Cookaholics Bulletin Board

Nance, I felt exactly the same way.

Last week my one of my grandsons celebrated his last year of grade school before moving on to junior high school. We let him pick the restaurant and he chose Applebee's. What a disappointment. I kept thinking about the book and remembered one of the few things prepared on site are the steaks. Well, maybe so but we took home as much steak as was eaten. The place was packed. I don't get it

fitzie

I agree Fitzie. I've never eaten at Applebees and after reading this book will certainly not break that record! Everything is so processed and pre-prepared, zapped in m/w, and so little fresh produce. Blech.

One thing the book reminded me of was that "back in the day", Pierre Franey and Jacques Pepin were very involved with Howard Johnson's. Ironic, we've come so far yet marched in place.

Nance

When my parents take us there, I like to start with a nice big Mudslide. Makes the rest of dinner much tastier.

Really?! Wow, I would have never guessed from their food.

Amy

Excerpt from the book: "Jacques Pepin, a celebrated chef of 1960's New York, ran the central commissary of HoJo's in Queens, while his contemporary Pierre Franey took a post as vice president and traveled the country for the company doing quality control for the company - even serving his gourmand friends reheated frozen meals on the sly as a way to test their quality".

An interesting article written by Jacques Pepin, talking about his apprenticeship at Howard Johnson's:

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/28/opinion/28pepin.html

Nancy

Yeah, if you read The Apprentice, he spends two chapters talking about HoJos. He liked it there, for a while.

Eat This Book is a lighthearted, well-written and highly entertaining romp through the bizarre and grotesque world of professional competitive eating ("gurgitating"). Ryan Nerz, the author, is also one of the chief promoters of the IFOCE (International Federation Of Competitive Eating), so he has great stories of competitions he MC'd, profiles of individual competitors, and bite-by-bite stories of pivotal or funny events.

Recommended, especially if you're on a diet and want something to help tame your appetite. Nothing like reading about some guy scarfing 16lbs of butter to make you want to skip lunch entirely.

Fuzzy, I am probably not going to read the book, but am curious if the author talks about the health of the competitors. I have wondered if competitive eating screws up people's digestive systems or causes any health problems. The amount of food those people consume seems to defy the laws of biology and physics. I can't stand to watch any of the competitions.

This is right up my alley but damn, my upstate library doesn't have it!!! NYP LIbrary does but that will take weeks.
Thanks Fuzzy. This is the kind of book I love to read in the summer.
Nance