#158 - by the time i get to arizona (pt 1).

i'm the oldest of four children & while i'm obviously the funny one, my sister (who's two years younger than me) has solidly cemented herself as the one most qualified to perform surgery & distribute meds. for the last three years, she's been working at a hospital out in phoenix & as of this past weekend, she's officially a doctor. her convocation ceremony was on saturday & i'd yet to visit her, so a week ago this thursday, i hopped on a jumbo jet & paid a visit to her & the state known for passionate anti-immigration, slacking on MLK day & sprawl as far as the eye can see...that and spring training baseball & old people. word is they're also known for a big hole in the ground.

since my life pretty much revolves around food, going into the trip, my sis & i had decided that other than sleep & the convocation (which actually ended up being a hour-and-a-half ceremony sandwiched between a cocktail hour & a dinner), the singular purpose of our four days together was to eat as much tasty, mostly-arizonacentric food as possible.

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snackdown! - 2.26.10

since all of our politicians apparently believe that everyone on the other side of the aisle has cooties, this week mr president gathered democrats & republicans together in d.c. to try to get both sides talking about the current health care legislation. during the televised six-hour summit, the president basically learned what he already knew--republicans just aren't going to offer anything, so the democrats have to go it alone. yay washington! it makes sense though, since it took them forever to decide whether there would be snacks on the table at the summit & whether they would be eaten on or off camera. sure it's an important issue, but it's largely symbolic of the whole health care debate. luckily, it wasn't representative of this week's food news.

• as i've noted many times on this here blog, i'm a huge fan of delaware's dogfish head breweries. i've always wanted to take a trip down to delaware to visit their brewery or their restaurant, but have never made the journey. now it looks like i may not have to. on tuesday, dogfish announced that they're coming to me & opening a rooftop bar & restaurant in midtown manhattan with mario batali, the jolly, ginger-bearded chef & food network star. until recently, i haven't had cable for years, so i don't know jack about him, but if he's smart enough to pair up with what may be the top microbrew in the country, he's cool with me. (grub street)


• are your chips not meaty enough? fret no longer, meat lover. chadwick, a british food company, has submitted a patent for "meat crisps," a snack product that would be made by pulverising meat, mixing it with an emulsion, seasoning it along with a range of binding agents & heating it in a wrapper before slicing it into thin pieces and microwaving it. they'll be lower in calories, fat & salt & if testing works out, they'll be in stores by the end of the year. the name i'm suggesting for their product: "moo crisps." brilliant, right? chadwick, you can use that name if you want...just send me a bag. (the telegraph)


• if you've ever wondered who the mad scientist behind mcdonald's creations was, this week chicagonow did an interview with dan coudreaut, the director of culinary innovation for the fast food chain. coudreaut, who started his career as a dishwasher at the four seasons, has been in his current position since 2004. he's the man responsible for the angus burger, the now-defunct asian salad & the current mcdonald's darling, the snack wrap. given mcdonald's enormous reach, when it boils down to it he's the most powerful chef in the world. it doesn't mean a thing though if he can't get mcdonald's to add that artichoke spread & asiago cheese burger they have in italy to the menu here in the states. (chicagonow)


• on tuesday, the ny times ran a piece about "snackbot," a robo chef designed by graduate students at carnegie mellon university. snackbot, who is "outfitted with a $20,000 laser navigation system," is designed to learn about robot-human interaction through serving food. i can picture it now. "hey snackbot, make me a sandwich." "hey snackbot, go get me another beer." "hey snackbot, fresh guacamole. stat!" snackbot bows his head obediently..."yes, shawn." he's not the only robot chef on the block though. the chinese unveiled the “world’s first cooking robot” back in '06 & famen, a japanese restaurant, has "two giant yellow robot arms preparing up to 800 bowls of ramen a day." it's pretty cool, as when the robots take over the world, they'll hopefully still make us dinner. (ny times)


• consolidation! yesterday, diamond foods, who's best known for pop secret & tasty tasty nuts (including my #1 snack of 2008), announced that they're buying oregon's kettle foods for $615 million. diamond, who started off as a co-op before going public in 2005, is the leading u.s. exporter of walnuts & has recently been running bizzare ads which, given this week's events at seaworld, may or may not be in good taste. for diamond, buying kettle foods is a smart investment, since they've doubled sales & increased earnings significantly over the last four years. also, their chips pretty much rule. (financial times)

nosh nook #121 - monday, august 31, 2009

miley cyrus and big sis take the range rover when they shake things up (link)
08.30.09 - examiner.com - tom lapointe

OMG OMG OMG GUYZ!!! miley cyrus was totally at millions of milkshakes, right in west hollywood! i know! isn't that awesome? i love milkshakes? you do too? that's why we're soooooooooooo BFFs! HEY GUYZ!!! guess what she was doing? OMG you're so right! she was getting a milkshake! get this though! miley is so down to earth & spunky at the same time that she went right behind the counter & made the shake herself! OMG!!!

the examiner.com's tom lapointe has the lowdown on the hollywood.tv video that documents miley's big trip to the famous milkshake joint. miley, her sister brandy & an unimportant/unnamed friend arrived in "rather attractive jean shorts and white tops" & got behind the counter & made "miley shakes." apparently the kardashian sisters & lindsey lohan have done the same thing, so that means she'll be headed for a life of crime soon if the pattern follows. you want a miley cyrus milkshake? if you like "vanilla ice cream with cookie dough, reese’s peanut butter cups, and whipped cream," then you do. check it out! eleven engrossing minutes of miley cyrus taking over "million of milkshakes!" how exciting!



i love that last night, when i first came across this breaking story, there were two ads for colon cleanser on the right next to miley. i also love that this article (apparently because miley showed up in her dad's range rover) eventually devolves into an article about the range rover, complete with a description from edmunds.com that goes into the specifics of the standard terrain response system..."journalism" at its finest.

nosh nook #90 - friday, july 17, 2009

new pizza hut iphone app cuts out strenuous phone ordering (link)
07.16.09 - the inquisitr - kim lacapria

the wait is finally over! as i mentioned a few weeks back, the big pizza chains are getting all giddy about technology & as such, are developing viral campaigns, social networking tools & iphone apps, all designed to marry the wonders of technology with the excitement of ordering crappy pizza.  pizza hut is leading the iphone race with the release of their new iphone app, "ihut," which, according to their demo video, is "the killer app for your appetite." the boys in creative must've spent hours on that slogan.

i wanted to test out the app for myself, so yesterday, whilst sitting at the airport, i downloaded it & fired it on up.  for starters, to do anything but play the "pizza hut racer" game that's part of the app, you have to go to the pizza hut website & create an account.  it turns out that you can't even create an account from their mobile site, so my plan for ordering up a large pie with the works & having it delivered to gate C12 (isn't that an explosive?) were foiled.  i kicked ass at the racing game though...a time of 1:22 and only three collisions with pizza boxes, one with a pan pizza & another with a thing of wings.

luckily, kim lacapria of the inquisitr (can i buy an "o" please?) has put together a rundown of the ihut app's benefits.  it's mainly designed to let hutskateers virtually place orders via interactive options that allow you to resize pizzas, drag & drop toppings and sauce your wings with a shake of the iphone.  you can't go too far though.  as the pizza hut press release for the app explains, "if an overeager pizza customer adds too many toppings, the pizza explodes and toppings go flying across the screen with an alert to make their pizza happier with fewer toppings." how fun! on top of ordering & playing racing games, there's a "virtual fridge" with coupons on it, so you can pay less for your crappy pizza.  lacapria thinks it's nice & all, but notes that she's "a born and bred New Yorker- if someone didn’t swear at you while you ordered it, it ain’t a pizza, dude." for the record, in my eight years in nyc, i've never been sworn at whilst ordering a pizza...sounds like ms. lacapria brings out the worst in people.

nosh nook #62 - tuesday, june 9, 2009

heinz creates world's smallest microwave (and you can plug it into your laptop) (link)
06.08.09 - the daily mail - by sean poulter

forty years ago this next month, in what has been seen as one of man's crowning technological achievements, america put a man on the moon. since then, other than the invention of the roomba, things have been a little slow on the technological breakthrough front...until now. what be this new beacon of progress? the world's smallest microwave, a portable device dubbed the "beanzawave."

this tiny innovation runs off a computer's USB port & comes to us courtesy of a design commissioned by the good folks at heinz, who were looking for a portable way to cook up their "snap pots." the daily mail's sean poulter describes the gadget as a way for "workers tied to their desks to create a warm snack, or hot drink, to see them through the day." the design, which uses "a combination of mobile phone frequencies," was designed by a "microwave expert" & "an authority on industrial design." microwave expert! that sounds like a deliciously scientific profession! too bad i had to go & get a film degree like a sucker.

heinz did a little research & it turns out that people really need tiny USB microwaves. as poulter notes, their research discovered that "69 percent of office workers find they are so busy at their terminals that they do not have a chance to go out for lunch every day." this data only tells part of the story. it's not like we're always busy. sometimes, it's that we love our jobs so much that we wouldn't even think of leaving our desks, even for a snack. currently, the tiny microwave is only in the design stages, but if we're lucky, heinz will fast track the beanzawave into production. they'd better, because if by years' end i can't use my computer to make smores & spreadsheets simultaneously, i don't know what i'll do...but i do know i won't be getting up from my desk to do it.