By David Draper

Despite the alarmist headline in the Los Angeles Times admonishing, “All Red Meat Is Bad for You, New Study Says,” I’m taking no less pleasure in having a freezer full of venison. Beyond the headline, the article reads like a scare tactic, threatening imminent death on anyone daring to eat a filet mignon.

“…Adding just one 3-ounce serving of unprocessed red meat—picture a piece of steak no bigger than a deck of cards—to one's daily diet was associated with a 13 percent greater chance of dying during the course of the study.

“Even worse, adding an extra daily serving of processed red meat, such as a hot dog or two slices of bacon, was linked to a 20 percent higher risk of death during the study.

“‘Any red meat you eat contributes to the risk,’ said An Pan, a postdoctoral fellow at the Harvard School of Public Health in Boston and lead author of the study, published online Monday in the Archives of Internal Medicine.”
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By Chad Love

Terminally ill children would receive special hunting privileges if a bill making its way through the Georgia legislature is signed into law.

From this story in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution:

Terminally ill youth in Georgia would get special hunting privileges under a bill passed by House lawmakers. The House of Representatives voted 161-1 on Monday to approve the legislation. It would authorize the state's natural resources commissioner to grant special hunting permits for big game or alligators to anyone under 21 who is terminally ill. The bill now heads to Gov. Nathan Deal's desk.

It would waive some rules on weapons, antler restrictions and hunter education requirements. Any youth getting such a permit would have to hunt under the supervision of a licensed adult hunter. The bill is named for Taylor Gramling, who asked to go hunting shortly before she died of leukemia at age 18. She successfully killed a deer on a plantation owned by comedian Jeff Foxworthy.

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by David Draper

Throughout the history of the written word, there are many great scenes about or relating to food—from that forbidden apple in "Genesis" to a can of peaches in Cormac McCarthy’s The Road. But as a genre, good writing solely about food is a bit harder to come by. Until recently, that is.

Though the blogger-turned-book-writer fad of a few years back has slowed some, our food-obsessed world continues to crank out tomes of literature about food. I don’t know about you, but I think that’s a good thing, even if you have to wade through the slush pile to find a few pearls, like these 5 ½ picks (listed in no particular order) that are among my favorite books about food.

1. The Omnivore’s Dilemma, by Michael Pollan: Whatever your feelings are about Pollan and his punditry, you have to hold some admiration for a man who went to such great lengths to learn where his (and ultimately our) food comes from. This book arguably kick-started our national obsession about food. I have loaned and gifted several copies, mostly to vegetarians.
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By Chad Love

It's looking more and more like ancient hunters were in North America, earlier -- and sometimes much earlier -- than previously thought.

From this story on bradenton.com:

Cut marks found on Ice Age bones indicate that humans in Ohio hunted or scavenged animal meat earlier than previously known. Dr. Brian Redmond, curator of archaeology at The Cleveland Museum of Natural History, was lead author on research published in the February 22, 2012 online edition of World Archaeology. Redmond and researchers analyzed 10 animal bones found in 1998 in the collections of the Firelands Historical Society Museum in Norwalk, Ohio.

Found by society member and co-author Matthew Burr, the bones were from a Jefferson's Ground Sloth. This large plant-eating animal became extinct at the end of the Ice Age around 10,000 years ago. "This research provides the first scientific evidence for hunting or scavenging of Ice Age sloth in North America," said Redmond. "The significant age of the remains makes them the oldest evidence of prehistoric human activity in Ohio, occurring in the Late Pleistocene period."
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By Chad Love

Even with a hunting season designed to help control their numbers, Idaho wildlife officials are being forced to shoot wolves in an effort to protect the state's struggling elk herd.
 
From this story on spokesman.com:  
 
Federal wildlife agents shot and killed 14 wolves from helicopters in Idaho’s remote Lolo Zone earlier this month. The three-day operation, aimed at reducing the number of wolves roaming the backcountry area where elk herds are struggling, was carried out in a partnership between the federal Wildlife Services agency and the Idaho Department of Fish and Game.

Wildlife managers hope a sustained reduction in wolf numbers will allow the Lolo elk herd, which has been severely depressed since the mid 1990s, to rebound. “We’d like to see one of Idaho’s premier elk populations recover as much as possible,” said Jim Unsworth, deputy director of the department at Boise.
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By David Draper

“Test tube hamburgers to be served this year.”

While it sounds like something out of The Jetsons, that recent headline from Britain’s The Telegraph is enough to make me shudder. And I hope all of you feel the same about the article’s alarming news that scientists are creating artificial meat in a laboratory.

The article quotes Professor Mark Post of the Netherlands’ Maastricht University as saying, “In October we are going to provide a proof of concept showing out of stem cells we can make a product that looks, feels, and hopefully [Author’s Note: the emphasis is mine] tastes like meat.”

The article goes on to state:

Although it is possible to extract a limited number of stem cells from cows without killing them, Prof Post said the most efficient way of taking the process forward would still involve slaughter.
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