Snack Tray: Stepford Wives Love Fructose!

My fellow Americans, can we stand by one more nanosecond and permit the Swift Boating of our sweetheart of the heartland? We refer, of course, to the backbone of American nutrition, high fructose corn syrup. Why, it's just liquid goodness fresh-squeezed from Mother Nature's bounteous teat—and yet some corn-hating meanies want to demonize the magic elixir. Well, it won't happen while the Corn Refiners Association is on watch. The CRA, a kind of NRA for the FFA, has struck back with a pro-fructose website, SweetSurprise.com, and a series of commercials that tells the truth about corn syrup—that only uptight women and dorky guys would dare question its nutritional value; that hot skinny babes evidently down the stuff by the flagon; and that Big Sugar's nefarious brain-clouding on the subject evaporates the instant it is challenged. Shuck this, Michael Pollan.

• If not for AlwaysHungryAB, we wouldn't have found this blog post, which relays the news that the five-year-old Christopher Pizza Company on Demonbreun's Restaurant Row will soon close its doors: "I'm not psychic or anything, but there were signs that day-to-day operations were not running with their usual amount of dysfunction. Things that should take days to fix (and would normally take weeks to fix) were taking months to fix. More than anything, I could tell the boss had changed....The question most people have asked me is: why close? I'm not sure I ever got a straight answer from Christopher on that one. My own personal (and by no means official) theory is that Christopher had the choice to renew his lease with jerk landlords (who are raising rent) and he declined." Make sure you click the very odd links.

• What do you get when you mix equal parts apple cider, banana liqueur and Drambuie, add limeade, then top it off with a stout portion of root beer schnapps? The name says it all.

• Speaking of which: "Escamoles are the eggs of the giant black Liometopum ant, which makes its home in the root systems of maguey and agave plants. Collecting the eggs is a uniquely unpleasant job, since the ants are highly venomous and have some kind of blood grudge against human orifices. The eggs have the consistency of cottage cheese." On Cracked.com's list of the six most terrifying foods in the world, this is only No. 6.

• Can you truly call yourself an omnivore? The true test can be found in this fun timewaster—courtesy of Kira at Food Alla Puttanesca, who posts side by side two lists of 100 foods any self-respecting omnivore should have under his belt. The first, which originated at Very Good Taste and quickly circled the globe, gathers a sampling of diverse dishes from poutine and umeboshi to the good old PB & J. (My score was a woeful 56/100.) The second, from Tigers & Strawberries, compiles a strictly vegetarian list running the gamut from artichoke-spinach dip to paw-paw. (Score: 76/100. Yesss!)

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