Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, November 12, 1993 TAG: 9311120038
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: By MIMI EUBANK and DAVID M. POOLE STAFF WRITERS
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
You know, life in a cool West Side apartment with a bicycle on the wall and boxes upon boxes of cereal in the kitchen. Have a zany neighbor who models Calvin Klein briefs, find out if you are the Master of Your Domain, and check out John-John's butt at the health club.
So the episode last week about nonfat frozen yogurt was the opening we were looking for.
For those who missed the yogurt episode, here's the plot: Jerry and Elaine, horrified to discover they are looking a little chunky, suspect that their neighborhood shop is loading up its nonfat frozen yogurt. They discover there is FAT in the yogurt and, in the process, clinch the New York mayoral contest for Rudolph Giuliani.
We decided to find out if the local nonfat yogurt was too good to be true, even though we might be a couple of weeks too late for the governor's race. Sorry, Mary Sue.
We started at Baskin-Robbins at Towers Shopping Center. To ensure our test results, we tried our best imitation of Elaine, sans a "wall of hair and face like a frying pan."
"I'll have a small [pause] Truly Free Cafe Mocha in a cup [swallow] to go. That's nonfat, right? 'Cause I'm on a special diet and the doctor said I can't have any fat."
It was good. Really good. Snatches of dialogue came to mind.
Kramer: "It's got a remarkable texture. You'd never know it was nonfat."
Newman: "I've been waiting for something like this my whole life! And it's finally here!"
George: "How can this not have any fat? It's too good!"
We had the same reaction when we sampled Fat Free Peach at TCBY out past Tanglewood Mall.
But we knew that we had stumbled onto the Great Yogurt Conspiracy (Jerry: "Who knows how deep it goes?") when we tasted the nonfat Dutch Chocolate at Mr. Sundae's, formerly Freshens, at Crossroads Mall.
It was creamiest, richest, chocolatiest, must unbelievably fat-free frozen yogurt of all.
Jerry: "This is so [expletive] good!"
The woman behind the counter assured us that there was no fat. "That's what it says on the box," she said.
Our next stop was Virginia Tech, where they have a bunch of cows and people in white coats who test all things bovine.
Walter Hartman, plant manager for dairy foods research, ran the three "specimens" through his test tubes, centrifuges and other test-like equipment. It was just like the lab in "Seinfeld," except there were no chemist babes and no politicians having their blood work done.
(We had considered including a sample from I Can't Believe It's Yogurt. But after tasting the nonfat Mandarin Chocolate, we could believe it was yogurt.)
The test results were not surprising. Baskin-Robbins and TCBY's yogurt turned out to be absolutely fat-free. Not even a trace.
The verdict for Mr. Sundae's was - to quote Jerry - FAT.
Two separate tests showed the vanilla yogurt had at least 0.7 grams of milkfat per 8 ounces - above the 0.5 percent standard for nonfat products set by the federal Food and Drug Administration.
Craig Gould, a co-owner of Mr. Sundae's, was surprised by the results because his supplier assures him that the yogurt is nonfat. Gould said the store might conduct its own lab tests.
Gould, himself a "Seinfeld" fan, said he thought the yogurt episode was hilarious.
"I'll get people who will stand there and say, `You sure this is nonfat?' "
Now they know.
We hope we haven't spoiled things for nonfat frozen yogurt fanatics.
Newman [crying in despair]: "It was good. I was enjoying myself."
by CNB