Posts Tagged ‘Jell-O’
“You cannot store them To warm the winter’s cold, The lad that hopes for heaven shall fill his mouth with mould”*…
[Earlier this month] craving sweets, Colin Purrington remembered the Twinkies.
He’d purchased them back in 2012 for sentimental reasons when he heard that Hostess Brands was going bankrupt and Twinkies might disappear forever.
“When there’s no desserts in the house, you get desperate,” says Purrington, who went down to the basement and retrieved the old box of snack cakes, fully intending to enjoy several…
Like many people, Purrington believed Twinkies are basically immortal, although the official shelf life is 45 days. He removed a Twinkie from the box, unwrapped it — it looked fine — and took a bite. Then he retched. “It tasted like old sock,” Purrington says. “Not that I’ve ever eaten old sock.”
That’s when he examined the other Twinkies. Two looked weird. One had a dark-colored blemish the size of a quarter. The other Twinkie was completely transformed — it was gray, shrunken and wrinkly, like a dried morel mushroom.
He posted photos on Twitter, and they caught the attention of two scientists: Brian Lovett and Matt Kasson, who study fungi at West Virginia University in Morgantown. “Matt is going to want that Twinkie,” thought Lovett, the instant he saw the mummified one.
That’s because, in the past, their lab has tested how well molds grow in Peeps, the classic Easter treat. Fungi actually found it difficult to survive on Peeps, because of the food’s low water content. “In a way, they are kind of like an extreme environment, right?” Kasson notes. “The food industry has crafted the ability to make foods that have a long shelf life.
Still, Kasson says, fungi are everywhere and have an amazing set of chemical tools that let them break down all kinds of substances. “You find fungi growing on jet fuel,” he says…
They reached out to Purrington, who was only too happy to mail them the Twinkies immediately. “Science is a collaborative sport,” he says. “If someone can take this and figure out what was actually growing, I’m all in. I really want to know what species exactly was eating my Twinkies.”
The Twinkies arrived at the lab, and the researchers got to work…
The illuminating (if not appetizing) tale of “A Disturbing Twinkie That Has, So Far, Defied Science.”
* A.E. Housman
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As we stop stockpiling snacks, we might send variously-well preserved birthday greetings to William A. Mitchell; he was born on this date in 1911. A chemist who spent most of his career at General Foods, he was the inventor of Pop Rocks, Tang, quick-set Jell-O, Cool Whip, and powdered egg whites; over his career, he received over 70 patents almost all of them for processed food items or preparation procedures.
“I’m not Jesus Christ but I can turn water into Kool-Aid”*…
More than 563 million gallons of Kool-Aid are consumed each year; more than 225 million gallons in the three summer months. That’s to say, 17 gallons of Kool-Aid are consumed every second during the summer season…
The story of Kool-Aid begins with another hyphenated product: Jell-O. Edwin Perkins—whose father owned a general store in Hastings, Nebraska—was fascinated with Jell-O. He persuaded his father to sell it at their general store and later began selling products directly to customers. Eventually he began manufacturing his own homemade products including perfumes, food flavoring and a bottled beverage he called Fruit Smack. Forming his own sales company and selling his products door-to-door, Perkins began bringing some of his concoctions to the general public. A spirit of DIY and interest in developing products led him to create the precursor to his most famous invention.
Before it was developed by Perkins in 1927, Kool-Aid was preceded by a fruit-based liquid called Fruit Smack.
It was a liquid concentrate available in a few different flavors. Corked and sold in four ounce glass bottles, the product tended to leak or break during transit. Despite Perkins’ intentions of enabling families to use the concentrate to make pitchers of the beverage for a very low cost, he was confronted with a bit of a supply chain problem. Fruit Smack was a hit with the Perkins’ customers, but its fragility created the need for something more economical, easier to transport and preferably in powdered form…
To create his superior drink, Perkins focused on dehydrating Fruit Smack using the proper mix of dextrose, citric acid, tartaric acid, flavoring and food coloring. The rest is sugary beverage history. When Perkins’ original Kool-Aid first hit the market, it had a paltry six flavors—orange, cherry, raspberry, grape, strawberry and the ever popular lemon-lime combo—and it only cost ten cents per packet!
It was originally a wholesale product only available to grocery stores or specialty candy shops. A few years later in 1929, Kool-Aid distribution expanded all over the country, eventually making its way overseas a few years later. Perkins’ operation relocated to Chicago and the Kool-Aid name was officially trademarked in 1934…
During The Great Depression, when hard times afflicted the American public, Perkins decided to halve the price to provide a luxury item to people who otherwise may not have been able to afford it. It ended up becoming one of Perkins’ most successful products and he later sold the brand to General Foods in 1953. A packet of Kool-Aid at most stores near me only costs about $.20 today, which is still incredibly affordable—unless you’re trying to buy certain discontinued flavors online, which can get a bit pricey…
From David Buck, via the ever-illuminating Tedium, Kool-Aid– how a powdered mix (and its bulbous mascot) became dominant players in the drinks market: “Thirsty? Oh Yeah!”
See also: “Kool Kool-Aid Facts!”
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As we stir and sip, we might recall that it was on this date in 1964 that Pepsi acquired the Tip Corp. for the rights to their Mountain Dew soft drink, a caffeine-packed citrus soda that currently accounts for about 6.6% of the U.S. soft drink market. Tip’s eponymous cola brand, a regional player in the Southeast, was allowed to languish.
“It’s all part of life’s rich pageant”*…
There’s an arms race of sorts now taking place in sports arenas. Hence, the Quad.
The Quad is the world’s biggest t-shirt cannon. The massive, four-barreled gatling gun resides in the bowels of the Milwaukee Bucks’ home arena. At some point during each home game, Bango, the Bucks mascot, rides it onto the court like Patton riding a tank into battle. Then he fires off 186 shirts in about 15 seconds, amid a cloud of cryo and shrieks from all the fans wanting something free.
The weapon of mass distraction is the latest brainchild of Todd Scheel, a former wedding DJ and Milwaukee-area businessman who now reigns as the Oppenheimer of arena armaments…
The NBA has invested much more than any other major sports league in “dead-ball entertainment,” or whatever you want to call the sponsor-friendly efforts to keep ticket buyers occupied during game breaks: “How The Milwaukee Bucks And A Former Wedding DJ Won The T-Shirt Cannon Arms Race.”
* Inspector Clousseau, A Shot in the Dark
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As we make ourselves targets, we might recall that it was on this date in 1897 that carpenter and cough syrup manufacturer Pearle Bixby Wait trademarked a gelatin dessert called Jell-O; his wife May and he added strawberry, raspberry, orange, and lemon flavoring to granulated gelatin and sugar.
Gelatin, a protein produced from collagen extracted from boiled bones, connective tissues, and other animal products, has been a component of food, particularly desserts, since the 15th century. It was popularized in New York in the Victorian era by spectacular and complex jelly molds. But it was Wait who launched gelatin into the mainstream… where, with some ups and downs, it has remained– though slightly tarnished as a family product by the 1980s advent of Jell-O shots and Jell-O wrestling. As of 2016, there were more than 110 products sold under the Jell-O brand name.
There’s always room…
Jell-O ad by Maxfield Parrish
As National Jell-O Week (the second full week of February) draws to an end, “16 Fascinating Facts About Jell-O.”
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As we marvel at a dish that’s equally-appropriately approached with a spoon or a fork, we might recall that it was on this date in 1968 that the first-ever 9-1-1 call was placed by Alabama Speaker of the House Rankin Fite, from Haleyville City Hall, to U.S. Rep. Tom Bevill, at the city’s police station.
Emergency numbers date back to 1937, when the British began to use 999. But experience showed that three repeated digits led to many mistaken/false alarms. The Southern California Telephone Co. experimented in 1946 in Los Angeles with 116 for emergencies.
But 911– using just the first and last digits available– yielded the best results, and went into widespread use in the 1980s when 911 was adopted as the standard emergency number across most of the country under the North American Numbering Plan.
The end of an era…
Bread is the staff of life, but beer is life itself.
-Anonymous
Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, snacking
Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has signed a bill that officially classifies beer as alcoholic. Until now anything containing less than 10% alcohol in Russia has been considered a foodstuff.
The full story at BBC.com
As we revisit our food pyramids, we might spare a sweet thought for William A. Mitchell, the food scientist who invented Pop Rocks candy, Cool Whip, the orange drink mix Tang, quick-set Jell-O Gelatin, and powdered egg whites; he died on this date in 2004. In his 35 year career at General Foods he received over 70 patents.
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