• The Cosmic Crisp apple is not the future
  Following up on my previous post about the new technological advance in apples – an actual food review of the Cosmic Crisp. Now I wonder if I am obsessed enough to actually seek one out at a US grocery store?

  The most curious trait of the Cosmic Crisp is the sound it produces upon taking a bite. It is the platonic ideal of a crunchy apple; Foley artists supposedly record bites of other fruits, like bell peppers and onion, to imitate an apple crunch in film, and indeed, the Cosmic Crisp’s crunch sounds ripped from a sound library.

• https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/27/arts/american-dream-mall-opening.html
  Another aspiration article about the US, this one talks about the new American Dream mall in New Jersey. It might be a destination on a road trip in the future!

  After 15 years in development, the project’s attractions are finally lighting up one by one, connected by networks of vast, unfilled corridors. In addition to Big Snow, there is a National Hockey League-sized ice rink, a Nickelodeon Universe theme park, and a dusting of retail: a Big Snow ski shop, an IT’SUGAR candy department store and a Whoopi Goldberg-themed pop-up shop selling her collections of ugly holiday sweaters and chic tunics. Teased future reveals include a DreamWorks water park, a Legoland, a Vice-branded “Munchies” food hall, a KidZania play land featuring a full commercial airliner and a field hopping with live rabbits.

• The Secret Travel Club That’s Been Everywhere
  All those stories about the first explorers to the North Pole or Everest, well they belonged to this club which has a clubhouse in NYC. It sounds like a place that you see in the movies (like Hellboy).

  Its illustrious list of current, historical and honourary members includes Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay, who first summited Mt Everest; aviator Charles Lindbergh, who made the first solo transatlantic airplane flight in 1927; Norwegian explorer Thor Heyerdahl who sailed his hand-built balsawood raft, the Kon-Tiki, from Peru to Polynesia; famed pilot Amelia Earhart who disappeared in the Pacific; Apollo astronauts, including Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong, the first men on the Moon; record-breaking deep-sea diver Sylvia Earle; British paleoanthropologist Mary Leakey, who discovered 15 new species of animal; Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos; Titanic film director and deep-sea explorer James Cameron; and primatologist Dame Jane Goodall, considered the world’s foremost expert on chimpanzees. The list is mind-boggling.

• Why the French Don’t Show Excitement
  Originally I thought this story was from an American viewpoint, but now I see that it is British. I wonder if it is just a jab at both the US and the French at being too excited or too apathetic?

  “I used to judge Americans because I thought they were always too ecstatic, always having disproportionate reactions,” he told me years later, though now, he added, “I feel like I have two worlds in my head, one in French and one in English. I feel like the English world is a lot more fun than the French one.”

• Uber’s Secret Restaurant Empire
  I’ve thought about this many times, that restaurants should just stop offering sit downs and just focus on pure food delivery. Looks like I’m late because this was already discussed in 2018.

  Brooklyn Burger Factory is located in the kitchen of Gerizim Cafe & Ice Cream, a small establishment on Ralph Avenue. There used to be only a couple of unspectacular burgers on the menu at Gerizim Cafe, and only about one a day sold, according to co-owner Joel Farmer.

  But the data team at Uber Eats perceived a demand for gourmet burgers in the area, and they approached Farmer about the possibility of expanding the selection. Farmer liked the idea; most of the raw ingredients were already on hand. The Brooklyn Burger Factory has been such a success—it’s now selling as many as 75 burgers a day, with revenue 28 times that of Gerizim Cafe—that Farmer is changing the name of the entire operation.

Posted by Kevin in Blogs Tags: food, french, pocket, uber