Cloned cows cause chaos
This week’s big news was the whole cloned meat, cloned milk fiasco. It initially emerged that there was milk from cloned cattle in the UK. Next it was cloned meat, as it was revealed that meat from the offspring of cloned cattle had been noshed. Some are saying the meat is fine, others think we’re all going to start mooing. Would eating cloned cow bother you?

Food prices set to soar
Animal feed prices, a shortage of silage, and poor harvests will, we are told, lead to a 10% rise in food prices by next year. Hovis has warned of a hike in the price of bread, as wheat prices climb after a Russian export ban. Pork, rice, orange juice, coffee, cocoa and tea are also set to spike after ‘a variety of freakish weather conditions across the world’, reports the Independent.

Rise in male infertility linked to food packaging
If your swimmers aren’t swimming, it might have something to do with what your food is coming in. BPA is a chemical used to harden plastics for food packaging, though the worry is that this might be the only thing that it hardens. A study has shown that men with high levels of BPA in their bodies had sperm counts that were 23% lower than those with less exposure to the compound.

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Other food news this week:
* Swap wine for beer and save calories.
* Chilli may lower blood pressure…
* …so it’s a good thing that food is 400 times hotter today than 50 years ago
* Junk food increases risk of allergies. I’m sick of writing about junk food.

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Blog of the week
Masterchef finalist Alex Rushmer has a rather swanky new website – check it out.

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Recipe of the week
Artichokes are bang in season right now – here’s a lovely way with them from Bitchin’ Camero.

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Video of the week
This week’s supper club had a New Orleans theme, with photographs by Edu Hawkins from the New Orleans Jazz Festival. Here’s BB King at his best: