Tess

What do you mean by a "parallel argument"? Junk food will still be cheaper and easier to procure and carry, require no storage or preparation.

On the other hand, I doubt very much whether people are buying junk food because they are so ignorant that they have no idea apples would be healthier. I mean, Americans eat like crap for all kinds of reasons. But it becomes a lot harder to eat healthy if you are (for instance) a working poor single mother with no transportation and-- as study after study of poor and/or nonwhite neighborhoods has shown-- fewer and more expensive shopping options. You can't get in the car and go to Costco and take advantage of economies of scale. Even your toilet paper is going to cost a lot. And then your income is low; your hours are often awkward with a long commute on public transportation of top of that, and then you're supposed to do creative cooking and shopping? Maybe some people can, but not being able to does not mean you are dumb.

All I can really do is echo what Andrew Fenton has said.

But this is not just a "belief." Try shopping for food in an inner-city neighborhood.

Ron, don't feel bad. If the server were just clumsy or slow or had an irritating voice, I can see feeling bad if you're not sure they weren't doing their best and you left a (for you) low tip. But the aggressive upselling is deliberate on his part, and my experience is that when this goes on it's also the policy of the establishment. It's true that the 17% tip may not communicate much to them as it's an amount a lot of people would consider fine, but at least you are not sending the clearly positive message what a 20% tip is. (At least, I usually get a nice "thank you" for that size tip.)

I think they have a couple other low-sodium flavors, but it's certainly a small line. If lower-sodium (as opposed to low-sodium) is OK with you, there are some other brands that are fairly readily available. Baxter's (from Scotland but widely available in US); Amy's; Health Valley and I'm sure there are more. Check sodium on the cans; it varies. Also, I think the Campbell's chicken and vegetable soups would be pretty easy to duplicate using prepared but low sodium broth; some of those brands that come in a box are not too bad. I probably won't try the deluxe Campbell's. When I have a yen for canned soup with all the salt-- usually when I'm sick in bed-- I go straight to Progresso.

The Spice House in Chicago (and online) sells various cheese powders, including blue cheese. Not sure how sprinkling it on a chip would work. I admit that while I like most Spice House products, the cheese powders are not my favorite. They taste a little dusty to me. Maybe I just haven't used them in the right recipes. I do like some of the cheese based herb mixes.

Andra, I'm sorry. I now realize my post was not very responsive. I read through the thread-- which I had somehow missed in the past-- and responded to the whole thing. Yes, BLF is a subject on its own. If you start a thread, I'll be reading because I'm always looking for new ideas about diet and fitness.

Has anyone mentioned the eGullet thread: "Weight Watchers: Watch it go down?" It runs to nearly 50 pages now. Even if you're not interested in WW-- it's not for everyone, by any means-- you'll find a lot of excellent recipes and cooking ideas. If you are interested in WW, it's really a remarkable resource, I think. (Full disclosure: I lost over 20 pounds on WW, but it took a year. I cheated like crazy.) There is a low carb thread, too; I forget the same but I certainly read it whenever I see it's been updated. Very good stuff there too. And of course the luscious Montignac thread.

The black cod in that recipe is the same as sablefish,* I think. Anyway, it works very well with sablefish. *At my Japanese market, they sell "black cod" in miso sauce and that is certainly sablefish.

I just picked up a bottle of HP Curry from the imports shelf of our local supermarket. It tastes a lot like ketchup with curry flavoring added. I could see using that on those Calbee shrimp chips.

Most commercial condiments and sauces are too sweet for me. Mustard with sugar (honey, whatever) in it strikes me as very weird. But I like ketchup on fried potatoes and a few other foods, even though I don't like ketchup itself. It must be an association thing. (I hate ketchup on bread though, and if ketchup from a burger gets into the bun, I won't eat it. Not that I eat burgers that much anyway.)

this surprises me too. i mean it's a food magazine. at the news stand. that costs about 5$. and some people here obviously take great pleasure in dissing it. i don't get it. ← I diss publications that I get for free! Seriously, it's in the nature of media to create discussion. You know what food photography I enjoy-- the pictures accompanying some of Jeffrey Steingarten's pieces in Vogue. I don't even like most of the photography in Vogue, but I like those. Who does them? Anyway, they rock, and some of them even make the food look appetizing.

Do you think they think that cover looks gonzo or something? That would be my guess. Some thinking like, "People are tired of prettied-up food shots"?

It does look wonderful. Is anyone else having trouble getting that website to function? It's OK for me until I get to the list of flavor compounds, and then there is no scrollbar and I can't get the page to work. (I'm using Windows XP.) I guess I would just call for a catalog. They offer it in PDF but that blows up my computer.

Someone gave me an old-fashioned ice cream maker (rock salt; turn by hand) for a wedding present. I used it when she came over, and that was it. It was not a terrible idea as I like quaint stuff, just too much of a mess for me to use often. Two different people have given me those corkscrews that look like bunny heads and some things to reseal wine bottles. Those are useful. My evil sister is always giving me expensive foodstuffs like balsamic-mustard cherries, which I then become hooked on.

The only reason I have to hide the raw fish, squid salad, etc., is so that the guy I live with won't have to look at it-- he can't stand the stuff. Well, he doesn't really need to see the price tags on the sashimi either. I do sometimes feel bad about spending money on expensive food that only I will eat, but he'd be welcome to have some.

Ditto on the canned fish. It tastes like cans. I also understand perfectly about cheesecake and mayonnaise, although homemade mayonnaise and have some kinds of cheesecake have brought me around recently. There's something about rich creaminess combined with the wrong taste that can be just-- gak.

How about inasmuch as not sneering at it behind their backs? ← Yeah, I also don't think it's fair to talk about "temporary vegetarians" as if that's your default assumption about vegetarians. What-- people who switch to vegetarianism are always going to go back? You don't know that.

I like protein in a snack too. Nuts (especially almonds) are good. Also, soy crisps, but i only like Stacey's. Ot edamame or miso soup. Although, since joining Weight Watchers I've found that if I'm hungry enough to eat at all I might as well have a small meal and then have less dinner.

I don't think the matcha Pocky is very bitter; in fact, I was disappointed and thought it didn't have enough taste to cut the white-chocolately mouuse. My favorite is still Men's Pocky.

One thing that really drives me crazy is watching a few people scurry around madly working while some more are just standing around talking. Why are those people talking not pitching in? Also, when the first person you speak to (making a phone reservation or walking in) is disorganized and/or has attitude. They're talking to someone else while they're talking to you. I've hung up the phone a few times just knowing that when we get there the reservation will not be on the books, because the person sounded so flaky.

It's not like people take out their dogs as dates to restaurants all the time. I've never been seated next to a dog in a chair. It's pretty discreet. Or maybe I'm just used to it. ← In a restaurant in Rome, I saw a great big bunny rabbit sitting on a chair next to a kid. It was their last night before closing for Ferraugusto and things were a little lax. I don't know if the bunny was a pet they'd brought in or maybe something nobody had eaten yet.

But, when the party is at my house, I can drink as much as I like and not worry about driving home! (Isn't that the biggest reason to throw parties?)

I think Misa's attitude is perfectly mature. She's not dissing other people for having kids; she's just not into them herself. It seems to me by not having them over she's avoiding being rude to them. I love kids. A lot of my friends have them, including young ones, and I often have them over. It does lend another dimension to entertaining, though. And I'm lucky that my dog loves kids. Oh, and that my friends have trained their kids to eat whatever the adults are eating.