Do the buzz words “new, improved, new and improved, better tasting, reconditioned, less fat, fat-free, best-selling, less calories, reduced for quick sale, limited edition, free toy, 50% off, or now with Olestra.” get to you every time you walk down the grocery store aisle or watch another commercial on the television? Are you torn between your curiosity for new products and your already strained budget for this month’s grocery expenses? Have you ever wondered if you were the only who one thought a certain way about a product? Well wonder no more because the folks at The Impulsive Buy are catering to your consumer questions.

With reviews dating back as far as August 2004, this site has been providing reviews catering mainly to food related products, services or restaurants. It’s not your typical kind of review where they states the facts, give their opinion and leave it at that. Their reviews are amusing and interesting and make you question if you’re really at a review blog in the first place. They also create video reviews for your view pleasuring. It’s a great site to check out to see if the newest products make the cut and manage to find their way into your shopping list.

I’ve always found posters, especially those that hang in the rooms of others to be rather interesting. Whether it be an image of someone they idolize, and image of their favourite pet or a landscape shot of a paradise miles away from their room, it reveals a lot about the kind of person they are and the interests they hold. My room, has no posters, both in my apartment and in my home in Toronto. Some have gone up but in the end, they all eventually come down. No particular reason, I guess there just isn’t anything that I adore enough to put up.

In a post in my Unproductive Findings blog I featured the Moxy Creative Posters related to music/fashion culture. I wanted to share something similar only geared towards food.

Specializing in posters and t-shirts, Pop Chart Lab brings unique and interesting graphic design to your world. While they still have limited designs the detail that goes into them are pretty amazing. The two that I wanted to feature were the culinary tools and the beer. The amount of design and detail that went into creating a well-rounded chart is awesome. They also have a blog which you can check out to stay tuned to their latest creations. Check them out!

Apparently the folks at Benihana didn’t like this whole concept and upon seeing a poor review of one of their restaurants, decided to take the fellow foodie to court for defamation of the company name. Now I’ve never had the opportunity to dine at one of the many Benihana chain restaurants so I can’t comment on whether or not such a poor review is warranted but the fact of the matter is, as food bloggers, as paying customers, we have a right to proper service and when we fail to receive that, it becomes our prerogative to share that experience with us. It’s not different than complaining about the treatment you received from a salesperson at a store or the customer service helper on the telephone.

The restaurant is suing the Kuwait blogger, Mark Makhou who runs a fairly popular local blog, for $18 000 after the blogger reported dissatisfaction with the meal he recieved. Here is an excerpt of the blog:

We ordered beef negimayaki for starters followed by an Orange Blossom maki and a Hibachi Chicken. The negimaki arrived looking good and was probably the best thing we had there even though I prefer Maki’s negimaki which has a richer teriyaki sauce. The Orange Blossom was very ordinary, wouldn’t order it again. Now the Hibachi chicken which is basically grilled chicken, that was the worst. The chicken was very chewy (I could swear it was undercooked if not raw) and tasted terrible. Even after I had the chef add some more teriyaki sauce in hopes of improving the taste it didn’t work. [...] Would I go back to Benihana? No I wouldn’t. Their sashimi and maki’s are pretty cheap (KD1.5 for 5 pieces of Salmon sashimi for example) but there are two other Japanese restaurants at the Avenues, Wasabi and Maki, and I would prefer either one of those to Benihana.

As a food blogger myself, this sounds hardly unreasonable should the facts be true. The blogger provides the facts of his experience and does not blatantly tell his readers to not visit the establishment. He just remarks that he will probably not return as there are numerous choices out there, a choice he has every right to make. It is a joke to think that all restaurants out there are putting forth the very best of the best all the time, most especially chains who are subject to direct guidelines in order to uphold the franchise.

In response, Benihana’s general manager in Kuwait, Mike Servo, posted a long and angry reply on Makhou’s blog that threatened legal action.

We are eager to know your name and meet you personally if you don’t have anything to hide.

You mentioned clearly on a detour way on not to go to Benihana and go to Maki or Wasabi or Chocolate Bar and we believe that this is against the law of Kuwait, We respect our rights on not to advertise in your website and if we don’t, this will not mean that we will be hurt by your side and if this done, the court in Kuwait will be in our side to give us our rights. to make this conversation short . We want you to give us your information, your name, your number and your address so our lawyer will take it from there and be sure that you in Kuwait were the jury is 100% clean and fair. [...] We will not let it go and we will follow you legally.

This is the last comment from my side and LPRC side; we wish that you will be free to give us your info. BTW are you Lebanese?

The last question is of significance because apparently non-citizen residents of Kuwait, including Makhou, have extremely circumscribed legal rights. Kuwaiti law is extremely favourable to businesses and non-citizens face significant barriers.

While the legal case continues on Benihana is now facing backlash from other potential patrons due to the incident. Angry patrons have been filling Benihana’s Kuwaiti Facebook page with threats and complaints, with the chain in turn deleting scores of Facebook wall posts.

That’ll teach the big guns out there; if you don’t want bad stuff getting out about you, don’t go after the guy who said it with no real intent of damaging you, you only make yourself look worse.

I came across an article that discussed a method to help decrease this dying process of fresh greens. It refers to a bath towel method. This is especially useful for the salad lovers out there. Cut the greens into bite-sized pieces, washing them, and shaking off the excess water in a salad spinner. Then spread the greens out on clean bath towels to air dry.

When you want to store them and put them into the fridge after drying, simply roll the towel up with the greens still inside  and secure with rubber bands to keep from unrolling. Store inside the vegetable crisper for best results. Just unroll the towel whenever you need a helping of greens.

The absorbent towels do a great job of keeping the greens moist but not damp so they stay fresh and crisp. My family tends to use  damp paper towels which are effective but this method seems like it would be even better. In any case, give this a try and see how it turns out for you.

Source: the Kitchn

That’s just the asian side of me coming out.

What has been interesting to see have been the spoofs and imitations that have now appeared all over youtube modelling their cooking endeavours to that of Epic Meal Time. Here are 3 notable contestants that you might be interested in seeing.

Be warned: they’re probably more gross looking than EMT’s videos. just letting you know.

And for a more notable advisary though much more aggressive and arguably more sickening is the folks at Regular Orindary Swedish Meal Time doing their own crazy antics. While EMT focuses on the ridculousness of the food and ingredients, ROSMT focus on the riculousness of the cooking process.

Hope your arteries didn’t clog up watching that.