Potato Chip News: Man Hits Another With His Car Over Potato Chips

Here's the link, but just in case that fails...

NASHVILLE, Tenn. – An argument over a bag of potato chips led to a brutal assault in East Nashville. A car was involved and the victim ended up with a broken leg.
Travis Patton told police he was inside the Z-Mart convenience store at 803 Dickerson Pike with 24-year-old Timothy Floyd early Monday morning.
Before they walked out, the victim said Floyd bought him a bag of potato chips and then asked Patton to pay him back.
Patton said he thought Floyd had bought the chips for him and just walked out of the store. He told police he didn't think anything of it until he saw Floyd drive up on the sidewalk and hit him with his car.
Officials said Patton sustained a broken leg. His family was nearby and was able to take him to the hospital.
"I didn't know he was hurt until I saw him hop on one leg over to a grey car. He was trying to get help," said Geraldine Jackson, Patton's aunt.
Police arrested Floyd not far from where the incident happened. He was charged with aggravated assault and driving with a revoked license. They said he should not have even been driving because his license was suspended.
Floyd was booked into the Davidson County Criminal Justice Center. 

Wow. Does Timothy Floyd blog about his love of potato chips, too? Geez.

The Hunt Begins!

Oh my goodness! Can't wait to get ahold of these!
http://www.fritolay.com/lays/index.html
Here's  great article about the contest:
http://www.fastcocreate.com/1682425/how-lays-got-its-chips-to-taste-like-chicken-and-waffles

Herr's Pizza Flavored Potato Chips

This video was a long time in the making and I'm really happy with it. My parents, the two other crazy people you'll hear in this recording, are the ones who got me into tasting stuff. They always have new snack products around the kitchen to try and we always experiment when we go out to eat or to events. Both of them are great with words and fantastic at storytelling, so I thought they'd make excellent potato chip testers. This slideshow proves that I am correct, again!

                                                                                                 

Potato Chip Pop-Up Visit: A Slideshow

Here's a slideshow of mine and Dante's visit to the Potato Chip Pop-Up at Iam8bit Gallery, 2147 W. Sunset Boulevard, Los Angeles, CA 90026. We went on December 21, 2012. Enjoy!

Nutty Brewnette at BJ's Restaurant and Brewhouse

I went out with a couple of my old co-workers just to get together and celebrate a few things at once. I've always had really good experiences at BJ's and obviously like brewhouses, so, despite the fact that the particular location they wanted to go to was in a mall, and this is the holiday season, I was excited to go and see these folks. Plus, I remembered that this BJ's had an outside entrance so I didn't have to actually go into the mall. Yay!

Jeremiah Red and Nutty Brewnette

 I normally order their house-made Hefeweizen, which is where I discovered that Hef is actually really great by itself, sans the added squeeze of citrus.  But, I felt like I should try something new and different. I couldn't decide and the server was too busy to help, so I ordered a sample of BJ's Jeremiah Red Irish-Style Ale and the Nutty Brewnette American-Style Brown Ale. If they failed, I'd just get a pint of Hef and call it a night. But the server proved to be so busy he forgot my order. First he brought me a strawberry lemonade. Then, he brought me a full pint of the Brewnette and said he'd be right back with a sample of Hef. I took a quick sip, and told him to forget the Hef. The Brewnette seemed to be fine.

Nutty Brewnette: Not a blonde!

I took a minute to taste it and it was actually really nice. It was flat and mouthcoating. It had a very distinct and strong flavor of caramel, but it wasn't salty or too sweet. There was also hints of sweet spices such as cloves and cinammon, as well as a pecans. It had elements that can be sweet, but the ale itself was not sugary in any way. 

My experience with darker beers is that their flavor is usually lost or severely distorted by most food, but I must've chosen a good pairing in the Mediterranean Pizza, because the beer and the pie were delicious together.  

A fun night with people I miss seeing on a daily, a yummy pizza and a great dark beer.  

Learning How To Taste Beer

The Beer Flavor Wheel

As I've mentioned before, I wish I had a better vocabulary about tasting things. Luckily, my friend, Aram, showed me a tasting wheel. I'd never seen such a thing, but was happy that someone had fashioned one particularly for tasting beer. 

There are a few different beer tasting wheels that I've found after searching the internet. It turns out that all of these show basically the same thing, they're just organized differently. The Beer Flavor Wheel is the one Aram found and showed me on his phone while we sat at the bar. I like this one because there are more descriptions to choose from. I found that the Beer Aroma Wheel was the easiest to look at, but I would use as an initial tasting wheel. If I needed a further description I'd turn to the more inclusive Beer Flavor Wheel.

Beer Aroma Wheel

I was originally confused about the terms "odor" and "aroma," because in my mind they refer to the sense of smell. I didn't know you were supposed to smell beer! Well you are. Check out this guide on how to taste beer. Very informative. I always smell everything anyway, but I never thought to really sniff it like when wine tasting. My other problem with aromas, or the tasting wheels, rather, was that the wheels were really focused on the aromas and had very little about taste. Like I said, as I'm going through these wheels I'm thinking of the last beer I drank, which was very caramely, but according to the wheel, that's just supposed to be aroma and not taste. So, again, I turn to the guide: 

 Taste: Raise the glass to the lips and swallow enough of the beer to allow it to wash the entire tongue. Try to separate the hop taste and the malt taste. Are they well balanced for the style? Balance is the blending of all of a beer's properties - bitterness, acidity, esteriness, hoppiness, etc. The more malted barley used (in relation to the water), the more full and powerful the taste. Is the body full or thin? Beer can be dry, (lacking sugar) and with a usually strong bitter hop character, or fruity (the presence of sugar), or rich (a full taste of malt and fruit). How is the aftertaste? The aftertaste should confirm the taste. Is it clean and pleasant? You want to experience a slight degree of aftertaste... 

Flavor: By far the most important and enjoyed element of drinking a beer is its flavor. To best taste all the flavors of a beer, make sure the liquid visits all four areas of your tongue: bitter, sour, sweet and salt. Take special notice of the orchestration of the balance between the hop bitterness and malt sweetness.
Flavor as "Maltiness": Malt provides the yeast the food to make much of the beer flavor. This can be described as a sweetish or dryish "earthy" flavor. A heavier roasted malt will also contribute a degree of "roasted" taste to the beer. What grapes are to wine, malt is to beer.
Flavor as "Hoppiness": Hops provide an "herbal, crisp, bitter, palate cleansing" effect to beer. Aromatic hops provide the herbal "grassy" nose, while bittering hops provide the gentle bitterness or "bite" in beer.

That's very helpful and makes me want to go out and get a sampler and some beer glasses. To beer tasting, my friends! 

  

Last Night the Music Killed My Taste Test

This evening, Dante and I stopped at Mendocino Farms for dinner before I dropped him off at work for the graveyard shift. They have really interesting and delicious sandwiches there, if you've never gone, I highly recommend ordering a familiar sounding sandwich because more than likely, there will be some ingredient that gives you a little pleasant kick in the tongue, as has been my experience. And their spicy dijon potato salad is truly divine.

Mendocino Farms also has baskets full of chip varieties you just don't find too many other places if at all. Well, Dante and I got our sanwiches, sides and chips and sat down to enjoy them. We were going to start by recording a chip tasting of the Sour Cream N Chive and Barbeque flavors of Route 11 Potato Chips, but almost right before we started, this mind-scrambling music started playing overhead and it totally threw me off my chip-tasting-game. My crazy response to the music influenced Dante and there we have the perfect storm of bad taste tests. It is funny nonetheless. Enjoy.

Oh, the music festival I refer to is the Moogfest, and if you go to the Live In Concert from All Songs Considered site, you will see some Moogfest concerts available so you can experience them for yourself. That's just not my kind of music.