Filed under: Vegetables , Fruit , Did you know? , America I recently learned that goats and sheep are more discriminating eaters than I had thought. Both prefer the finer things in life. By that I don't mean organically grown hay, but something a bit more gourmet, truffles. Goats, which as a kid I thought subsisted solely on paper and tin cans, have a less refined palate than sheep, according to the study in this month's issue of Small Ruminant Research. Sheep's favorite flavors in order of preference include truffle, garlic, onion, apple and caramel, maple and orange flavors while goats prefer truffle, onion, apple and garlic. Both ruminants expressed a distaste for strawberries. Read     Permalink     Email this     Linking Blogs     Comments

Filed under: Chocolate , Candy , Stores & Shopping For Mother's Day, See's Candies has restyled one of their signature boxes into an adorable pink and white purse with a beaded handle. It is packed with an assortment of truffles and other chocolates and topped off with a bow. In addition to selling the purse alone, See's also sells a larger Mother's Day Keepsake Collection , which includes the 10-ounce purse, an additional pound of assorted chocolates and a pink bag full of foil-covered chocolate hearts.

Filed under: Chocolate , Stores & Shopping , New Products The Godiva G collection is the ultra-gourmet line of chocolates made by the popular chocolatier. For Mother's Day , they have introduced a limited release 20-piece set of chocolates. Each collection is packaged in an elegant pink gift box and, in honor of the jeweler Aaron Basha, a free travel jewelry case is included with each purchase. Unfortunately, no jewelry is included, but speaking of jewels, each candy in the collection looks like one, with unique and vibrant coloring topping of each of the decadent, intense truffles. The box is $65 and will only be available through May 14th.

Filed under: Farming , Business , Lush Life , Vegetables , Far East , Newspapers , Europe In China, many products are produced at prices much lower than they are in other countries, but until recently, agriculture was not subject to the same type of mass industrialization. Now, it appears that China is muscling in on the truffle market , something that the French are not too happy about. France has a 45% share of the truffle market and their fungi cost an average of more than $500 per pound. Two new Chinese varieties of truffles cost more than 90% less - $28 per pound. The director of Yunri foods, a Chinese company that sells the truffles, said that they sell over 20 tons of truffles and mushrooms a year, mostly to the United States, United Kingdom and France.