The Magee family does do the Chinese take-out thing from time to time and we always end up with a couple of small cartons of leftover rice. I usually ask for a carton each of white and brown rice since part of the clan refuses to go brown (I figure this is okay since they eat whole grain in every other situation). So guess which carton is sitting in the refrigerator almost completely full? The brown rice carton of course!

Rather than waste this wonderful source of whole grain, I have mastered a few teen-friendly ways to use it up the next day or so.

Remember how I said, “stay tuned” at the end of a recent blog I wrote on stevia (Stevia: The Next Chapter?), I wasn’t kidding. Here it is the beginning of the school year and already fur is flying.

CSPI (the non-profit Center For Science In The Public Interest) just sent out a press release urging the FDA to conduct more testing before stevia extract is used in food and drinks. This appeal is based on a new report by toxicologists at UCLA, which claims that several laboratory tests show that the sweetener causes mutations and DNA damage, raising the possibility that it increase the risk of cancer.

Amy’s Bowls (in the frozen food section) have a new flavor – Mexican Casserole.

This entrée got my attention because I was looking for vegetarian entrées to sample for an article I was writing. Yes, it contains cheese, but it would fit an ovo-lacto vegetarian meal plan just fine.

My biggest disappointment when I opened up the box was that the bowl didn’t seem to have half as much contents as the photo on the box suggests. It does have the nice cheesy topping pictured on the box, however, which is where quite a bit of the grams of fat and saturated fat appear to be coming from.

So the two major political parties CAN work together… and a safer food supply could be the result!

I’m not going to get into politics here, but I do find it fascinating that the two major political parties that can’t seem to work out many of the country’s pressing issues, have managed to come together long enough to write a bi-partisan bill, the FDA Food Safety Modernization Act, which has been introduced in the Senate and is waiting for the committee to work on it. The bill would help refocus the Food and Drug Administration on prevention of (rather than reaction to) food-borne disease outbreaks… hello E. coli on raw spinach… and salmonella-laced jalapeño peppers.

Pepperidge Farm Baked Natural Wheat Crisps – Toasted Wheat

These crackers have zero trans fats and only 1 gram of saturated fat per serving because partially hydrogenated oils and saturated fats aren’t used to make them. Vegetable oils are the 6th ingredients listed, including sunflower, canola and/or soybean oil). But that’s not the best part about these new crackers. Whole-wheat flour is actually the first ingredient and there are 2 grams of fiber per ounce of the crackers! (The second ingredient is unbleached enriched wheat flour.)