Frivolous Rant of the Day

Props to my Salem neighbor, Dan Cederholm, for his packaging design critique. Funny how the "conveniences" of modern life often end up being somewhat of a pain in the ass. My personal pet food packaging peeve is health food that comes in NASA grade therma-sealed plastic with no reclosable pouch. Does the company think that their product is so good that I will eat all of it in one sitting? Tofurkey ain't bad on whole wheat with a little provolone and mustard with baby spinach, but damn, it ain't that good. Since I often end up making a sandwich with Tofurkey at 7:45am with seconds to get out the door, the poor packaging design is a definite drawback. There's the cardboard outer layer, securely glued together on both ends with no perforation, then the thick plastic inner shell with no detectable tear-off strip. And after one has managed to hack open both, there's no way to seal the packaging back up, so one end's up with a small bag of Tofurkey Jerky in their fridge after a day. Luckily I happen to have that "Anal Retentive Chef" gene, so I seal the whole mess up with a Ziploc baggie before I put it back in the fridge. And another thing, there's no friggin' expiration date on the package! I don't think you can get Listeriosis from tofu, but the tofu you get in the white plastic tub ususally goes slimy after about 4 days. How is Tofurkey any different?

If you are a carnivore and still actually reading this, let me let you in on the vegetarians' dirty little secret; "Health Food" is only called that because you bought it in a store with better lighting and Miles Davis playing over the speaker system instead of Madonna. Even though soybean is probably the world's biggest legal crop, and simply needs to be grown,harvested, processed and shipped, rather than fed, slaughtered and processed, faux meat products cost almost two and a half times what actual meat costs. It's as if the entire health food industry has assumed that the only people who don't want to eat meat are doctors, lawyers, and real estate brokers.

You want to know the secret to finding healthy, easy open food without taking out a lien on your mortgage? Shop at asian markets. There's something oddly satisfying about paying $1.09 for a good sized package of pre-fried tofu (trust me there's no other way you want to eat it) while someone yells for a pricecheck on chicken gizzards over the loudspeakers in Vietnamese. If you are a vegetarian on an actual budget, don't go to Whole Foods for anything except Burts Bee's Foot Balm and meatless gravy, go here:

Mei Tung SuperMarket: on that weird no man's land strip between Chinatown and the Ladder District. Everything from incense to Nutella at low,low prices.

Super 88 Markets: These are starting to crop up everywhere. Lots of selection, usually they have a deli too.

Ming's Groceries: Washington St., near the Herald building: Absolutely the best if you have the time to really poke around. Most of the packaging is in an asian language, so it helps if you find something good to remember what the packaging looks like. They also have the cheapest porcelain figurines and vases in town! Recommendations: Sun Silk brand shampoo and conditioner, vietnamese rice vermicelli noodles, Nong Shim instant noodle soup and the bulk spices.

Frivolous Rant of the Day