Stuff and listeria hysteria

It is after the holidays and a number of gifts baskets that were given have been disassembled and the stuff that was in them is ready for consumption.  Hence today’s offering being called “Stuff”. 

Our stuff for today!

Something different!

Nor sure what the moose has to do with toffee!

The spread!

There is a tendency for some of these baskets to have weird things that profess to be gourmet. Sometimes they pull it off and sometimes they don’t.  The thing we had today that would fit that category would be Asher’s Dark Chocolate Smothered Potato Chips.  Asher’s byline on the package is “The Official Chocolate of Everyday Life.”  It seems a tad presumptuous, don’t you think.  These were ridged potato chips with a lot of dark chocolate on them.  If you were worried that taste combination would be strange, not to worry because you could hardly taste the chip.  The chocolate was very good but a little more of the salty taste might have made it even better.

Smothered potato chips?

More chocolate than potato!

So much for Hershey's!

In addition we had a chocolate bar from Chuao chocolatier, which we had never hear of but is based in San Diego. It was called “Peace, Love and Peppermint”. It was their paean to the glee of the holiday season.  This was a dark chocolate bar with small pieces of smashed candy cane.  We are not fans of candy canes, particularly when they are smashed into things but here the pieces were small enough so the mint taste did not overwhelm. It wasn’t so bad and the chocolate was pretty good. 

It sounds more unappealing than it was.

Not so bad after all!

Other stuff included some piroullines, the tube-llke wafers with a chocolate filling, and some toffee shortbread cookies. The latter were very good and nice and buttery as shortbread should be.  We noticed from the nutrition facts that if you ate two thirds of the small box you would have gotten your full day’s requirement of saturated fat.  Good stuff!

Classic piroulines!

Get your saturated fat right here!

We are hoping that this did not turn out to be last cake hour for one of our colleagues.  Apparently he is a purchase of Dole salad mixes that have been implicated in a listeria outbreak. If he was unlucky enough to get one of the recalled lots he might succumb over the weekend and in the worst case scenario, never return.  He isn’t really in a big risk group, not pregnant or immuno-compromised, for example, but far be it from us to downplay his concerns. This will teach him next time to just buy a head of lettuce. Here’s hoping we see you on Monday!

Listeria and salad story here: http://www.cdc.gov/listeria/outbreaks/bagged-salads-01-16/index.html

 

Will he make it?

Got Doled onto salads!