Omnivore Atlanta

Gourmet’s Melissa McCart writes about a recent culinary boot camp experiment to help Army cooks hone their understanding of technique, ingredients and flavor profiles. The chefs who participated in the training were recently deployed to Afghanistan, where they are now making meals for 600 to 800 soldiers at a time.

The Chicago Tribune dining staff ran an editorial story yesterday about all the phrases they hate seeing on menus. “World famous” and “garden fresh” were among their most loathsome clichés.

If you liked the Hardee’s Biscuit Hole ad that Cliff put up last week, you’ll love these new salacious marketing treats. The Western fast food chain Carl’s Jr. is featuring MTV The Hills star Audrina Patridge in a television commercial for their Teriyaki Burger – “It’s more than just a piece of meat.” And Burger King is currently running an unimaginative, super suggestive ad in Singapore for their BK Super Seven Incher burger.

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UPDATED BELOW (04/22/09)

I’m sick as a dog with either the worst cold I’ve had in years or the flu, following nearly two weeks of horrible allergies. So I’m barely eating. I just browse the Internet between naps.

This week’s Viral Video Chart is of course topped by Susan Boyle’s performance on Britain’s Got Talent. But this video from some workers at Domino’s also made the top 20 list:

Police have charged the two Conover, N.C., employees with distributing prohibited foods. Domino’s claims it was all a prank and the food was never delivered. Sure, sure.

Fox News has the story covered in detail, and provides links to a couple more videos.

UPDATE: The YouTube video has been banned but you can still see the two Domino’s employees in action here.

This video from Burger King, a strange commercial, also went viral during the last week:

The Texican’s marketing in Spain caused the Mexican ambassador to write an outraged letter to Burger King, which has in turned killed the ad and other marketing materials. It’s all about inappropriate display of the Mexican flag. Yahoo has the story.

Another recent Burger King vid has the morality police up in arms too. This time the complaint is about (the formerly gay) SpongeBob SquarePants’ eroticizing of the booty:

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I just filed my end-of-year Grazing rant, part of which was devoted to the rise in consumption of fast food because of the recession. In looking around the Internets, I came across this clip of Andy Warhol eating a hamburger in Jørgen Leth’s 1982 film “66 scener fra Amerika,” a Danish film whose title means “66 scenes from America.”

The scene is reminiscent of Warhol’s own early style of sitting cameras before people for hours and hours. As a teenager I used to go to a hidden-away art theater owned by George Ellis, who played the horror-show host Bestoink Dooley on local TV, to see Warhol’s films. I’m talking the super-boring ones like 8-hours of the Empire State Building, just standing there, in “Empire.” And there was the 3-plus hours of “The Chelsea Girls,” actually six hours projected on a split screen.

At one point, Ellis owned a theater at Ansley Mall, where he screened Warhol’s “Lonesome Cowboys,”. I was there the night the theater was raided by the police and the projector shut down.

Eating a fast food burger — Burger King, I think — seems like a perfect performance piece for an artist who was obsessed with repetition, icons of pop culture and tedium. Have a look and imagine yourself in his place.

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There’s little I find as inhibiting to intimacy as the smell of fast food. I’d rather kiss a smoker than a Burger King patron.

Apparently, many people feel differently. Burger King is now marketing a men’s body spray, Flame, that draws its olfactory inspiration from the Whopper. I kid you not.

The company’s marketing material describes it as “the scent of seduction with a hint of flame-broiled meat.”

The good news is that, being only $3.99, it is already sold out.

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Apparently the King is dropping wallets. Still waiting on an Atlanta siting.

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Ever wanted to take revenge on restaurants that done you wrong? Here’s one Atlantan’s problem:

I was in high school, and needed a job. I applied at a local restaurant called “Atlanta Bread Company.” The manager at this particular restaurant was a complete bitch. I could go on forever about how she made me wait for an hour only to talk to me like a child, but… just trust me. This whore needed to be slapped. I did not slap her, though. Nay, I simply walked out peacefully and held a grudge for 5 years. Not a day goes by since then that I don’t drive by said restaurant and get a bitter feeling in my stomach.

Yesterday, I went to a Burger King. I’m not a huge BK fan, and this day reminded me why. The service was slow, the food was disgusting, and the cashier (who was clearly the product of a brother/sister marriage) was as much of a bitch as the bread lady.

That’s the setup. You have to read the entire (funny) post here, in order to understand how the writer plotted simultaneous revenge on both restaurants…if you can call the recording below revenge.

Got that? This person must have an easygoing disposition to find this adequate vengeance for five years of bitterness and a really bad burger.

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Just in case you missed it, here’s the video of the dude taking a bath in the kitchen sink of the Xenia, Ohio, Burger King where he worked:

Burger King has issued this statement:

We have sanitized the sink and have disposed of all other kitchen tools and utensils that were used during the incident. We have also taken appropriate corrective action on the employees that were involved in this video.

Additionally, the remaining staff at this restaurant is being retrained in health and sanitation procedures.

Here’s a follow-up interview with the culprit. Mainly, it’s voice-over on the video above, but the culprit does appear at moments in his usual attire, looking even more fetching than he does in the tub.

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Speaking of fast food, NPR’s “Morning Edition” featured a brief piece about Burger King this morning. Unlike McDonald’s and other companies, Burger King refuses to pay an extra penny per pound for tomatoes from Florida. The extra penny is to improve the lot of Florida’s migrant tomato pickers, who have not had a raise in 20 years!

Listen to the 3-minute piece, including Burger King’s lame excuses, here.

(Image from Duncan’s TV Ad Land)

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