FYI

Don't crucify them

Cauliflower, broccoli and cabbage cruciferous vegetables, all are three of the most recommended veggies on everyone's low-fat food budget. The problem is, they emit an unpleasant odor. That's because they contain sulfur compounds called mustard oils or isothiocyanates, the publication Environmental Nutrition says.

"When cooked, these and other compounds break down to form various odoriferous compounds like hydrogen sulfide (rotten egg smell), ammonia, mercaptans and methyl sulfide," it says.

They aren't harmful, the newsletter says, but the longer you cook the veggies, the more they stink.

"To reduce the odor, steam the vegetables only until tender-crisp, and try adding a few pieces of bread to the cooking water to absorb the odoriferous compounds."

Another popcorn wrinkle

Movie Popcorn: The Debate, Part III . . . First it was those nutrition watchdogs at Center for Science in the Public Interest exposing the artery-clogging effects of popcorn made in coconut oil.

Movie theaters responded by switching to oh-so-healthful canola oil.

Now, AMC Entertainment Inc. has switched again to sunflower oil. The difference, executives say, is in the taste.

In an AMC poll of 200 moviegoers, 70% preferred the sunflower-oil popcorn, ascribing to it a better or more buttery taste. Nutritionally, the oil has a tiny bit more saturated fat than canola but no trans fatty acids and one-third the cholesterol-raising fatty acids.

Minor technicalities to the roughly half of movie popcorn purchasers who opt for the "butter topping." Yes, this adds significantly to the snack's fat and cholesterol content.

What's more, it isn't butter at all. At least in AMC theaters, it's "partially hydrogenated soybean oil," which is somewhere between vegetable oil and margarine, said Phil Pennington, an AMC vice president.

Real melted butter, he said, would pose practical problems, with the butterfat and milky portion separating. Some theaters induce that separation and keep only the butterfat, creating a topping that's really loaded.

Strictly for eGG heads

Mysteriously, "addresses" like http://www.deltanet.com/2way/egg don't look so strange anymore. That one happens to be the Internet address of eGG (Electronic Gourmet Guide), an on-line food magazine. Just like a conventional magazine, it has articles, recipes, food trivia (the eGGsters also sell their own food-trivia game on floppy disk) and interviews. The eGG people recommend browsing it using Netscape, which is downloadable from their page. On all most Internet directories, including Yahoo.

Compiled by Journal Sentinel food staff. Send FYI contributions to: FYI-Food, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Box 371, Milwaukee, WI 53201-0371.

Copyright 1995
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