Author: Steve Cavers

Again, today I step away from Second Life to look at food.

I’m not a picky eater. I’ll dig into Kraft Dinner as eagerly as a proper macaroni dish, and not complain that it tastes like petrochemicals. After all, Kraft Dinner has no pretentions of being more than it actually is: crappy dried pasta with fake cheese powder. But sometimes there’s a huge difference between what’s advertised and what’s actually in the package.

Take this example of Lilydale “Latitudes” pre-cooked chicken breast. I assume it’s aimed at busy professionals who enjoy a grilled chicken breast in a “chef prepared sauce”, but don’t have time to grill or saucify anything. Me, I’m just lazy, so I picked up a package of the “fajita” style chicken breast. The photo of a juicy, tender chicken breast with red and yellow peppers was irresistable to a lazy twit like me.

Well, I got my just desserts, and before the main course even. Inside the package was not a whole breast of chicken, but catfood-style chicken shreds in a homogenous goo. Was this package supposed to be in the petfood section? It looks horrible!

Obviously, this is an extreme case of false advertising. The package clearly says “whole chicken breast”, but it actually contains pulped and shredded… something. I guess it might have been chicken at some point, but then again, it might just be yak vomit.

Note to self: next time, just buy the chicken and grill it yourself. That or buy the same thing for a fraction of the price from Miss Mew.

Today I set aside my Second Life endeavours to explore a myth that’s very important to me. Or at least to my stomach.

Picture this: Craving a little guacamole for your chips, you buy a couple of avocados at the supermarket. When you bring them home, your heart sinks when you realize they’re hard as rocks! Totally unripe.

But don’t give up hope. Assorted experts on the intertubes claim that you can speed the ripening process by placing the avocado in a paper bag. Some say you should put a banana or apple in the bag with it, but others say that’s not necessary.

So today I put on my Mythbuster hat and attack this one pseudo-scientifically. I have two very unripe avocados, and placed one in a paper bag (as the experts suggest), but left the other exposed on the counter. Let’s see which one ripens faster. If they ripen at the same speed, “myth busted”, as Adam and Jamie say. According to the experts, it can possibly take only a day, so I’ll post the stupendously thrilling results later.

And yes. This is the kind of thing I do when I’m bored.

UPDATE! – Sept. 25

No changes to report. Avocados still unripe. More news on this amazing experiment later.

SHOCKING CONCLUSION! – Sept. 26

Today I removed the avocado from the bag and discovered that it was ripe enough to eat. And so is the other one. Hmm.

So what can I conclude from this fiasco? Putting an avocado in a paper bag doesn’t make it ripen any faster than it’s unbagged counterpart. Also: This was a colossal waste of time.

And now: guacamole.