Ok, the food geniuses from Switzerland have given us many tasty things. Swiss chocolate can get devout Weight Watchers to ignore  their sacred vows and forget about their daily ‘points’ limit. And a  good cave-aged Gruyère or other quality Swiss cheese is capable of getting even lactose-intolerant people to put up with any potential side effects in order to savor the beautiful, stinky, stuff.

Back of Switzerland. Sweet Tea is purely Southern territory.

But the Swiss have no history of tea production and while they may enjoy a cup of steaming tea on a snowy  night, getting a glass of ice-cold sweet tea in Switzerland is like buying diet food from McDonald’…you can order it, but you are not going to be happy with what you are served…and you may even end up vomiting afterwards.

I admit, there are a LOT of things I just don’t understand…like why food trucks are so damn popular and how come sporks are not found EVERYWHERE?!? So when I saw this “Swiss premium Southern Style Sweet Tea,” I was at first confused… and they just plain pissed. The whole idea, does not make sense. It is like Taco Bell selling sushi or if Krispy Kreme started offering hot-yoga classes alongside their hot dougunts…You don’t see a good Southern company like Zatarain’s (known for their Cajun rice) promoting a line of premium milk chocolate or instant fondue! So WTF Switzerland? I am a fan of your knives, your watches, your funny Lederhosen pants, and of course YOUR food…but back off and respect that Sweet Tea, along with deep-fried everything, pecan-pie, and turducken  are gift from the Deep South of the USA… Switzerland, you have ENOUGH culinary accomplishments, SO let us Southerners enjoy our limited successes so that we can try to compensate for our low literacy levels, our high obesity levels, and the many other ways our proud region lags behind the rest of the developed world.

…and YES. I am a Southerner. Born and raised in Louisiana…and proud of it.

Well… it turns out there is… Check out this article posted by FOX.

It explains everything.

Here is the link if you want the full address:

http://www.foxnews.com/leisure/2012/06/18/eating-at-altitude/

Now…if we could just figure out why airlines still lose EVERYBODY’S luggage….

The Red Delicious apple…one of the biggest cons in the produce world

Ahhhh….The Apple.

So many variations of this humble fruit exist. From the intensely tart Granny Smith,  to the super sweet Honey Crisp, the possibilities seem endless. Of course there are always Gala apples, arguably one of the best all-around apples. These are consistently a  go-to choice for the Fed Up team because of their crunchy texture, mildly sweet taste, affordable price point, and the fact that they seem to be available EVERY WHERE!

…BUT there is one other apple which seems to rival the Gala’s in terms of availability…an apple that shows up all the time….an apple that is the ‘face’ of the fruit, the image most people think of first when the fruit is mentioned…It is the Red Delicious apple.

But why?!? It does not make sense that the Red Delicious is so widespread. The Red Delicious apple’s texture is often mushy, bruises are common, and the tough skin and bland tasting flesh make this apple unappetizing. Maybe, I have just be subjected to years of poorly handled Red Delicious apples; but I have NEVER had a decent Red Delicious apple…and I feel that I am not alone in this. A comedian once said, ‘Red Delicious apples: Always red, rarely delicious.’  This has got to be one of the most true statements about the world of produce that I have ever heard.

It as if this farmers/producers of this fruit have realized how badly it sucks and decided to overcompensate with a completely misleading name.  Be warned, foods that sound too good to be true, often are.

Don’t get lured in by the deceptive name or low price…this is one BAD APPLE

The fact that the Red Delicious often represents the entire family of  apples, is just not right. Google ‘Apple’ and you first get an image of a Red Delicious (after the about a hundred ‘Apple’ computer logos). When children learn their ABC’s, there is always a Red Delicious apple pictured with the ‘A.’ And walk into any grocery store, and there are piles of Red Delicious taking up the prime real estate. This is an insult to the apple community. Maybe Red Delicious apples are cheaper or  easier to produce…that could explain why they are so widely available and often the only fruit you find in a convenient store, served on a plane, or simply placed on a teacher’s desk.  But I bet the Red Delicious  is a cunning fiend, who is corrupting our food sources by bribing grocery stores with significant amounts of cash and gifts, in order to guarantee their continual dominance of the apple world.

The REAL ‘Red Scare’ has just begun…So who will stand with me against the tyranny that is the Red Delicious? Lets get rid of this giant phony, this poor representative of a proud fruit. We must impeach the Red Delicious and nominate a new candidate to stand proudly on store shelves, and satisfy our hearts, our minds, and our stomachs.  Lets pass on the Red Delicious and nominate Galas at the new leader of the humble apple.

Next time you are in a grocery store and see that Red Delicious just staring at you, realize that you deserve better. Make no compromises and choose an apple that properly represents how delicious this fruit can be.

A place ONLY serving churros. Now that is a HYPER niche market….but obviously it is doing well because the chain is growing.

I am working in Central America, and came across this sugar sanctuary in a large mall in Panama. I had to laugh at how there is an ENTIRE restaurant chain dedicated to churros, the Latin American fried doughnut-like treat. I then realized that in the USA, we too have our own special shrines which also dutifully specialize in ultra specific foods…think about Cinnabon, Auntie Anne’s Pretzels, and Mrs Fields Cookies.

Churro Mania, the name of this food court restaurant chain, is from Venezuela and now has grown all across Central and Southern America. Apparently there are even outposts of Churro Mania in Florida.

The dulce de leche stuffed churro in all its sugary glory.

I was just shocked at the sugary creations this place was advertising. The one that stood out the most to me was a dulce de leche stuffed churro that is then topped with an additional drizzle of the sweet syrup. Other items on the churro-only menu included concoctions with cream cheese or  chocolate. Oh. And you could get a soda… But no diet soda, no bottles of water, and there was no food offered that was not deep-fried and shrouded in layers of sugar.

Yep… I eat healthy, especially when traveling…For lunch all I wanted was a salad, so I did not partake in the sugar overload as my colleagues did. They did all energetically say it tasted great though…but that could have just been the initial sugar rush talking.

Keep your eyes peeled and your diabetic friends away…Churro Mania may be coming to a shopping mall near you.

After reading this (especially #7), my mind has been blown, and I am looking at the world in a whole new way…

Check out the link and then start wondering why you haven’t thought of that yourself?!?

Here is the link.

It is nice to see other people ‘rant’ about food and food related stuff.

This exotic fruit lures in the ignorant with its elaborate looks and impressive-sounding name.

The lavish buffet at an Asian hotel I was staying at had a beautiful bowl of this “Dragon Fruit.” I was lured in by the exotic nature of the stuff, and knew that I should take full advantage of this foreign fruit which I had never seen before…So like any good buffet guest, I LOADED up my plate with a pile of sliced up fruit. It look so tasty with the bright exterior contrasting with the seed-dotted flesh of fruit’s interior…so I thought to myself, “what the Hell,” and added a few more pieces to my plate for good measure.

I then brought my overloaded dish to my table and took my first bite. CRAP!…crap. This stuff was bland. It did not taste horrible; it was just boring. The taste was mildly melon-like. But with no assertive flavor I was left wondering why ANYONE would eat this when a typical cantaloupe offers twice the taste at half the price. It was as if the “Dragon Fruit” was trying to cover its pathetic taste with a fancy exterior and an impressive name. This was some sort of false advertising. The only other fruit that has managed to piss me off this much is seeded grapesand the terrible annoyances involved in dealing with their hidden land mines.

Sometimes is is just best to stick with what you know. Enjoy the watermelon, the kiwi, and the grapefruit; while they may not be quite as rare as the Dragon Fruit on the far left, they taste a whole lot better.

I ended up looking like a wasteful ass when the waiter came by to clear out the table and saw my pile of uneaten fruit. But I bet I am not the only over-zealous guest who took too much of the “Dragon fruit,”  to only be surprised by its disappointing taste and then leave a plate full of uneaten fruit to be picked up by the bus boy.

When I got home from my trip to Asia, I came across this damn “Dragon Fruit” in the local grocery store’s produce section. It was extremely expensive, but easily lures ignorant shoppers in with the powerful name and elaborate exterior. This stupid fruit is  adding to the already existing confusion of the grocery shopping experience where the numerous options become overwhelming. But, I really lost it when I saw “Dragon Fruit” flavored frozen yogurt as this month’s special, at the local frozen yogurt shop I visit. I tried it, and it tasted nothing like the real fruit…it was actually decent. But I really hope this “Dragon Fruit” flavor does not become the next trendy thing that shows up in everything from chewing gum and drink mixes, to air fresheners and toilet bowl cleaner.

Dragon Fruit flavored frozen yogurt…this damn fruit is just going to be ANOTHER stupid trend.

Like the beautiful people with no personality, many fruits have exteriors that suggest a far more appealing option than is actually provided once you get to know them. Just like for people, it is also true for fruit, it is what is on the inside that counts!

A crappy box of Cookie Crisp. The box proudly boasts how it is made with “Whole Grain.” That does not make up for the stale taste and lack of any sort of nutritional value. Plus, pretty much EVERY cereal has “whole grain,” INCLUDING the most decadent of sugary cereals: Lucky Charms and Cinnamon Toast Crunch.

It has no nutritional value, and quite frankly it is a very childish product. But the concept of this cereal just kept gnawing at the back of my mind…it just seemed to have so much potential.

Well, I finally decided to buy a box.

I can now say from personal experience; Cookie Crisp cereal is terrible.

The idea of a cookie based cereal sounds genius. We all know milk and cookies are a beautiful combo. Well Cookie Crisp is FAR from anything even resembling cookies. When you open the box, you get no wiff of freshly baked goodness, and no taste of rich cookie dough. What you do get is a strong chemical-like smell and a bland taste of something that seems to have gone stale.

It is just beautiful marketing. The name “Cookie Crisp” conveys such a tasty image…but is it a complete lie. Actually, no. It is not a COMPLETE lie, the cereal is very “crisp.” But styrofoam packing peanuts have a nice “crisp” texture, and I am not pouring those into a bowl of milk.

The little cookie shapes of the cereal have little cookie taste.  There really is nothing but a bad tasting crunch that leaves you wondering how can they claim there is any cookie  flavor at all. I tried the cereal dry and drenched in milk and both led to unsatisfactory results. This cereal has so much potential…but after one spoonful, I was immediately disappointed with the taste, and disappointed with myself for falling victim to such an obvious marketing gimmick.

These little cereal pieces may look kind of like chocolate chip cookies … but ignore them. THEY ARE A TRAP!

Even Dozer, the Fed Up dog, was reluctant to eat the stuff (and he eats his own poop). So the box of Cookie Crisp was tossed out and from now on I am sticking to my reliable cereals, damn good granola, and the crack of breakfast foods: Honey Bunches of Oates….until I get lured in by another creative cereal concoction (those Mini Churros cereal keeps one getting attention and so does that Cinnabon cereal)

So if you insist on having cookies for breakfast, just get some real cookies and crumble them up into your cereal bowl. It will taste a WHOLE lot better and probably will be better for you too. But in reality, none of us should probably be eating cookies, candy, or any type of desert as our morning meal. I am pretty sure my nutritionist would not recommend cookies as a healthy part of a well-balanced and nutritious breakfast.

Have you been cerealously mislead? I can’t be the only one who buys something that looks amazing, but is only rewarded with a sever case of buyer’s remorse.

But sometimes too many choices lead to too much confusion. Options are nice, but there is point at which decisions can become an overly elaborate process due to the clutter from the variety. This is especially true for simple products or foods that all seem like the same damn thing…

Look at salt. It is not THAT complex of a food, and but there are hundreds as different choices. All the salt possibilities seem like a Dr Seuss creation: Do you want rock salt, sea salt, Kosher salt, truffle salt? Do you want your salt with a fox? Do you want your salt in a box? DOES IT REALLY MATTER?!?

But ok, I admit that there are some occasions when a particular salt variety is necessary. You are going to want some cheap, grainy stuff to throw over an icy driveway during winter. You are  going to want some strong-smelling salt to wake up an unconscious person. And you are going to want the Kosher stuff if you are cooking for an orthodox Jewish friend.

Does Whole Foods really need to offer so many kinds of “Himalayan Salt”? Is there even a difference between any of them?!?

And I am sure there is a reason to buy “Pink Himalayan Rock Salt.” Maybe you want to use the color to girly up a manly steak. Or maybe you are just too good for any salt variety not carried down the highest mountain range in the world by humble Sherpas. Either way, do we really need 5 separate varieties of “Pink Himalayan Salt,” on one store shelf? I mean, I could understand two maybe three options of this crap; It would make sense if it was sold in two different sized bottles, or the option for premium priced salt originally harvested from Everest’s summit and a “budget” option that was simply scooped up from a lower lying base-camp. But already this is extreme. Having so many choices of something that I am pretty sure is the same damn thing, is just annoying. This is a perfect example of when the luxury of choice becomes a burden of a decision.

So if you really can enjoy the fine flavor nuances from the varieties of the various “Pink Himalayan Rock Salts,” then good for you. But personally I am just pissed off to see prime shelf spaced used up when there are so many other good foods that still need proper representation at grocery stores.

I pissed red…that is never a good thing.

I have been spazzing out. Searching to find out what the Hell is wrong with me. I am a good guy…a little cranky, and highly opinionated, but a good guy overall. Why does crap like this happen to me? What did I do to deserve this(besides blaming Canada for a few things and making fun of Korean food)?

I hoped it was just a one time thing…but no, second piss of the day, and more red.

I was really starting to get nervous.

Peeing red was starting to really freak me out. Dozer, the Fed Up dog, was very concerned.

So I decided to give myself a day and accept the red piss. I figured that after 24 hours, I would be fine and the beautiful yellow tint I am so familiar with, would once again show up in my beloved toilet bowl.

NOPE… 24 hours later and I am peeing an even darker shade of red. Ok, I am already a nervous fool even when everything is normal,  and now I was REALLY starting to get very scared.

Then a rumbling in bowels told me it was time to poop. I don’t want to get into any more details than necessary, but poop is not supposed to be red. It was one thing for me to have some slightly red colored pee, but to see a bright red “log” floating in the toilet was too much for me.

I tried to think if I felt sick, or if I had somehow injured myself. I simply could not think of anything that could have led to the sight I kept staring at in the toilet bowl.

I decided that it would be best for me to take my mind off of things and try to clean the dirty dishes that  I had been neglecting. I had been playing a game of “Jenga” with them and finally I had gotten to the point where the next plate I would add, would result in my “Jenga” tower toppling. I started to scrub the cutting bord first and began getting real pissed as the stains would not come out. A bright red tinge seemed to be permanently faded into the cutting board surface. That’s when I realized it…those beets. Those DAMN BEETS.I had never had a beet before, and decided to try them for the first time on Pizza the other night.  I had no idea what I was doing and the pizza came out a mess, along with EVERY thing the juicy red beets touched.

I looked online, and immediately confirmed the culprit of my red pee. Beets have been known to do this.

There are plenty of foods that screw with your digestive system. Some make your urine smell far worse, others make your stools rock solid, and of course some stuff turns your toilet bowl interesting colors.

I am ok now and happy to see things returning to normal. But I am fed up with foods I had already eaten, just unexpectedly showing up with crazy side effects. I wish we could just enjoy a good meal and not get any stupid surprises  that scare the “piss” out of us.

Damn beets.

Reblogged from DM on a Whim:

• 

Ok so I'm out of the loop and been really bad at blogging, but this caught my attention and I have to talk about it.  A california woman sued the makers of Nutella for what she says "making her believe" that Nutella was part of healthy breakfast.  First of all in this day and age when parents read all the labels and annoy the crap out of kids, did it not cross her mind to read the nutritional facts on the back?  

Read more… 218 more words

* Same Name, Different Food: Why do so many foods have names that are so freaking similar or even the same??? Look at chocolate truffles, and those mushroom-like truffles often added to expensive pasta dishes.  If I order a box of “truffles” to give to my wife for Valentines, I bet she would be a little weirded-out if she received a bunch of overpriced fungus. And then there is tuna. While canned tuna, can sill make a simple and delicious meal; it is COMPLETELY different from the tuna you expect to be served in some quality sushi. Yet we often just use the term “tuna” with no further descriptions and hope for  the appropriate fish to be used.

Backing powder and backing soda...right next to each other on the shelf. Choose wisely, the wrong one can lead to complete disaster (or at least some crappy cake).

* Similar Product, Completely Different Use: Then there are items which are SO SIMILAR, yet can lead to a giant mess if not used correctly. I STILL have no idea what the difference is between “baking powder” and “baking soda”, and why there has been a box of one of these in the back of our fridge for several years. Parsley seems like such a simple herb. BUT NO… adding curly-leaf parsley to some garlic bread is not a good idea. Curly-leaf should be used for presentation alone, and not for eating. Why do grocery stores even sell the damn stuff? And then why do they put it RIGHT next to the tasty flat-leaf variety that is intended for consumption? The Fed Up household in particular battles with “snap peas” and “snow peas.” I know Mrs. Fed Up loves one of these and hates the other. I can never remember which one, so I just end up buying both and then seeing if our dog will ever become a vegetarian by giving him whatever is left.

Is this a "yam" or a "sweet potato?" Do you know? Does ANYONE really know?...probably not.
Either way it one ugly vegetable.

*One Food, Multiple Names: Of course there are also items that get multiple names or are simply mislabeled. In the grocery store the term “yam” and “sweet potato” are constantly used to refer to the same brown root. These are actually two vastly different vegetables, but the carelessness of the US grocery industry has simply decided to ignore this fact. So the ugly looking root we see in our local stores is commonly called by both terms, and I don’t think ANYONE knows which term is the correct one. All items that have multiple names that all refer to the same thing piss me off. Eggplant and aubergine, prawn and shrimp, cukes and cucumber. The list goes on. Why can’t we just decide upon one term and stick with it. I am just too damn lazy and so I really don’t want to expand my vocabulary any further.

*Confusing Man-Made Creations: Then there is just random stuff made up by humans. Ok I know what a turduckhen is (a beautiful dish comprised of a turkey that is stuffed with a duck, which is stuffed with a chicken) because I live in the America’s Deep South where the delicacy was born. But WHAT THE HELL IS BALONEY? And is “Velveeta” actually a cheese? And how can “Cookie Crisp” be a legitimate breakfast cereal?

The wall of olive oil at your local grocery store is unnecessarily complicated. You better have taken a college-level course on olive oils in order to understand all the crazy variables involved in this purchase decision.

*Too Many Options, Result In Too Many Wrong Choices: TOO MANY TIMES, there are complex decisions needed to be made when buying relatively simple ingredients. The other day I wanted to cook some salmon for dinner. I thought I could quickly run in the store and grab some fish and be home in no-time…NOPE. First the guy at the seafood counter wanted to know if I wanted King Salmon or Sockeye. After just taking a chance and saying “King,” I was then bombarded with  bunch of other questions that I had no answer to: Do you want Atlantic? Pacific? Farm-rasied? What about a fillet cut or a steak cut? Would you like the skin on or off? ALL I WANTED WAS SOME FISH. Instead I got a confusing exam which overwhelmed me. I ended up just buying some chicken. Multiple, confusing options are not limited to seafood…purchasing basic olive oil involves far more thinking than I prefer. Do you want to buy some cheap stuff in a plastic bottle, or some stuff in an elaborate glass bottle that has been harvested from Mediterranean olives that were fertilized by organic goat poop? Do you want an moralistically-proper batch of “extra virgin” oil, or will you accept some regular old virgin oil, or are you cool with everything and will happily settle for some slutty stuff? Do you want your olive oil “cold-pressed (What the does that mean?). ” And all this is just assuming you want olive oil…don’t even consider looking at all the other oil possibilities like sesame, pumpkin, grapeseed…those involve their own set of  college degrees in order to decipher what you should buy.

*Termanology That Just Does Not Make Sense: Random  termaeliogy confuses the Hell out of me. For example, When does a shrimp get to be called “jumbo?” But I can look at a shrimp and decide if it is large enough for me. Confusion is  especially likely to occur when purchasing cuts of meat. Do “baby-back-ribs” come from baby animals? And no, a rib-eye is not the same as a rack of ribs. Pork tenderloins come from the back of a pig, but turkey tenderloins come from the bird’s breast…right? And “Canadian bacon” still disappoints me, IT IS NOT BACON, and tastes nowhere as good as REAL bacon.

This is the kind of crap that lures us away from the safety found from a simple apple. Just because it looks like it is from Mars, does not mean it is going to be tasty and worth $40.00/lb.

*The Fresh Produce Section Is A Battlefield: Walking through the produce section of any grocery store is like walking through a minefield sometimes. Nowadays rare fruits from around the world can be found sitting next to humble apples. You sometimes get side tracked by the exotic looking melons, which lead you to maxing out your credit card so that you can bring one of them home… only to realize they taste like crap. It is so easy to get distracted by all the random tropical stuff when all you really need is a damn apple. Assuming you get past all the crazy fruits and make it to the apple section in one piece, then there are THOUSANDS of varieties to choose from. If you make the wrong decision you get a tart apple when you were craving something sweet. Plus, how do you tell if it is a good apple? Do you sniff it? Do you tap it with your hand and listen for a particular sound? Do you drop on the floor and see if it bounces? And then of course you are racing the people next to you, to make sure you get the best apples out of the bin before they do. This same delmia is consistent with pretty much every piece of fruit or vegetable out there. Maybe that is why so many Americans avoid fresh produce altogether and instead opt for french fries and strawberry milkshakes as their source of nutrients.

*Cooking Complexity: Assuming you get home with a full load of groceries, just determining HOW to make the food is a complicated process. Do you bake? Broil? Bar-be-que? I gave up thinking about it, and now just rely on throwing food in my trusty toaster-oven and hope for the best. Then there is the craziness involved with all the various forms of measurement. You can’t just use any-old tablespoon or cup to measure out the appropriate amount called for in a recipe. YOU have to use SPECIFIC tablespoons and cups. And then there are ounces and pounds and quarts and liters. What unit of measurement is supposed to be used with each food is sure to leave you dumbfounded at one point. And don’t even try to figure out how to convert a tablespoon to an ounce or a liter to a pound (is that even possible?)

Food is tasty, but sometimes it is too damn complicated. I think I will let Mrs. Fed Up do all the groceries and cooking for a little while.

If you see Rice Kirspies "Treats" next to doggie "treats" on a grocery store shelf, then it is clear that the food industry is just trying to confuse us now.

No longer do many foods even have descriptions of REAL flavors to help you make your purchase decision. Just look in the frozen foods aisle and you will see popsicles labeled with flavors such as “blue” or “green.” COLORS are NOT flavors! What the hell is “red” or “purple” supposed to taste like? “Red” is a primary color, NOT an adjective to be used for describing the flavor nuances of a frozen snack.

Colors are NOT appropriate flavors descriptions. Colors should be used to describe visuals, not tastes? Who determines the fine flavor nuances between "purple" and "red". Do food manufactures just think we are too dumb to know what a grape or strawberry is supposed to taste like?

But now an entire generation has grown up with this, and confidently describes and purchases food based off of a color and not a taste. Even I have to admit that I have a pretty good idea for what “red” will likely be. Maybe it is cherry or strawberry…or even “fruit punch” flavor-whatever the hell that is supposed to taste like nowadays.

Just look around and pay attention to the labels of the packaged foods you buy. Even if the packaging states a true “natural” flavor, like grape, we often call many of tasty options we eat by the color they are, and not the fruit they are based off of. Just think of Kool-Aid. How many times have you drunk “purple” Kool-Aid? I don’t know your typical beverage drinking selections, but I bet you have thought “purple” Kool-Aid, a lot more than you have ever thought about “grape” Kool-Aid.

Either way, the taste of many of the foods we eat,  like Kool-Aid or popsicles, or candy are probably so processed and artificial that there is no true taste left of anything that could have been naturally  harvested on a farm.

So what the hell is "Berry Blue Typhoon" supposed to taste like?

Then there are freaking flavor descriptions that go even further. Clever marketers realized that while a “blue” flavored food may sell… a more elaborate, yet vague, flavor description will sell even better. Who knows what “TIDAL RUSH” is supposed to be!?! Did some guy from product R&D chug a few gallons of fresh seawater as the tide swept in? Sounds nasty though, right? Yet we buy into it.

And these stupid flavor names are seen on all sorts of products, from cereal to condiments. Do food manufactures think all of our pallets are so dumbed down, that we can not decipher taste beyond pretty colors and useless descriptions?

Maybe I buy too much processed and packaged foods, and not enough fresh produce that needs no flavor labels. Maybe I just need to embrace the simplicity of purchasing foods based solely by if they are my favorite color, or if their elaborate (but nondescript) “flavor” sounds interesting.  For now though, I am just going to go home and make some chicken with some red stuff on top, and have a nice tall glass of purple Kool-Aid…or maybe “Tidal Rush,” that sounds tasty.

Ok. Let me rephrase that; What are so many foods being sold in a “baby” form. It seems like ALL fruits and vegetables sold, now have some midget version of themselves sitting next to them on grocery store shelves.

Do we honestly need 6 different types of miniature tomatoes? I like variety, but this shelf always makes me laugh when shopping at our local store.

Baby carrots have always been around. I belive they are just carved out of full-sized carrots, then repackaged and sold for a premium price. They are convenient though and I see the need for them. How stupid would we all look chomping down on full-grown carrots during our lunch time. It would be awkward if your meal consists of a foot-long carrot and a foot-long sub. If the carrot is anywhere near the size of  the sandwich you are eating as your main course, then I think you need to find yourself a more reasonable sized root to consume (unless you are Bugs Bunny). And that slimy “baby corn,” has been a stir-fry accompaniment since the first wok was used or P.F. Chang’s was franchised (whichever came first). Like the baby carrot, the baby corn’s size is the sole reason for its popularity; a full size cob of corn could never get picked up by a chop-stick wielding eater.  But neither the mini carrots or corn really taste any better than their full-sized counterparts. And they cost more.

But walk around and you will find apples and bananas sold in miniature format. Even fruit like kiwis are getting the bite-size-baby treatment. Then there are the “baby bella” mushrooms, and even baby artichokes.  This is starting to get a ridiculous

Maybe the tapas trend has been taken to an extreme and now farmers everywhere decided to start selling small-plate style produce.  Maybe our appetite has desired smaller produce so that we can easily compact more of it in our over-stuffed bellies. Maybe someone has a shrink-ray gun and is having too much fun….Either way, smaller versions of full-grown produce has SO MANY negatives.

A cheesy name like "Cuties" is enough to convince many of us that these are something we have to add to the grocery cart. But just think how much more peeling is going to be involved compared to a bag of "normal" sized fruit. (In defense of the Cuties, these actually do taste significantly sweeter than regular oranges, and they have been genetically engineered to be VERY easy to peel...but their smaller size means plenty of peeling just to get a mouthful of food.)

Look at an apple. A dwarf apple has practically the same size core as a full-grown one. Your core to edible-fruit ratio is complete crap in a bite-sized apple.

Tiny  orange hybrids(called by the various names like satsuma, clementine, etc) and those trendy  mini bananas that look like stubby fingers, are all so much more labor intensive. To get a solid snack from these baby-sized fruit, involves way to much peeling for my limited patience.

Then there is…the price. Fed Up readers will know that I am stingy, and will search endlessness for a good deal.  BUT, I am willing to pay a premium for something that justifies it. A hand-crafted cheese or a sushi roll made with exotic ingredients for example. “Baby”  fruits and vegetables that are TRULY just an immature versions of an adult crop, should be far cheaper. Produce picked before they are fully grown obviously take less time to produce, so then why the Hell are we paying as if they we some gourmet delicacy? Its like paying more for a 3 moth old bottle of wine, then for that same wine aged 3 years. And while there may be legitimate flavor and nutrient differences from dwarf fruit/vegetables, I always find is difficult to pay more when you are getting so much less food…I know, I know, quality frequently trumps quantity; and quality is damn expensive. But still buying 5 ounces  for the same price as 5 pounds, is always a difficult decision.

Baby Takiis...Ok, now they are just making crap up. These are just shiitake mushrooms that haven't grown. But, because they are called "Baby Takiis" I am sure Mrs. Fed Up will find them adorable, and will want to bring home a few boxes.

I think it is all just clever marketing. Give something a cute name and people will pay extra. Call anything “baby,” and a mother’s instincts and emotions are instantly triggered. And if something seems exotic enough, like “baby takiis”, then customers will line up just for the novelty-factor.

While there are some good reasons to bring home a bag of bite-sized carrots, lets agree to think really hard about bringing miniature produce into our homes.  Just like real babies, baby fruits and vegetables can be freaking expensive and come with a lot of extra baggage.

It says they are the "ultimate in antioxidants," but is a baby artichoke really that much better than a standard artichoke. If the term "baby" does not lure us in, the use of trendy buzz words like "antioxidants," will get many of us interested.

Part One; WHAT THE HELL IS THAT?

Take a peek inside the "no-mans-land" that is your office's break-room fridge. Just be prepared for the sights and smells you are going to come across.

You would never leave food rotting in your fridge at home. Well actually I do, but I solve that problem with making these…or by pawning the old food off on dinner guests. But it seems like all work-place break-rooms and office kitchens are exempt from the social norms and requirements that are practiced everywhere else.

Our office  break-room has got some very interesting items always lying around. I am pretty sure a lot of this stuff is the culinary equivalent of U.F.O.s and should be banned to Area 51. I am not culturally ignorant, I understand that foods from around the world can differ widely from a typical American tuna sandwich. But some of the items I have discovered in our office kitchen were just TOO far out there, and really could have come from Mars.

We do have a very culturally diverse workforce in our office building, but still I think there needs to be a limit to what is acceptable in the public kitchen. Some items smell nasty from the moment they are bought into the building… but their smell gets ridiculously bad after a few days of being neglected and left to putrefy in the bowels of the office kitchen.  I really do wonder what sort of magical power is possessed by ALL office kitchens, that causes people to forget about the food they brought to work that morning. There is some type of vortex or Bermuda-Triangle effect taking place in office kitchens that just leaves people completely oblivious to the fact that food goes bad.  The entire building soon reeks due to people’s inability to remember to eat their own damn lunches or at least toss them out before they turn into unidentifiable piles of mold. But fine, I eat stinky cheese and plenty of garlic, so I can deal with the smells of other people’s food…well at least before the rot sets in.

Seriously, I have no freaking clue what this is. I came across it when pulling my simple sandwich out of the fridge, and was completely dumbfounded trying to guess if this was food that had transformed due to excessive "aging" or was actually intended to look the slimy mess that it was. ...I hope the owner of this meal did not see me taking pictures of their food. That would be slightly awkward.

Then there are some foods that may not smell, but certainly do NOT belong in the work place. TRUE STORY: there was a LIVE turtle the other day in our kitchen…and YES it was intended as someone’s meal. At first, being the grub obsessed guy that I am, I was only terrified that someone’s lunch may actually eat MY lunch. Then I saw the bigger picture and realized there is a freaking LIVE turtle in our kitchen that someone plans to eat. I am ok with the random gelatinous goo, funky fruit, expired entrees, and the rotting remains from old take-out. I just think it is a little extreme to start bringing in livestock for luch…It is completely unpractical because I am sure it will take longer than your half-hour break to prepare.

Other items have been banished to the back of the office freezer for such a long time now that they would have to be chiseled out of their icy enclave. These containers have been there so long that no one could possible still know what is inside, and I am sure the original owner has long since left this place of employment. So these frozen ice-cubes of lunches past, will remain pieces of history and forever reside in the kitchen…until a new fridge is bought, or they are excavated and added to the Smithsonian  Museum of National History.

Items that have been banished to the freezer are rarely ever retrieved. They become artifacts that can now educate us on the evolution of weekday lunches, beginning with the early Paleolithic era to present day.

Sometimes our office kitchen is graced by the presence of fruit…but unfortuantly people often bring mashed and molding produce. It seems to me that my colleagues woke up one morning, said to themselves after searching their home fridge, “this crap is going bad here at my house, so lets just bring it to the office and hope someone else is desperate  enough to munch on it”…. I guess charity is a nice idea, but I am pretty sure you would get poisoned if you ate any produce THAT old.

So leave the unidentifiable foods , live animals, rotting fruit, and last-week’s leftovers at home…or at least hide it in a brown bag so it gets overlooked and blends in with everyone else lunch (but that won’t help the smell though).

After a long day of working in the coal mine (ok… I really am just another office drone) and dealing with rush hour traffic, I finally pull up to my peaceful home. But damn, there it is.

ANOTHER restaurant has tainted my sanctuary with their take-out menu pasted to my front door.

Every night I am greeted by another flyer advertising cheap food and crazy combos. I really am getting tired of restaurants "tagging" my home with their promotions. Can't they just be satisfied spamming my email and leaving my home out of this!?!

I understand they are just trying to make a buck, and spread the word about their NEW triple cheese, extra spicy, all natural taco-pizza-burger or some other crazy concoction.

Our neighborhood has become the battle ground for the various pizza joints and Chinese delivery places.  All trying to outdo one another with the most EXTREME dish they can come up with. Then they stealthy stalk our defenseless homes and without warning strike suddenly, leaving a flyer, a menu, or some other way for them to “mark-their-territory.”

In all honesty, I don’t mind a menu or two of a new place. I am eager to discover the next great restaurant (as long as it is not ANOTHER food truck). But now I am just fed up with always having to come home to a crowded door full of restaurant propaganda. If they want me to pay attention to their place so bad, stop leaving paper at my doorstep, and instead start leaving pizza. Some free food sitting for me when I got home would definitely get my attention. Or money…cash is always nice.

Well I guess I will just have to wait and hope that one day ONLY my email inbox will be stuffed with junk mail and not my home as well. Or if I am just too damn impatient to wait for that day, I could just get a bigger, scarier dog for our front yard.

Yep, the current Fed Up dog is not exactly doing a good job of keeping anyone from littering my home with junk mail.

Think about it. We ALL stare at that cereal box each morning. The rear side of box really is a blank slate that has so much potential. What if “where is the bathroom, ” and “my cereal is soggy” was translated on the back of a box in Spanish? Learning a new language would suddenly become easier (and tastier) for so many people. What if the basic principles of philosophy were outlined on the back of a box of Frosted Flakes? That PhD would become a lot more realistic for breakfast eaters everywhere. If “Tony the Tiger” became  ”Tina the Teacher,” and  if each box provided educational content, then the world would be a whole lot smarter. Parent’s everywhere would be thrilled to know they could spend less on private education and more on breakfast.

And of course we are not asking for “Snap, Crackle , and Pop” or “Captan Crunch” to be removed from the cereal landscape. These mascots could still grace us with their presence every morning: Couldn’t Froot Loop’s Toucan Sam teach us about rainforest conservation? The Honey Nut Cherrios bee could lecture us on the finer points of the “birds and the bees,” saving many gym teachers the embarrassment of teaching sex-ed. Hell, a box of Wheaties, the “breakfast  of champions,”  should  show you how to work off that pile of bacon you ate alongside the bowl of cereal. There is SO MUCH POTENTIAL!

It is kind of sad that there is an entire cereal box back dedicated to how to make a "Snack Mix." Is it really that complicated to mix cereal and nuts together? I bet we could fit a good portion of America's history in that same space, and we would be a whole lot better off.

Instead our boxes are just billboards for “Big-Cereal’s” propaganda,  which blatantly tries to get us to  purchase more of their products. Or even worse, when we must spend the morning getting a stupid rabbit to the end of a maze or tasked with completing some other boring game or puzzle printed on cereal box’s back.

And then there is a whole other level of crap on the back of the box…those ridiculously dumb recipes. Do we really need ANOTHER recipe for how to make “Chex mix?” I don’t think this recipe is so complex that it justifies taking up the entire back side of a family-sized cereal box. All you basically do is mix Chex with pretzels…

Maybe the cereal companies don’t realize that society would be so much more intelligent if they just sacrificed the back side of their boxes to provide valuable information. But I do understand how this space is a useful advertising asset for cereal companies, so they won’t just give it up. So… how cool would it be if the government subsidized ”Big-Cereal” to provide a serving of education along with a each serving of cereal. I am sure if Kelloggs got some tax relief, then they would not mind ditching their various promotions on the rear of their boxes in favor of some college level course work. There could even be quizzes on the back of cereal boxes that you could fill out and send in for your GED or some sort of doctoral certification. If there is online college programs, can’t there also be similar programs on cereal boxes?

For now though, I guess I will just have to be content with going through that maze ANOTHER time and possibly rereading about how to combine chex cereal and pretzels to make chex mix. At least there will be something tasty to snack on.

Cereal companies have accomplished great things. There boxes are filled with amazingly addictive food that has become the “crack of breakfast.” They have found ways to make it healthy and ways to make it highly processed so that it NEVER goes bad (have you ever seen stale Rice Krispies before? I sure haven’t). And cereal has now even become a popular morning meal world-wide. Now all they have to do is give us back our “free-prize-inside” and provide  a little early-morning-education, then this will be the perfect model of what a food should be.

But WOW, the world has changed.

Food trucks are everywhere, serving eveything, at every price. Its kind of a joke now. There is even at least one TV show dedicated entirely to food trucks and the grub they sell.

You know we have a slight food truck addiction problem when there are television shows focused solely on the trend. The Great Food Truck Race has had multiple seasons...and it is actually a decent show (but it is no Iron Chef).

Ok, from what I personally have noticed, there are some legitimate reasons for this onslaught of food trucks, and for this trend becoming so popular across the entire county.  The economical reasons to serve food from a truck rather then a proper building, definitely helped this trend grow. There is a lot less overhead and a lot less headaches. Plus, there is no rent to pay, only a small staff  is required, and you don’t have to clean up a flithy restroom at the end of the day. More importantly, if business is slow one day, then you can pack up and move down the street; And if business is slow one year, then you can pack up and move to a different career.

Just cause it is easier to open a food truck, does not mean we need everyone to start doing it. Food trucks really just seem to be another “trendy thing.” I am not trying to hate any specific truck, in fact I know many of them serve up amazing stuff. I just think the whole concept has reached a saturation point. Kind of like how frozen yogurt shops have become so freaking popular recently.  I like frozen yogurt, but it is nothing special or unique now that these “fro-yo” shops are everywhere. A food truck or two in every neighborhood is cool, but a food truck or two on ever corner is crazy.

I know I am starting to get sick of all the trucks that constantly show up at any event, whether it is a big-band rock concert or an 8 year old’s birthday. I don’t think I am alone in thinking thinking this too.  I bet one day we will all be nostalgic for a simple sit-down resturant. One with a wait staff, and a lengthy menu, and a full kitchen…and a restroom.

I came across this craziness while surfing the web. Our society's obsession with food trucks has gone too far.

A quick look at my hands reveal just how dumb I am...there are way too many scars from burning myself while cooking up a meal...damn those toaster ovens get hot.

Today I finally realized…me, Mr. Fed Up, is one of those dumbasses.

I have sliced my thumbs while slicing strawberries and I have smashed my hands when smashing sweet potatoes. But my  most common form of kitchen injury is the “burn.”  I seem to always forget to grab a mitt when pulling pans out of a 400 degree oven.  I neglect the use of tongs when trying to flip vegetables on a grill. My impatience for eating freshly made toast with melted cheese, has resulted in multiple cases where my sense of taste has gone numb from the burn-induced-blisters. When lifting the lid and checking to see if my crab boil is ready, excruciatingly hot  steam has frequently hit me in the face.  Whenever I carelessly reach in a toaster oven to grab a bit of food at the far back corners, those red-hot wires running along the base and ceiling inside the appliance have toasted my hands, burned my fingers  and singed my arms. Getting burnt is a weekly occurrence for me.

For a long time I was in denial, I thought I was not one of THOSE dumbasses on TV…but then, just today my Mother looked at my fresh burns on my knuckles resulting from ANOTHER toaster-oven-incident, and simple said, “You are stupid.”

Mom’s are pretty much always right in the end. So yep, I am stupid. In my rush and eagerness to make tasty food, I resort back to  caveman-levels of intelligence and focus solely on stuffing my face with grub as soon as possible.  I am sure many cavemen reached into their fire, carelessly burning their hands in the quest for roasted meat. Sometimes one’s gut instinct can be a life saver, other times it can leave you “burned.” But that does not mean I am going to start using oven mitts any time soon.

Maybe one day there will be more products that state the obvious, and remind us to not to put our hands in the sink disposer, or that  stoves really do get hot. But for now, we need to try and remember these things by ourselves…or deal with the consquences of forgetfulness or stupidity or carelessness or whatever you want to call it…I call it “instinctive behavior.”

Some berries in their natural state before they have been tainted by the "Sponge." They look tasty all on their own, and you don't feel like a complete dumbass for having them at your home...Does EVERYTHING need to be certified of by some TV cartoon?

Ok, I understand that in America we have a bad problem where kids (and adults) won’t stop stuffing their face with junk food, and often any vegetable consumed is first deep fried then doused in sugary ketchup. I mean have you looked as some of our condiments you can buy today? No wonder we have a “big” problem in this country.

So it makes sense to try and get children to eat their healthy veggies any way possible. By branding healthy options with popular cartoon characters, hopefully some couch-potatoe kids will be convinced to try something not from a drive-thru window…I mean if the king of the “square pants” is doing it, it must be cool.

But what I am fed up  with now is how these stupid cartoons are showing up on all of my food. Ok, YES I am just a big kid and I love my morning cartoons…but I really don’t want to open my fridge and see a package of brussels sprouts with some giant Disney-type character staring out at me each day. Plus, I feel like a freaking idiot sometimes when checking out at the grocery store with a cart full of food whose packaging makes it seem like I only bought a pile of those “snack-packs” each 6 year old has before nap time; or just went on a shopping spree at Toy’s R Us.

It just is really annoying how it seems  half the foods on grocery store shelves have some stupid cartoon gimmick screaming at us for attention…now if  we got “The Office’s” Dwight Schrute, or “24′s” Jack Bauer telling us to eat more spinach instead of some disproportional sailor (Popeye) who smokes too much, then maybe it would not bother me so much, AND our society would eat more “green” instead of grease.

Sponge Bob has ruined edamame for us all.

Oh, and I am sure you know those licenses to use the cartoons on those food packages and labels, don’t come cheap. So, the food industry is more than happy to pass along those hefty expenses to us, just so our edamame can be offically “Sponge-Bob-approved.”

But I guess kids trump parents when it comes to who is the more important consumer. So it looks sadly like Sponge Bob is going to be sticking around in my kitchen for a while longer…damn… I hate that Sponge.

In a world where you can get seedless grapes in any variety (black,red,white) why the hell would anyone purposely serve grapes that require for you to use surgical precision to dissect them before consumption. Or you must take the “watermelon-seed-technique,” by eating the whole grape and then having to spit out seeds along with half of the fruit. It is just stupid.

Some people, go to an extreme and take a snooty approach to the whole fiasco…they believe that they are too superior and well mannered to take a fork and knife to a grape, and they would never consider spiting anything out at the table. These people actually eat the seeds….now that is stupid too.

But really, the truly stupid people are the ones who go out and purchase these seeded grapes. In every grocery store, there are ALWAYS grapes of the seedless variety. Yes, occasionally there will be those large “globe” grapes that are seeded, and people may decide to pick those up due to their impressive size…but we really all know people who buy these oversized grapes are just compensating for something. These shoppers just need to get some self-confidence and realize the large grapes are just not worth it when you have to deal with those damn seeds. I mean if you really must try to impress your guests/friends with a bowl of large grapes, then at least try something even more creative like serving the grape-like Kiwi Berries I recommend.

Anyway…please help us get rid of this culinary pest. Boycott these seeded grapes so that we can prevent further victims from having to suffer their wrath. Together we can win this war and put an end to another stupid food that our genetically engineered farming techniques and advance technology can easily remove from our lives. I look forward to a bright future where seedless grapes will not threaten any potential meal.

This is a strange paradox. While I can understand such an approach being a reasonable evolutionary outcome (the high rate of selection enforcing a much quicker increase of the species’ fitness), I simply couldn’t understand why any self-aware organism would volunteer itself to be removed from the gene pool in a bid to increase the fitness of the whole species. It was quite a paradox, one that had me doubting the food’s self-awareness in the first place.

It seemed just too altruistic to be true.

But I have had to come to terms with it, and I have termed it “coming of edibility.” Food that is ready to test how alive it is by facing me, is alive enough to be eaten and fail the test. The Sarlacc, thus, decides who lives and who dies as a snack.

Odds are good for the dying bit. Free tip if you are of the gambling type.

I have, however, through astute observation, improved and maximized my approach towards food acquisition based on this trait.

The Sarlacc is probably the most powerful optimization force in the Universe. Given enough incentive, in the form of food, I am sure I could create a perpetual motion engine.

Admit it, you had to think for a bit and wonder if I was being serious.

Of course I was.

Where was I? Right, optimization. See, I noticed that the food that rarely got away (rarely being the keyword) was not seen again in a long time. It did not seem like a big mystery, managing to get away from the Sarlacc is rare enough to instill a newfond love for being alive in even the most suicidal lemming, but thanks to a particularly obnoxious and boisterous food, which I made sure I’d remember in case we crossed paths again (an unlikely event, given the tiny lifespan of these talking sacks of meat), I understood an additional social undercurrent in the food’s hierarchy.

The one that got away (and I still cannot understand what is so special about that phrase) and I crossed paths again. Given how terribly nonexistant my movement path is, the only way this could happen was for the food to come near again. And come near it did.

What I observed was quite enlightening. The food had, apparently, gained some notoriety inside its tribe, and was lording its newfond status over the rest. He had decided to come and “show them all” where it had all happened.

I am not unacquainted with this particular behaviour, I am a sight to behold (hold on the be, whatever it may be). But when the younglings of the tribe started to emulate their senior, amidst cries of fear, terror, and elation (from themselves and from the rest of the tribe) I realized that was opportunity knocking.

I of course ate the food. Quite a few of them… Except one.

The one that got away.

The one I let get away with it. It got away with its pride. And what a ruckus that caused! Surely this would be of some advantage. And it was.

This is all primal food behaviour, I am sure I do not need to explain it to you, my dear reader. But to voice the bovious, there was a dispute in the food’s hierarchy.

There were loud cries of excitement, angry threats, taunts and bewilderment. There was only one option of course. The food will try again. The Sarlaccdome, two food enter, one food leaves!

Usually no food leaves, but I don’t think they wanted to contemplate that possibility.

So they came at it again. The tribe watched breathlessly, two of their best came to taunt the almighty Sarlacc…

And miraculously, both got away again.

They tried a third time, getting even closer this time, challenging me even more. And still came on top.

The tension was palpable, the challenging food obviously having a hard time of it, and the crowd getting tense and restless, crowding like a crowd would trying to get a better view.

The best way to get a better view?

Getting a bit closer.

That’s because, you see, confidence is contagious. So is enthusiasm.

And so is Death by Sarlacc™. I managed to restrain myself long enough, and most of the tribe managed to get a vantage point to watch the race of these two… From the inside of my stomach. I am sure they gave those two a hero’s welcome once I swallowed them too.

Getting away strategy #17: When a food “testing itself” gets away, let another food from the same tribe go. while it not always works, the net result is a positive food flow into my belly.

Hat tip with the tip of my hat to the Specimen’s tip, I should be more open minded about baiting food with other food. Sometimes it IS useful!

I have received a few interesting visits these days. A few days ago, some floating box threw down a sacrificial Jawa at me. It was rather unexpected, and very welcome. It struggled frantically, as they always do, but made its way down my maw very cleanly.

There were cheers coming from the box, and one of its occupants made a curious comment:

“Wait for it, this is gonna be the easiest million credits we’ve ever made!”

Credits. I became familiar with the concept of money a long time ago. The idea of some token with which the food exchanged junk with one another seemed rather amusing. Ever since, I’ve been wondering what the going rate of a dozen Jawas could be.

Well, for some reason the food thought their actions would bring them a considerable sum of money, so I concluded that reversing the roles would possibly make me receive it; after that, it’d be a matter of finding a suitable food that would barter for the goods I wanted. So, with that in mind, I spat the Jawa back at the box, and the whole lot of them (Jawa, box, and its occupants) went up in flames as the thermal detonators they had attached to the Jawa exploded.

I never got the million credits, however.

The day after, some other food came and gave me a barrage of blaster shots, trying to kill me apparently. They sting like crazy though, so I was rather irritated, to the point that I half-burrowed while only leaving a couple of limp, useless tentacles behind.

“I think it’s dead.”

They shot some more at my tentacles, but I couldn’t move them.

“It’s not moving. Let’s go get its head, the bounty is ours!”

Now that made no sense. Or rather, it did from a food-thinking point of view, but not from that of an intelligent being. There was a price on my head. But here’s the killer: I don’t have a head.

Regardless, I couldn’t move the tentacles… because I wanted the food to take the bait and come closer. After they did, I got their heads and laid quietly on the sand, letting it soothe the stinging burns of their blasters. How uncivilized of them.

And the day after that, some other food came and doused me with some liquid and set it on fire. It was surprisingly hot, very relaxing. It seemed like a very useful kind of liquid to have, so I tested its use by lashing out with my tentacles to splash the food that had doused me with it. The results were mighty amusing.

I have to grudgingly admit that the food can be quite creative sometimes. Not very smart, but creative nonetheless.

After that last flaming one, the food left me alone for good. Or so I thought, until yesterday a curious visitor came. I heard the conversation between it and its companion as they came closer, walking slowly on the sand.

“I’m telling you, it don’t matter none how high you set the bounty, noone’s coming back to mess with this thing after what’s happened with the other bounty hunters!”

“I will not rest until that thing is dead! You hear me? Dead!”

“Whatever made you think that…”

“It ate my friends! I told them they were being stupid with all this cult of the Sarlacc thing, but they wouldn’t listen, and that monster ate them all!”

“Yer friends were those nutcase cultists? They had it comi…”

Their conversation was interrupted by a quick series of blaster shots that silenced the latter food. Interesting, apparently there were still some of my “followers” out in the wild. I thought I just had to wait and…

“You hear me you bloody monster? I’m gonna blow you to bits! You can’t reach here can you? But I can reach you!”

This food at least possessed some powers of observation, it was standing beyond the reach of my tentacles and too far for me to collapse the walls of my home to trap it. Only one thing to do. I searched my stomach and, with a loud rumble, spat a ball of food composed of some of my former “followers,” making it land just at the edge of my reach.

The fresh food gasped audibly but did not get any closer. I gargled and spat another, same distance. It started cursing me, but didn’t get any closer. I tried a few more times.

The food was in quite a state by then, but still maintained its distance. You may think that I was just wasting food trying to lure in the new prey.

But you would be wrong.

See, the primary purpose was not just to lure in the new food. True, it would have been an acceptable outcome, but ultimately the problem was that I was just too full.

No, not too full to eat more.

A Sarlacc is never too full for a new meal. If a Sarlacc tells you that, he’s just gunning for you to become his next meal, as fast as possible.

Then again, that is what a Sarlacc always aims for, by definition.

Going back to the issue at hand, the problem was that I was too full to properly maneuver under the sand. My body is much larger than most foods realize, since they do not get to see it buried under the sand. But when there is enough room, I can simply squash myself down to disturb the sand on the surface.

Disturb as in collapse. A larger collapse than most foods get to see.

A collapse large enough to trap the fresh food, and recover the partly digested ones. It was a most touching reunion party inside my stomach.

So, as I was saying in the beginning, I do not think the food predicted that the ultimate consequence of its actions would be to spend the next millennium inside my stomach.

They never do.

What a day.

I had some visitors today. This on itself is not an exceedingly rare occurrence, there is always some food that wants to dispose of some other food, and they are kind enough to share with me.

Touching, I know.

Often, the food knows that they have to be careful with what they do. I often wondered why food would knowingly approach me and put itself in obvious danger, until one informed me that they found the closeness to danger to be exhilarating and fascinating. Some sort of proof of their being alive. I wonder how alive it felt after I gobbled it down without chewing.

As I said before, the food’s intelligence seems to be rather rudimentary. Luckily, I do not need to fully comprehend the thought pattern of their minuscule brains in order to take advantage of it.

See, today’s visitors were not regulars. It’s not like I could tell the difference between more regular sacrifice-offering food and new sacrifice-offering food, my skills when it comes to identifying individual foodstuffs is reduced to asserting their tastiness (that’s Sarlacci for you, we are streamlined and efficient!), but the way they talked in awe of my imposing presence gave them away.

That, of course, put me on alert. A chance may present itself to exploit their lack of experience.

Their box floated above my home for a long time, I made twice my tentacle count in different frequencies of voices above me, and of all those only two seemed destined to meet my maw. The other food seemed greatly excited about getting a chance of seeing me munch on them, and in their excitement they made several rude comments about me.

I am not an excitable creature. But one particular comment grated on my teeth like a misplaced grain of sand on my tendrils.

“What can that stupid thing do anyway? It’s not like it can reach us up here, why the big deal about being careful from the boss?”

It was true, the box was high, beyond the reach of my tentacles. But I thought it poor form.

Patience.

After a short time… short for me, you understand, it must have felt extremely long to the food up there; I sometimes believe the food will die of old age on me when I’m taking a long time eating it, 50 years lifespan! Ahahaha! Where was I? Oh, yes, after a short time they finally decided to start the sacrifices. For what I gathered from the sound vibrations, they were throwing a piece of food down and making the other watch. Interesting, it meant everyone would probably be watching.

Down came the first food. I quickly reached with a tentacle and put it close to the maw. It was struggling frantically, but with a second tentacle I managed to restrain it. I wrapped it around its limbs, and put the tip on its mouth to stop it from screaming. Another second and in it went.

But I didn’t gulp, oh no. The food above sounded like they were having a grand time of it. It was perfect. I aimed carefully, and with a well executed spit, sent the food flying back up. There were some sounds, of surprise I assume:

“Woah!”

“Lookit him go!”

“He’s coming down again!”

I hoped I hadn’t thrown it too high. If it broke its limbs on the fall it would be of little use. An instant later, the sounds confirmed that I had made a perfect throw. I let myself feel smug for a while.

As I said, I thought the comment of the food to be in poor form. So I decided that a lesson – and a possible rain of food – was in order. For years I have been keeping the accessories of the food that falls into my maw, not just everything but the useful bits: blasters, vibroblades, all those “weapons.” I don’t keep grenades though, they give me some terrible gas if I swallow them by mistake. The blasters are not too bad, they sting worse than a krayt dragon bite, but they can be quite useful.

So I let the food grab some of these weapons – with it did with surprising enthusiasm – and spit it back onto the box. It was glorious, at the end of the day I had half a dozen meals inside my belly. True, these blasters make the food have a charred aftertaste not entirely to my liking, but one cannot have everything.

I wonder if the remaining food found the experience exhilarating or fascinating. Considering the excited cries calling for getting away as fast as possible, I can assume they did. And they didn’t even thank me.

How rude of them.