On Our Radar: Dirt, Pollan, Chefs and Chickens

And you thought a water tasting was weird. In San Francisco, writer Anne Zimmerman reports in Culinate how she tasted, OK smelled, dirt to see if the food that came from it had similar flavors. The answer: Yes.

The AP's Ryan Foley looks at Wisconsin farmers' backlash against author Michael Pollan, who spoke in a stadium usually "reserved for presidents and rock stars."

At Atlantic Food, Eleanor Barkhorn ponders chef empires and asks: When does a chef stop being a chef? "Does a chef belong in the kitchen, and does he become something else once he expands his 'empire' elsewhere?" she writes. "Or are television shows, cookbooks, and more a beneficial part of a chef's creative development?"

In this week's New Yorker, Susan Orlean examines our obsession with backyard chickens and her own attempts to raise them in an Eglu plastic coop. (Subscription required for the article but you can always watch the video.)

-- Jane Black