Eggplant, Baba ghanoush, and Moussaka

4/6/14: This week on "The Food Guys:" Greg and Jon offer tips for making buttermilk pancakes. Flour, leavening, liquid, and a little bit of sugar are the basics, with two parts dry to three parts liquid ingredients. . http://www.thebakingwizard.com/

3/30/14: This week on "The Food Guys:" Jon and Greg discuss vanilla, one of the most identifiable aromas in the world. "Vanilla" is a perfume, a flavoring agent, the pod of a tropical Meso-American orchid, an extract and a paste. It's not to be confused with synthetic vanillin, the widespread, inexpensive flavoring.

3/23/14: This week on "The Food Guys:" Greg and Jon go on for some time about the physiology of taste, and the Silicon Valley of eating.

3/16/14: This week on "The Food Guys:" Jon and Greg react to a Wall Street Journal article from April 2013, "New Health Worry in Red Meat," by Melinda Beck. (The article reports on the findings of a recent NIH study linking gut bacteria and carnitine to the formation of a metabolite called TMAO.

3/9/14: This week on "The Food Guys:" Greg and Jon marvel at the diverse population of animals found in soil, and how they languish in microscopic obscurity even while Earth's food web depends on them.

Food Guys Jon Jackson and Greg Patent discuss a study comparing whether fruit juice is as effective at preventing Type 2 diabetes as whole fruit. It's not. In fact, fruit juice consumption is associated with a heightened risk.

Food Guys Greg Patent and Jon Jackson explore candy-making, caramelization, and the chemistry of cooking with sugar.

February 16th, 2014: Jon and Greg reveal the secrets to artfully photographing soufflés. (Hint: you'll need a lot of soufflés.)

February 9th, 2014: Greg and Jon describe the "magic" of gluten, which gives yeast bread its structure, strength and texture. One of gluten's proteins, gliadin, acts like hooked tennis balls, latching onto another protein, the spring-like glutenin. As bread dough is kneaded, this pair of proteins combines to provide both elastic and plastic qualities; the dough expands and forms long, elastic strands; and, when it's baked, bubbles of carbon dioxide produced by yeast are trapped by the dough's structure.

February 2nd, 2014: Jon and Greg reiterate their skepticism regarding "gluten-free" marketing by food manufacturers. In the absence of data on the prevalence of non-Celiac gluten sensitivity in the U.S., Greg observes, this condition is: "less a diagnosis than a description." Jon and Greg also discuss the evolutionary relationship between humans and gluten, particularly gliadin, one of gluten's components.

January 26th, 2014: Greg and Jon summarize an article from the Los Angles Times from January 17th, 2013, titled: "Alliance of big city school districts aims for more healthful meals." Quoting writer Teresa Watanabe:

January 19th, 2014: Jon and Greg discuss farro, a category of ancient, low-gluten wheat first cultivated in the Fertile Crescent. Farro comes in three varieties - most farro imported from Italy to the U.S. is the emmer variety - and several forms, distinguished from one another by how much bran was removed from the grain. (Whole farro requires soaking before cooking.)  Greg suggests using farro as hot breakfast cereal and in soups, salads, side dishes and desserts.

http://mariaspeck.com/

January 12th, 2014: Greg and Jon discuss ways to incorporate more vegetables, raw and cooked, into each meal, by structuring breakfast omelets, main dishes and soups around them.

The Food Guys dish up numbers on the smoke points of different cooking fats, guided by a 2010 article by Shilo Urban, "How To Cook With Oils: The Manifesto."

When should you worry about the smoke point of your favorite cooking oil? Mostly when you're frying, says Greg Patent. Once oil is hot enough to start smoking, its flavor and nutritional value break down, and carcinogens begin to form.