Quote:
Originally Posted by BetterRed
I think most US corn (maize) ends up as corn syrup and motor fuel where a high sugar (maltose) content would be desirable. Another instance of industrial use trumping human consumption.
|
In the US, there are two forms of corn - sweet corn (Zea mays convar. saccharata var. rugosa), and field corn (Zea mays indentata). The stuff normally sold to people is sweet corn, and is about 1% of the total grown. Field corn is primarily
animal feed, and a principal substance fed to cows.
We get corn from the farmer's market, and can get several varieties. There's a lot of sweet corn because that's what folks like to eat (especially when served as corn on the cob) and farmers grow what sells.
The issue with corn syrup in foods is that a lot of it is high
fructose corn syrup, which is problematic. The fructose is an addition, not a natural part of the syrup.
And use as motor fuel varies. Corn is something whose oil can be refined into biodiesel. (So are soybeans, which also get refined to biodiesel.) As the name implies, biodiesel is useful if your vehicle
has a diesel engine. It's no help in a standard automobile that expects gasoline.
I don't have a breakdown handy, but I believe corn refined into biodiesel is a relatively small fraction of total corn production.
A chap I met in upstate NY (which is a major agricultural area) a while back told me his son was working on a setup to refine biodiesel. He'd source used cooking oil from restaurants as the ingredient to refine. You wouldn't put it in your car, but it might be just the thing for your tractor or emergency generator. I was tickled.
And there are several outfits in NYC whose business is collecting and recycling cooking oil. I see them periodically pulled up in front of local Chinese and Thai places. I suspect biodiesel is their end product.
There's a chap in Australia I ran across who is a micro-distiller. He's a farmer growing rye as feed stock. He taught himself TIG welding, constructed a still, and refines some of the rye into whisky. While he's at it, he also refines used cooking oil from a roadhouse near his fields, and converts it to biodiesel. He uses it in his tractor and to provide the heat for his still. He's a one man shop and a
small batch producer, but I suspect his spirits are quite nice, thank you.
Quote:
|
For some reason most of the garlic sold here now comes from Chile, Argentina, or China, all three have perfected the art of removing the flavour. When Australian garlic was freely available I only needed a few cloves to make a jar of aioli, now I need a couple of heads.
|
Garlic here mostly come from California, and has retained its flavor.
______
Dennis