It’s Friday afternoon, and that means it’s time for me to give you a little weekend reading from around the web. Here are a few food related items that I thought might interest you.

A pedestrian-attacking bird isn't the only “aggressive” news item making headlines in San Francisco. According to the New York Times, lawmakers in the City by the Bay have voted to make already ironclad recycling laws even more stringent. New ordinances will require that San Francisco residents use three separate curbside garbage bins: one for trash, one for recyclables, and one for compostable waste.

College students are not famous for self-reliance. Food, to most of us, means standing in line for a serving of stir-fry, a chicken breast from a big metal tray and a hearty blast of ketchup from a red pump. For the adventurous chefs, there's some Frank's Red Hot on top of the salad bar.

On a recent Saturday, Washington, D.C., interior designer Morrigan Green stopped at a produce stand and picked up some dandelion greens. $9 a pound? No problem. Says Green: "These are as good a yuppie green as you can get."

 

As suburban homeowners commence their annual battle against weeds, more people are paying top dollar to eat them. The dandelion -- perhaps the most common weed of them all -- is seeing a huge surge in sales at grocery stores. Other long-scorned greens making the leap to the dinner table include purslane, lamb's quarters and stinging nettles, a skin-irritating plant that can be eaten safely after boiling.

 

In a city of pizza snobs, the pies served at the Crocodile Lounge (325 East 14th Street; 212-477-7747), a dark and typically crowded East Village bar, barely rate.

 

The crust may be light and thin, but it’s not charred to blistering by a 900-degree wood-fired oven. The sauce, though tomato-sweet, is not made from prized San Marzano fruits. The cheese binds the pizza together well enough, but you’d never mistake it for mozzarella di bufala.

 

Still, these entirely edible 10-inch pizzas — which are also available at the Crocodile’s Brooklyn sibling, the Alligator Lounge in East Williamsburg (600 Metropolitan Avenue; 718-599-4440) — have one advantage over the über-authentic versions sold nearby: buy a drink, whether a $6 Goose Island ale or the $5 house lager, and the pizza is free.

 

Image: Matt Callow 

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