Food news antipasto

While much of the Northern Hemisphere swelters in the wake of heat advisories, in the Southern Hemisphere the winter is a little more chilly than normal. With heating costs soaring, it makes sense to look for ways to stay warm that don’t involve turning up the thermostat. One thing you can do is to eat these five warming foods that will warm you up from the inside.

If you are experiencing the heat wave side of the equation, Food and Wine wants you to know that it’s okay to put ice cubes in your rosé. This is a practice that the French call rosé piscine, and it is their trick to staying cool during summer. The article notes that adding ice doesn’t have to be limited to pink wines; many whites benefit as well. It may alarm purists, but adding ice may even be worth trying on red wines.

The latest fashion craze intersects with food, as the hot accessory of the summer is a food-themed purse. Kate Spade offers one that looks like a ketchup packet, and there are also purses that resemble soy-sauce bottles, watermelon slices, cobs of corn, slices of buttered toast, and even a package of Tums. While some are on the pricey side, there are bargain bags starting at $8 USD.

A few days ago we wrote about the Caesar salad’s 100th birthday, and noted that it was unique for a food item to have such a distinct provenance. However, what is widely believed to be a clear-cut lineage is a little more murky upon closer inspection. It seems that the recipe may have come from another person at the restaurant where it was invented, perhaps even from the mother of one of the chefs who worked there. It wouldn’t be the first time that a man took credit for a woman’s invention.

Following up on our story about food recalls we are sharing a CNN opinion piece written by cookbook author Michael Ruhlman. He explores whether it is safe to eat runny eggs and rare meat given the multiple H5N1 avian influenza outbreaks that have confirmed at dozens of dairy farms in the US. He notes that “the virus has been found in the muscle of infected cattle, it’s alive in raw milk, and it is small enough to pass through the pores of eggshells,” but thinks at this moment avoiding raw milk is sufficient as a food safety precaution and is continuing to eat mollet eggs and rare steak.

In case you missed this weekend’s post: Can you eat your way to fewer mosquito bites?