King Corn/Count Smokula

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Xeni talks to the filmmakers behind King Corn, a new documentary about the corn industry. And royalty of another kind - Count Smokula!

[#1 posted by RunawayJim , October 22, 2007 7:41 AM]

I just wanted to point out that not all beer is made with corn. It's generally macro-brewed beer from companies like A-B, Miller, and Coors that are brewed with corn, using less malted barley, making the process less expensive and giving the beer less flavor. If you want beer made without corn, support the craft beer industry. BeerAdvocate.com is a good place to start (I am simply a BA reader and enjoyer, not affiliated with the site at all).

[#2 posted by Xeni Jardin , October 22, 2007 9:49 AM]

Good point, Jim! We should have made this clearer. The film is really good, the guys sent me a screener copy and I watched over the weekend. While the theme is kind of scary (corn is in everything, it's a huge, gov-subsidized industry, corn derivative foodstuffs are making America fat), the movie is not preachy at all, very fun, and the scene where they try to homebrew high-fructose corn syrup is just hilarious. I think that's my favorite part of the film, and worth the price of admission alone.

[#3 posted by ediew , October 22, 2007 9:57 AM]

High fructose corn syrup is the bane of my existence. Goes right through my system. It's a great diet tool though. As it's infiltrated more and more food and liquid, as I cut them off the list, there's that much less to tempt me.

[#4 posted by Xeni Jardin , October 22, 2007 9:57 AM]

Oh, and coincidentally, the NYT ran an editorial on the farm bill just this weekend: Link.

[#5 posted by strider_mt2k , October 22, 2007 11:07 AM]

I try to avoid high fructose corn syrup also.

It's evil, pure and simple.

[#6 posted by x , October 22, 2007 11:19 AM]

That was the best video yet. Xeni becoming much more natural. Interesting content, good pace. I loved it.

What I would like to see is all the boingx2 staff cover a story together. One that is all futurismic, dystopian and creepy and yet leaves us with an awareness of how small we are in the sea of time.

BTW: Goggles, fezs and capes are coming back. Scoff now, but soon world leaders will don them, and then you will see I am right.

[#7 posted by Anonymous , October 22, 2007 11:25 AM]

Looking forward to seeing this one.

(Ian's a darn good cook, too, BTW.)

-eric from Ann Arbor

[#8 posted by Xeni Jardin , October 22, 2007 12:27 PM]

@X, thanks very much! We're planning to do more collaborative work among the BB team on future episodes, so... stay tuned, please!

Oh, also -- Bonnie at the excellent food blog ethicurean has an interesting review up on King Corn:

http://www.ethicurean.com/2007/10/10/king-corn/

[#9 posted by Anonymous , October 22, 2007 3:17 PM]

This goes back to the Maya's belief that we all come from the corn.

[#10 posted by Pat Race , October 22, 2007 3:24 PM]

I'm not saying that food is bad for you, I'm just saying we eat an awful lot of it. [insert ominous music]

[#11 posted by sg76 , October 22, 2007 5:13 PM]

Michael Pollen's "Omnivore's Dilemma" (ISBN10 #0143038583) covers the "corn-ification" of our food supply in much more detail. It goes into great detail about our food supply, alternatives and looking at how those choices affect us, without being preachy.

And just remember: mass-agriculture is one of the compromises we accept when we have larger and larger civilizations. Before we were "corn people" we were "wheat people".

[#12 posted by eliterrell , October 22, 2007 5:18 PM]

7 million pounds seems a bit high. Assuming the guy is 40 (he looked a lot younger to me) that works out to almost 480 pounds per day. I grew up on a farm and having lugged around more than my share of 40 lb bags of corn, I'd be interested to see an accounting of that.

I've seen figures cited (searching The Omnivore's Dilemma on Amazon) that say corn fed cattle eat 8 pounds of corn for every pound of meat they gain. Chickens are a more efficient 2 to 1. I don't know anything about how much corn is needed to make syrup but I'd be very surprised if it could make up the balance. I see estimates that people eat 60 lbs of the syrup per year which works out the 1/6 of a lb per day. I'm skeptical that if it takes 450 pounds of corn to produce 3 ounces of syrup that there is nothing else they can use what is left over.

The only thing that remotely makes sense is that he may be including the full weight of the plants. I'd consider that cheating though since a)he isn't eating the plant and b)as it's harvested it is chopped up and returned directly to the soil. Anyway, I doubt that could make things work out because by harvest time a corn stalk tends to be pretty darn light.

Anyway, that's just a little 'cuz-i-feel-like-it' internet research, maybe someone who actually knows something could chime in.

[#13 posted by WordyGrrl , October 22, 2007 8:53 PM]

This ep forced a bad joke into my head:
Q: What do vegetarian zombies eat?
A: GRAIIINNNNS....

Yeah, sorry. Had to.

[#14 posted by madmanforfood , October 23, 2007 7:42 AM]

Xeni,
Love this interview...we need more focus on this subject that reaches outside the foodie -- we may be loosing this round of the battle on the farm bill even with the great efforts like the Ethicurean, but...it is not over yet.

On that note, Bonnie at the Ethicurean pointed me your way...thought you might enjoy reading a regular blog "from the road" by Curt Ellis, co-creator of King Corn, over at Culinate. He will be doing a weekly review of the premieres and the antics surrounding this great film.

Mark

[#15 posted by madmanforfood , October 23, 2007 7:43 AM]

Oops...for got the link to Curt's ongoing blog...

http://www.culinate.com/kingcorn

Enjoy!

[#16 posted by Mingross , October 23, 2007 11:44 AM]

Nom nom nom. I has many corms.

http://icanhascheezburger.files.wordpress.com/2007/07/ihasmanycorms1.jpg

Sorry, couldn't resist.

[#17 posted by pork musket , October 24, 2007 10:24 AM]

'I don't eat HFCS' crew member checking in. It seems almost impossible to get bread or ketchup without HFCS in it unless you go organic.

[#18 posted by devophill , October 26, 2007 1:43 AM]

Well, I stopped drinking HFCS soda a couple of years ago, so that's a start. Only the tip of the iceberg, though.

[#19 posted by Anonymous , October 26, 2007 1:46 PM]

I'm having a hard time getting the video to embed correctly on my blog. I'm copying & pasting the "embed" code into my post, and all that's showing up as the written code... Help?