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The mysteries of 'Chopped'
Do the contestants on the Food Network's Chopped have an opportunity to see what's in the pantry and fridge and what appliances and serving ware are available for them to use before each competition begins?
First there's the matter of the food baskets that each contestant must open. They have to use all these "mystery ingredients," said Ted Allen, host of the Food Network's Chopped and Food Detectives, in a recent interview with about.com.
"The rules are pretty simple," Allen said. "You can do whatever you want, but for each course there is a basket of mystery ingredients. That can range anywhere from three to five things and you have to use all of them in your dish. You can use a little bit, you can use a lot. It's not like on Iron Chef where you have to make one of them the focal point.
"But I have to say it's really difficult to cook with when you have to use all five things or all three things. They might not necessarily seem to go together in an obvious way. We're not going to give you like Soba noodles, salmon, ginger and soy sauce. It's never going to be that simple, and then you only have 30 minutes to think of the dish, execute the dish and plate the dish. It's actually really, really hard. But some people manage to pull it off."
As far as equipment and pantry, the contestants do get a heads-up. Each contestant is given a tour of the kitchen and has access to a refrigerator and pantry with a wide variety of ingredients.
The Herbal Essence of the '70s
I remember a shampoo I used when spending the night at my aunt's house. It was green and smelled good and had a picture of an exotic woman on the label. Can you tell me what brand it was?
We suspect you're referring to Clairol Herbal Essence shampoo, a product of the 1970s with a drawn label of a woman with long, straight hair dotted with flowers.
It was launched in 1971 and was advertised as using "natural" ingredients. Its audience was women of the 1960s and 1970s who were supposedly influenced by the so-called flower power movement. That advertising angle wore down over time and was eventually replaced.
Stop signs cost $160 to install
What agency is responsible for the installation of stop signs? What is the cost of posting the signs, in the sign and labor?
It depends where the stop sign is located. If it's on a state road, the Florida Department of Transportation would do the work. If it's on a city or county road, an agency for one of those jurisdictions would be responsible.
But the costs should be about the same. Kristen Carson, a spokeswoman for the DOT in the Tampa Bay area, said the costs to install a stop sign would run about $160 or $170.
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