Things That Make You Go Boom

A non-exhaustive list of flatulence-causing foods. Add more in the comments! Looks like nothing is safe!
Source: The Internet

Apricots
Artichokes
Asparagus
Baked beans
Bananas
Bagels
Bean salads
Beer
Beets
Black-eyed peas
Bog beans
Bread
Broad beans
Broccoli
Brussel sprouts
Cabbage
Carrots
Cauliflower
Celery
Cereals
Cheese
Chickpeas
Chili
Corn
Cucumbers
Dressings
Eggplant
Field beans
Fruits
Garlic
Ice cream

You fall within the normal scale if you produce between 1 to 4 pints of gas per day.

Kohlrabi
Leeks
Lettuce
Onions
Parsley
Peppers, sweet
Seeds
Lentils
Lima beans
Mung beans
Peanut butter
Peanuts
Peas
Pinto beans
Most individuals release a little burst of air through the rear quarters approximately 14 to 23 times each and every day.

Potatoes
Pretzels
Prunes
Raisins
Red kidney beans
Sauerkraut
Sodas
Soybeans
Barley
Breakfast cereals
Granola
Oat bran
Oat flour
Pasta
Pistachios
Rice
Rice bran
Rye
Sesame flour

Cows actually burp and toot so frequently that they are responsible for about 15 percent of all the methane gas produced worldwide. This would mean that they are really not very environmentally friendly critters.

Sorghum, grain
Soy milk
Split-pea soup
Stir-fried vegetables
Stuffed cabbage
Sunflower flour
Tofu
Tuna
Wheat bran
Whole grain bread
Whole wheat flour

Do We Eat Too Much?

I have been mulling over the question of whether or not we eat too much. Do we really need three meals a day, or will one or two suffice? Even if we eat healthily, are we being wasteful by eating too frequently? And is there too much emphasis on food in our lives?

Do a quick Google search for "eat too much" and you will find all sorts of sites about eating too much meat, not eating enough meat, eating too much salt, and not eating enough salt. It seems like every few years something on the "do not eat" list becomes healthy and vice versa. So don't despair, in ten years scientists will announce that gorging oneself on salty, oily, sugary, snacks is good for you - only, gorge in moderation.

A rather long article in Time magazine boils it all down to society and culture: "We eat together when we celebrate, and we eat together when we grieve; we eat together when a loved one is preparing to leave, and we eat together when the loved one returns. We solve our problems over the family dinner table, conduct our business over the executive lunch table, entertain guests over cake and cookies at the coffee table."

We have moved food from being merely a means for survival into a social ritual. But, nutrition and parties aside, food has unquestionably infiltrated itself into other aspects of our lives. So much so that even our lexicon is overflowing with gastronomically related expressions:

- to chew the fat
- too much to stomach
- spews forth information
- hunger for knowledge
- thirst for the truth
- bit off more than he could chew
- bite sized pieces of information
- eating her words
- have his cake and eat it, too
- to eat humble pie

...and so on and so forth. No wonder we are all so food-focused.

As interesting a picture as this may paint for you, whether you like it or not, food is on your mind.

How to Open a Coconut

I was surfing the web and came across a very informative site called www.howtoopencoconuts.com. It shouldn't surprise me that such a site exists, but I found it amusing that there is an entire website dedicated to showing you how to open a coconut.

The way this website advises you to open the coconut is by delicately tapping holes in the end of the coconut and then draining the liquid (coconut water). Once the coconut water has been extracted, gently wrap the coconut in a towel and then sledge the thing with a hammer until pulverized. You may wish to bare your teeth, yell and think of something that makes you angry. I call that a bonus.

The funny thing about this method is that at the top of the website are the following words, "but we humans can't just sit around and let monkeys show us up, right?" - yeah, right. Monkeys can crack open a coconut with their bare hands, a banana peel and a pebble, but we use rusty nails and hammers. Sure, we are much smarter than them.

This got me thinking about the most efficient method for opening coconuts.

I went to About.com, which is a great resource for advice on almost anything. They suggest that after draining the coconut of its juices (by using a corkscrew to poke it in the eyes), you whack the coconut with the blunt edge of a knife. If that doesn't work, bake the coconut in the oven for 15 minutes and then whack it with the blunt edge of a knife. I think they like whacking things with blunt edges of knives.

WikiHow suggests that you hold the coconut in the palm of your hand and have a go at it with the blunt edge of a machete. "Hey, can you hold this coconut for a minute while I go crazy over it with a machete? Don't worry, I'm only using the blunt edge". Ah, no. Live-Food.com shows you a video in which the person demonstrating how to open the coconut wields a meat cleaver the size of Greenland and then tells you not to cut your fingers off. Thanks for the advice.

Jeremy and Michael, whose coconut-opening video is featured on lonelyplanettv.com, demonstrate their somewhat unique method. According to these two outdoorsey types, all you need is a swiss-army-knife, a coconut, a car jack and a heavy off-road vehicle. Simply puncture the eyes of the coconut with the swiss-army-knife and prop the coconut between the car jack and the underside of the heaviest part of the car. Pump the jack until the coconut explodes under the pressure.

So there you have it. If you are planning on getting yourself stranded on a deserted tropical island, all you need to take with you is a hammer, a nail, a towel, an oven, a corkscrew, a large, meat cleaver, a swiss-army-knife, a car jack and a heavy 4x4. I don't know about you, but to me it seems easier just to bring along a monkey.

Popcorn

The art of popcorn-making is dying. I remember when my father passed on the secret of popcorn-making to me one night. We were standing by the stove and he was shaking the pot over the open oven flame.

Not too much oil.
Not too much heat.
Shake. Shake. Shake.
And the fourth secret, which I am not at liberty to disclose.

I was never much good at making popcorn, despite that I know the fourth secret. The last time I tried to make popcorn from corn-kernels over an open flame, I wasted a bag of popcorn and about an hour and a half. There were times, though, that I got it right and the corn popped perfectly. I dubbed myself "The Popcorn King". I seem to have lost the knack and thus the popcorn throne. My shake-the-pot technique has been found wanting - and then there's the fourth thing, which I don't do very well. But I can't tell you what that is.

So now I do what the majority of the popcorn-eating population do. Either I buy it ready-made from a popcorn vendor, or I use the microwaveable stuff.

The popcorn-vendor popcorn is not bad. The machine spits out a decent popcorn, but then it is a risky business. You have to be careful from whom you buy - and I doubt they do the fourth thing, which as you know by now, I can't share. Trust me, I doubt they do it. At least not in public.

Microwaveable popcorn is certainly the easiest method. It is quick, reliable and tasty. The manufacturers have hit on the right blends of fatty oils, preservatives and salt. You can buy the salt reduced or salt free varieties, but then, what's the point? Believe it or not, there is actually an art to making microwaveable popcorn. Well, I wouldn't go so far as to say that it's an art. It's more of a skill.

You see, the popcorn manufacturers can't test every microwave on the market, so the instructions are very general, "...on the highest setting for between 2 and 4 minutes". In my microwave, four minutes is popcorn murder. Complete incineration. Now, I don't know about you, but to me it's much more fun creating black, inedible kernels while standing over a stove furiously shaking the pot and doing the fourth thing (which I can't reveal) than it is standing there watching the popcorn burn inside the microwave.

You really have to have the knack, even when using the microwave. It is certainly a matter of trial and error. You have to learn how your microwave behaves. You have to feel what it feels. See what it sees. Understand its psyche and get inside its mind. A microwave is like a person, each one is different. If you understand one, it doesn't mean that you understand them all. My microwave, for example, is schizophrenic. Sometimes two minutes is enough. Sometimes it needs up to three. Four minutes is completely out of the question and even three can be totally lethal.

So I stand by the microwave. Watching. Listening. Feeling. And when my instinct tells me that the popcorn is ready, despite the heavy popping sounds, I quickly flick it off. Too long and the popcorn is toast. Not long enough and I end up with more crunchy, teeth-killing kernels than I would like. The timing has to be perfect to get the right ratio of edible popcorn to unpopped kernels.

But even when the microwave gets it right, it's a real shame I can't do that fourth thing.

The Product Every Supermarket Lacks

Go down to your local supermarket and take a look around. What is missing? Come on, think. What is it that you have always needed but could never find in your local grocery store? Any ideas?

Okay, I'll give it to you: ham or latke flavored soda.

Now you are kicking yourself because it was so obvious that you should have guessed it right off. CNN reports that this "holiday season" Jones Soda Co. in the United States is marketing a number of new flavors that have always been missing from the American diet, including ham flavored and latke flavored soda. Both kosher and caffeine free.

I don't know about the ham one, but I wonder about the latke flavor. Did the product development team fight about whether it should taste like store-bought, instant or home-made latkes? Also, do you have to drink through a thick layer of oil before reaching the actual soda? That could really put a damper on the fizz.

Just in case you were worried that the other traditional Channukah flavors were being left out, you should know that the Jones Soda Co. Channukah Pack includes all your favorites, such as Apple Sauce, Chocolate Coin and Jelly Doughnut flavors (while stocks last). Sounds...scrumptious.

According to the CNN article (and please, don't eat before reading the next bit), "For its contract to supply soda to Qwest Field, home of the Seattle Seahawks, Jones came up with Perspiration, Dirt, Sports Cream and Natural Field Turf. The company -- fortunately or unfortunately -- prides itself on the accuracy of the taste."

Now, I can see how they got it right for the ham and latke flavours, but perspiration flavor? Field testing must have been fun. Can you imagine the Jones Soda Co. executives around a large board-room table testing out the Perspiration flavour before it went to market?

"Glad you all could make it to this taste testing. I'm Bob from Product Development. We have here what we think is a winner for the Perspiration Flavor line of sodas. Okay, Jack, being the CEO you can go first. Drink from bottle number one and tell me what you think."

[Jack drinks]

"Um. It's good. A bit salty. I don't think my perspiration is that salty. What do you think, Jim?"

[Jim drinks]

"Yeah. I think Jack is right. His perspiration really isn't that salty."