Remember how, on multiple- choice tests, you were always a little afraid to choose the option “neither”? There was something about it that just felt wrong. Well, back in mid-August, we reported that Troiani’s executive chef, Walter Pisano, was leaving the Mackay Restaurant Group’s fine Italian eatery. While Pisano cited creative differences as the reason for the split (isn’t that always the culprit?), we weren’t sure if that meant we would lose Pisano and his talents to a bigger city or if it meant we should keep our eyes peeled for some kind of new upscale fusion spaghetti joint here in town. In this case, as it turned out, “neither” was actually the right answer. We should have guessed that Pisano would be returning to his post at Tulio, where, 12 years ago, he was the founding chef. He claims that during his three-month hiatus he ate at about a hundred different restaurants in Seattle, New York, Boston, and Las Vegas. Pisano says that returning to Tulio means he has “creative license [to] impact the menu with my own personal cooking style.”
No More Waffling
You know we live in topsy-turvy times when it’s the Drug Enforcement Administration, not some basement-dwelling stoner, that’s wracked with paranoia. That’s the accusation made by hemp-food advocacy group Vote Hemp in a recent press release trumpeting the Hemp Industries Association’s Sept. 28 triumph over a DEA suit intended to ban hemp-food products in America. A February decision by the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in favor of the HIA will stand henceforth “as the law of the land,” according to the organization’s lead attorney, which means local groceries like PCC and Whole Foods can continue offering hemp waffles, cereals, and breads. According to Vote Hemp, eating such products won’t cause you to fail your workplace drug test, despite what the DEA may have insinuated; even poppy seeds on bagels and muffins have a better chance of making you high, though the odds there are still a zillion-to-one. And at a time when farmed salmon and other fish sources are joining nonorganic beef on the growing list of animal products to avoid, hemp-seed oil is looking like a safer way to get your omega-3 fatty acids, one of the natural fats identified by physicians as beneficial to the body. Vote Hemp’s next project: fighting for the legalization of industrial hemp, which can be turned into rope and other nonedible goods.
Eat Your Vegetables
Sporting the Onion-worthy headline “Thousands of American Children Prepare Salad,” a notice from the American Institute of Wine and Food recently informed Hot Dish that around 6,000 elementary-school students across the country will learn about the virtues of local produce this month as part of AIWF’s Days of Taste program, now in its 10th year. According to the program co-chair, Caroline McSpadden, Seattle’s involvement commenced last Thursday, when students from Rainier Valley’s Concord Elementary School visited the Cherry Valley Dairy in Duvall to learn about local milk production. Upcoming area events for fourth- and fifth-graders include in-school sessions with chefs and guided tours of Pike Place Market. Visit www.aiwf.org for more info.
Food and/or beverage news? E-mail Hot Dish at food@seattleweekly.com.
