EU-DIGEST

Labels: Food, Genetically Modified Food, Inc., Oscars

Food during Easter around the world - by Karen Herzog

If your family is Polish and keeps the traditions of Poland, you may serve kielbasa, considered indicative of God's favor and generosity, in addition to ham, a symbol of joy and abundance.The Greeks and Portuguese serve round, flat loaves marked with a cross and decorated with Easter eggs. Syrian and Jordanian Christians have honey pastries. After an Easter dinner showcasing lamb, Germans may eat lamb-shaped cake. Europeans generally enjoy sweet breads, cakes, cookies and chocolate rabbits to end the Lenten period of traditional abstinence. The French are known for gorgeous chocolate bunnies, and also for chocolate fish. The poisson d'avril isn't directly related to Easter but is part of the Easter season, starting April 1, when children use a paper version to play April Fools' tricks, according to www.chocolateatlas.com.

Dessert for Easter doesn't have to be a pastry or candy. One of the best-known Lent and Easter desserts in Mexico is a Mexican bread pudding called capirotada. It usually consists of toasted French bread, cheese, milk, butter, peanuts and raisins. It is soaked in syrup that includes water, brown sugar, cinnamon and a variety of other ingredients. Easter for Greek families would not be complete without hard-boiled eggs, traditionally painted red on Holy Thursday. The red eggs signify the blood of Christ, and some are baked into twisted sweet-bread loaves or distributed on Easter.

You also may display on your Easter table red beet horseradish (symbolic of the bitter passion of Christ), lamb-shaped butter (a reminder of Christ's goodness), eggs (symbolic of the Resurrection) and babka, a sweet bread symbolic of Jesus, "the bread of life." You won't forget the salt, regarded as a necessary element of life.

Labels: Christianity, Easter, Food, Religion, Tradition

Labels: EU, Food

Food makers in Europe volunteer to cut ads directed at children

Leading companies in the European food and beverage industry said Tuesday that they would voluntarily change their policies on advertising for children by the end of next year, setting standards on nutritional content to encourage more healthful lifestyles. The move followed recent calls by the European Union for the food industry to use commercial communications to support parents in making the right diet and lifestyle choices for their children, the 11 companies said in a joint statement.

The companies, which together account for around two-thirds of cash spent each year on food and beverage advertising in the EU, said they would do this by the end of 2008. The companies are Coca-Cola, Groupe Danone, Burger King, General Mills, Kellogg, Kraft Foods, Mars, Nestlé, PepsiCo, Ferrero and Unilever. They agreed to publish policy commitments on advertising to children on a special Web site during the next 12 months.

Labels: Advertising, EU, Food

Chinese Fish laced with dangerous chemicals - US cracks down on fish from China - Diedtra Henderson

US Federal authorities, under fire for responding slowly to tainted Chinese imports, yesterday said they will halt shipments of five fish species sent from China because they are laced with dangerous chemicals. Farm-raised basa, catfish , dace , eel, and shrimp from China can no longer enter the United States until importers can prove the shipments are free of chemicals, including antibiotics and agents that can trigger tumor growth in lab animals after long-term exposure.

The US Food and Drug Administration, however, stopped short of pulling the tainted seafood from stores and restaurants because, they said, the products pose a low public health risk.

Labels: Food

France targets 'le snack' in obesity battle - by Peter Allen

Even in a country renowned for its exquisite food and adhesion to regular meal times, there has been no escape from "le snacking" and the rise of obesity. The French are now consuming so much fat, salt and sugar that all advertisements for products considered unhealthy will, from today, be accompanied by health warnings. They will accompany publicity in newspapers and magazines, on television and radio and online. The health ministry, which designed the measure, says it will help children "guide themselves" towards making better "eating decisions".

"We want people – and particularly young people – to cut back on the snacking and get back to healthy habits," a spokesman said. Advertisers who refuse to run the messages will be fined 1.5 per cent of the cost of the advertisement, to be paid to the National Institute for Health Education. They will have a choice of four officious sounding but simple warnings, which Xavier Bertrand, the health minister, said would be regularly updated to keep them effective. They include: "For your health, eat at least five fruits and vegetables a day" and "For your health, undertake regular physical activity."

The advice flies in the face of the image of the svelte and cuisine-conscious French, perpetuated by books like Mireille Guiliano's best seller French Women Don't Get Fat. The book argues that the French can eat croissants and foie gras without ballooning because they savour flavours and do not eat huge portions.
But growing numbers of processed snacks and ready-made meals with high fat, salt and sugar contents are changing that image. According to government figures, 5.9 million of France's 63.4 million people are obese and 20 million are overweight.

The news of a fat France may offer some comfort to Britain, which has long been top of the European tables for unhealthy eating and obesity. Jacques Chirac, the French president, caused a storm in 2005 when he suggested to Vladimir Putin, the Russian president, and Gerhard Schröder, the then German chancellor, that the only food worse than Britain's was to be found in Finland. "You can't trust people who cook as badly as that. After Finland, it's the country with the worst food," he said.

Labels: Food, Health