Monday, July 29

 
RICH CHOCOLATE STORMS AMERICA

I have bad news for you if you're trying to break your chocolate habit. Premium chocolatiers are planning a $30 million advertising blitz this year to persuade Americans to eat more chocolate. (File this story under "Preaching to the Converted.") According to this story in Advertising Age, Americans are not holding up their end of the deal in worldwide chocolate consumption. This comes as a major surprise, seeing as Americans constantly get accused of consuming far more than their fair share of every other precious global resource. A few example: Lindt & Sprungli plans to spend $4 million to get us to eat more Lindor Truffles (my verdict: The fillings are too icky-sweet.) Godiva, a brand owned by the Campbell Soup Co., aims to spend an undisclosed amount to persuade us that its chocolate is not just a product but a lifestyle. (And not because you need a second income to support your premium-chocolate jones, I'm guessing.) I'd write more, but I just got this sudden urge for a Mars bar ......
posted by Unknown 11:32 AM

Thursday, July 25

 
Is Bottled Water Better Than Tap?

Okay, I do feel a little doofus-like whenever I buy a bottle of water from a vending machine, a convenience store or the supermarket. Buying water?? What next, buying air? (Oh, yeah. We do that already. Oxygen bars. Not me, though; I draw the line there.) This story from the Baltimore Sun casts an earnest if slightly jaundiced eye at the practice, examining it from various viewpoints: nutrition (beware extra carbs and calories in flavored waters), economics (It can be pricey!) and environment (added pollution caused by trucking water from source to plant to store). And, of course, the snob value: Some restaurants are adding "water sommeliers" to help diners navigate their way through all the varieties. Get me a Coke!
posted by Unknown 10:43 AM

Friday, July 19

 
The Five Olive Oils of France

France produces only 2 percent of the world's olive oil, but, because they are French, they've gone and appellation-controleed the whole process. That means, as with wine, there are five distinct growing regions around the country, and only the olive oil produced in a particular region, such as the Coteaux d'Aix en Provence, can bear that particular appellation. This article in the International Herald Tribune by Patricia Wells explains the differences among them, notes characteristic flavors and suggests best uses.
posted by Unknown 8:49 AM

Friday, July 12

 
Breakfast at Tokyo's (coffee shops, that is)

Tokyo is one of the most expensive cities in the world. Even if you have an unlimited expense account, at some point you too would rebel at paying almost US$5 for a cup of coffee. The solution, according to Kaori Shoji in the International Herald Tribune, is to venture out of the hotel to a local coffee shop. The shops cater to the hordes of commuting Tokyo businessmen who don't have to eat at home by offering full meals for the price of one coffee. And we're not talking the Cholesterol Express of your average Denny's Grand Slam breakfast, either. It's an entertaining piece and in IHT's tradition of food-meets-culture reporting.
posted by Unknown 9:33 AM

Thursday, July 11

 
FDA to require trans fat listing on food labels

Research that came out in the late 1980s and early 1990s cited trans fatty acids as being potentially more harmful to the body than traditional evils such as cholesterol, although the current wisdom is that neither is good for you in large amounts. Trans fats are commonly those that have been hydrogenated. If you haven't been near a hydrogen molecule since high school, that means foods that are made with fats that have had a hydrogen molecule added to make them firm enough for use in manufacturing. Margarine is the one that comes to mind first, because it's an oil in its natural state. Many processed foods are made with hydrogenated fats, such as cookies, crackers and microwave popcorn. This story, from the Boston Globe and Associated Press, talks about how the U.S. Food and Drug Administration is thinking about adding warning labels noting the presence of trans fats in a food product.
posted by Unknown 12:27 PM

Monday, July 8

 
ICED-COFFEE $CAM DUPES JOE SCHMOES
Only in the New York Post could you find this story: Two guys go a-walkin'; the first buys hot coffee, the second buys iced coffee and pays half again as much. In a white-hot New York rage, the first guy does some cipherin' and figgers out that the iced coffee should actually cost less than the hot coffee. He's right, mathematically speaking, but what he forgets is the "chic" tax, that it's cooler to walk around with iced coffee in a showoffy see-through plastic cup than with a paper cup of plain old standard stuff. Not that we agree with the rip-off, of course, but people are people.
posted by Unknown 9:12 AM