“Extra large Bic Mac meal and a statin, please”
This week doctors called for a free statin to be served with fast food. The cholestrol lowering drug will help offset the more egregious effects of eating these foods, ‘a function equivalent to a filter on a cigarette or a seat-belt in a car’. Whilst initially sceptical, it doesn’t seem like the worst idea in the world. Would you feel odd popping a pill with your MacDo?

Icelandic fishermen overdoing the mackerel
The EU is on ‘a collision course’ with Iceland over the fishing of mackerel, reports The Grocer. Iceland has voiced its intention to catch three times as many mackerel as EU quotas stipulate, with the Faroe Islands also aiming to exceed guidelines. Mackerel is currently one of the more sustainable fish – it would be good to keep it that way.

Rice yields under threat from global warming
Scientists have found that in parts of Asia rice yields have dropped by 10-20% as a result of warmer night-time temperatures. There was a clear correlation between daily minimum temperature increases and a drop in rice produced. Yet further cause for concern, as the BBC put it, ‘that climate change will make it harder to feed the world’s growing population.’

*****

Other food news this week:
* Andrew Lansley is piling pressure on restaurants to display calorie counts on menus.
* A Chinese takeaway meal could contain up to a wine glass of fat, according to a recent study.
* The 8 food words rejected by the OED.
* Marmite ‘costs more than a gallon of petrol’.
* Pea plant grows inside man’s lung.

*****

Blog of the week
* Fuchsia Dunlop’s forthright defence of Chinese food.

*****

Recipe of the week
* Gooseberry tartlets with jasmine whipped cream from Tasty Trix.

*****

Video of the week
I can’t get enough of this dancing cockatoo. It’s the Saturday Night Fever neck movement that does it. Makes me miss our lovebird Houdini, who has gone to a better place….he’s not dead – we just gave him away to someone who wouldn’t shout at him every time he squawked.