Media Mix: Paula Deen's Butter Balm; Blood And Chocolate Desserts; And Starbucks' New Coffee

The Daily Byte brings you all the food news fit to read.

Paula Deen's Butter Lip Balm: The sexiest female celeb chef (according to Maxim) brings her favorite flavor to your lips, with butter-flavored lip balm. Flavors expand to pecan pie, pumpkin pie, key lime pie, peach cobbler, and banana pudding, so go ahead and "put a little South on your mouth!" [Grub Street]

Southeast Asian Fusion: We all know we have the French to thank for the bahn mi. But did you know Cambodian cuisine uses smoked fish in salads, like French cuisine? Or that Dutch and Indonesian food are often interchangeable? [NPR]

Blood and Chocolate Mix in Canada: Several adventurous Canadian chefs are experimenting with blood in their dishes, adding it to pastas and creamy custards. Not too far-fetched for most who've had pig's blood tofu in Chinese restaurants or Poland's duck blood soup. [The Globe and Mail]

Starbucks' New "Weak" Coffee: The megachain released a new "Blonde" roast Tuesday, designed for "42 percent of U.S. coffee drinkers who prefer a lighter roast." Maybe we'll start drinking our coffees black now? [Eater]

How Food Goes From Farm to Table: Here's an inside look at Cherry Central, which ensures food safety in its processing plant by using technology to record the "date, time, location, temperature, and food safety compliance," every step of the way. [GOOD, Fast Company]

The Daily Byte is a regular column dedicated to covering interesting food news and trends across the country. Click here for previous columns.