Our weekly serving of off-the-menu items – a few popular favorites from the week, as well as a few morsels that may have slipped your notice.
Global warming threatens coffee crops.
Coffee Companies Step in to Protect Farms from Climate Change
As climate change progresses, rising temperatures pose an increasing threat to coffee farms. Higher temperatures can cause droughts, kill insects that are key to pollination, and spread more diseases that harm coffee plants. Coffee companies like Starbucks are beginning to work more closely with farmers, offering seeds for more resilient strains of coffee and advising small suppliers on adaptive farming, to help them prepare for the challenges that climate change may bring.
The new Jell-O Play kit can create edible, jell-o based building blocks.
Jell-O Reveals New Building Blocks
The newly released ‘Jell-O Play’ comes with a set of molds that allows consumers to create their own set of edible building blocks. Each Jell-O Play kit produces its own set of shapes, letting kids build a variety of towers, cars, and animals. The toy line doesn’t just include molds, it also comes with edible stickers and Jell-O cookie cutters, making the potential array of Jell-O blocks even more customizable.
Even though consumers are usually anti-GMO, knowing that their food is genetically modified may make them more open to GMO based foods.
Labeling GMOs Makes Them More Appealing
Although genetically modified foods are known for driving away consumers, a new study in Vermont shows that people are more likely to not mind GMOs if food is properly labeled as genetically altered. When Vermont passed a law two years ago requiring that GMO foods bear a label, food companies protested, believing that their business would be hurt. However, the mandatory labeling has instead revealed that people are about 19% less opposed to GMOs when their food is properly labeled.
Switching up the way you eat a food can renew interest in and enjoyment of its flavor.
Enjoy Popcorn More by Eating It with Chopsticks
Tiring of a food is a common experience. Even if you love a food, once you eat it enough times, chances are you enjoy it less. Researchers at Ohio State University have found that although this is true, interest in frequently eaten foods can be renewed through changing up how you eat them. Unusual forms of consumption, like using chop sticks to pick up popcorn or drinking water from a martini glass, can reinvigorate your enjoyment of and engagement with eating and drinking habits.
