You wouldn’t think the genome sequencing for an ear of corn would turn out to be one of the most complex sequencing that scientists have concluded.  The reason for such complexity is that about 85 percent of its DNA is composed of transposable elements — segments of DNA that can move between locations.

I’ll admit, that one of the methods I use to determine my liquor choices is packaging.  If a bottle is well-designed, be it scotch, gin or rum, then I’m more apt to plunk down $20-$30 for a bottle. 

The Dieline examines 50 such bottles that would get my business whether or not the product is any good.  Despite the overabundance of Absolut Vodka bottles, it’s nice to see to Portland spirits make the list.  That both 12 Bridges Gin and Lovejoy Vodka (both are crafted by Integrity Spirits, whose Trillium Absinthe also made the list but I haven’t partaken yet) are excellent tasting spirits in their own right is an added bonus.

If you’re wondering that’s the Hawthorne Bridge on the bottle.

I’m not surprised by any of the breweries on this list, nor am I surprised by their ranking.  I don’t really consider Sam Adams (Boston Brewery) a craft brewery anymore.  They’re just too big, too national; they’ve traded in their quality of product for the ability to compete with the macro-domestics.  But otherwise, you can’t go wrong with any of the breweries on this list.  They’re all making great, quality beers.

My 10 favorite from this list would be (in no particular order): Deschutes, Magic Hat, Matt Brewing Co. (Saranac), Stone Brewing, Dogfish Head, Lagunitas, Brooklyn Brewery, Rogue, Abita, and Shipyard.

Even with the recession and some fast food chains doing well, Arby’s is clearly the one joint falling behind.

Perhaps most significantly, the meat of the business isn’t particularly good. On Friday, I stopped into an Arby’s for the first time this millennium. It was clean, and I noticed an array of products beyond the bare-bones menu I recall from my Midwestern youth. Moneybox may be a food snob, but he is a nondiscriminating connoisseur of street food and greasy fare who still makes the occasional run for the border at Taco Bell. (Don’t tell Mrs. Moneybox.) But even I had difficulty completing the reporting for this assignment. Forget about salads and vegetables. As I scoured the menu—the gyro, the french dip, the patty melt—I had difficulty identifying anything that had gone through less processing than uranium. A few bites of a roast beef sandwich slathered with goopy cheddar sauce, and I was done. On the food chain, the thinly sliced beef is about as far from Boar’s Head deli meat as Boar’s Head oven-roasted ham is from the vaunted jamón Iberico.

Well, okay, it probably is the roast beef.  But the restaurant doesn’t even have anything else to offer customers aside from it’s namesake sandwich.  Not a good business decision.

It weighs in at 222.5 lbs. and comes courtesy of Nonni’s Restaurant in Concord, N.H.  Anyone wanna takes bets as to whether or not it was fully cooked on the inside?

On the NY Times small business blog, Bruce Buschel shares 50 things restaurant servers and staff should never do.

1. Do not let anyone enter the restaurant without a warm greeting.

2. Do not make a singleton feel bad. Do not say, “Are you waiting for someone?” Ask for a reservation. Ask if he or she would like to sit at the bar.

3. Never refuse to seat three guests because a fourth has not yet arrived.

4. If a table is not ready within a reasonable length of time, offer a free drink and/or amuse-bouche. The guests may be tired and hungry and thirsty, and they did everything right.

More establishments should heed the advice of #4.  The list is handy for not just restaurant servers and owners, but also customers.  It’s a nice road map for determining if a place goes above and beyond.  There are too many restaurants in your city to eat at a place that doesn’t provide excellent service.  The next 50 will follow next week.

From the mad chef himself: “They are not a pilot for some new, family friendly, watered down follow on. They are instead brief, often violent, alt versions of NO RES–representing things we could never have done on the actual show-or the way things should have gone on the show–or animated acknowledgments of what already went terribly wrong on the show. Or, for example, my take on the network’s “Travel Bug” promo campaign–about which I was, shall we say…dubious.”

Episode one has already hit YouTube, but others in the web series will hit on the Travel Channel website. [via]

Thomas Keller, world-renowned chef of The French Laundry/Per Se/Bouchon had the chance to rekindle his relationship with his absentee dad shortly before the old man passed away at 86.  Really, if you read one story about how cooking and family and forgiveness can heal a soul, buff out the hard edges to a person, this would be it. “Mr. Keller ate many of the dishes in the book with his father at Ad Hoc. Even after the accident they would go, despite the physical challenges of getting his father out of the house. Ms. Cunningham said she used to worry about how customers might feel watching the famous chef feed his father.“Here he was taking care of his father just like a baby,” she said. “For Thomas, it didn’t make the slightest difference. Whatever he could do to make his dad comfortable he did.””

One of the problems of any kitchen, especially small ones, is how to store spices.  Sure you could throw them in draw or get one of those rotating carousels, but honestly, those aren’t particularly good solutions.  Right now, I’ve got these small magnetic tins attached to the side of my fridge.  The problem with that is they aren’t particularly attractive and they always get knocked off into the vortex between the fridge and counter.  You know, that nefarious space where things go to disappear and die.

Anyway, for $44 Yanko Design has created this cool Zero Gravity Spice Race.  It comes with 12 custom spice canisters and a magnetic base that half of them will stick to, making use of vacant wall space. So you can get your spices to hang above the stove or where ever, but definitely out of the way.

Given how the Bills’s season has unfolded, and well, the past 80 some odd years, isn’t it time the City of Buffalo receives good news?: “Most experts predict that wing prices will continue to rise at least until the Super Bowl in February, when a lot of wings are sold and prices peak. Even afterward, demand looks set to remain strong. Pizza Hut announced this month that it would expand the availability of its wings menu, which it calls WingStreet; in 3,000 stores today, the menu will be added to 2,000 stores in the near future. Adam J. Scott, a founder of Wing Zone, an Atlanta-based chain with 80 restaurants in 20 states, said the days of cheap wings might be gone forever. That is, unless something changes on the supply side.”

It shouldn’t be too hard to genetically modify some chickens in a giant factory warehouse in the middle of America to keep cheap wings on the table.  Afterall, the City of Buffalo needs this.  They depend on this.  Can’t we think of them?  If not me? [via]

Huntington, W.V. is the unhealthiest part of the good ole U.S. of A.  No?  Don’t believe me?  Try these stats on for size, courtesy of the CDCA: Nearly half the adults are obese, the area leads the nation in incidences of heart disease and diabetes; the poverty rate is 19 percent almost 50 percent of people 65 and older have lost their teeth. 

Grim shit all around. 

Luckily, though, they have British superstar chef Jaime Oliver on their side.  The Super Chef has become something of a healthy-food community organizer over the past several years and the NY Times gives him the lengthy profile treatment. 

Earlier that day, Oliver met with a pediatrician, James Bailes, and a pastor, Steve Willis. Bailes told him about an 8-year-old patient who was 80 pounds overweight and had developed Type 2 diabetes. If the child’s diet didn’t change, the doctor said, he wouldn’t live to see 30. Willis told Oliver that he visits patients in local hospitals several days a week and sees the effects of long-term obesity firsthand. Since he can’t write a prescription for their resulting illnesses, he said, all he can do is pray with them.

This is so bad, but amazing, no terrible, omg I want one, 1,500 calories in one sandwich, but donuts! burger! bacon! cheese! I don’t know.  I just don’t know. 

Anyway this was a big hit during Massachusett’s Big E, where 17,000 of them were sold.  Apparantly, it originated in Georgia (figures) but has since been exported to Scotland where they deep fry this (because Scotland has figured out how to deep fry everything).  I would get drunk and eat this, that’s all I’m saying. [via]

And yup, that was the sound of the French’s gastronomic and cultural street cred going up in a poof of smoke.  I honestly find this funny, but in a sad sad way that McDonald’s is opening a restaurant and a McCafe at the most visited museum in the world.

“This is the last straw,” an art historian working at the Louvre, who declined to be named, told the Daily Telegraph. “This is the pinnacle of exhausting consumerism, deficient gastronomy and very unpleasant odours in the context of a museum.”  He went on to say, “I’m not against eating in a museum but McDonald’s is hardly the height of gastronomy.  Today McDonald’s, tomorrow low-cost clothes shops.”  The horror!