RSS

Category Archives: food

Review: Wendy’s flatbread surprisingly tasty

12 Apr

wendys-flatbreadIt’s time once again for “I tried it so you don’t have to” theatre here on the blog, this time starring Wendy’s new Flatbread Grilled Chicken Sandwich. I’m pleased to report, however, that the second part of that intro isn’t actually necessary: the new fast-food concoction in this case is really quite good.

The new sandwich went on sale in North America on Mar. 26 and is sticking around for a limited time, until the end of May. Wendy’s is actually offering up two options: the Asiago Ranch features grilled white meat chicken, spring mix, tomatoes, Asiago cheese, bacon and a creamy ranch sauce. The Smoky Honey Mustard is the same, but without the bacon and with – naturally – a honey mustard sauce. Both come in a toasted five-grain flatbread.

Me likey the ranch sauce, as well as bacon in general, so I of course opted for the Asiago option. My first impression upon seeing it in its wrapper was that it was a little smaller than I expected. In a society that’s struggling with obesity levels, that’s not necessarily a bad thing. I thought, hmm, a decent-sized meal for a change – that’s good! Read the rest of this entry »

 
Comments Off

Posted by on April 12, 2013 in food, wendy's

 

Review: Boston Pizza’s Pizzaburger is a mouthful

03 Apr
boston-pizza-pizzaburger

A burger and pizza in one? What’s not to love?

It’s always risky to release a new product on April 1, given all of the April Fool’s fake news that inevitably circulates on the web that day, but Boston Pizza went there anyway.

The Edmonton-based yet Americanly-named chain on Monday launched its new Pizzaburger, which is… well, exactly what it sounds: It’s a burger baked inside of a wrapped-up pizza… a burger panzerotti of sorts. Here’s the promo video:

Regular readers know I’m not one to miss out on such new concoctions, so I went down to the local BP to give it a try. And given that I love both burgers and pizza, how could I possibly go wrong with something that combines both? Read the rest of this entry »

 
1 Comment

Posted by on April 3, 2013 in burgers, food, pizza

 

Review: BK’s pulled pork and sweet potato fries

15 Mar

BK-pulled porkOnce again, it’s fast food Friday here on the blog. In my ongoing quest to try new fast-food creations so that you probably won’t have to, this time around I tried Burger King’s new pulled pork sandwich and sweet potato fries. Here’s my review.

The sandwich: south of the border, this bad boy is called the Memphis BBQ Pulled Pork Sandwich, but the geographical descriptor has been dropped here in Canada. Apparently not enough Canadians have been to Memphis to make that a selling point.

If you compare my photo above to Burger King’s official glam shot, it’s clear as mud that the reality is very different from the fantasy. My first impression of the actual thing was that it looked thoroughly unappetizing. While pulled pork sandwiches are usually a goo of barbecue sauce, the ooze dripping from this one was actually the cheese-like stuff on top. The bun and onions appeared a little tired while the pork itself was rather generic looking. Read the rest of this entry »

 
4 Comments

Posted by on March 15, 2013 in Burger King, food

 

Spam: a horrible, horrible Hawaiian delicacy

23 Jan
McDonald's Spam platter is a delicacy in Hawaii. And the new star of my nightmares.

McDonald’s Spam platter is a delicacy in Hawaii. And the new star of my nightmares.

I’ve eaten a lot of crap for this blog. And that’s not figurative – I mean that literally. As a guy who wrote a book that’s one-third about how fast food has contributed to technological advancement, I’ve strangely felt it my duty to keep up on the latest developments in the field. That includes sampling a lot of weird, unique and often gross fast-food concoctions.

In Sex, Bombs and Burgers, I spend some time explaining the origin and spread of Spam – the canned meat, not the email – and its ties to food technology and the history of war. The product was invented in the 1930s by Jay Hormel of the Hormel meat empire in an effort to use up the unwanted parts of pigs. Surprisingly, this canned franken-meat didn’t sell well – until the Second World War broke out, whereupon it became the perfect food for troops since it was high in calories, completely portable and virtually indestructible (and unperishable).

Spam was shipped by the ton to the Pacific Islands, where American troops ate it up. It also filtered into the general populace and has since become enshrined as local cuisine. Islanders have come up with numerous new ways of eating the canned meat – small slices are placed on top type of rice in a sushi-style musubi, or it’s cooked like sausage and served along with rice and eggs in breakfast platters. Read the rest of this entry »

 
2 Comments

Posted by on January 23, 2013 in food, hawaii, spam

 

Edible burger wrappers get it wrong

16 Jan
Paper? Mmm... paper.

Paper? Mmm… paper.

Brazilian burger chain Bob’s recently got a lot of press for introducing edible wrappers made of rice paper. With the tagline of “there’s no need to control yourself” emblazoned on the wrappers, the chain said it was testing them for environmental reasons.

Bob’s proclaimed the test a success, with less packaging waste as a result. Here’s a video of customers chowing down on the wrapper/burgers:

If there was a bigger food gimmick in 2012 – and there were many, from bacon sundaes to burgers with black buns – I certainly didn’t see it. What Bob’s and pretty much all the reports on the stunt failed to mention is just how important human senses are when it comes to eating food. The edible wrapper counters several of them.

The brain and senses are hardwired to enjoy certain foods, with our eyes and noses generally acting as the first line of defense. If something looks or smells off, we won’t eat it, which is why there are so few black-coloured foods (black usually means rotten to the brain). It’s how early humans were able to survive long enough for all of us to get here.

It’s also why some of the people in Bob’s video – who were doubtlessly given free burgers if they promised to eat them with wrapper on camera – looked confused before taking a bite. Humans have to consciously trick their brains into eating something sight (or scent) unseen.

One last problem is the texture of the packaging – there’s just no way to track the human brain into thinking that eating paper is fun or desirable.

Harvard professor David Edwards might be on the better track, with his invention last year of WikiCells, a sort of see-through edible packaging made from natural materials. This type of packaging allows consumers to see what they’re eating and it can also be naturally scented, so it can actually add to the desirability. It also doesn’t have a weird texture.

 
4 Comments

Posted by on January 16, 2013 in burgers, food, packaging

 
← Older posts
 
Follow

Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.

Join 4,131 other followers