Flannel Shirt

Another reason not to eat squid: backdoor calamari

This. Even if it's not true.

A friend told me the other day that she'd heard a horrifying report on public radio: You know those deep-fried, chewy rings of calamari? Sure. Well, they're sometimes served in imitation form, made from slices of a pig's rectum. Wait … what?! And so it happened second-hand, as these things almost always do: An urban legend hatched and spread its wings.

My friend had heard the story from radio producer Ben Calhoun, who put it in his segment for the Jan. 11 episode of This American Life. You should go listen: It's not an expose but a charming, funny paean to the hog bung. (More on that in a bit.) Calhoun doesn't really think that buttholes have surfed into our seafood—"If I had to bet money on whether it’s happening [in the U.S.], I would absolutely bet money that it’s not," he told me earlier this week—but his reporting in the piece did leave some tiny room for doubt, and that margin of uncertainty, the implied what if that was central to his piece, provides a blueprint for how a rumor gains the gloss of truth.

Where did the legend of the backdoor calamari come from, and why has it only just emerged? The story started in the classic way, with an email from a stranger. Calhoun heard it from a fan of This American Life who wrote in to say that she had heard it from a guy who worked in pork production. When Calhoun followed up, the farmer told him that he'd learned about faux mollusk from a guy he knows who manages a meat-processing plant. That manager, for his part, told Calhoun that he was 95 percent sure the claim was true, though he admitted that he'd never seen the fakes himself—he only knew of them from the people that he worked for at the plant. And while no one at the plant had ever seen a rectum packaged as a squid, employees there confirmed that they had heard the story, too.

If you like calamari, feel free to read it all and reassure yourself.

Meat

My daughter Robin flew in yesterday for a short visit up here in Portland. Yesterday we went across the street to the Laurelwood Tavern and drank lots of beer and talked and talked until we were snockered. 

Today Robin did her work (she regularly telecommutes) while I recovered. Tonight we headed over to Podnahs, that great rib place in town. It was Thursday night so along with the rack of pork ribs we got some lamb ribs. Robin was knocked out by the hog, I really liked the lamb (and the pork ribs). Their mac and cheese was great too.

Now we are stuffed and flopped on the couch watching "Wheel Of Fortune". I don't think I'll be accomplishing anything else today. And we brought home a box of meat we couldn't finish.

No explanation needed here

Happy Thanksgiving!

For some of us.

Turkeys are just dinosaurs

And lots of creatures were not only eaten by them but ate them over the years. A history of birds on the menu.

Seventh Annual Fluff Festival!

You're missing it. I'm not sure how my daughter missed this. She travels the world to attend all sorts of cutting edge celebrations of humanity. How'd she miss this? How did you miss this? 

Ocean Ave Pops has partnered with Pretty Things Beer for their  “Hop on Pop.” It  features a hop-brewed tea, orange, fluff and some Jack d’Or wort (beer before it has fermented).  We’re most excited for the Lickety Split, available only on Saturday.  It features banana, chocolate, cherries, locally produced peanut butter and, of course, fluff in a cool popsicle.

We’ve got savory covered with Brazilian barbeque, Latin tapas, Indian fare and traditional hot dogs from local businesses.

Well, there's always next year!

 

Chick-fil-A

The Rude Pundit has an interesting and vaguely obscene take on the Chick-fil-A kerfluffle. Here. I won't cite any of it because I try to keep a level of decency here; however, Pundit pretty much craps on all sides of the argument. 

I get a little nervous about boycotts. I mean, when I discovered that Coors was funding ultra-rightwing wackos with links to Nazis hiding out in South America as well as funding anti-gay stuff I stopped drinking their swill. Coors, to my taste, is crappy beer, so that was easy. Long ago they made up with the gay community, going as far as to sponsor stuff like SF's gay freedom day parade and gay softball leagues, so I'm not boycotting them but I still don't drink their watered-down beer. I remember I didn't buy Shell gasoline for awhile because they supported Apartheid in South Africa, and I still don't buy it because it's notoriously more expensive out here on the West Coast. I don't buy BP because of the crap that they dumped in the Gulf of Mexico, but they may have changed their name. But then I've got a Unocal card and they've been killing indigenous peoples in South America and were behind the pipeline through Afghanistan deal back in the 90s that got that whole ball of wax rolling.

It's hard to boycott all crappy corporations because so many of them have done crappy things to workers, consumers and the environment and economy, and half the time you just don't know. Then again, if you do know you don't go out of your way to support people who are supporting hating a group.

There are no easy answers. But there aren't any Chick-fil-A franchises in this part of the country so my caloric intake won't be influenced either way.

Here's a picture of people praying for non-gay chicken sandwiches:

Here's an op-ed by a lesbian who works at Chick-fil-A.

Here's a piece saying that Chick-fil-A's brand name has suffered by its owner's public stance against gay equality.

Jon Stewart also checks in on this cultural armageddon. Unfortunately, since being gay has nothing to do with culture but with biology this deep-fried piety isn't going to change anything. People are born gay. If you believe in God then ask how come he created gays. Or have a chicken sandwich. 

More calories, more jealousy

Another scientific discovery.

 If you're meeting an ex lover, plan on coffee instead of lunch if you'd like to keep the peace at home.

When it comes to consuming calories with a person of the opposite sex, sharing meals sparks significantly more jealousy than meeting that same person for coffee.

"Our research suggests that sharing lunch involves more than the physical consumption of calories," conclude co-authors Kevin M. Kniffin, a postdoctoral researcher at Cornell University's Dyson School of Applied Economics, and Brian Wansink, the director of Cornell's Food and Brand Lab, in their new paper, "It's Not Just Lunch: Extra-Pair Commensality Can Trigger Sexual Jealousy," which appears in the peer-reviewed journal, PLoS ONE.

Research by Kniffin and Wansink measured the amount of jealousy reported by current romantic partners if one of them were contacted by an ex lover and subsequently engaged in several food- and drink-based activities.

"We consistently found that meals elicit more jealousy than face-to-face interactions that do not involve eating -- such as having coffee," Kniffin said. "These results are consistent for both men and women."

For couples who are attuned to relationship risks, this study suggests that men and women who "do lunch" run the risk of a jealous spouse or partner at home.

"It's key to remember that from your spouse's perspective, it's not 'just lunch.' While meals can strengthen social relationships, they can also destroy them," Wansink said.

 

FIre on the mountain, pizza in the belly

When I was dumping my iPhone pix into my computer the other day I discovered this pizza.

It was at Fire On The Mountain, which is a pizza/microbrewery. Portland has microbreweries all over the place and lots of pizza places, and this was both.

It's a fig and prosciutto, with blue cheese and carmelized onions. And mozzaella. I like good old-fashioned pizzas with a good red gravy and sausage and pepperoni and peppers and mushrooms. But this pizza was undoubtedly the the best pizza I've ever eaten. We also split an order of hot wings too. I particularly liked the Jamaican jerk sauce for the wings. And the beer was delicious. Wonderful. Those are Joan's arms offering up that pizza goodness like Demeter at harvest time. Mmmm.

All the weight I'd lost during the stress of my move to Oregon from California seems to be finding its way back to me.

Pee guitar

In my neverending search to find important developments in mankind's growth I give you Pee Guitar.

Reminds me of a joke by George Carlin that involved a group of men, a keg of beer and a Kent micronite filter.