Scary news is brewing: Companies set to market brewskies based on beer, milk

Add this to the ever expanding list of reasons I’m glad I don’t drink anymore:

1. A brewery in Hokkaido, Japan, has started selling a low-malt beer made with milk. The product, with the wonderfully perfect name of Bilk, is made by the Abashiri Brewery which also makes the equally appetizing Purple Ale pictured at right. Bilk “reportedly has a fruity flavor that its brewers hope will be popular among women.The idea for the drink was conceived after dairy firms threw out a huge amount of surplus milk in March last year.” I’m not getting drunk, I’m fighting off osteoporosis. Suddenly the Mongolian national booze Ayrag — fermented mare’s milk — sounds … every bit as gross as it did before. (Anyone ever explore the connection between Mongolian cuisine — care for some mutton boiled in tea  — and their desire to conquer the world? Maybe they were just looking for a decent nosh.)
2. Coca-Cola is looking to produce kvass in Russia, a traditional beverage made from fermented bread that is also sweet and fizzy. NB: Coke is just playing ketchup, er catch up, here: PepsiCo, has catered to Russian tastes via white-mushroom-and- sour-cream-flavored potato chips and sukhariki, a traditional snack food made from dried brown bread.

Bilk is sounding better by the minute.

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What do you like to whistle as you wander by the graveyard?

“We have found that the U.S. economy has been surprisingly resilient, surprisingly able to manage the increase in prices that we have already seen. I am hopeful that it will continue to do so.” — US Energy Sec. Sam Bodman

I have a law that I would like to see passed as soon as possible. It’s very simple: anyone who wants to prognosticate about the economy is required to shop for his or her own groceries. No one who has watched the price of apples go from $1.29 lb to $1.79 lb and milk hit $4 a gallon (brand name not store brand) is going to use the word resilient unless preceded by words “Hope it’s”.