part class on creating an urban farm or community garden, on May 2nd, 9th, and 16th. Topics include locating and identifying available land, working with the city to get the proper permits, building a community of volunteers, and the horticultural nuts and bolts of productive edible gardening and landscaping.

And finally, don't forget about what's growing in your own backyard. Want to turn your lawn into a food forest? Check out a recent blog post about how a week (and a bunch of friends and neighbors) transformed one Oakland bungalow, thanks to the help of permaculture designers Planting Justice. Neighborhood Fruit and Produce for the People can help you find, glean or distribute excess fruit in your neighborhood. Got extra lemons or loquats? Don't waste them, share them!

I'm broke. Of course, so is nearly everyone else these days. The belts, they are a-tightening. Practical choices, which seemed almost unheard of a couple of years ago thanks to easily-obtained credit, have to be made.

Do I want to meet friends for dinner at the newest hipster restaurant? Sure I do, but I also need new towels and underwear, so I'm going to have to pass, thank you very much. Maybe I'll meet you after dinner.

It's a state of fiscal being that I'm quite familiar with-- I've never had a lot of money to begin with, so everything is a matter of either/or.

Once, while staying with a very wealthy friend of mine when at University, he performed a little fashion show for me, displaying his back-to-school shopping finds. Now for most of us, back-to-school shopping means a trip to The Gap or something equally affordable. To my friend, this meant a couple of weeks in Paris and Milan. So when he popped out of his bedroom door asking in his posh little English accent, "Do you like my belt? It's Valentinoooo..." I asked the following question:

"Alex, exactly how much did that belt cost you?"

"Oh, Michael, you're not supposed to ask that. It was only seven fifty."

"Seven hundred and fifty or $7.50?"

"Don't be insulting. I shouldn't have told you. Do you like it or not?"

"Oh, it's great and all, but your belt costs as much as my rent. It's a question of belt-or-rent for me, and I'd have to say that I love my apartment more than your belt."

"Well, Michael, I can't help it if you're poor."

He paid for that last, unfortunate statement not with his life, but with dinner.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining (loudly). There are billions of people on earth who are worse off than I am. But sometimes I want to feel like the big shot I've never, ever been. So, rather than buy an obscenely expensive car or suit or summer home or any home, for that matter, I allow myself the small luxury of luxurious food and drink. I do my best to have a gorgeous hunk of cheese wrapped up in the fridge as well as a bottle of good champagne , which I keep on hand in case of emergencies. Whenever I am feeling blue or poor or totally hopeless, I open the refrigerator door and look at the champagne. Just knowing it's there lifts my spirits. It tells me I haven't yet fallen through the cracks.

And then I think of the pair of shoes I could have bought with the money I spent on that damned bottle of bubbly.

Today, I wanted something rich. Something that would make me feel like that big shot I will more than likely never become.

So I up and made myself a dish named for America's first billionaire-- Oysters Rockefeller.

Oysters Rockefeller*

Having never been a fan of big business (or big business guys, for that matter), it struck me as odd that I should want to make something that pays homage to the grandfather of corporate culture and American oil-dependence. Of course, Rockefeller also donated vast sums of money for education (he was instrumental in the founding of both the University of Chicago and Spelman College, for example) and was dedicated to the eradication of both hookworm and yellow fever.

So there you have it.

Oysters Rockefeller got their start--and their name-- at the world famous Antoine's Restaurant in New Orleans. In 1899, chef Jules Alciatore substituted Gulf Oysters (which were plentiful and local) for the French snails (which were scarce and, well, from France) in a dish the restaurant had traditionally served.

It was a terrific success. The dish of oysters (which were typically eaten only raw until this time) covered in rich, green sauce and subsequently baked was as novel as it was rich. In an apocryphal story, one Antoine's customer was so astonished by the heft of these baked oysters that he decried (people, incidentally, decried much more often in the 19th Century than they do in the 21st), "Why, this is as rich as Rockefeller!"

And so the name stuck. Of course, it also helps that the sauce is green in color, which is coincidentally the color of American money, of which Mr. Rockefeller had more of than anyone else.

There has been some debate as to the original, correct recipe for Oysters Rockefeller. Jules Alciatore swore that he would take the secret of the recipe to his grave.

He was a man of his word.

Some people insist that spinach was not part of the original recipe, and that the green of the sauce came from parsley and slow-cooked celery. Others, like Emeril Legasse suggest the option of green food coloring. Seriously. Parmesan or no parmesan? Herbsaint, Pernod, or Absinthe? Frankly, I don't care. I say make it whichever way you like, as long as you make it rich. That is, after all, the point of the dish, isn't it?

This is my own, particular version.

Makes enough sauce for 18 oysters, or 6 servings in my book.

Ingredients:

12 to 18 medium-sized oysters. Fresh, please.

6 tablespoons unsalted butter

6 tablespoons spinach, finely chopped

4 tablespoons shallot, finely chopped

3 tablespoons flat leaf parsley, even more finely chopped

1 tablespoon chervil (if you can find it), finely, finely chopped

5 tablespoons fresh breadcrumbs, toasted, plus 3 tablespoons for garnishing

1 tablespoon absinthe (or Pernod)

1/2 teaspoon salt

A few dashes of Tabasco sauce

A few turns of freshly-ground pepper

2 tablespoons grated parmesan cheese

Rock salt

Lemon wedges for garnish

Preparation:

1. Using a small oyster knife (from experience, I can suggest you do not use a flat head screwdriver), pry open the poor, defenseless oysters. Pour off any liquor and reserve. If any oysters have opened themselves up to you without your asking them to do so, they are to be avoided, much in the same way one would avoid a human who does the same thing upon first meeting. Loosen the meat and leave on the half shell.

2. In a medium-sized saucepan, melt butter. Add spinach, shallot, parsley, chervil, bread crumbs, Tabasco, absinthe, salt, and pepper. Cook, stirring constantly, for about 10 to 12 minutes. Set aside, add reserved oyster liquor, and let cool.

3. Combine the 3 tablespoons of bread crumbs with the parmesan. Set aside.

4. Preheat oven broiler to 400. Line a sheet pan with aluminum foil and a layer of rock salt. Or, make as many rock salt mounds as you have oysters to save salt. The purpose of the salt is to stabilize the oyster shells and keep them level when broiling. Lay oysters over the salt, place a spoonful of the spinach mixture, and set under the broiler for about 5 minutes. Watch them carefully. I tend to lie on the kitchen floor, if it is sufficiently clean, and watch. That way, I can get a little bit of rest as I wait for the oysters to brown properly.

5. Once the oysters are sufficiently browned, remove them carefully (they are very hot, after all) to a serving platter lined with more rock salt. Add a few drops of Absinthe to the top of each oyster. Serve hot with lemon wedges and Tabasco sauce on the side. Eat enough hot oysters until you feel as rich as you need to feel**

*My apologies to anyone who may keep oysters as pets. You may not want to read this recipe. I seemed to have upset a lot of people last week, so I'm being extra careful this time around.

** Just a note-- John D. Rockefeller died of arteriosclerosis. He was nearly 98, but it was the arteriosclerosis that finally got him. You have been warned.

In honor of today's 40th Earth Day anniversary, let's talk about how we can all make our kitchens a little greener. Now I realize we're all busy and sometimes going the green route takes an extra step or minute of time. After working during the day, helping my daughters with their homework, making dinner and cleaning up, I know I am often tempted to take short cuts. For instance, do I really have to rinse out that tub of moldy sour cream so I can save the container for later use? Honestly, I just want to throw it out. And paper towels are so easy to use for cleaning off the counter. I admit that I am sometimes guilty of taking the easy road (for instance, I have yet to give up paper napkins because my two 9 year old daughters go through cloth napkins ridiculously fast and I wonder what's worse: composting paper napkins or incessantly washing dirty cloth ones?). Yet I am also making a concerted effort to take that extra step or minute when needed. What I've found is that it really isn't difficult to make a few minor adjustments in how I purchase food, handle waste, and run my kitchen so we use less energy and water and create less waste. I also discuss why I'm making these choices with my daughters so they start to think about their own environmental choices (for instance, using reams of paper to draw pictures).

Following is a list of things everyone can do to use less energy and create less waste. Contrary to what Kermit the Frog sang, it IS easy being green.

Buy from bulk bins: A 2006 EPA study determined that 'containers and packaging made up the largest portion of waste generated, 31.7 percent or 80 million tons." One great way to avoid packaging waste is to buy from bulk bins. Many stores offer bin items that you can bring home and store in your own containers (such as cereal, pasta, rice, etc.), which means you will throw out less containers. Some stores even offer olive oil and other liquid items in their bulk areas. Whole Foods, Rainbow Grocery, Berkeley Bowl and Farmer Joe's in Oakland all offer a wide array of bulk foods.

Buy Large: When purchasing food that comes in a container, buy large. For instance, choose the large yogurt container and then spoon out individual portions instead of purchasing numerous small yogurt containers for the same item. This reduces your waste to one plastic container, and is also less expensive. It also enables you to monitor the portion size instead of relying on the manufacturer's amount. Plus you can always reuse that large container (see below).

Reuse Waste: Instead of tossing out that plastic container, use it to store leftovers; as a storage container for change, pencils or something else; or give it to your kids to take to the sand lot.

Eat more whole foods and less packaged alternatives: Fresh vegetables don't come in prepackaged containers (unless you shop at Trader Joe's -- and I wish they'd stop doing that). Avoid packaged meals all together, if you can (things like Lunchables, frozen dinners, and items that come with individual servings wrapped in plastic). Packaged meals usually are served on plastic trays which are then wrapped in plastic and finally placed in boxes, creating literally tons of waste each year in our land fills. Fresh meals are also far healthier and tastier.

Purchase a to-go cup and bring it with you when buying drinks from outside vendors: Imagine how many cups just one coffee shop goes through in a single morning. Now multiply that by the number of stores in just San Francisco alone. That's a lot of trash. Now imagine how much less trash we'd generate if we all took our own reusable cup to Peet's and Starbucks. This is such an easy way to help make a big difference. Plus Starbucks is now charging 10 cents less per purchase if you use your own cup so you can even save money.

Buy local foods to reduce your grocery carbon footprint: In other words, don't be tempted by those grapes from Chile which traveled thousands of miles to get to your grocery shelf. Instead, buy something that is in season where you live and is grown nearby. The easiest way to do this is to shop at a farmer's market, but you can also find a lot of local options at a normal grocery store. We're lucky enough to live in California, where crops are abundant, so just be sure to check the little stickers that detail where your produce was grown. The same goes for meat and dairy items. Clover, Strauss Family Creamery and Berkeley Farms are all relatively close, as is Petaluma Poultry and Prather Ranch. Plus, recently-picked crops just taste better. For more on this topic, check out this article from the Center for Urban Education about Sustainable Agriculture.

Use a dish towel instead of paper towels: Although that one paper towel may not seem to take up a lot of space in the trash can, five a day equals 35 a week and 140 a month. That's a lot of thrown-out paper. It's often just as easy to use a dish towel or cloth napkin. If you really need to use a paper towel, compost it afterward.

Make a No Waste Lunch: As I mentioned in a previous post, making a no waste lunch is easy and economical. Invest in some good reusable containers, including a decent thermos and some cutlery. For more on this topic, see my No Trash Lunch post.

Give up baggies: Instead store food and leftovers in reusable plastic or glass containers (maybe that old yogurt container you decided to keep instead of throwing out).

Compost! Most local cities are now offering composting as part of standard trash pickup to encourage residents to keep compostable items out of the trash. Composting has therefore become pretty easy, so just do it.

Use green cleaning supplies, including making your own: I don't need to tell you about all the green cleaning products out there, but if you haven't started using some, considering giving them a try. This is especially true for dishwashing and laundry soap, which contain phosphate additives, leading to algae blooms that consume oxygen in the water, killing fish and plants. You can also make a lot of your own cleaning supplies from items you may already have in the kitchen. Check out The Green Guide's DIY Household Cleaners article for some great tips.

Purchase reusable bags for grocery shopping: Yes, this one is obvious, but if you haven't already bought your own bags, now is the time. You can also buy reusable bags for your produce and bulk food items. Oh, and remember to keep them in the car or near your bike so you don't forget them at home.

Choose glass over plastic: Some companies are now offering glass packaging instead of plastic. For instance, Strauss Family Creamery uses glass bottles as milk containers. So, if your budget allows (as these products are often a little more expensive than competing brands) choose glass packaged products. When making your decision you should note that there is a $1.50 glass bottle deposit for Strauss milk, but you get that money back when you return the cleaned bottle to the store.

Eat a vegetarian diet at least once a week: Even if you eat humanely-raised and organic meats, all meat has a larger carbon footprint than vegetables. Mark Bittman discussed this topic at last year's TED Conferences (and if you have an extra 20 minutes, I recommend viewing his talk). According to Mr. Bittman, "[a]fter energy production, livestock is the second-highest contributor to atmosphere-altering gases. Nearly one-fifth of all greenhouse gas is generated by livestock production -- more than transportation." So whether or not you think San Francisco's new Meat Free Mondays initiative is good or bad legislation, consider foregoing meat one day a week.

Run the dishwasher only when there is a full load; air dry if possible: Running the dishwasher once a day instead of hand washing after each meal saves both water and energy. According to Tree Hugger, energy efficient dishwashers "use only half the energy and one-sixth of the water, less soap too." So, if you have a dishwasher, use it.

Buy Energy Star appliances: And as long as we're talking about appliances, if you are in the market to upgrade your kitchen, be sure to purchase Energy Star appliances, especially the fridge which is generally the single largest user of energy in the house. If you rent and have a really old refrigerator, ask your landlord to upgrade your appliance.

Recycle your plastic grocery and other small plastic bags: Most grocery stores that use plastic bags now have recycling containers where you can drop off used bags. Some residential recycling programs also pick up plastic bags. Check your trash collector's web site for more details.

Switch to compact fluorescent light bulbs in the kitchen and throughout your entire house: These bulbs use 75% less electricity and last ten times longer. What more do you need to know?

For more energy and waste-saving tips, check out these great sites:
Treehugger
The Green Guide
KQED's Earth Celebration 2010 page
Reduce.org
Chelsea Green
Environmental Protection Agency
HuffPost Green

And TMC provides a list of 50 eco-friendly apps available at the iTunes store.

Please share your own tips for having a green kitchen in the comments section. I'd love to hear your ideas.

A light supper: Mustard-roasted Salmon, Turnip Gratin, Wheat berry Salad

Have you ever played the Barefoot Contessa drinking game? One drink for every time she asks, "How easy is that?", two for each time she mentions Jeffrey (that lucky dog), social for any time she implores you to use only "really good (insert expensive ingredient here)." It's a fabulous game.

By the end, you are tipsy as a Hamptons housewife at a clam bake. You are also starving from all the delectable dishes taunting you on the screen. And, you may or may not be sporting a sweater draped over your shoulders at this stage in the game.

Oh, Ina, I joke because I love. (And because I am secretly envious of your BMW convertible, Pottery Barn kitchen, and herb garden the size of my apartment.)

In all seriousness, I do adore many of the Barefoot Contessa’s recipes. They are classic dishes that any domestic-goddess-in-training needs to know, wholesome home-cooking with a French slant. Things like roast chicken and brownies from scratch…or roasted fish in a creamy mustard sauce.

This is one of my favorite Ina recipes. It is a staple in my weeknight dinner rotation because it is incredibly easy to make, ready in 15 minutes, full of flavor, and healthy. I’ve made some adaptations to her original recipe, swapping out red snapper for salmon, and substituting yogurt in place of crème fraiche. I prefer salmon because I think the flavor works well with the creaminess of the yogurt and the tang of the mustard and capers. I choose yogurt over crème fraiche because it has all the flavor you need without the fat, it’s much cheaper, plus I always have some yogurt in my fridge.

Turnip Slice

For this particular weeknight supper (I feel like Ina would have called it “supper”), I served the salmon with a side of turnip gratin and a lovely salad of wheat berries, kale, and cranberries from Whole Foods. Dare I say, I think the Contessa would have approved.

Salmon with Creamy Mustard Sauce
Adapted from Barefoot Contessa Back to Basics, “Mustard-Roasted Fish” (2008)

Serves: 4

Ingredients:
4 (8-ounce) salmon fillets
½ cup plain yogurt
2 tablespoons Dijon mustard
1 tablespoon whole-grain mustard
2 teaspoons capers, rinsed
Salt and pepper to taste
Chopped dill for garnish

Preparation:
1. Preheat the oven to 450 degrees F.
2. Line a sheet pan or baking dish with parchment paper. Place the fish fillets skin side down on the sheet pan. Sprinkle generously with salt and pepper.
3. Combine the yogurt, mustards, and capers in a small bowl. Spoon the sauce evenly over the fish fillets, making sure the fish is completely covered.
4. Bake for 10 to 15 minutes, depending on the thickness of the fish, until it's barely done. You can tell the fish is done if it flakes away easily when prodded with the tines of a fork.

Most reviews of Gristle will start with an assessment of Moby, the fantastically irritating middle-aged multi-platinum electronic musician-turned-food policy expert who edited the book. Based on what I know of Moby, I do not like him. It wouldn't be fair to hate him. Hating is a tough thing to do, even when you really know someone well enough to feel okay about doing it. While, for a long time, Moby barely registered a chirp on my pop culture radar, he first became the subject of my considerable distaste in 1999, when his mega-smash album Play came out, saturating radio station playlists, television commercials, and department store dressing rooms with "soulful" Alan Lomax-recorded blues samples wrapped in pulsing techno. The songs were inescapable and horrible. Much to my dismay, they chased me everywhere I went. More recently, in late March, weeks before this book arrived in my mailbox, I thought of Moby again when the New York Times published a Sunday Routine feature about him. Every section reads as if the author (Moby, in his first-person voice, presumably as recorded and edited by writer Lizette Alvarez) cannot help but be astounded by his own charm and cleverness. He names his favorite kind of organic tea, brags about his wretched-sounding pancakes, revels in online Scrabble victories, rattles off a vile but fiercely healthy smoothie recipe, and (on account of Calvinist ancestors) admits to a few "guilty" pleasures -- including that leviathan of vice, "mass market fiction." A friend linked to the article on Facebook, adding a highly derisive caption. A day later, a mutual friend commented on the post, sharing a shameful nugget of hearsay from yet another friend who apparently knows Moby quite well -- well enough to text with him, at least. According to this undoubtedly suspect source, when Moby texts, he dutifully concludes each message with a jaunty sign-off: "This is Moby, on the text."

While Gristle's editor might come across as a smug self-righteous cartoon, an easy target given the trappings he's prone to wearing, the message he, co-editor Miyun Park, and the host of noble experts they've gathered are pushing is real and worthy of very serious discussion. Simply put, this book -- a featherweight at 144 pages -- has forced me to re-contemplate the advantages of vegetarianism in the face of a corporation-clogged taxpayer-funded mainstream meat industry dedicated to processing artificially cheap, unhealthy, and potentially dangerous animal protein products for mass consumption, with a startling disregard for its underpaid workers and the environment.

In Gristle, each contributor handles a brief chapter with a one word title focusing on a single negative aspect of factory farming's effect on people, animals, and the world -- an issue to house arguments supported, in turn, by facts. It's a tidy assemblage of frill-free prose and grim, gray-scale visual aids. There's a uniformity to the writing and presentation uncommon to a collection of such far-flung perspectives, but the diversity nips any argument that Moby's cast of contributors are all cut from the same animal rights activist cloth.

There's Brendan Brazier, Canadian Ironman triathlon competitor, weighing in on health. asserting that, "leaving farm animals out of your diet is a simple decision with life-long benefits." Whole Foods honcho and dedicated libertarian John Mackey talks taxes, revealing that Americans currently spend 8% of their incomes on food, whereas, one hundred years ago, they spent over five times as much -- a change brought about, in part, by government subsidies that distort markets "tremendously." Christine Chavez and Julie Chavez Rodriguez, human rights activists and granddaughters of Cesar Chavez, write about the abysmal working conditions in factory farms. Paul and Phyllis Willis, the manager of Niman Ranch Pork Company and a community activist respectively, discuss how factory farms tear up communities: In just two decades, Iowa has seen an 84% decrease in the number of farms raising pigs, yet almost five times as many pigs. That means bigger farms, and less farmers. Lauren Bush, C.E.O. and co-founder of FEED as well as the niece of George W., focuses on the environment, and Diet for a Small Planet author Frances Moore Lappe and her daughter Anne address global warming, offering up a specific morsel I actually remember stewing over in my youth: 16 pounds of grain and soy are required to raise one pound of steak.

I have written before about my own experiment with vegetarianism. I never ate much meat as a kid, largely because my parents didn't. I stopped altogether when I was 13, in 1993. I tasted fish again in 2001, and poultry a few years later. Before long, I was a full-bore bone-gnawing omnivore, even more adventurous and meat-centric once I began writing frequently about food for amusement and income. Reading Gristle sent me back to a time I often struggle to remember -- the moment I decided to stop eating meat -- and about halfway through the book, I wondered why I had. There was a time not long ago when I saw the meatless phase of my young life largely as a drawn-out gesture of gentle rebellion against my cultural surroundings, a politicized substitute for dying my hair green. I was only vocal and remotely militant about vegetarianism for a few years, and yet I remained a vegetarian for many more. Did I stick to my diet out of habit? Was I trapped by a desire to maintain consistency? Making sense of the flights of logic generated by my 16-year-old mind always requires major effort, but in this matter, I was probably never so stupid. Meat -- as most of America knows it, and has known it for decades -- might not be murder, but it is a huge unholy mess.

Growing up, I always liked animals, particularly cute ones like pigs and sheep, but I didn't stop eating them because they blinked, breathed, and made noises. The philosophical heft of my decision didn't approach Moby's. Once, as he describes in the aforementioned New York Times piece, "the most pretentious person [he] has ever met, Moby outlines his reasoning in the introduction. Essentially, he followed the golden rule as extended to animals, with Blaise Pascal's Gambit wading in: "I took the logic of ["betting" on God's existence as opposed to non-existence] and applied it. . .I decided that it's probably a better "bet" to extend compassion as far and wide as possible as opposed to restricting the lengths to which I would extend compassion." Me, I just had a vague aesthetic aversion. Meat seemed heavy, dirty, and unclean. There were just icky inklings, though I soon found facts to back them up. In Gristle, those facts come off as particularly devastating.

Gristle rather delicately avoids directly damning all carnivorous acts. For all its polemics and pamphlet-esque tone, this book is, at its core, optimistic, hinging on the idea that, if people really know the facts about where the meat they eat comes from, they'll change their ways. They'll eat less meat, and make sure that the meat they do eat comes from truly reputable, responsible farms -- even if it's expensive or inconvenient to do so. Maybe they'll even eschew it entirely. In the introduction, Moby writes, "if enough people find out about the hidden ramifications of industrialized farmed animal production, we'll eventually see a shift away from supporting these destructive industries, which would lead to a healthier, cleaner, and more humane world."

I'm not positive that would help. In his chapter, John Mackey suggests that, "the only reason our abuse of animals is still tolerated is because most people aren't aware of it." While the average American may not know the details of how domesticated animals are treated in factory farms, the net of ills cast by the meat industry's participants is too huge, perfect, and ridiculous not to warrant suspicion -- especially considering how much attention a slew of best-sellers have devoted to it. Even with Moby's name attached, a wee volume from a smallish press is going to be read by the same people who already read Diet for a Small Planet, Fast Food Nation, and The Omnivore's Dilemma -- not exactly obscure texts, but not quite Oprah, MTV, and Good Morning America either. In her epilogue, Miyun Park writes:

"[S]omehow industrial animal agribusiness has largely managed to get away with oppressing workers, making us and our children unhealthy, slowly but surely destroying rural communities, contributing to global warming and global hunger, cultivating the emergence of devastating zoonotic diseases, and polluting the water we drink, the air we breathe, and the land on which we all live -- all while getting subsidized by taxpayers."

It's astonishing, and while saying "enough" to the injustice is fine, the problem isn't that the information hasn't at least begun to trickle down. The problem is that a lot of people really don't care that much. It's one thing to read about abused, confined fowl, tortured, manure-smeared stacks of swine, polluted rivers, and drug-resistant bacteria, and be horrified, but it's another thing entirely to implement a dramatic lifestyle shift. It isn't, as Brazier puts it, a "simple change."

Speaking personally, fast food restaurants -- where Americans inhale most of their factory-farmed meat -- are easy to avoid. At the same time, my favorite local ethnic eateries likely source from the same coops and lots. Grease-laden sidewalk tacos, Filipino breakfast silogs, sausages at Lao dives, Shanghai soup dumplings, Cambodian curries, and Korean short ribs don't always come with a Niman Ranch stamp. Enjoying those flavors, supporting those small businesses, and by extension, the communities from which they spring means eating meat that does harm. It's a tough call sometimes. At many area restaurants catering to diners with Slow Food-friendly values, menus proudly name the farms and ranches charged with raising the meat they serve. High-end grocery stores do the same, and they're rewarded with customers from the same relatively moneyed, socially-conscious pool. To put it mildly, the circumstances encourage elitism, and discourage a wider diffusion of responsibly raised animal products.

I take my meat-eating opportunities one bite at a time. I'm not nostalgic for the vegetarian days, but I struggle with guilt for grazing broadly, especially when I'm pretty sure I'm eating an animal whose life was miserable and brief. Eating in a professional capacity scrambles good intentions. One week, I shop at the right stores and eat very little meat, and only that which I know to be of worthy provenance, and the next, there's a new torta to taste, and taste it I must. Since reading Gristle -- an amped-up Cliff's Notes for the pro-vegetarian literature I inhaled as a teenager -- the predicament has been a little tougher. Dancing above my head like Mango, Moby is there, surveying every bite, sipping a cup of organic white tea, wagging a skinny little finger, eyes closed, his huge pale noggin shaking back and forth. You can't have the torta. No, no, no, he says softly. Sadly, I can't just smack him away.