Let me get this out of the way right up front. It’s sad that Paula Deen has diabetes, and I’m not trying to mock the very real emotional and physical issues she is dealing with. Diabetes being as prevalent as it is, is one of the reasons I am passionate about cooking and eating better. The culture that has developed around diabetes is very scary and very real.

To quote Michael Pollan:

According to the surgeon general, obesity today is officially an epidemic; it is arguably the most pressing public health problem we face, costing the health care system an estimated $90 billion a year. Three of every five Americans are overweight; one of every five is obese. The disease formerly known as adult-onset diabetes has had to be renamed Type II diabetes since it now occurs so frequently in children. A recent study in the Journal of the American Medical Associationpredicts that a child born in 2000 has a one-in-three chance of developing diabetes. (An African American child’s chances are two in five.) Because of diabetes and all the other health problems that accompany obesity, today’s children may turn out to be the first generation of Americans whose life expectancy will actually be shorter than that of their parents. The problem is not limited to America: The United Nations reported that in 2000 the number of people suffering from overnutrition–a billion–had officially surpassed the number suffering from malnutrition–800 million.

Right, serious bits out of the way lets get to the funny bits.

By now everyone has certainly heard some joke about Paula Deen and her diabetes diagnoses (and subsequent deal to sell diabetes drugs), her approach to food is one that makes you think diabetes and a heart attack would be lurking around the corner, waiting to hit her like a frozen ham.

So I thought I would look at  some other celebrity chefs to see if I  can find a disease that might fit their own particular idiom.

Ah Guy Fieri, a person I like to mock so much that I decided to be him for Halloween. Sadly I was incapable of being enough of a giant twit to dissuade people from thinking I was honoring him rather than mocking him. It haunts me still that there are people who think I was “that Minute to Win it Guy,” and meant it in a good way. I don’t know that the man has enough of a cooking style to really find an affliction to match, so I will focus on his personality.  If diarrhea of the mouth were a real thing that would be perfect, but alas, no such luck. All of that hair dye must do something to him right? Perhaps brain parasites? No no I have it. Lockjaw. What could possibly be better for the man who has a whole show seemingly dedicated to cramming the largest possible bite of food into his gaping maw.

 Now that we have Guy all nice and quiet lets move on to everyone’s favorite multi media darling Rachael Ray. Full disclosure, once upon a time I watched 30 minute meals, in the early days of Food Network it was a pretty solid instructional food show. Sadly as she has become a larger and larger presence, that quality has gone by the wayside. Instead of the possibility of  meal I might be happy to serve to my family and friends I am now inundated with and endless string of cute catchphrases and Rachael Ray branded product placement. It is the catch phrases that lead me to the disorder most befitting the queen of the choup. That’s right, you guessed it, Tourettes syndrome. Imagine if you will, Rachael endlessly spitting back her own catchphrases, choup, yum-o, EVOO, delish.  ”Hi Rachael how was your day today?”  Yum-O

I must give her some credit though. She at least knows she has become a parody of herself.

How about  food curmudgeon, Anthony Bourdain? I love Bourdain, he makes me want to eat  and prepare better food. Which is the job of a  food show host in my book. He does, however, rub a lot of people the wrong way, and if you are a fan of Rachael or Guy or Paula, you likely think he is a miserable ass.

Lung cancer would be the easy choice for, Bourdain. Though he has quit smoking he certainly smoked long enough that his lungs have a long way to go to return to happy shade of pink. I think something a bit more exotic is in order for Tony, something like Kuru, though that may be better left to Andrew Zimmern.

 Some rapid fire options:

• Sandra Lee, listeria from a dented can
• Tom Colicchio, aneurysm from dressing down a top chef loser.
• Mario Batali, head trauma after a slip and fall due to worn out Crocs.
• Bobby Flay, beaten like, well you know

The list is endless really, so many food related personalities have characteristics that simultaneously endear them to some and annoy the beejesus out of others.

(Not shown Guy Fieri riding Paul Prudhomme as a bouncy ball)

Between the Simpsons and Ted Allens recent video mocking “Pretensions Foodie Bullshit” it is becoming clear that foodies may have crossed the line into obnoxiousland.

The very term has been debated and discussed buy such luminaries as Chris Onstad and Mark Bittman. (OK maybe calling Onstad a luminary is stretching it but Achewood is awesome)

For some,  foodie is definitively an amateur status, someone who not only likes to eat food, but desires to know more about the food they are eating and preparing.  As with any hobby, when someone gets to a certain depth of knowledge they can come across as a know-it-all jerk who sounds like they are talking down to you about their topic of choice. Though with more of a niche hobby you may not have as much opportunity to talk about it. I mean seriously how many casual conversations can you shoehorn your in-depth knowledge of insect reproduction into? Everybody eats though, so any time there is food in front of you, it can seem like an invitation to discuss your knowledge of that food. I find myself, (Hi I’m Mark and I’m a Foodie) thinking through my words before I comment on food to be sure I don’t come off like said know-it-all jerk. Sometimes it’s hard, especially when you have some pretty passionate ideas.

For others, foodie is a general term used to describe anyone, who is not a Chef, that has something to say about food. As Mark Bittman says, people with a demonstrated knowledge of food that were not chefs were referred to as gourmands or more simply food critics, but have now been lumped into the big foodie bucket. As a result professional food writers can be easily dismissed as “just another foodie.”

Particularly in today’s climate where food and politics are so closely intertwined it would be a disservice to all involved to disregard the writings of someone like Michael Pollan or Marion Nestle because of their perceived foodie status.

Not to say that Pollan and Nestle are necessarily correct but you can’t have an intelligent debate without both sides being well represented.

On the opposite side of the fence you have writers like B.R Meyers who have begun a Moral Crusade Against Foodies. Articles like this shine a spotlight on the complicated issues than surround food and the  culture of worship that has grown around it.

Food, like any seemingly simple topic that has experts involved, has become a difficult conversation to have in some circumstances. Who would have thought that in addition to religion and politics we might have to exclude food from polite dinner conversation.

Me I’ll take my dinner conversation with some locally raised, slowly braised pork belly with some roasted root vegetable puree.

What surprised me even more was not the popularity of this uber-caffeinated tonic (seriously – the same caffeine as 6 cokes, in just one ounce??), but the new target market – the 60+ demo.

Apparently, this snake oil has been advertising in AARP‘s magazine, and as a result, seniors have been hurriedly pushing their tennis ball-outfitted walkers to find this holy grail of energy.   However, what they will soon realize is what all of us who have downed a Mountain Dew or tall boy of coffee while pulling an all-nighter know “ that when the quick boost subsides, you either take a nosedive, or you have to keep hitting the sauce, which I guess is the idea. It works for crack, so why not energy drink?

My next question is – where 5-hour will go with their new audience? Prune-flavored shots? Nursing home sponsorships? Advertising in the newspaper? More bogus pictures of active-looking fossils? I sure hope so on all of the above.

Jill VanHeest says she took her 2-year-old son Nikolai to the hospital after his eyes turned red and dilated and he began acting up. She said he was given fluids and released a couple hours later with no lasting effects.

This is interesting timing, because almost a week ago an Applebee’s in Michigan served another toddler a margarita instead of apple juice.

The company’s responses since have been interesting:

Applebee’s president Mike Archer, said, in part:

“We want to express how thankful we are that the child involved in the incident at our restaurant … was not seriously injured as a result of accidentally receiving the wrong beverage. We also want to apologize to his parents, for the stress and worry this caused them. Although our efforts to speak with the child’s parents have been unsuccessful, we extend our personal apologies.”

Further, the company has posted a few times on their Facebook page, as well as website, addressing the issue.

Conversely, Olive Garden spokesman Rich Jeffers, said, in part:

“This was an extremely regrettable accident caused by the failure of an employee to follow our strict operating procedures. We take this situation very seriously, and we are especially grateful that the child involved was not seriously harmed. We have absolutely no tolerance for failure to follow our operating procedures and we took swift, appropriate action to deal with this situation.”

The company’s Facebook page and corporate site fail to mention this issue, the former instead focusing on its sweepstakes and garden fare menu (they were probably too busy waterboarding the offending employee).  Also note that the Olive Garden debacle happened on March 31 – two weeks ago – with very little damage control until recently.  Applebee’s has taken a much more aggressive approach to this six-day-old incident, proactively responding to the issue – even publicizing its new training protocol for employees, without blaming anyone for making the mistake (albeit a doozy).

Both of these chains claim to be family-friendly, but which response leaves a better taste in your mouth?  My answer is the chain that avoided sweeping the problem under the rug and took the issue on.  Do you agree?

Every December or January, armchair Nostradamuses try to predict what is in and what is out. As you all know by now, the ever-present cupcake has permeated our culture to an absurd level. There are now cupcake stores on way too many corners, and prognosticators are signaling their demise (finally!) due to a saturated marketplace. Ever heard of Men Without Hats? These things do not end well.

Now, this development has been on the horizon for awhile, but what was unknown was what would fill the sweet tooth void from these over-designed, uber-expensive, très snooty confections. Apparently, the answer is pies. According to NPR and the business minds at CNBC, “trend-spotters are calling pie the food of the year.”

As careful readers know, I am not shy about my affinity for a jumbo slice, and I am still ashamed that cake won out over pie in the So Good Would You Rather? poll. Therefore, I am pretty excited about this development. Pie has so much more flexibility than cake – sweet vs. savory, fried pies, deep dish, mini-pies, etc. Pies are also far less pretentious that cupcakes. Just try to pull that act off while taking down a piece of sweet potato pie – no ma’am!

So that’s my opinion, but what do you think? Are cupcakes finally played out? Will pies be big this year? Are you on the bandwagon with me? Has it been long enough that I can start working the Safety Dance into my repertoire? Let me know…

Thanks to Johnny Cupcakes for the logo at top.

A couple weeks ago, I wrote a post about McDonald’s in which I made a comment about the “quality” of their food.  I can now see the error in my ways.  I had no right to take such an obvious shot at a company that is doing the best it can to offer reasonably priced food for the masses. Therefore, I offer my heartfelt apolo…

Wait — this just in from the So Good breaking newsdesk…

That, dear readers, is not strawberry soft-serve — that is mechanically separated chicken.  This substance is explained by Fooducate as:

“[An] invention of the late 20th century. Someone figured out in the 1960’s that meat processors can eek out a few more percent of profit from chickens, turkeys, pigs, and cows by scraping the bones 100% clean of meat. This is done by machines, not humans, by passing bones leftover after the initial cutting through a high pressure sieve.”

Then, from Michael Kindt, via Gizmodo:

“There’s more: because it’s crawling with bacteria, it will be washed with ammonia, soaked in it, actually. Then, because it tastes gross, it will be reflavored artificially. Then, because it is weirdly pink, it will be dyed with artificial color.”

This substance went into Chicken McNuggets, until very recently.  Mechanically separated meat can also be found in hot dogs, jerky, bologna and pepperoni.  Frankly, this should surprise no one, and only serves to reinforce that there is a reason that some fast foods/junk foods are cheap – because they are literally made from stuff at the bottom of the barrel.

Does this change your mind about eating chicken nuggets, hot dogs, etc?

H/t to HuffPost for the initial lead.

Update (from Eick): While So Good’s reporting on this matter has generally been accurate, a lot of other blogs have been correcting points made by other sites. Kottke wants to note that the meat is NOT “soaked” in Ammonia, although as Snopes describes, both beef and chicken manufacturers sometimes introduce ammonium hydroxide as a “antibacterial agent.”

As JT noted, this substance WAS used in McNuggets until recently, but no longer is.  However, it is still used in many other types of commercially sold chicken nuggets.  According to Wikipedia, in a 2002 lawsuit against McDonald’s, a judge commented that Chicken McNuggets are a “McFrankenstein” creation of various elements not used by the home cook. Reports seem to indicate it was after the release of Super Size Me in 2004 that the change was made from mechanically separated meat to boneless white meat chicken.  The current McDonald’s ingredient list for McNuggets does not include mechanically separated meat.

That doesn’t mean there aren’t gross, and totally unnecessary chemicals in your McNuggets here in America. As CNN reports:

American McNuggets (190 calories, 12 grams of fat, 2 grams of saturated fat for 4 pieces) contain the chemical preservative tBHQ, tertiary butylhydroquinone, a petroleum-based product. They also contain dimethylpolysiloxane, “an anti-foaming agent” also used in Silly Putty.  By contrast, British McNuggets (170 calories, 9 grams of fat, 1 gram of saturated fat for 4 pieces) lists neither chemical among its ingredients.

From the sustainability desk of So Good comes a news story about an idea to transform one of the most recognizable consumer icons for the good of the planet.  The object: the Coca-Cola bottle.  The idea: to turn the famous curves of the bottle into a rectangular shape for the following reasons, according to the designer, Andrew Kim:

• The new bottle features a smaller footprint, making its transportation much more efficient.
• A stackable design allows for more efficient transport.
• The slimmer cap reduces waste.
• The collapsible design does not takes up much space in recycling bins and encourages cap recycling.
• The bottle is made entirely of plant-based sugar cane byproducts.

Now, as we all know, a company like Coke would never do something as reasonable as sacrificing their “classic contour bottle” for the betterment of the planet.  If Coke cared about people above making money, their main products would not contain enough HFCS to choke a horse.  But what if they DID?  Now the design is not perfect, and Coke remains bad for you, but the good that would come out of this for the sake of the planet would be dramatic.

Especially on the day after Earth Day, isn’t this the kind of idea that we need more of?

See more So Good Coke coverage here, here, here and here.
H/t to Fast Company for the scoop.