snackdown! - 4.9.10

it's time to play ball bitchez! this week, the baseball season officially kicked off with sunday night's game between the ny yankees & my beloved boston red sox. with a new baseball season comes the usual 1,001 stories about all the new & diverse food options now available in & around the ballparks, from food & drink at jerry remy's new sports bar & grill in boston to tony o's cuban sandwich at minnesota's new target field. a bar & grill endorsed by a beloved sportscaster & a cuban sandwich endorsed by a former star outfielder? you can't beat that with a bat! let's get to the snackdown!

• about a year back, frito-lay announced that they were going to start selling their sun chips in compostable packaging. this year, they're continuing their eco-friendly efforts as they've made a licensing deal with ecoist, a company that "upcycles" waste into "stylish, high quality, and limited collection handbags." through the agreement, ecoist will be upcycling frito-lay waste into items like "purses, clutches and place mats." they also offer a potato chip bowl that's "hand-woven from 260 'upcycled' lays potato chip bags," the perfect gift for someone who thinks that it's a good idea to spend $40 on a potato chip bowl just because it's made from upcycled materials. (la times)


• if there's one thing that the hemingway name is known for, it's bliss. with that in mind, mariel hemingway, who's best known for her role in woody allen's 1979 film manhattan, has recently come out with blisscuits, a snack she developed in her kitchen & describes as a "healthy 'health' bar." as of right now, they're only available in nyc (at gourmet garage) & in seattle (at tully's coffee), but the blisscuit website promises that that'll change soon, "because of its wonderful taste, incredible food value, and support of healthy living, while being actively promoted by mariel’s involvement and reputation." bonus! if you're a fan of hers, she'll be visiting five different tully's coffee locales today & tomorrow. feel the bliss, people. (seattle post-intelligencer)


• you might think that germans feast on nothing but schnitzel & bratwurst, but that's not the case. according to abc news and a 2008 poll by german men's health magazine, doner kebab, a "grilled meat snack that comes wrapped in a pita bread with shredded lettuce, tomatoes, onions and different dressings" has become germany's favorite fast food item. the snack, which was "originally made of lamb and sold only on a plate," came to germany forty years ago along with a large influx of turkish folks. since its arrival, it's gone through some changes, as doner kebab vendors have added pita bread & dressing to the mix. mcdonald's germany hasn't tried to capitalize on its popularity yet, but based on the recent addition of nyc-themed cupcakes to their menu, i have trouble believing that a mcdoner kebab's not in the works. (abc news)


• it's a sad time for pickle businesses here in nyc. a century ago, the lower east side was home to a thriving pickle industry, with "as many as 150 other pickle places in existence," but these days, there's little left of that industry. sure there's still the annual pickle festival, but last august, guss' pickles (a l.e.s. fixture for 85 years) had to close down their manhattan location & move to brooklyn. all that remains now is the pickle guys. i guess folks just don't have the same enthusiasm for soured, phallic-shaped vegetables that they used to. (straits times)


• while pickles are hurting in nyc, nationwide, hummus is on the rise. as fox news reports, hummus has been a dietary mainstay in the middle east for centuries, but here in the u.s., it's only recently become popular. according to information resources inc (some market research company). back in 2006 it was only in 12% of households, but by last year, it was in 17% of them. in the last twenty-one months, u.s. hummus consumption has increased by 35%. gitti crowley, the VP of marketing for tribe hummus "attributes its growth to america's embrace of ethnic foods in general." i attribute it to bruno's attempt to jumpstart the israeli-palestinian peace process. (fox news)

nosh nook #200 - friday, december 18, 2009

snack bar sells gold-covered schnitzel for €150 (link)
12.17.09 - the local

hey schnitzel truck! yeah, i'm talking to you. i've never eaten your schnitzel, but i've been hearing a lot about you ever since you started dispensing schnitzel to the good people of nyc back in july. from what i note from your twitter feed, you camp out in dumbo on fridays. too bad i don't work there any more & you don't tend to be all that close to where i work these days or i'd have checked you out by now. i like cutlets. i like the kraut & the brat. schwarzenegger & hitler have sort of turned me off from austrians, but from what i've read, you're much cooler than those two, since you're all about the yummy, truck-dispensed food & not about the misguided governance or psycho nationalization. people tend to like you.

still, you probably need to step up your game unless you want to be shown up by the germans. the local, a german newspaper, reports that the berger straße restaurant in düsseldorf sells the "golden kaiser schnitzel," "a veal filet coated with gold leaf and truffles." unnecessary gold adornment! just like goldschlager! totally classy. other than its german origins, it's the sort of golden dish that glenn beck [PUNCH] could get behind, maybe even film a set of sincere commercials for whilst wearing his pathetic christmas sweater. that's where our future is, my fellow americans. it lies in the four G's: god, gold, guns & gilded schnitzel.

...so the schnitzel goes for €150 & is "swathed in 24-carat gold," but what makes it so expensive is the truffles. truffle prices are no joke, son. the ones used in the golden kaiser go for €5,000 per kilo. that's over seven G's! it's like you can buy a kilo of truffles or feed ten guatemalan families for a year. you couldn't pay a-rod to take one swing or field a ground ball though. despite its outlandish decadence, since adding the dish to the menu three years ago, they've sold about 100 of them. now they're starting to promote the gold-covered schnitzel, so hopefully it'll take off. i'd suggest going international, taking out an ad in time out abu dahbi. i hear those abu-dahbi fat cats love eating gold.

nosh nook #106 - monday, august 10, 2009

sweet snacks could lead to higher shopping bills (link)
08.09.09 - the local

sometimes i wish i was a full-time researcher dude, someone who gets paid to develop crazy tests & perform them on people. i'd be all "test subject A" & "hypotheses" & "control group" & then i'd peer into people's psyches & come up with conclusions & whatnot. i'd have a sexy assistant & we'd have an on & off relationship, one that'd be characterized by numerous witty arguments where we'd analyze each others' behavior & draw conclusions based on our findings. it'd be hot enough for usa, but not hot enough for hbo.

at germany's friedrichshafen university (also known as "zeppelin university"...their school motto should totally be "we get the led out!"), researchers have used their special research powers to find a link between sweets & shopping. as the local ("germany's news in english") reports, "researchers at friedrichshafen university say eating sweet things makes people more willing to spend money on shopping, after looking at chemical reactions in the body and brain - and their relation to behaviour." see! that's research that i never would have thought to do nor would i have thought was actually necessary, but that's what researchers do!

here's what these researchers did...they gave one group of people sugar water & another group water or nothing at all. then those groups of people were "asked to say whether they felt the prices of a number of everyday shopping items were fair – and if they said no, were asked to name what they felt would be a fair price." the folks with the sugar water rated the prices as fair more often than those in the other group & suggested fair prices that were higher than those given by the non-sugar water folks.

it's all because the sugar led to the brain producing serotonin, which makes people all crazy. regardless, marketing researcher peter kenning said that "supermarkets which might decide to offer shoppers a chocolate bar for free at the door might be wasting their time" and was quoted as saying "i would not go so far as that at the moment. the research into the exact mechanism will keep us busy for a little while yet." that's too bad. i mean, why do research if you can't use it for devious means? you know?

nosh nook #103 - wednesday, august 5, 2009

a museum devoted to a national snack obsession (link)
08.04.09 - the ny times - by gisela williams

in germany, things are all backwards crazy & whatnot. they don't even have tacos on every corner there! their fast foods are wacky things like döner kebab (a turkish meat sandwich) & currywurst, which contains fried pork sausage & a sauce made of ketchup & curry powder. it's totally a national dish & it's believed that it was invented sixty years ago by a woman from berlin, although hamburg sometimes tries to lay claim to the snack.

as the times reports, on august 15th, martin löwer, a german marketing executive, loves the currywurst so much he's opening a museum in berlin dedicated to it, right next to the checkpoint charlie museum. foot traffic! for just seven euros, you get things like "a documentary called “best of the wurst,” a reproduction of a currywurst imbiss (snack shop), and a map of the world which shows where to buy currywurst." you don't get any currywurst though.

eventually, you'll be able to sample currywursts in "an attached but separate lounge" that features "sauces created especially for the museum by two of berlin’s top chefs."  until then, you can check out some of the city's favorite currywurst imbisses at places with wacky foreign names like "konnopkes imbiss," "curry 36" & "imbiss ku’damm 195." at the last one, you can even repair the past wounds of german-french relations by pairing currywurst with a glass of champagne...classy.

snack away! #1 - when in deutschland.

so! hello! how are you? i am very well, thank you for asking...or, as the locals might say here, sehr gut, danke! if you are slightly looney, or just plain stupid, or maybe your school lacked the funding for a foreign language department, that’s german! yes, i am in germany and i have agreed to discuss some of the local eats and drinks for this here bloggy-blog.

as many of you surely know, shawn and i go way back. back to approximately october 31, 1998, when i was a mere three weeks past the age of consent. shawn is six years my senior, and as the good elder he is, he took it upon himself to educate me thoroughly in the vast and glorious ways of the snack.

my memories of our time together are filled to the brim with images of 4-C iced tea, endless varieties of chex mix snack mix, and flipz, the chocolate-covered pretzel snack. it should come as little surprise to you to learn that i gained nearly twenty pounds while we dated. good times. no really, they were quite fun, despite my ever-growing ass and chin.

snack away! #1 - when in deutschland.
guest blogger: megan jones, hamburg, germany

snack: ja! kartoffel-snacks mit paprika-würzung
drink: tuborg pilsener

anyhooters…i am now here, in germany, and i am doing some very efficient german snacking. those germans are wicked efficient, for reals. i’m drinking a tuborg pilsener (TUBORG!!!) and munching on some ja! kartoffel-snacks mit paprika-würzung.

the beer is pretty decent. nothing special actually, but I sure do love the name. tuborg! and the picture of the dude on the front is priceless. he’s all thirsty and shit and doesn’t know where his bier is or something. it’s great.

i can’t find a link for my ja! kartoffel-snacks, which frankly surprises me, since ja! is apparently a huge company here. you can find ja! cheese, chips, milk, yogurt, toilet paper, and so on. it’s like the generic brand, i think. the price is just right for me and the quality is always good. i’m definitely a fan of ja! yes!

anyway, these are potato-snacks, with paprika spices and they are kind of weird. i can’t stop eating them, but that clearly means shit, because they are simultaneously making me slightly sick to my stomach. they are weirdly styrofoamy. pop one in your mouth and it starts to dissolve instantly. i have a theory. i think they, the ja! overlords, make some sort of like, potato puree, and then they squeeze it through some sort of thingamajig, and it squirts out these weird, airy potato nuggets. they bake them? or perhaps they fry them? shit, i have no idea.

either way, they then sprinkle on the paprika goodness. paprika is freakishly popular here and frankly, i’m already tired of it. i’d pay some serious euros for some old-school salt and vinegar chips--the kind that take your breath away because they are so vinegary. yum.

so yeah, that’s what i’m eating. now, back to your regularly scheduled blog.

megan jones lives in hamburg, but her heart is really in indiana boston albuquerque boston. she makes badass cakes. you best recognize, son.
www.flickr.com/photos/jonesgirlcreations