Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, January 19, 1994 TAG: 9401250272
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 8 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: DEBORAH S. HARTZ FORT LAUDERDALE SUN SENTINEL
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
But even if you won't be nibbling junk food anymore, you still might enjoy digesting a few fun facts about them.
Try taking this quiz. We've gathered some little-known facts about processed foods from ``I'm a Spam Fan'' (Longmeadow Press, 1993) by Carolyn Wyman. After reading the questions, just ``name that food.'' Then check your answers and score your knowledge of processed foods. Good luck.
1. During a record cold spell, 11-year-old Frank Epperson left a mixture of powdered soda pop mix and water with the stirring stick still in it on his back porch overnight. What food resulted?
2. At the company's annual picnics, the co-founder of this food company would take a sledgehammer to a cinder block resting on his partner's stomach (a trick the man learned while taking a course on carnival techniques at Oberlin College). What company did he help start?
3. What food company has an entire plant in Rockland, Ill., devoted to cracking eggs?
4. What food was invented by an American Indian chef taking revenge on a disgruntled customer?
5. What food product would you get free if you winked at your grocer on the appointed day in 1907?
6. In 1976, what food was used to lure baboons back to a zoo in King's Mill, Ohio, after their escape?
7. What product failed to sell when shoppers found it tasted like bananas?
8. What food product is a young Korean man likely to bring to his girlfriend?
9. What food product's recipe is known to only four people inside the company's Dallas headquarters? (The recipe itself is locked in two different city banks in case disaster destroys one of them.)
10. What must you chew to cause triboluminescence (a phenomenon where light is emitted when certain substances are rubbed, crushed or broken)?
11. Puerto Rico is the sales capital of this product, which is used to make La Mexda, a combination of this product, mayonnaise and Spam. What is the product?
12. What food product was represented by chef ``Little Oscar,'' who was only 10 wieners tall?
13. In 1976, author Wilson Bryan Key said that this food had the word ``sex'' baked onto its surface so people subconsciously would link eating it with doing it. What is the food?
14. There are 22 of these in every box and if you are lucky, you will get at least one of each: bear (sitting and walking); bison, camel, cougar, elephant, giraffe, gorilla, hippopotamus, hyena, kangaroo, lion, monkey, rhinoceros, seal, sheep, tiger and zebra. What product is this?
15. What is the most important ingredient in a Walkabout, a snack enjoyed by Southwesterners as they walk around fair or rodeo grounds?
\ ANSWERS
1. This one is easy: The Popsicle.
2. Ben & Jerry's - Jerry took a sledgehammer to Ben.
3. Sara Lee.
4. Potato chips. One night in 1853 when Commodore Cornelius Vanderbilt was dining at a restaurant in Saratoga Springs, N.Y., he sent his french fries back to the kitchen because they were too thick. Meaning to annoy the commodore, chef George Crum cut the next batch paper thin. Vanderbilt loved them and so did lots of other customers.
5. Kellogg's Corn Flakes.
6. Twinkies.
7. Swanson fried chicken TV dinners. A banana-scented yellow dye used to decorate the box covers was not allowed to dry long enough before food was packaged in them. Swanson sold the whole lot of banana fried chicken to a food chain in Florida that said their customers preferred the new taste.
8. A 9-pack of SPAM - it's a taste the Koreans developed from the SPAM that regularly flowed from U.S. military bases.
9. Dr Pepper.
10. Winto-O-Green Life Savers (you may have to eat the Life Savers in a closed closet with a friend, though, so you can see the sparks coming out of your partner's mouth).
11. Cheez Whiz.
12. Hey, we give this one away: Oscar Meyer Wieners.
13. Ritz Crackers.
14. Barnum's Animal Crackers.
15. Fritos corn chips. To make a Walkabout, open a snack-size bag of Fritos and plop in some chili, cheese and onions. Eat it with a spoon.
Now Rate Yourself: 1 to 5 answers correct, you haven't been eating your Wheaties; 6 to 10 answers correct, help yourself to another Twinkie; 11 to 15 answers correct, congratulations, you are the Jolly Green Giant of processed food trivia.
by CNB