Category Archives: New Products

Star Dough

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Those who can, make their own dough.

Those who can’t or are short on time? They welcome a little help.

Enter Star Dough to the rescue.

Made in small batches from unbleached wheat flour, sweet butter, creme fraiche, baking powder and sea salt, this frozen, prepared dough is a lifesaver. It comes already rolled out into rounds sized perfectly for making pies and galettes. Or use cutters to make little tarts or canapes or whatever your imagination dreams up. Just thaw, then unroll the rounds and they’re ready to use.

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Wines to Take Along Anywhere

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A fun and handy wine pouch from the family that invented Clif Bars. (Photo courtesy of Clif Family Winery)

How cool is this handy wine pouch?

It’s made by St. Helena’s Clif Family Winery, the founders of whom also invented Clif Bars. So, they ought to know what works and what doesn’t in the great outdoors, right?

It’s light, unbreakable, and supposedly has an 80 percent lower carbon footprint than two glass bottles, and 90 percent less waste and less landfill space than two glass bottles.

There’s even a built-in handle so you can hang it from a tree when you’re out camping or just wanting to free up table-space in the backyard.

Each pouch holds the equivalent of two 750-ml bottles and keeps the wine fresh for as long as a month after opening. Each pouch is a bargain $16.99, too.

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New Whole Grain Pasta and A Food Gal Giveaway

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New 100% Whole Grain Pasta. (Image courtesy of Golden Grain)

We all know we should be including more whole grains in our diet for added fiber and nutrients.

Golden Grain just made that easier to do with the launch of its new 100% Whole Grain Pasta. This is one case where you won’t need a science degree to figure out the ingredients list on the back of each box, either. There’s just one ingredient: durum whole wheat flour.

The Whole Grain Pasta comes in four varieties: angel hair, spaghetti, penne and elbow macaroni.

Contest: One lucky Food Gal reader not only will win four boxes of the 100% Whole Grain Pasta (one of each type), but also a Cuisinart Chef’s Classic stainless steel four-piece, 12-quart pasta/steamer set.

Win samples of the new Whole Grain Pasta, plus this nifty pasta/steamer cooking set.

Entries for the contest, open only to those in the continental United States, will be accepted through midnight PST June 4. Winner will be announced June 6.

How to win?

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The Fifth Taste — In A Tube

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The taste of "savory'' in a tube.

You’ve no doubt had the experience of trying something so irresistible that you wished it could be bottled and sold?

Laura Santtini, a British cook, has done essentially that with her #5 Umami Paste by capturing the delectable “fifth taste” and putting it into a tube.

As you know, sweet, salty, sour and bitter comprise the four basic tastes we experience on our palate. But more than a century ago, the Japanese discovered what they hail as the fifth taste, otherwise known as umami. It’s often described as “savory” tasting and reflected in ingredients such as tomatoes, cheese, anchovies, mushrooms, cured pork, aged beef and miso soup.

Santtini’s #5 Umami Paste created a sensation last year when it was released in the United Kingdom. This year, it’s finally available on our shores at Dean & DeLuca, where a 2.46-ounce tube is $6 or at ChefCentral for $5.99. For the best deal, Fresh & Easy stores (with locations in the South Bay), are featuring it at the special price of $3.49 until July 6. I recently had a chance to try a sample.

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New Seafood Online Retail Store and A Food Gal Giveaway

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Fresh Loch Duart salmon delivered to my door that I cooked up on a grill pan.

Family-owned Anderson Seafoods, Inc. of Orange, Calif., which has supplied premium seafood to retailers such as Whole Foods and Trader Joe’s, has launched an online retail store for consumers.

Imagine both fresh and frozen fish sent to your door via overnight delivery.

Now, you’re probably thinking that shipping fish in doesn’t sound very PC, but Anderson Seafoods has teamed up with UPS to offer carbon neutral shipping to help mitigate that. You can purchase carbon neutral offsets that UPS will match at a very affordable 20 cents per package delivered.

In this day and age of heightened concerns about where our seafood comes from, though, I only wish the Anderson Web site had more detailed information on where some of the types of seafood come from. For instance, it sells “fresh Atlantic salmon,” but doesn’t mention that it’s farm-raised. It also sells Chilean Seabass, even though this species remains on the “avoid list” on the Monterey Bay Aquarium’s Seafood Watch Guide because it is still considered overfished.

Recently, I did have a chance to sample some of the seafood products, including fresh Loch Duart salmon ($22.01 for 12 ounces), billed as a sustainable farm-raised salmon from Scotland; fresh ahi ($28.50 for 12 ounces); and frozen mahi mahi ($24.11 for 12 ounces). The fish comes vacuum-sealed in insulated containers.

The fish is vacuum-packed for delivery.

The quality is definitely high. For instance, the beautiful piece of salmon was fresh and rich tasting, and arrived sans any pesky pin bones at all, which was quite impressive. I also tried one of Anderson’s frozen entrees — salmon potstickers ($12.38 for 14 ounces), which were very plump with a substantial filling of salmon, water chestnuts and panko bread crumbs.

Salmon potstickers crisped up in a pan till golden.

Contest: If you’d like to try some of the seafood, I’m happy to be able to give away a $125 gift card to Anderson Seafoods. Entries, limited to those in the continental United States, will be accepted through midnight May 28. The winner will be announced May 30.

How to win?

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