Food News Today Transcripts for the week of November 28th, 2011

Ladies who love burgers, the produce label that also acts as soap and does eating sweets make you a sweet person? For November 30th 2011, this is Food News Today.

 Good Morning, we are now streaming on our SupermarketGuru Facebook fan page and on Food News Today.com. If you have any thoughts or comments on today's show, tweet me -@phillempert- or send me a note on Facebook, immediately following today's broadcast we will continue the discussion on Facebook. 

Food News Today is sponsored by ConAgra Foods, who shares with me the desire to provide the most current, interesting and unbiased food news.

Let's start our last November show with today's useless food history fun facts!  November, where did you go? I bet you didn't know that today is national mousse day - no, no that mousse - nope, not that one either… There you go, the choclatey stuff, mmm.  And for an exceptionally useless fun fact,  today in 1858, John Landis Mason patented the Mason Jar. Do you know any fun food facts you'd like to share? Let me know. If I use your fact I'll send you a SG Canvas Tote.

>We frequently describe people as sweet, sour, fiery, and bitter – but have you ever stopped to think if maybe these types of people actually like the associated foods? Well, a recent study looked at a preference for sweets and what that person’s personality was like. Scientists actually found that a liking for sweeter foods was an indication that a person is more agreeable and helpful, but not extroverted or neurotic.

In one of five studies involving more than 500 people, researchers from Gettysburg College in Pennsylvania, St. Xavier University in Chicago and North Dakota State University, showed that people who ate a piece of chocolate rather than a non-sweet food were more likely to volunteer and help another person in need.  Aw, how sweet!   In another study researchers found that people also associate having a sweet tooth with a pleasant disposition. The participants were shown photos of people with neutral facial expressions, but with comments under the pictures that would say, for example, that they liked eating chocolate.  People actually rated those associated with sweet food higher in agreeableness.  The research is published in the Journal of Personality Social Psychology. 

>Do you always remember to wash your produce before you eat it? Well, now you probably will.  New York electrical engineer and designer Scott Amron has come up with an idea that could transform the way the industry labels fruit and vegetables as well as consumer compliance in washing their produce.  It’s the Fruitwash label.  And just as the name suggests, the new label, when wet and gently rubbed, dissolves into an organic fruit soap that helps remove water-resistant wax, pesticides and fungicides. Currently the labels ingredients are being kept secret, they are designed to outlast the fruit they label.  The process of adding water and rubbing the label triggers the dissolving action, which transforms the label into a fruit wash. Alternatively, the stickers can be peeled off and thrown away. Amron hopes to bring the labels to market within the next 6-9 months. 

>On another note, it seems elderly ladies and burgers go well together. Some 27 years after the famous “Where’s the beef?” commercial for Wendy’s which featured a feisty Clara Peller with a couple of cohorts, the White Castle chain just had its own lower-key engagement with a silver-haired female.  Ninety-year-old Constance Huening was named into the White Castle Hall of Fame. She was one of 11 inducted this year, and one of only 80 inducted since the Hall’s 2001 launch for their allegiance to the distinctive burgers. 8,000 applied reported Cincinnati.com.  Her proof: apparently she ate a slider on her latest birthday milestone, just as she’s done since she was a child and every New Year’s Day for good luck. Besides the warm, traditional aspect to this story, there’s an underlying cleverness here.  While fast-food chains are often criticized for the nutritional composition of their foods, White Castle has some fun with one of their longest-living fans – a person who looks absolutely fine despite her periodic burger cravings.  Nothing like indulging every once in a while.

What's on your food mind this week? Tweet me @phillempert or post your comments on our SupermarketGuru facebook page or shoot me an e-mail.  Thanks for watching!