Tuesday, November 20, 2007

It's Green-Bean Casserole Time

In this article, the Washington Post profiles the dish that is oh so familiar to the dinner table at Thanks- giving:

MONTVALE, N.J. -- Here, in a gleaming stainless-steel test laboratory, six employees in hairnets and white coats are peering at our Thanksgiving destiny. It is a tray of French's French Fried Onions, or FFOs, those succulent morsels of oil and shame that must top the green bean casserole that must appear on 30 million groaning tables on Thursday.

They must taste like reliability itself, a polestar of Americana in an era of artisanal persimmon-infused oil glazing haricot verts.

... The ideal FFO is a nice round O, or at least a crunchy strip. That's what they're after, here in the lab, where they perfect the recipe that is mass-produced and lands, in 2.8- and 6-ounce containers, in supermarkets from coast to coast (with biggest sales in the Midwest, of course).

... To ask why we eat FFOs is an attempt to get at the root of Thanksgiving gluttony itself. There is no reason except that we are Americans and it is our God-given right.

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