Pimp My Wry

Big Beef, Little Conscience

We have to change the way we look at our meat.

Beef Packers, Incorporated (BPI) just announced its second major recall this year.  The reason?  Drug-resistant salmonella.  Again.

Rather than bait you with a lot of rational commentary before pulling the rug out from under you, I'm going to charge straight into the analogy.  Hopefully you're not in the mood for foreplay.

BPI is seriously like the scumbag who goes to a different bar each night, picks up random girls (or guys), has unprotected sex with them, and then, weeks later, calls them all to inform them that he's got an STD. Or three.  Then he goes right back out to the bars and does the whole dance over again.  Bastard.

But BPI isn't limiting itself to picking up people in bars, where you might expect this kind of thing. Beef Packers, Inc. is the kind of company that takes its disease-ridden meat to public schools:

A USA TODAY investigation published last week raised questions about whether orders the company made for the National School Lunch Program also should have been included in the summer recall. Although the orders made for schools tested negative for salmonella, food-safety experts and lawmakers say the beef produced for schools should have been rejected by the government. Instead, it was sent to schools.

So BPI's meat "should have been rejected by the government," but wasn't?  That's like if you are an unknowing girl from the bar scenario above, and your friend (who's supposed to be one of those motherly watchful types, but who's really a shithead) knows that the meat belonging to the scumbag hitting on you is putrid and diseased but lets him buy you a Cosmo anyway.  Then she leaves you two alone so that she can go dance with some jerks with popped collars instead of protecting you from toxic sausage.  That's the government for you — too busy catering to bailing out jerks to perform essential functions like regulating what we stuff down our throats.

Long-shot analogies aside, BPI was entrusted with providing meat for school lunch programs but didn't give enough of a damn (or didn't want to spend a little extra money) to quality-check a lot of its stock.  And the government regulators?  Where were they? Hoping that the salmonella would take out a few school kids before they could turn into ginger-beating bullies?

The good news is that since July BPI has been out of the school lunch business, because, as Cargill (BPI's parent company) spokesman Mark Klein said, "it has bid on no contracts."

The bad news: With its track record, BPI will be putting kids at risk again soon.  It's only a matter of time until lobbyists bribe  "donate funds to the re-election campaign of" the right official and pass government quality tests with flying colors.  Or maybe they won't even bother trying. After all, why make the effort if regulators will just look the other way?

Worse news: The beef lobby, as well as the chicken, pork, turkey and "miscellaneous species meat substances" (hot dog) lobbies, are quite powerful.  (Here's one example.)  BPI's transgressions are just a few of the many that occur every year.

Worst possible news (for me, specifically): All this writing about beef has got me jonesing for a hamburger.

"911 Does Not Connect You To Domino's Pizza!"

A montage of stupidity from Current TV and all the folks that dial 911 when they shouldn't.

You know who you are!

Pardon Me, Do You Have Any ... Idea How Desperate You've Become?

If you need further proof that the conservative party is disintegrating in a pool of desperation, look no further than the video below of  Sean Hannity, Laura Ingraham, and Mark Steyn criticizing President Obama because (wait for it...) during a recent trip to Virginia he had the nerve to order a burger with Dijon mustard instead of ketchup. 

That's right, even Barack Obama's palate Is un-American:

Domino's Headed To The Boneyard?

How many jackasses does it take to destroy a company's image? Well, if you ask Domino's USA president Patrick Doyle, the answer is two.

NEWTON, N.C. -- Two Conover Domino's employees are facing criminal charges after posting a video on YouTube that showed them doing disgusting things to customers' food.

Kristy Lynn Hammonds, 31, and Michael Anthony Setzer, 32, turned themselves in to Catawba County authorities late Wednesday afternoon. They are charged with contaminating food. ...

Hammonds, who also goes by the name Kristy Lynn Thompson, has a rap sheet that includes charges for communicating threats and making harassing phone calls. Those charges were ultimately dismissed. But Catawba County authorities did confirm that Hammonds is a registered sex offender from Alexander County.

Did you just throw up in your mouth? If you did, I don't blame you.

If you're one of the million or so people who saw the disgusting video between the time it was put up on Monday and the time it was taken down on Wednesday, scroll down to the video that's replaced it on YouTube — the one in which Patrick Doyle tries to repair what Hammonds and Setzer have done.

If you didn't see the video, you can watch the local news report that includes clips from it here. But be warned — it's not for people with weak stomachs.  In fact, it might be one of your worst nightmares.

The disgusting video showed Setzer sticking a piece of cheese up his nose and then hiding it in a sandwich. It also showed him pulling down his pants (he later wiped a sponge on himself and then did the dishes). And that's not all. 

We all suspect that stuff like this happens in restaurants from time to time; we also all hope that it doesn't happen to us. But hoping really doesn't do any good. The truth is, you never know what's in your sandwich or pizza in addition to what's described on the menu.

That said, I think that this is one of those crimes where 'an eye for an eye' type of punishment is completely called for. I also think that I'm not the only one with that idea. Are you reading this Catawba County jailers?

But regardless of the punishment in store for these creeps, the damage to the brand is done:

Domino’s spokesman, Tim McIntyre, [said that the] company was preparing a civil lawsuit. “Even people who’ve been with us as loyal customers for 10, 15, 20 years, people are second-guessing their relationship with Domino’s, and that’s not fair.”

In just a few days, Domino’s reputation was damaged. The perception of its quality among consumers went from positive to negative since Monday, according to the research firm YouGov, which holds online surveys of about 1,000 consumers every day regarding hundreds of brands.

“It’s graphic enough in the video, and it’s created enough of a stir, that it gives people a little bit of pause,” said Ted Marzilli, global managing director for YouGov’s BrandIndex.

The Domino’s experience “is a nightmare,” said Paul Gallagher, managing director and a head of the United States crisis practice at the public relations firm Burson-Marsteller. “It’s the toughest situation for a company to face in terms of a digital crisis.”

Hammonds and Setzer told executives that the video was a prank and that the food was never sent out to be served. But not many people are willing to take the word of these vile individuals, and one reason for that is because of a comment Hammond made in the video:

“In about five minutes it’ll be sent out on delivery where somebody will be eating these, yes, eating them, and little did they know that cheese was in his nose and that there was some lethal gas that ended up on their salami. Now that’s how we roll at Domino’s.”

And that's how the rest of us roll away from Domino's.

Alice Waters, What Are You Thinking?

I’m a little bit annoyed with Alice Waters. 

Oh, sure, she deserves her props for her food advocacy, for helping to raise awareness about the value of organic foods, yadda yadda yadda. I admire all that.

It’s her smugness that’s bugging me.

Did you see the segment about Ms. Waters on “60 Minutes”? The one where she cooked breakfast for Leslie Stahl?

The steps involved in preparing this "simple repast" go something like this:

• Open a restaurant in Berkeley
• Pretend it’s a co-op, but retain the majority share
• Make a couple of million bucks
• Build or renovate your kitchen to include a wood-burning hearth—conveniently at standard counter height
• Pick up some hand-forged iron spoons with really long handles
• Stock up on firewood
• Buy eggs, tomatoes, olive oil and herbs (organic, of course)
• Have your assistant build a fire in the hearth about an hour before you want to make breakfast—for me, that would be at 7 a.m., so my phantom assistant would have to get up before 6
• Chop up some tomatoes and herbs (are they organic? If not…), allow the mixture to marinate
• Slice some bread bread bread*
• Grill it
• Spoon the tomato mixture on the bread (which has been placed on a hand-painted plate that you got in Italy—part of a set of 40)
• Take a nap
• Coat an iron spoon with the olive oil (did I mention that the olive oil should come from your good friend’s grove and be organic?)
• Crack an egg into a bowl, slide the egg into the oil-coated spoon
• Walk across the kitchen to the fire shove the egg under the flames gently fluttering from the log and stand there until the egg bubbles up and cooks through
• Walk back to the counter where the plated bread/tomato thing is
• Scoop the egg on top of the tomatoes
• Serve
• Repeat as needed   

Hey, Gourmet...Leave Them Kids Alone!

In today’s New York Times, there is an article singing the praises of Michelle Obama’s advocating healthy eating habits. It includes the intriguing tidbit that the editor of Gourmet magazine, Ruth Reichl, “would like the White House kitchen to issue regular news releases that describe what the first couple and their daughters are eating. (Then parents across the country could tell their children, ‘You know, Malia and Sasha were eating salad yesterday. ...’)”

Really? Really?

Really.

I would just like to say, right here and now, that I thank the god of your choice for not having me grow up as America’s First Daughter. For if I had, in fact, grown up as America’s First Daughter, here’s a transfatty little taste of what one of those non-eating-disorder-inducing press releases would look like circa 1985:

7 a.m. Diet Pepsi.

9 a.m. Diet Pepsi.

10 a.m. Pencil eraser.

11 a.m. Half a sheet of graph paper.

12 noon.  Five (5) stolen French fries from unsuspecting friend.

2 p.m. Three (3) pieces Hubba Bubba bubble gum, original flavor.

2:45 p.m. Jiffy Pop popcorn, Diet Pepsi.

3 p.m. One (1) box of Wheat Thins dredged in Temp Tee whipped cream cheese.

4:30 p.m. Twenty (20) piece chicken mcnuggets with four (4) containers of sweet ‘n’ sour dippin’ sauce, Diet Pepsi.

5:30 p.m. Four (4) spoonfuls of unnatural peanut butter (creamy).

7 p.m. Two (2) slices pepperoni pizza, one (1) slice cheese, Diet Pepsi.

9 p.m. Five (5) pieces pepperoni picked off leftover slice.

9:15 p.m. Tip of leftover slice.

9:30 p.m. Half of de-tipped leftover slice.

9:40 p.m. Other half.

10 p.m. Diet Pepsi.

11 p.m. Slice of cheese pizza hidden in oven by mother.

12 midnight.  One layer of Pepperidge Farm Milanos, half/whole bag potato chips, dependent upon whether there is a half or whole bag available.

1:30 a.m. White bread, toasted, buttered.

3 a.m. Whatever pizza is left, wherever it is hidden. Cold, inhaled.

3:05 a.m. Diet Pepsi

While Malia and Sasha may not currently be strictly adhering to the above diet, and I certainly don't recommend that they do, I’d bet dollars to doughnuts (mmm…doughnuts…) that the likelihood of them joining the Cult of Disordered Eating (a.k.a. Stop Watching Me Eat!) would increase exponentially with each friggin’ press release about what they’re putting in their already-surely-freaked-out mouths.

And if anyone starts talking about how toned their arms are, I’m takin’ my ball and goin' home.

Do You Care More About What Goes Into Your Stomach Than What Goes Into, Well, Other Parts of Your Body?

Do you think more about the food you eat than the sex you have? 

A new research paper by Mary Eberstadt at the Hoover Institution, a public policy research center at Stanford University, suggests that you do.  

"Of all the truly seismic shifts transforming daily life today — deeper than our financial fissures, wider even than our most obvious political and cultural divides — one of the most important is also among the least remarked," the paper begins. "That is the chasm in attitude that separates almost all of us living in the West today from almost all of our ancestors, over two things without which human beings cannot exist: food and sex."

Dear In The Headlights

Right after I wake up, but before I begin my daily grind, I head straight for my other daily grind, that magical blend of deliciousness that throws me into high gear. Like so many people around the world, I can't start my day without a cup of java. I require my wakey juice, rocket fuel, my daily infusion; I crave a fix of jitter, a cup of brewfus, and a hit of poison.I ne-e-e-e-ed a cup of coffee. But what I don't need is to have my joe served to me by a topless waitress.

Don't get me wrong, I have absolutely nothing against the tatas at titty bars or the hooters at Hooters. It's just that on the plate of life I like to keep my chicken wings separate from the breasts; I prefer the sort of slippery nipples that don't come in or around a shot glass. And If I see a pair of headlights heading straight for me at six in the morning, I want to be sitting in my car with my seat belt on and my steering and brake fluids adequately topped off. I don't want to be sitting in a coffee shop eating fried eggs.

So, it's a good thing I don't live Vassalboro, Maine, a community of 4,400, where 40-year-old resident Donald Crabtree has recently opened The Topless Coffee Shop, a place offering half-dozen kinds of coffee and tea, cappuccino, juices, soda, pastries from local bakeries, and the special of the day, every day, gazongas.