Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, September 8, 1993 TAG: 9309230290
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: JEFFRY SCOTT COX NEWS SERVICE
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Rock bands (Green Jelly, formerly Green Jello)
Rock singers (Jello Biafra of the Dead Kennedys)
Jell-O wrestling
Jell-O shots (a mixture of liquor and Jell-O)
Memorable moments in the movies (John Belushi's Bluto inhaling a bowl of cherry Jell-O in ``National Lampoon's Animal House'')
An all-Jell-O restaurant (Hello, I'm Jell-O)
A tongue-in-cheek seminar on the history of Jell-O at the Smithsonian Institution (during which the recipe ``Primordial Aspic'' premiered)
Research comparing the wave patterns of the dessert to those of the human brain (it's a tie).
THE JELL-O FILE FOR JELL-O- PHILES: SPOONING THROUGH PRODUCT'S PAST
Did you know the inventor sold out for a mere $450?
Hold a bowl of Jell-O upside down and shake it and it will produce a wave pattern identical to the electroencephalographic waves of the human brain, according to Dr. Adrian R.M. Upton, a Canadian researcher. Does that mean Jell-O has an IQ, and is it higher than the genius columnist in Parade magazine? Nobody knows. But the professor says the test raises the ethical question: How can a person, in good conscience, throw out a bowl of Jell-O when it can't legally be declared dead?
A lot of people think Jell-O is made from the hooves and horns of animals. Not so. General Foods says Jell-O is made from refined ``collagen-bearing tissues of any animal slaughtered for food purposes.'' The collagen, typically extracted from hide trimmings, is converted to gelatin. The gelatin is cooked in pure water, which is filtered, then evaporated, to produce dried gelatin.
Jell-O was invented in 1897 by a Leroy, N.Y., maker of cough medicine, Pearl B. Wait, whose wife, May Davis Wait, came up with the name. Jell-O sales hit $181 million last year, of which Wait heirs collected exactly nothing, because Wait had the foresight to sell the business in 1899 - for $450.
Jell-O started with four flavors - lemon, orange, raspberry and strawberry - and today comes in 20 varieties. Strawberry is the most popular. The newest flavor, watermelon, was introduced in June. Berry blue became the first blue Jell-O when it premiered in 1992. It's now the third most popular flavor. Some flavors have flunked. Two were brown. Chocolate was one. See if you can guess the other (Hint: It wasn't good to the last drop).
Bill Cosby will celebrate 20 years as a Jell-O spokesman in 1994, which means he's had more longevity than Mr. Whipple, and stayed a lot busier than the Maytag repairman.
There's a Jell-O museum in Rochester, N.Y. But the dessert's main claim to icon fame is a Smithsonian Institution conference on Jell-O history held two years ago. Exhibits included a pastry and orange Jell-O melange entitled ``Undescended Twinkies.'' Among the lectures: ``Jell-O and Jack Benny'' and ``White Religious Cults: Lime Jell-O and Little Marshmallows.''
General Foods says it does not endorse the use of Jell-O in alcohol drinks or in Jell-O wrestling, a fad a few years ago.
It's not nice to mess with General Foods. Remember the band Green Jello? Probably not. Anyway, they're now Green Jelly. General Foods lawyers lean hard on trademark interlopers. In Greenville, Miss., a guy opened an all-Jell-O restaurant, calling it ``Hello, I'm Jell-O.'' Lawyers growled. Now he's in an Augusta mall, and his place is called ``Hello, I'm Gelatin.'' Guess his rhyming dictionary didn't make the trip. May we suggest: ``Come On In, I'm Gelatin,'' or ``Don't Bother to Knox.''
You were asking about gelatin in the movies? Without it, Charlton Heston (playing Moses) couldn't have parted the Red Sea in ``The Ten Commandments.'' Gelatin also had a strange, cameo role in the sex-slave movie ``91/2 Weeks.'' And in ``Jurassic Park,'' in the middle of a human feeding frenzy, you'll notice a raptor saving room for a lime gelatin dessert.
by CNB