For starters, about 83% of adults drink coffee in the U.S., the world’s largest consumer of coffee, up from 78% a year earlier, according to the National Coffee Association’s 2013 online survey. That’s an average of three cups a day per person, or 587 million cups.

Who’s Drinking Coffee & When

Thirty-five percent of Americans drink their coffee black. Photo courtesy Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf.

How Americans Drink It

 
What Do We Pay For Our Coffee?

Find more statistics on StatisticBrain.com.
  

September 28th is Drink Beer Day. Only a few ingredients are needed to make beer; typically, barley malt, unmalted grain, hops, yeast and water.

We were explaining to a friend that our favorite beers are heavily hopped IPAs. “What exactly are hops?” he asked.

We turned to Samuel Adams, the pioneering craft beer brewer, and to USA Hops, a nonprofit organization of growers, for an education.

A hop is a flower that looks like a soft, green pine cone. It grows on a long vine. The flowers are almost exclusively used as a brewing spice in the production of beer.

But what’s important to the brewer is not the whole flower or the petals, but the lupulin glands inside, which contain a golden resin. This resin is the depository of the alpha acids necessary for the hops to impart their signature bitterness and flavor to the beer. It also acts as a natural preservative.

Like any agricultural product, the unique conditions of soil, moisture, elevation and sunlight of the particular field have a direct impact on the quality and character of the hops. Hop varieties grown in their original regions will impart different flavors when grown elsewhere. The “hop belt,” where the most flavorful hops thrive, falls along the 48th parallel.

Each region’s hop varieties impart different flavors, from the aromatic piney notes in German hops to earthy ale hops in England and the citrus brightness of American hops.

SOME HOPS HISTORY

The oldest hop growing region in the world is located in Bavaria, a temperate region in southeast Germany, just west of the Alps (Munich is the capital). The local Noble aroma hops varieties, low in bitterness and high in aroma, are prized worldwide.

The earliest beers weren’t made with hops. The earliest mention of hop growing dates only to 1000-1200 C.E. in Germany. Prior to hops, other bittering agents, from juniper to roots and pine, were used. None could create the layers of flavor that hops impart, and it was a lucky day when the first brewer tossed those green flowers into the brewing vat.
  

[2] This beauty is a no-bake strawberry cream pie. Here’s the recipe (photo © Wife Mama Foodie).

[3] How about a strawberry and chocolate cream pie? Here’s the recipe (photo © Food 52).

[4] We’ve never had a roasted strawberries. In this pie, the strawberries are roasted in the oven. Here’s the recipe (photo © Delicious Australia).

[5] Beyond cream pie: a strawberry shortcake made with a pound cake loaf. Here’s the recipe (photo © The Baker Chick).

[6] Boozy strawberry shortcake with Baileys Irish Cream. Here’s the recipe (photo © Baileys).

[7] Strawberry ice pops in rosé wine. Here’s the recipe (photo © California Strawberries).

[8] Beyond the biscuit: a strawberry shortcake layer cake (photo © Japan Recipe Tin Eats).

[9] Pork tenderloin with balsamic strawberries. Here’s the recipe (photo © Southern Living).

[10] Souffle omelet with balsamic strawberries. Here’s the recipe (photo © California Strawberries).

A cream pie is a plain pastry or crumb pastry shell with a pudding or pudding-like filling.

Butterscotch, chocolate, frangipane and vanilla are most common, as are banana cream pie, coconut cream pie, strawberry or raspberry cream pie.

What’s the difference between cream pie and creme pie?

Just the spelling.

Creme is an Americanization of the French word for cream, crème (pronounced KREHM), most likely adapted in the U.S. to make the dish sound more special.

But why mispronounce another language’s word for cream? Unless it’s a French recipe, such as Coeur à la Crème, stick to “cream.”

And celebrate the day by making this delicious strawberry cream pie recipe, courtesy of the California Milk Advisory Board.

You can substitute your berry of choice: blackberry, blueberry, raspberry, etc.

There are more than 70 additional strawberry recipes below—beverages, desserts, sweet snacks and savory foods.

> The year’s 12 strawberry holidays.

> The year’s 31 pie holidays.

> The different types of pie: a photo glossary.

> The history of strawberries.

> The history of pie.
 
 
RECIPE: STRAWBERRY CREAM PIE

Ingredients For 8 Servings

For The Crust

 
For The Filling

 
Preparation

1. PREHEAT the oven to 350°F.

2. MIX the flour and powdered sugar together. Add the butter. Mix together and press the mixture into a 9-inch deep dish pie plate. Bake 12 to 15 minutes or until lightly browned then let cool.

3. COMBINE the sugar, salt and cornstarch in medium size saucepan. Slowly whisk in the milk until smooth. Cook over medium heat until thick, stirring constantly. Boil 1 minute, then remove from the heat.

4. STIR a small amount of the hot mixture into the beaten egg yolks. Pour it back into the pan and cook for 2 minutes more, without letting the mixture boil. Remove from the heat and stir in vanilla; fold in sour cream. Cover and cool to lukewarm.

5. LINE the pie shell with the sliced strawberries and pour the filling over the berries. Chill well before cutting into wedges. Makes 8 servings.
 
> See many more delicious recipes from the California Milk Advisory Board.

> Also check out this raspberry cream pie recipe (National Raspberry Cream Pie Day is August 1st).
 
 
MORE STRAWBERRY RECIPES

Beverage Recipes

 
 
Dessert & Sweet Snack Recipes

 
 
Savory Food Recipes

 
 
Holiday & Seasonal Recipes

CHECK OUT WHAT’S HAPPENING ON OUR HOME PAGE, THENIBBLE.COM.

Not surprisingly, it has a different flavor profile. Our resident sriracha expert says it has more of a flavor kick than his usual brand (Huy Fong, a.k.a. Rooster, Sriracha), with a heat that builds.

You can buy the 12-ounce squeeze bottle on Amazon for $6.99 with free shipping on orders over $35. So consider these attractive green bottles as stocking stuffers for your heat-loving friends.

Musashi Foods has also launched Japanese Spicy Mayo, the condiment used to make spicy rolls at sushi bars. It’s also delicious with crudités, eggs, fries, sandwiches and burgers, seafood and anywhere you’d like some heat in your mayonnaise. It’s the same price and delivery deal as the Green Sriracha, on Amazon.

(Note that you can make your own spicy mayo by mixing hot sauce into conventional mayonnaise. You can control the heat this way—Musashi’s mayo is pretty hot!)

WHAT IS SRIRACHA?

Sriracha, pronounced see-RAH-jah, is a Thai hot chili sauce. It is made from red chiles, distilled vinegar, garlic, sugar and salt; and is aged for three months or longer.

Unlike American hot sauces such as Tabasco, which are vinegar sauces that are infused with hot chiles, sriracha is primarily puréed chiles, making it a much thicker sauce.

The sauce is named after the coastal city of Si Racha in eastern Thailand, where it was first made and marketed. Different brands can be found in the Asian aisle of many supermarkets and in Asian groceries.

According to multiple sources, including an article in Bon Appétit, the sauce was made more than 80 years ago in by a local woman, Thanom Chakkapak. She initially made the condiment for her family, and then for friends, to enjoy with the local seafood (think of it as a much hotter counterpart to American cocktail sauce).

As is a common story in the specialty food business, they encouraged her to sell it commercially—and it became the best-selling chile sauce in Thailand. In 1984, Ms. Chakkapak sold her business to a major food company, Thai Theparos Food Products.

What’s the correct spelling: sriraja, si-racha, sriracha or siracha?

According to Andrea Nguyen, who wrote the article for Bon Appétit: Since Thailand does not adhere to one romanization system for Thai words, many variants have emerged, chosen by manufacturers who have created their own version of the original sauce.

However, the most commonly accepted spelling is sriracha.

ABOUT MUSASHI FOODS

Founded in 2013 in New York City by an entrepreneur with a passion for hot and spicy food and named for the famed Japanese Samurai, Miyamoto Musashi, Musashi Foods is a producer of premium Asian sauces made from the highest quality ingredients. For more information visit Musashifoods.com.
  

You can enjoy the same baked apple flavor with a betty or crisp (a.k.a. crumble). The differences, along with dough-topped variations such as cobbler, grunt, pandowdy and slump, are below.

BEST APPLES FOR BAKING

When you bake apples, you need a variety with balance of sweet and tart flavors and, more importantly, flesh that doesn’t become mushy when cooked. These include:

Apple crisp: With a crumb topping, it is easier to make than a pie. Photo courtesy McCormick.

Ingredients

 
For the Cinnamon Topping

 
Plus

Preparation

1. PREHEAT oven to 350°F. Combine apples, lemon juice, sugar and cinnamon in a large baking dish. Pour water over apples.

2. PREPARE the topping. In a separate bowl, using a fork, cut the butter into the other listed ingredients until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs.

2. SPREAD the topping over fruit mixture. Bake in a 350°F preheated oven 50 minutes or until topping is golden brown. It’s that easy!
 

CRISP, CRUMBLE, COBBLER, ETC.: WHAT’S THE DIFFERENCE?

A crisp is a deep-dish fruit dessert made with a crumb or streusel topping and baked. Similar dishes include: