September 14, 2017 • 18 mins
Here’s what happens when wild fact-finders are accidentally released into a supermarket… Join us for a bonus Fact-Off, featuring Researcher Gabe.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey there, podcast listeners, Welcome to Part Time Genius. Now.
As many of you may remember from a bonus episode
a few weeks ago, our lead researcher, Gabeluisier was in
studio with us here in Atlanta, and he was here
a few days and something weird happened during that visit,
and I felt like you should all know about this.
So we just left the office. We were all headed
to dinner, and Mango throws out this fact about Little Debbie.
(00:22):
And then you can't just throw that out there and
not share the facts, all right, so let me just
share it with the audience. So basically, unlike Aunt Jemima
or joe Is Suzu, who were pure marketing inventions and
like the ideas of copywriters, Little Debbie was actually a
real person. And she was the granddaughter of the company's founder.
And what's strange is that her granddad used her image
(00:44):
without her parents permission, and her parents were pissed about.
I bet they were, yeah, And of course years later
she became an exact at their company and then so
it all worked out. That's all you have to do
to make somebody happy, all right. So that was the
fact that Mango shared with us. I thought it was
a good fact, and and and so Gabe then made
a comment about how many interesting facts are just sitting
on the shelves of the grocery store. And we just
(01:04):
happened to be passing a Kroger on our way to dinner.
So that gives Mango an idea. And now I should
preface this by saying, we're talking about the same Mango
that so many listeners have described as always sounding happy,
and many of them have said I feel like I
can hear him smiling. But what they don't know is
just how competitive Mango can be. So Mango just says
(01:26):
pull over. I didn't say that. I think I said
something like, I've got an idea. You can't get me
pull into this parking lot. Well, I don't know if
that's how he said it. And in fact, we have
Gabe with us here on the line. So so, so, Gabe,
can you back me up a little on this one.
I mean, I think he might have said I've got
an idea, But yeah, the way he said it sounded
urgent and earn enough, we should probably pull over. True,
(01:50):
that's true. Any anyway, Mango then explains his idea. So
so we'd each walk to the middle of the grocery store,
and he said this with such a serious face. We
knew this something very real. And so then after saying
one to three go, we'd all have sixty seconds to
run two different parts of the store take pictures of
three items that we then wanted to share facts about.
(02:12):
But we'd have to be back in the center aisle
before the sixty seconds was up, and if we were late,
he said we'd be disqualified. And he didn't even want
to hear our fact. Again, I didn't say any of
that day. Packed me up here. We're getting kind of confrontational.
Don't put me in the middle of this, guys. I
really I don't remember what he said exactly, but let's
just say this was definitely a side of Mango I
(02:34):
hadn't seen before. The man was ready to compete, all right.
So so before I could even ask questions or confirm
whether it was one to three and then we could
go on three or whether it was one to three, go,
I feel like Mango just screamed go, and then I
found myself running like a madman all around the store.
It took me a few seconds to remember what we
(02:55):
were actually trying to do. But so here's what you
need to know the facts from this episode of there
was volts of that sixty second dash. So now that
you know who to thank or blame for this one,
let's get started. Hey there, podcast listeners, welcome back to
(03:25):
Part time Genius. Okay, So we talked about this ridiculous
game that Mango put us up to, and for some reason,
Gabe and I agreed to. So we each pulled three
facts from the grocery store, and Gabe as our lead researcher,
We're gonna let you start off first. I can't even
actually remember which direction you ran. I was so focused
on my first stop. So so, so what did you
find first? Right? So I made a bee line for
(03:49):
the candy aisle and came away with a big bag
of jelly belly jelly bean. And I did that because
I knew they would give me a chance to share
some ridiculous facts that one of the most notorious jelly
beans fans, none other than our forties president Mr Ronald
Reagan's right, And yeah, it's it's no secret at this
point that Reagan loved jelly beans, but I don't think
(04:12):
most people know that he was particularly passionate about jelly bellies,
and I mean for this arrangement he had with the company,
he actually began receiving twenty four pounds shipments every month
during his time as governor of California, which, if you
do the math, because about ten thousand, two hundred beans
every thirty days, that is insane. I Yet, I've heard
(04:33):
that Reagan was a big fan of jelly beans. Mango said,
you'd heard that as well, But I didn't know that
it was especially jelly bellies. And I didn't realize the
quantities of these. But so why did he like them
so much? Anyway? Well, yeah, he first started eating him
when he quit smoking in the early sixties, so they
served a practical purpose, you know, beyond simple snacking. But
(04:55):
Reagan also seemed to appreciate jelly beans is some kind
of litmus test for the people he mad. So this
one time he said, quote, you can tell a lot
about a fella's character by whether he picks out all
of one color or just grabs a handful. But anyway,
that's great. Yeah. So, as weird as all this sounds,
(05:16):
the kipper's jellybelly love of there wouldn't have each peak
insanity until he made it to the Oval Office. So,
for instance, the company created a new blueberry flavor jelly
bean for his inauguration back in one and they distributed
more than three tons of them to the attendees, and
it only got crazier from there. So Reagan upped his
standing order to a staggering seven hundred and twenty bags
(05:39):
per month, over three hundred and six thousand jelly beans,
and he has those distributed among the White House, Capitol Hill,
and a few other federal buildings every month. And he
even stocked the beans on Air Force One, where he
kept them in a specially designed jelly bean holder that
wouldn't spill their in turbulace. Yeah. So, you know, plenty
(06:02):
of Americans continue to honor President Reagan and all kinds
of ways, but I think the most fitting one is
this portrait of him made from ten thousand Jellybelly jelly
beans that hangs in his Presidential library. And Simmy Valley, California,
that's pretty incredible. Well, you got us off to a
good start with your first fact, Mango, you wanna you
want to take the next one? Yeah, So I just
went to the High Museum exhibit of Warhol in Atlanta
(06:25):
from from Aisle seven come all the time, okay, And honestly,
if you haven't gone, it is amazing. And I'm not
even that big a Warhol fan, but seeing like all
these giant mouths together on the purple wallpaper that Warhol
had designed for the Paris exhibition, I mean, it is incredible.
But of course, so when I passed the Campbell soup cans,
(06:48):
I I knew I had to snap a shot. And
and there are a couple of things I love about
the Campbell Soup series, Like the first is that Warhol
loved the soup and how consistent every flavor was, Like
he actually appreciated that tomato soup always tastes like the
same tomato soup, which kind of plays a role in
the arts philosophy. And I also love that he hated
that Campbell's discontinued some of the soups, Like he made
(07:10):
a portrait of all the thirty two soups he could
find at the time, but he actually wished that they
still made his favorite soup, which was called mock Turtle.
What is that? I know, It's apparently a Campbell soup
that was supposed to taste like turtle soup. But uh,
it's popular in London, but not not a mock turtleneck. No, no,
But here's my actual fact about the series. So in
(07:31):
a book called I'll Be Your Mirror, which is a
collection of Andy Warhol interviews, Warhol gripes that despite everything
he did for Campbell's, they never sent him a single
can of free soup, and he genuinely loved the product.
It was kind of weird that they didn't send himself.
That's pretty great. Actually, I had another fact that I
was going to start with, But I do have a
Warhole connection in one of my facts, all right, and
(07:53):
I'll get to that connection in just a second. But
you know, I had to run as quickly as I
could to the pop tart section. I know this wouldn't
surprise you, Mango. So so Mango knows this about our family.
But every year we go on a beach trip in
the summer, and that's the one week of the year
that my wife, Georgia, allows the kids and me to
eat as many pop tarts as we want. Otherwise we're
(08:13):
never allowed to have pop tarts in the house, and
so we'll buy like ten or fifteen boxes of these
things to try, all the different flavors, all the nasty
new ones, just for the sake of trying them. But
here's the weird thing. I learned about pop tarts recently.
So Kellogg actually wasn't really planning to make them, But
in nineteen sixty four, their biggest competitor, Post announced it
was planning to release this new fruity pastry. It didn't
(08:36):
have to be refrigerated, it could keep for months or
even for years. But after the announcement, Post made two
huge mistakes before they released it. So there's this fun
article on Thrillist about this, which you should definitely check out.
But the two big mistakes were one, they took way
too long to get the recipe down and actually get
the product out to market, and so it gave Kellogg
(08:57):
time to figure out a very similar product. Then the
other big mistake, and this one is just baffling to me,
is they decided to call the pastries. Are you ready
for this name? It's called country squares. How great? We're
talking about the nineteen sixties when the words square would
have definitely meant something negative. No one had wanted to
buy something like this, and so they tried to recover
(09:17):
and rename them Toast Thems, but the damage had definitely
been done and pop Tarts were born. And now, as
for the connection to war Haul, they definitely wanted to
come up with something that was, uh, you know that
that felt more hip than what than what Post had done,
and Warhol was big at the time, and so they
decided to call these things pop tarts. So pretty interesting.
(09:39):
All right, Well, Gabe, let's go back to you. Actually,
I think I ran into you on this aisle because
I was also planning to try to get to a
serial Fact. But I'm pretty sure you were doing something
at the same time. Did you end up getting a
serial Fact? Yep? I did. Um. So, you know, like
most people who grew up with Saturday morning cartoons, Breakfast
Cereal holds a special place in my heart, hand in
(10:00):
my pantry. Be tough sometimes, thank you, But it can
be tough sometimes trying to choose which cereal to buy.
But I found the picking which cereal to share fun
facts about it is even harder. And that's because there's
just so many good ones out there. I am a kid,
it hard, so you know, I had to go with
one of my childhood's favorite Lucky Charms. Lucky Chimes has
(10:23):
been around since the early sixties, and this was back
when a product developer named John Hollohan first hit upon
the idea of combining cheerios with bits of circus peanuts.
You know those squshy orange marshmallows made to look like peanuts,
do I that's like one of my top ten favorite candy.
Most people find nasty, which is just even better for me. Well,
(10:44):
the design is the Lucky Charms marshmallows have actually changed
a good deal along the way, so the pink heart
is actually the only original marshmallow shape still and used today. Um.
But here's the really crazy part. According to a press
release from two thousand eight, each of the marshmallow bits
or market company those are actually meant to represent one
(11:05):
of Lucky the leprecons magic powers. So the heart marshmallows
granted the power to bring things to life, and the
rainbows allow him to travel instantaneously from place to place. Wow.
I don't know about you, Mango, but I feel like
I have those kinds of powers of Lucky Charms. All right.
Another good fact. Wow, Gabe, I'd say you're probably on
the lead so far, So Mango what do you what
(11:26):
do you have next? So, because I can't get away
from canned foods, I also had to snap a pick
of Chef boyar D and and just like little Debbie,
what's amazing to me is that the chef was a
real person and actually an amazing chef, like Hector. Boyer
D came to States as a kid and started working
in kitchens at age eleven and by age seventeen he
was a fixture at the Plaza Hotel. And and here's
(11:49):
the most amazing part. He actually catered Woodrow Wilson's wedding.
Oh wow, that is crazy, that's pretty great. Well, somebody
that did not cater Woodrow Wilson's wedding, and I was
disappoint it to learn was not a real person. And
that's Betty Crocker. Unfortunately, this is really disappointing to me.
But she was actually created by General Mills and the
twenties because of all these questions that were coming in
(12:10):
from customers. So there was an employee there named Agnes White,
and she was one of the test recipe creators and
cookbook writers, and she ended up portraying Betty and these
radio ads anonymously. And she ended up even starting a
show where they had this kind of test kitchen and
advice column that they gave to their listeners, and she
was the host of that as Betty Crocker. But my
(12:31):
favorite fact is that despite not being a real person,
there was a survey from Fortune magazine that found Betty
to be the second most admired woman in America after
Eleanor Roosevelt. Of course, who was the first, lady. That's
so crazy? Yeah, it's pretty good. All right, gavee. It's
time for your last fact. Don't disappoint us. You've been
great so far. What you got next? All right? So,
(12:52):
as a self professed French, frive them. I have to
go with a personal favorite this last time and talk
about hind catch up. Okay, so have to do with
the iconic fifty seven varieties logo you find on their
catch up bottles. So the number itself was the idea
of the company's founder, Henry Heinz. In two he was
(13:14):
riding a train through New York City when he spotted
a sign advertising twenty one styles of shoes. So he
just really lapsed onto this idea of advertising an oddly
specific number of products. So he adopted the fifty seven
Varieties slogan for his own brand. You know, even though
the company made something like sixty different products at the time,
soft seven was just a completely made up number, right exactly.
(13:37):
But there's one last thing about that number I wanted
to talk about. On every glass bottle of Heinz Ketchup,
there's an embossed number fifty seven on the neck right
where the bottle narrows, and only about eleven of Ketchup
users know this. But the fifty seven is a secret
weak spot that can be struck with a knife or
fork to help to catch up poor faster. And since
(13:57):
ketch Up typically pours from a glass bot at less
than point one miles per hour, it's a pretty handy trick.
I like that, you know, the speed that catch up
travels out of the bottle. That's great, just off the
top of my head. Yeah. But by the way, you
guys know the difference between Ketchup and Captive, No, I've
I've always wondered that. Well, they're spelled and pronounced completely differently,
(14:19):
and that's it. Yeah, Otherwise there's the exact same product. Alright,
good deal. I'm glad you didn't lead with that fact.
That's good. No good, that's three good facts from you
gave all right, Mango your last one? You got one
more for us? Yeah, definitely, So Will knows I love Ramen.
After college when we were waiting tables and I didn't
(14:40):
have that much money, like I I basically lived on
this stuff. And and so I wanted to take a
second to talk about Momofuku Ando, who's the inventor of
instant noodles and cup noodles, and the story of the
founding is amazing. So basically, Japan was pushing American made
bread on its citizens in the late fifties, kind of
has the source of substance. And when Ando asked why
(15:01):
not make noodles, which were more common in the cuisine,
basically the response was that the fresh noodle manufacturing couldn't
supply and feed the country. So Ando set out to
create noodles. And this is quote in the Japan Times
that he said, which I absolutely love, and it's that
peace will come to the world when people have enough
to eat, and noodles were his contribution to that. So
(15:21):
I just think that's really sweet and and there's so
much to say about him. But my favorite fact about
Ramen and Ando is that he actually established a World
Instant Noodle Summit that meets every two years, where noodle
manufacturers that high standards for instant noodles, so like one
of them is that the fill two lines on the
inside of the cups for like how much water to
pour in or or the produced on dates like that
(15:43):
all came from him. But today they are over a
hundred billion units of instant noodles sold every year. And
the reason you can reliably buy a bag and it
will taste good is thanks to Momofuku, Ando and his
Ramen collective. Wow, that is pretty incredible. But I feel
like as much as we eat at the Ramen play downstairs,
we've earned a seat at that summit. I feel like
we should attend this summit. And and in fact, that
(16:06):
is so good. The fact you've managed to talk about
Ramen and chef Oyerty and Warhol all in one episode.
I don't know about you, Gay, but I feel like
we have to give the crown to Mango on this one. Yeah.
I mean, after what we saw on that car ride
to Kroger, I'm thinking society you've never seen. Well, I
have to admit it was a lot of fun. I'd
(16:27):
be up for doing that again sometime, although maybe we
we We just were very lucky that we didn't get
kicked out of Kroger and before we ran around and
got our facts. But that was a ton of fun.
I hope everybody has enjoyed this. We'll be back tomorrow
with a regular episode. But if we've missed any great
grocery related facts that you feel like you need to
share with us, you know where to hit us up
part Time Genius and How Stuff Works dot com, or
(16:49):
you can call us on our two seven fact hot line.
It is still seven seven. That's excellent. That's one eight
four four pt genius. We've had a blast hearing from
so many of you recently, but thanks so much for listening,
and we'll see you next time. Thanks again for listening.
(17:17):
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(17:39):
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forget Jason? Jason who
Hey there, podcast listeners, Welcome to Part Time Genius. Now.
As many of you may remember from a bonus episode
a few weeks ago, our lead researcher, Gabeluisier was in
studio with us here in Atlanta, and he was here
a few days and something weird happened during that visit,
and I felt like you should all know about this.
So we just left the office. We were all headed
to dinner, and Mango throws out this fact about Little Debbie.
(00:22):
And then you can't just throw that out there and
not share the facts, all right, so let me just
share it with the audience. So basically, unlike Aunt Jemima
or joe Is Suzu, who were pure marketing inventions and
like the ideas of copywriters, Little Debbie was actually a
real person. And she was the granddaughter of the company's founder.
And what's strange is that her granddad used her image
(00:44):
without her parents permission, and her parents were pissed about.
I bet they were, yeah, And of course years later
she became an exact at their company and then so
it all worked out. That's all you have to do
to make somebody happy, all right. So that was the
fact that Mango shared with us. I thought it was
a good fact, and and and so Gabe then made
a comment about how many interesting facts are just sitting
on the shelves of the grocery store. And we just
(01:04):
happened to be passing a Kroger on our way to dinner.
So that gives Mango an idea. And now I should
preface this by saying, we're talking about the same Mango
that so many listeners have described as always sounding happy,
and many of them have said I feel like I
can hear him smiling. But what they don't know is
just how competitive Mango can be. So Mango just says
(01:26):
pull over. I didn't say that. I think I said
something like, I've got an idea. You can't get me
pull into this parking lot. Well, I don't know if
that's how he said it. And in fact, we have
Gabe with us here on the line. So so, so, Gabe,
can you back me up a little on this one.
I mean, I think he might have said I've got
an idea, But yeah, the way he said it sounded
urgent and earn enough, we should probably pull over. True,
(01:50):
that's true. Any anyway, Mango then explains his idea. So
so we'd each walk to the middle of the grocery store,
and he said this with such a serious face. We
knew this something very real. And so then after saying
one to three go, we'd all have sixty seconds to
run two different parts of the store take pictures of
three items that we then wanted to share facts about.
(02:12):
But we'd have to be back in the center aisle
before the sixty seconds was up, and if we were late,
he said we'd be disqualified. And he didn't even want
to hear our fact. Again, I didn't say any of
that day. Packed me up here. We're getting kind of confrontational.
Don't put me in the middle of this, guys. I
really I don't remember what he said exactly, but let's
just say this was definitely a side of Mango I
(02:34):
hadn't seen before. The man was ready to compete, all right.
So so before I could even ask questions or confirm
whether it was one to three and then we could
go on three or whether it was one to three, go,
I feel like Mango just screamed go, and then I
found myself running like a madman all around the store.
It took me a few seconds to remember what we
(02:55):
were actually trying to do. But so here's what you
need to know the facts from this episode of there
was volts of that sixty second dash. So now that
you know who to thank or blame for this one,
let's get started. Hey there, podcast listeners, welcome back to
(03:25):
Part time Genius. Okay, So we talked about this ridiculous
game that Mango put us up to, and for some reason,
Gabe and I agreed to. So we each pulled three
facts from the grocery store, and Gabe as our lead researcher,
We're gonna let you start off first. I can't even
actually remember which direction you ran. I was so focused
on my first stop. So so, so what did you
find first? Right? So I made a bee line for
(03:49):
the candy aisle and came away with a big bag
of jelly belly jelly bean. And I did that because
I knew they would give me a chance to share
some ridiculous facts that one of the most notorious jelly
beans fans, none other than our forties president Mr Ronald
Reagan's right, And yeah, it's it's no secret at this
point that Reagan loved jelly beans, but I don't think
(04:12):
most people know that he was particularly passionate about jelly bellies,
and I mean for this arrangement he had with the company,
he actually began receiving twenty four pounds shipments every month
during his time as governor of California, which, if you
do the math, because about ten thousand, two hundred beans
every thirty days, that is insane. I Yet, I've heard
(04:33):
that Reagan was a big fan of jelly beans. Mango said,
you'd heard that as well, But I didn't know that
it was especially jelly bellies. And I didn't realize the
quantities of these. But so why did he like them
so much? Anyway? Well, yeah, he first started eating him
when he quit smoking in the early sixties, so they
served a practical purpose, you know, beyond simple snacking. But
(04:55):
Reagan also seemed to appreciate jelly beans is some kind
of litmus test for the people he mad. So this
one time he said, quote, you can tell a lot
about a fella's character by whether he picks out all
of one color or just grabs a handful. But anyway,
that's great. Yeah. So, as weird as all this sounds,
(05:16):
the kipper's jellybelly love of there wouldn't have each peak
insanity until he made it to the Oval Office. So,
for instance, the company created a new blueberry flavor jelly
bean for his inauguration back in one and they distributed
more than three tons of them to the attendees, and
it only got crazier from there. So Reagan upped his
standing order to a staggering seven hundred and twenty bags
(05:39):
per month, over three hundred and six thousand jelly beans,
and he has those distributed among the White House, Capitol Hill,
and a few other federal buildings every month. And he
even stocked the beans on Air Force One, where he
kept them in a specially designed jelly bean holder that
wouldn't spill their in turbulace. Yeah. So, you know, plenty
(06:02):
of Americans continue to honor President Reagan and all kinds
of ways, but I think the most fitting one is
this portrait of him made from ten thousand Jellybelly jelly
beans that hangs in his Presidential library. And Simmy Valley, California,
that's pretty incredible. Well, you got us off to a
good start with your first fact, Mango, you wanna you
want to take the next one? Yeah, So I just
went to the High Museum exhibit of Warhol in Atlanta
(06:25):
from from Aisle seven come all the time, okay, And honestly,
if you haven't gone, it is amazing. And I'm not
even that big a Warhol fan, but seeing like all
these giant mouths together on the purple wallpaper that Warhol
had designed for the Paris exhibition, I mean, it is incredible.
But of course, so when I passed the Campbell soup cans,
(06:48):
I I knew I had to snap a shot. And
and there are a couple of things I love about
the Campbell Soup series, Like the first is that Warhol
loved the soup and how consistent every flavor was, Like
he actually appreciated that tomato soup always tastes like the
same tomato soup, which kind of plays a role in
the arts philosophy. And I also love that he hated
that Campbell's discontinued some of the soups, Like he made
(07:10):
a portrait of all the thirty two soups he could
find at the time, but he actually wished that they
still made his favorite soup, which was called mock Turtle.
What is that? I know, It's apparently a Campbell soup
that was supposed to taste like turtle soup. But uh,
it's popular in London, but not not a mock turtleneck. No, no,
But here's my actual fact about the series. So in
(07:31):
a book called I'll Be Your Mirror, which is a
collection of Andy Warhol interviews, Warhol gripes that despite everything
he did for Campbell's, they never sent him a single
can of free soup, and he genuinely loved the product.
It was kind of weird that they didn't send himself.
That's pretty great. Actually, I had another fact that I
was going to start with, But I do have a
Warhole connection in one of my facts, all right, and
(07:53):
I'll get to that connection in just a second. But
you know, I had to run as quickly as I
could to the pop tart section. I know this wouldn't
surprise you, Mango. So so Mango knows this about our family.
But every year we go on a beach trip in
the summer, and that's the one week of the year
that my wife, Georgia, allows the kids and me to
eat as many pop tarts as we want. Otherwise we're
(08:13):
never allowed to have pop tarts in the house, and
so we'll buy like ten or fifteen boxes of these
things to try, all the different flavors, all the nasty
new ones, just for the sake of trying them. But
here's the weird thing. I learned about pop tarts recently.
So Kellogg actually wasn't really planning to make them, But
in nineteen sixty four, their biggest competitor, Post announced it
was planning to release this new fruity pastry. It didn't
(08:36):
have to be refrigerated, it could keep for months or
even for years. But after the announcement, Post made two
huge mistakes before they released it. So there's this fun
article on Thrillist about this, which you should definitely check out.
But the two big mistakes were one, they took way
too long to get the recipe down and actually get
the product out to market, and so it gave Kellogg
(08:57):
time to figure out a very similar product. Then the
other big mistake, and this one is just baffling to me,
is they decided to call the pastries. Are you ready
for this name? It's called country squares. How great? We're
talking about the nineteen sixties when the words square would
have definitely meant something negative. No one had wanted to
buy something like this, and so they tried to recover
(09:17):
and rename them Toast Thems, but the damage had definitely
been done and pop Tarts were born. And now, as
for the connection to war Haul, they definitely wanted to
come up with something that was, uh, you know that
that felt more hip than what than what Post had done,
and Warhol was big at the time, and so they
decided to call these things pop tarts. So pretty interesting.
(09:39):
All right, Well, Gabe, let's go back to you. Actually,
I think I ran into you on this aisle because
I was also planning to try to get to a
serial Fact. But I'm pretty sure you were doing something
at the same time. Did you end up getting a
serial Fact? Yep? I did. Um. So, you know, like
most people who grew up with Saturday morning cartoons, Breakfast
Cereal holds a special place in my heart, hand in
(10:00):
my pantry. Be tough sometimes, thank you, But it can
be tough sometimes trying to choose which cereal to buy.
But I found the picking which cereal to share fun
facts about it is even harder. And that's because there's
just so many good ones out there. I am a kid,
it hard, so you know, I had to go with
one of my childhood's favorite Lucky Charms. Lucky Chimes has
(10:23):
been around since the early sixties, and this was back
when a product developer named John Hollohan first hit upon
the idea of combining cheerios with bits of circus peanuts.
You know those squshy orange marshmallows made to look like peanuts,
do I that's like one of my top ten favorite candy.
Most people find nasty, which is just even better for me. Well,
(10:44):
the design is the Lucky Charms marshmallows have actually changed
a good deal along the way, so the pink heart
is actually the only original marshmallow shape still and used today. Um.
But here's the really crazy part. According to a press
release from two thousand eight, each of the marshmallow bits
or market company those are actually meant to represent one
(11:05):
of Lucky the leprecons magic powers. So the heart marshmallows
granted the power to bring things to life, and the
rainbows allow him to travel instantaneously from place to place. Wow.
I don't know about you, Mango, but I feel like
I have those kinds of powers of Lucky Charms. All right.
Another good fact. Wow, Gabe, I'd say you're probably on
the lead so far, So Mango what do you what
(11:26):
do you have next? So, because I can't get away
from canned foods, I also had to snap a pick
of Chef boyar D and and just like little Debbie,
what's amazing to me is that the chef was a
real person and actually an amazing chef, like Hector. Boyer
D came to States as a kid and started working
in kitchens at age eleven and by age seventeen he
was a fixture at the Plaza Hotel. And and here's
(11:49):
the most amazing part. He actually catered Woodrow Wilson's wedding.
Oh wow, that is crazy, that's pretty great. Well, somebody
that did not cater Woodrow Wilson's wedding, and I was
disappoint it to learn was not a real person. And
that's Betty Crocker. Unfortunately, this is really disappointing to me.
But she was actually created by General Mills and the
twenties because of all these questions that were coming in
(12:10):
from customers. So there was an employee there named Agnes White,
and she was one of the test recipe creators and
cookbook writers, and she ended up portraying Betty and these
radio ads anonymously. And she ended up even starting a
show where they had this kind of test kitchen and
advice column that they gave to their listeners, and she
was the host of that as Betty Crocker. But my
(12:31):
favorite fact is that despite not being a real person,
there was a survey from Fortune magazine that found Betty
to be the second most admired woman in America after
Eleanor Roosevelt. Of course, who was the first, lady. That's
so crazy? Yeah, it's pretty good. All right, gavee. It's
time for your last fact. Don't disappoint us. You've been
great so far. What you got next? All right? So,
(12:52):
as a self professed French, frive them. I have to
go with a personal favorite this last time and talk
about hind catch up. Okay, so have to do with
the iconic fifty seven varieties logo you find on their
catch up bottles. So the number itself was the idea
of the company's founder, Henry Heinz. In two he was
(13:14):
riding a train through New York City when he spotted
a sign advertising twenty one styles of shoes. So he
just really lapsed onto this idea of advertising an oddly
specific number of products. So he adopted the fifty seven
Varieties slogan for his own brand. You know, even though
the company made something like sixty different products at the time,
soft seven was just a completely made up number, right exactly.
(13:37):
But there's one last thing about that number I wanted
to talk about. On every glass bottle of Heinz Ketchup,
there's an embossed number fifty seven on the neck right
where the bottle narrows, and only about eleven of Ketchup
users know this. But the fifty seven is a secret
weak spot that can be struck with a knife or
fork to help to catch up poor faster. And since
(13:57):
ketch Up typically pours from a glass bot at less
than point one miles per hour, it's a pretty handy trick.
I like that, you know, the speed that catch up
travels out of the bottle. That's great, just off the
top of my head. Yeah. But by the way, you
guys know the difference between Ketchup and Captive, No, I've
I've always wondered that. Well, they're spelled and pronounced completely differently,
(14:19):
and that's it. Yeah, Otherwise there's the exact same product. Alright,
good deal. I'm glad you didn't lead with that fact.
That's good. No good, that's three good facts from you
gave all right, Mango your last one? You got one
more for us? Yeah, definitely, So Will knows I love Ramen.
After college when we were waiting tables and I didn't
(14:40):
have that much money, like I I basically lived on
this stuff. And and so I wanted to take a
second to talk about Momofuku Ando, who's the inventor of
instant noodles and cup noodles, and the story of the
founding is amazing. So basically, Japan was pushing American made
bread on its citizens in the late fifties, kind of
has the source of substance. And when Ando asked why
(15:01):
not make noodles, which were more common in the cuisine,
basically the response was that the fresh noodle manufacturing couldn't
supply and feed the country. So Ando set out to
create noodles. And this is quote in the Japan Times
that he said, which I absolutely love, and it's that
peace will come to the world when people have enough
to eat, and noodles were his contribution to that. So
(15:21):
I just think that's really sweet and and there's so
much to say about him. But my favorite fact about
Ramen and Ando is that he actually established a World
Instant Noodle Summit that meets every two years, where noodle
manufacturers that high standards for instant noodles, so like one
of them is that the fill two lines on the
inside of the cups for like how much water to
pour in or or the produced on dates like that
(15:43):
all came from him. But today they are over a
hundred billion units of instant noodles sold every year. And
the reason you can reliably buy a bag and it
will taste good is thanks to Momofuku, Ando and his
Ramen collective. Wow, that is pretty incredible. But I feel
like as much as we eat at the Ramen play downstairs,
we've earned a seat at that summit. I feel like
we should attend this summit. And and in fact, that
(16:06):
is so good. The fact you've managed to talk about
Ramen and chef Oyerty and Warhol all in one episode.
I don't know about you, Gay, but I feel like
we have to give the crown to Mango on this one. Yeah.
I mean, after what we saw on that car ride
to Kroger, I'm thinking society you've never seen. Well, I
have to admit it was a lot of fun. I'd
(16:27):
be up for doing that again sometime, although maybe we
we We just were very lucky that we didn't get
kicked out of Kroger and before we ran around and
got our facts. But that was a ton of fun.
I hope everybody has enjoyed this. We'll be back tomorrow
with a regular episode. But if we've missed any great
grocery related facts that you feel like you need to
share with us, you know where to hit us up
part Time Genius and How Stuff Works dot com, or
(16:49):
you can call us on our two seven fact hot line.
It is still seven seven. That's excellent. That's one eight
four four pt genius. We've had a blast hearing from
so many of you recently, but thanks so much for listening,
and we'll see you next time. Thanks again for listening.
(17:17):
Part Time Genius is a production of How Stuff Works
and wouldn't be possible without several brilliant people who do
the important things we couldn't even begin to understand. Christa
McNeil does the editing thing. Noel Brown made the theme
song and does the mixy mixy sound thing. Jerry Roland
does the exact producer thing. Gabe Bluesier is our lead
researcher with support from the Research Army, including Austin Thompson,
Nolan Brown and Lucas Adams and Eve Jeff Cook gets
(17:39):
the show to your ears. Good job, Eves. If you
like what you heard, we hope you'll subscribe, And if
you really really like what you've heard, maybe you could
leave a good review for us. Do we do we
forget Jason? Jason who
Part-Time Genius News
Hosts And Creators
Will Pearson
Mangesh Hattikudur
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