Beijing’s Peking Duck Restaurant, run by the same family for five generations, has a seating capacity of 9,000 – nearly half the seating capacity of the entire MCI Center. No table is left unoccupied for more than a few minutes.
There is actually a term for the fear of peanut butter sticking to the roof of your mouth: “arachibutyrophobia.” Now try saying that with peanut butter stuck to the roof of your mouth.
Hands off my chocolate stash, buddy.
- The Swiss lead the world in chocolate consumption per capita – roughly 22 lbs of chocolate per person per year. Americans eat roughly 10 lbs of chocolate per person per year.
- Chocolate was first manufactured in the U.S. in 1765 by the John Harmon Company.
- The country that produces the most cocoa? Africa.
- Dark chocolate may lower risk of heart disease for the same reason touted for red wine: each contain substantial amounts of flavonoid phenolics.
- Chocolate is 20% protein, 40% carbohydrate, and 40% fat.
- Cocoa beans were once used as currency in Mexico (used extensively in trade by native Indians).
There actually was a “Chef Boyardee,” an Italian immigrant who came to the U.S. in 1914 when he was 17 years old. (The Italian spelling of his name is actually “Boiardi.”) After working at New York’s Plaza Hotel, Boiardi moved to Cleveland, where customers asked for bottles of his spaghetti sauces to eat at home. Boiardi obliged, added cheeses and pasta to the sauces, and an industry was born. Next time you’re in the grocery and see cans of that now-slimy canned pasta, look for the Chef Boyardee picture – that’s him.
The National Soft Drink Association writes that soft drinks now account for nearly 30% of Americans’ beverage consumption. That is equivalent to more than 576 12-ounce servings per year, translating into more than 4,300 teaspoons of sugar. Now that’s just gross.