It was a hard time. Lilo, I did not realize that you came from Frankfurt/Oder, I thought you were from Frankfurt/Main. My admiration to all of the refugees then and now. Having a home at Christmas 1944 again, there were my mother, father absent somewhere on the eastern front, my little brother, grandfather and me. A 5 bedroom house but at Christmas we were 23, 19 of the inhabitants refugees from Dresden, Hamburg, Nuernberg and the first woman, child and grandmother from the area NE of Dansk. By April 45, until January 46 we were 45. Then came the 2nd of January 45. I was sent to Nuernberg to deliver some potataoes and root vegetables to a reative. I was the messenger for the family. Just shy of 13 yrs, I looked like 8 and most people felt sorry for that little one traveling by herself. The overcrowded transportation system usually had a bit of room for me and the police looking for contraband in the form of food w/o accompanying ration card never bothered me. I delivered my loot, went back to the railroad station and then came the air raid sirens. 3 days later they dug us out of the railroad airraid shelter. I guess from that time comes my dislike of crowds.

Lydia, I have only the most basic understanding of the physiology of taste; but from what I have been told by physiologists who specialize in that area, it has more to do with chemistry than the actual number of taste buds or what a particular taste bud detects. The 'mapping' that I described was done in the 1970s so the thinking has changed among researchers since. The reason the study was designed was to either prove or disprove earlier studies by scientists who in the first half of the 20th century had created 'tongue maps' to indicate where the four sensations of taste (sweet, sour, salty, bitter) resided on the tongue. (A fifth sensation, umami, sometimes described as 'meatiness', has since been added.) The current thinking (from what I understand) is that all taste buds are capable of detecting all the sensations; but according to the interaction between food chemistry and a person's chemistry, some sensations will vary in intensity from person to person, even from time to time in the same person (illness can cause changes in the sense of taste which everyone who suffers a head cold already knows). Those more knowledgeable about chemistry can explain it better, I'm sure. What the physiologists told me about my own sensitivity: For whatever chemical reason, my taste buds do a bang-up job of detecting bitterness. It's both a good and bad thing for me -- 1) the bad: it makes me a hell of a hard-to-please attendee of social events since I don't like most of the beverages that most socializers imbibe; 2) the good: I'm likely to spit something poisonous out before it can harm me, and I'll never be an alcoholic.

My recipe calls for a ratio of 1:1:1 of sugar: apple cider vinegar: beet juice+water. I made two dozen eggs so used two cups of each; I'll use a bit less sugar next time. Boil and peel the eggs, set aside. In saucepan, add your AC vinegar, sugar, and beet juice/water from cans or jars of beets. Bring to a boil, then simmer for about fifteen minutes, set aside to cool a bit. Add the whole spices, if desired, to the solution just as heat is turned off but still simmering. It's hard to find whole beets, but they are more common in jars than cans. Put the drained beets, eggs, and spices in a large glass containers. There needs to be plenty of room for the contents to move around and be bathed by the pickling solution. Divide the pickling solution equally among the jar or jars of eggs/beets, shake gently, stash in the fridge for at least 48 hours. For my doubled batch, I used four cinnamon sticks, three bay leaves, teaspoon each whole cloves and peppercorns. I strongly suggest using the freshest spices possible. Some recipes don't call for the spices at all but the depth of flavors is truly enhanced with their addition. Nothing will taste strongly of cloves or cinnamon, but the overall flavor will be so much more delightful. EVERY RECIPE WILL BE DIFFERENT! Mine is my mother's, grandmother's, great grandmother's, and mine. By the way, most of the better salad bars include pickled beets, sometimes sliced. They won't be as good as the homemade version, but I always add a few to my salad.

" I don't think stores "donate" expired food. " But they do donate food that has past its "best before" date. They are not the same thing, in spite of people using the terms interchangeably all over this thread. Second Harvest picks up thousands of pounds of it a day., and US food rescue organizations do the same. Interestingly, which grocery stores (including WalMart and Costco) provide most is decided more by the manager than anyone else, even though all managers are given the go-ahead by corporate -- if they are willing to donate the dock time and staff loading of skids, then they do it. Some see the value in it (including the value of having less to throw out, because they pay for garbage by volume- less garbage means more savings). Both the US and Canada have laws protecting donors of food from liability, if donated in good faith.