Five men from Papua New Guinea survived more than two months at sea by eating driftwood and coconut shells.
Their horrendous ordeal began when the family of eight's 22-foot boat ran out of fuel on a trip to a nearby island.
Ocean Encounter, a U.S. fishing ship, ended up rescuing the men two months later near the South Pacific island, Nauru. Two of the seven men that were rescued unfortunately passed away from severe malnutrition before the rescue vessel could reach proper medical assistance. The eighth passenger, a 15-year-old boy, drowned before the rescue boat arrived after jumping into the water to recover a shirt that had blown away.
Ever wondered where that lettuce leaf you're eating was grown?
Kroger says it's become the first grocery chain to employ traceability technology on its salads, so consumers can see exactly where its packaged Fresh Selections salad greens come from.
For its pre-washed, ready-to-serve salads, Kroger is using HarvestMark technology -- a 16-digit tracking code on packaging that consumers can plug into HarvestMark's Web site to trace the greens back to the source, including the region where the produce was grown and the date it was packed. It's part of the grocer's new "Quality You Can Trace" program.
The revamped product is now using red beet juice, purple cabbage, cocoa powder, paprika and turmeric to replace the artificial ingredients that had been flavoring and coloring the wafers for years.
Modern Ponce de Leons, take note. The diet of the Sardinian people is the latest to be linked to a longer life.
The island of Sardinia lies 120 miles west of the Italian mainland. It is the second largest island in the western Mediterranean with Sicily only being larger.
The Sardinian diet emphasizes bread, cheese and red wine. Sardinian Cannonau, a very darkly-colored red wine, has the highest level of antioxidants of any known red wine in the world.
"This is so dark that the Italians call it vino nero, which means 'black wine,'" Buettner told "Good Morning America".
No surprise here, Sardinians also eat lots of fruits and vegetables and meat is a once-a-week celebration. Contrary to other Meditteranean diets, not a lot of fish is eaten.
Instead, cheese is used as protein source -- specifically, grass-fed cheeses.
Buettner also reveals one common denominator of healthiest people alive are the consumption of nuts. Buettner recommends the 2-by-4-by-2 rule -- people who eat 2 ounces of nuts four times a week live an average of two years longer.
Dr. Mehmet Oz and Rachael Ray. Photo: Jennifer Lawinski
Even presidents know it's hard to get kids to eat their vegetables.
Former President Bill Clinton told parents a gymnasium full of parents in Harlem Saturday that he shared their struggles with finding and committing to healthy eating. Getting kids to eat fruits and vegetables is hard, he said. "Especially in Harlem, where I can say we have a lot of other options and they all taste good."
The talk was part of the the New York City Wine and Food Festival's Weight Watcher's Fun and Fit in the City event, targeted at combating childhood obesity and promoting healthy eating for the city's kids. The ex-president's foundation is headquartered in Harlem, and its top priority in the U.S. is the fight against childhood obesity.
On Tuesday, the Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) released its list of Top 10 riskiest foods policed by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. According the the report, the items on the "FDA Top 10" account for nearly 40-percent of all reported foodborne outbreaks since 1990. The CSPI is a non-profit food safety and public health organization.
The FDA regulates nearly 80 percent of the nation's food supply including fruits and vegetables, seafood, egg and dairy products and most packaged foods.
But are they being overly cautious? Read the list after the jump.
Crescendo ($70, pictured) is a set of four glasses, each in a different delicate shade of pink. Since they're stemless, the glasses are great for non-alcoholic drinks as well as white wines, and they're dishwasher-safe.
Pink Vinum Rosé ($59) is a set of two pink-stemmed glasses specifically designed for rosé wine. They're also dishwasher-safe, and the color of the wine isn't distorted, since the pink tint is limited to the stem.
Riedel is donating 15 percent of their pink sales to Living Beyond Breast Cancer, a national nonprofit organization dedicated to empowering all women affected by breast cancer to live as long as possible with the best quality of life -- now that's something we can all raise our glasses to. Order online or find them at Bed, Bath, and Beyond.
McDonald's at Chicago's Navy Pier. Photo: jwrb,Flickr.
A Chicago man has filed a lawsuit against McDonald's Corporation after he says he swallowed a gold earring in his sandwich.
The man purchased the sandwich on Aug. 11 from the McDonald's at Chicago's Navy Pier, according to the suit filed on Wednesday in the circuit court of Cook County, Ill.
KFC is getting grilled over its new chicken offering.
The Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine (PCRM) has sued Kentucky Fried Chicken over a carcinogen, PhIP, which the nutrition advocacy group says is in KFC's new grilled chicken. PhIP is a compound on California's list of carcinogens that is created when meat is grilled.
The PCRM filed the suit in San Francisco Superior Court for violating California's Proposition 65. This proposition mandates that businesses must warn customers if there are carcinogens in their products.
For more than two years John Manley had trouble breathing.
The Wilmington, N.C., man was constantly under the weather, prone to pneumonia and shortness of breath, and doctors didn't know why. His wife, thinking he was depressed, even bought two dogs to try and cheer him up and get him out of the house.
But last week, doctors at Duke University Medical Center finally unraveled the mystery of Manley's chronic health woes: a piece of a Wendy's plastic utensil had been lodged in his lung.
A California company has recalled 2,268 pounds of beef and bean burritos on fears they may be contaminated with listeria monocytogenes.
Windsor Foods of Riverside, Calif., issued the recall for 18-pound bulk cases of individually wrapped Butcher Boy Red Chile Beef and Bean Burritos, the USDA's Food Safety and Inspection Service said. The cases contain 72 burritos each, carry the the establishment number "EST. 1905" within the USDA mark of inspection as well as the package code "1219215" and the case code "2080001."
Burritos in question were produced on Aug. 3 and delivered to a Minnesota storage facility. Consumers with questions about the recall should phone Windsor Foods at 909-477-4813.
Consuming foods contaminated with listeria monocytogenes can cause listeriosis, which can be fatal in infants and the elderly, and can cause high fever, severe headache, neck stiffness and nausea among healthy people.
Are you concerned about food safety? Let us know in the comments below.
Kudzu, the hardy weed that blankets more than 8 million acres of the South, may have some redeeming qualities after all.
Researchers at the University of Alabama at Birmingham last week published a study in the Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry showing kudzu reduces hypertension and regulates glucose metabolism in rats. If their findings hold true for people, the vine long considered one of the South's most aggravating curses could help combat the region's latest scourge: obesity-related health problems.
Some fresh fruit juice shots. Photo: Jennifer Iserloh
My neighbor Susan recently gave me this charming book about old fashioned cocktails. The author stresses throughout the book that the base of a delicious mixed drink comes from premium spirits and fresh juices -- no bottled mixes. He's got some real concoctions in there from what he considers a "gentler" time when specialty cocktails and sophisticated entertaining reigned supreme.
I really like the idea of a homemade drink, especially when it comes to entertaining. But I've never been able to handle those bar shots that people try to get you to down when you're out for a night on the town.
Cosmetologists have long raided the kitchen cabinet to make everything from cucumber lotion to egg white shampoo, but Sunburst Trout Farm's Sally Eason believes her new trout caviar skin cream is unprecedented.
"I always heard caviar was the best thing for your skin," says Eason, whose family has been raising mountain trout in western North Carolina since World War II. Laughing, she adds: "I'm hoping I'm going to look like I'm 22."
Caviar beauty treatments aren't new, but none of the products currently on the market are made from golden trout roe. Sunburst Trout Farm has a history of extracting value from trout eggs, having pioneered trout caviar in the early 1990s. The tangerine-hued eggs have since surfaced at ritzy restaurants and on Jacques Pépin's television show.
But in 2007, Sunburst's processing plant was destroyed by light-fingered arsonists who made off with 670 pounds of the farm's treasured roe.
There's nothing like the calming warmth of a shot of espresso -- that old friend you count on to get you going.
But like the passive-aggressive pal leaving catty notes on your Facebook wall, your morning joe can turn on you in an instant, especially if you have one too many.
I've only been betrayed once, but it was enough to permanently slow my caffeine binge habits: The moment I swallowed the offending shot, my heart started pounding, I saw double, my hands started sweating and I stumbled blindly towards the door of my favorite café, trying to sneak out unnoticed. (It is not ideal for a CoffeeMeister's reputation to be crumpled on the floor of a café in a fit of caffeine-induced hysteria).
It's easy for people to forget -- or deny -- that caffeine is a drug, but the facts say otherwise: Like its distant cousins cocaine and nicotine, it's an alkaloid, though there aren't typically state-funded "quit cappuccinos" campaigns. The stimulating stuff's natural function is as a built-in pesticide for plants like coffee, cacao and tea.
Contrary to the paralyzing effect it has on crawling critters, it sends us skipping back to our desks at 3 p.m. with a renewed sense of joie de vivre. Sadly, however, too much of a good thing is bad news indeed.
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