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Last month I attended a meeting of the Virginia Grain Producer’s Association to learn more about how the vast majority of grain is produced. I had the pleasure of being accompanied by three other CGA members, and, inevitably, the topic of scale came up. The VGPA farmers think in thousands of acres; CGA producers may be working with 100 or less. One of the challenges of building up a regional food system of any sort is balancing supply with demand. So the calculators came out and numbers were crunched, and it made me realize I don’t have a good handle...

Last fall, when researchers unearthed the remains of a 3,000-year-old structure in the western Armenian town of Metsamor, they faced two mysteries: First, they didn’t know what purpose the structure had served. Beyond that, a strange powdery substance covering the area left them stumped...The team assumed, at first, the material was simply ash. After all, charred remnants of the building’s reed roof and wooden beams indicated it had met its end in a fire...The powder wasn’t ash, but wheat flour. They had unearthed an ancient bakery.Archaeologists estimate that the structure could have once held as much as 3.5 tons of...

Protesters took their angst out on an Andy Warhol piece of art in Milan, Italy, on Friday by throwing flour on a sports car painted by the pop artist in 1979. The event is just another in the trend being set by Generation Z climate-change activists targeting artwork in galleries and vandalizing them with food or other means. **SNIP** This time, Reuters reported, members of the group Ultima Generazione, or Last Generation, covered Warhol's the BMW Art Car with flour to look like it was covered in snow. According to Ultima Generazione’s website, the group conducts nonviolent civil disobedience actions...

A historic flour mill in Oregon owned by the nation’s biggest independent flour milling company has been completely destroyed by a fire. Authorities are describing the Grain Craft mill in Pendleton as a total loss after a small fire that began on Tuesday afternoon reignited early Wednesday morning while the building was empty, fully engulfing the mill due to the significant amount of dry grain it was housing as well as its wood structure. Pendleton Assistant Fire Chief Tony Pierotti told the media that the fuel load was “extreme” because the silos were filled with finished grain. Authorities have been...

Many small businesses continue to struggle and now a growing number of pizza shops in the Grand Rapids area are closing. Just over a year after Rico Nelson took over Franco’s Pizzeria on Alpine Avenue in Walker, he had to shut the store down. He’s far from the only one. "Business usually takes a while to get your niche and get it figured out," Nelson said. "But it’s just so hard with the uncertainty of the future right now, you know?" It’s the perfect storm facing small businesses right now: employee shortages, rising food and gas prices and supply chain...

Large-scale street protests have been raging in Iran since last week, as inflation and the war in Ukraine have driven flour-based food staples to jump by as much as 300% – this also after the government moved to cut food subsidies. Amid the soaring prices, already in an economy devastated by years of US sanctions gong back to the Trump administration’s pullout of the JCPOA nuclear deal, the central government has few options in terms of relief for the populace given assets abroad remain frozen.Illustrative, prior protest: APDemonstrators have been outraged over food prices and lack of urgent supplies such...

NORWICH, Vt., July 20, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- The country's oldest flour company is now King Arthur Baking Company. The rebrand of King Arthur Flour reflects what the company has always been: a company of bakers who believe in the power of baking to forge community and bring joy. The new logo, which features a wheat crown, celebrates the brand's commitment to baking.

Some 12,500 cases of 5-pound bags of Pillsbury Unbleached All Purpose Flour have been recalled because of possible salmonella contamination. This information was posted on the websites of two supermarket chains, Publix and Winn-Dixie, which said that the product was recalled by the parent company of Pillsbury baking products, Hometown Foods Company. Flour marked with two lot codes are involved in the recall: 8 292 or 8 293 representing about 100,000 bags of flour. The packages carry a best-if-used-by date of April 19, 2020. No announcement was posted on either the Hometown Foods Company’s website or the Food and Drug...

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — General Mills is expanding a flour recall issued over a possible link to an E. coli outbreak after four new illnesses were reported. The recall announced Monday covers several varieties of Gold Medal and Signature Kitchens flour produced on certain dates through February 10. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has said flour produced at a General Mills plant in Kansas City, Missouri, is a likely source of the outbreak, which so far has sickened 46 people in 21 states. The CDC says 13 have been hospitalized, and one person has developed a type of kidney...

The Professor uncovers some old footage with an amazing story. Exploding pianos created by the legendary BD Shaw as part of his expert testimony. Flour and flash pot were put in a piano with terrible results.

Palm Beach Fire Rescue is investigating reports of white powder found at Palm Beach International Airport. Crews were called to the scene just after 10 a.m. Check back for updates on this breaking news story

EDMONDS -- Traffic in Edmonds was detoured for more than an hour Tuesday while a hazardous materials team investigated a report of a suspicious powder discovered at the intersection of Sunset Avenue and Edmonds Street. "It turns out the white powdery substance is, in fact, flour," Snohomish County Fire District 1 spokeswoman Leslie Hynes said. A witness told firefighters that a couple of crows were to blame.

I am an avid canner, and I also buy flour in bulk. I was intrigued by the 15-20 year storage life for canned dry goods. If you like sales and buying extra flour, rice, dried beans and cornmeal, this may be a great help to you! You don't need a pressure canner, just your oven.

FUNNIEST VIDEO OF THE WEEK.... Mommy was not feeling well and had to stay in the bathroom longer than usual during which my two boys, ages 1 and 3 took my new bag of flour out of the cupboard and destroyed my house. This is from ONE 5lb bag. Don't believe me? Hand a full bag to a 3 year old and see what happens.

HONOLULU (AP) -- President Barack Obama ended his nearly two-week Hawaiian vacation on a somber note Monday, taking his daughters to visit his grandfather's grave. The president's motorcade wound through the island of Oahu's mountainous terrain late Monday afternoon on its way to National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific at Punchbowl.

BULLETIN -- NEW YORK POLICE AND FBI RAID HOMES IN QUEENS IN TERRORISM INVESTIGATION.6 minutes ago from BNO Headquarters

SNIPPET: "U.S. counterterrorism officials have linked one of the nation's most wanted terrorists to last year's thwarted plot to bomb the New York City subway system, authorities said Wednesday. Current and former counterterrorism officials said top al-Qaida operative Adnan Shukrijumah met with one of the would-be suicide bombers in a plot that Attorney General Eric Holder called one of the most dangerous since the 9/11 terror attacks."

(CNN) — Meghan McCain again took aim at some leaders of her party Monday night, declaring the GOP is currently being hijacked by those trying "to make it more extreme." In an interview on The Colbert Report on Comedy Central, the outspoken daughter of Arizona Sen. John McCain said the party needs to broaden its message as it struggles to regain power in the halls of Congress and eventually the White House.

In about a month, the Minnesota State Fair starts. I love the Fair but at the same time, I hate it - because it sounds the end of summer. Anyway, I digress. I occasionally enter in the baking competition. I try to compete against the blue-hair crowd, you know the types who enter 30 different items every Fair. This year, I'm planning on possibly changing the type of flour I'm using. I always use whole wheat flour for my bread recipe. There are a lot of different whole wheat flours out there. You know, the specialty ones. What would you...

She was a freshman on an academic scholarship at Bryn Mawr College, preparing to fly home to California for Christmas, sleep-deprived, with questions from a calculus exam still racing through her head. In the space of a few hours on Dec. 21, 2003, Janet Lee landed in a Philadelphia jail cell, where she would remain for three weeks, held on $500,000 bail and facing 20 years in prison on drug charges. All over flour found in her luggage. "I haven't let myself be angry about what happened, because it would tear me apart," Lee said. "I'm not sure I can...