Andy Rooney_ 60 Years of Wisdom and Wit - Andy Rooney [38]
Everyone who sells anything to restaurants had an exhibit, so there were garbage cans . . . corn cookers . . . can openers . . . wall decorations . . . seating arrangements . . . and devices to keep bartenders from stealing.
Restaurants sell 20 percent of all the food eaten in the United States. They are first in the number of retail business places. In other words, there are more restaurants than any other kind of store. We did a lot of poking around at the convention and we got a frightening look at what some restaurants are going to be feeding us.
1st Exhibitor: Well, this is a soy protein with about 60 percent protein and it goes into . . .
Rooney: What does it do?
1st Exhibitor: Well, it stretches out products like tuna salad by about 30 percent.
Rooney: What do they use it in, in addition to tuna fish?
1st Exhibitor: It goes into egg salads. It’s used to extend all kinds of meats, either uncooked as meat patties or it might go into precooked entrees . . . sloppy Joes, chili con carne.
Rooney: Is it any good?
1st Exhibitor: What kind of a question is that?
Rooney: Now, what is this here?
2nd Exhibitor: These are our Morning Star institutional link sausage–like flavor product.
Rooney: Sausage . . . like?
2nd Exhibitor: Sausage-like flavor.
Rooney: They’re artificial sausage?
2nd Exhibitor: They’re artificial sausage. They have no cholesterol, no animal fat.
Rooney: What do they have?
2nd Exhibitor: Well, they’re made out of various vegetable proteins . . . soy protein, wheat protein. We use egg albumen to hold it together. Rooney: Are you a chef?
2nd Exhibitor: No. I’m trained as a biochemist.
Rooney: Now what is this machine?
3rd Exhibitor: This is a mechanical meat tenderizer.
Rooney: You put the meat on there?
3rd Exhibitor: Put the meat on here. It’ll pass through underneath the needle. The needle will come down and penetrate the meat and break down the tissue.
Rooney: So a restaurant could buy this and really buy less expensive meat?
3rd Exhibitor: That’s right.
Rooney: Now, I would call that orange juice canned. Not fresh.
4th Exhibitor: Fresh frozen.
Rooney: Fresh frozen. Right.
Rooney (looking at ingredients): Now, “standard chicken base.” How, do you pronounce that ingredient?
5th Exhibitor: It contains hydrolyzed vegetable protein.
Rooney (reads ingredients): “Salt, chicken fat, monosodium glutamate, dehydrated chicken, dextrose, dehydrated vegetable, spices and spice extract, bicalcium phosphate, citric acid.”
5th Exhibitor: Right.
Rooney: That’s chicken base?
5th Exhibitor: That’s right.
Rooney: It tastes like chicken?
5th Exhibitor: Exactly. Four ounces of it tastes like an extra gallon.
Rooney: You put just four ounces of this hydro . . .
5th Exhibitor: And that’s the basis for . . . in other words, if you want chicken noodle, you throw noodles in.
Rooney: How many restaurants don’t use anything like this?
5th Exhibitor: Almost 100 percent of the restaurants use it. If they don’t, then you’re way on the other side of the . . . You can’t exist today.
Rooney: You mean without the artificial stuff?
5th Exhibitor: It’s not artificial really. You’ve got monosodium glutamate. You’ve got extracts. You’ve got fats. The real thing mixed with the chemical. This can feed or this can substitute or feed a thousand people per chicken, where you might have to take a hundred chickens. . . .
Rooney: The chickens must love it.
5th Exhibitor: You’re a nice fellow.
Restaurants are one of the few good examples left of really free enterprise in America. There isn’t much government control of them and the good ones prosper. The bad ones usually, though not always, go out of business.
The best restaurants are operated by people who like food better than money. The worst ones are run by people who don’t know anything about food or money.
So that’s our report on eating out in America. The camera crew is glad it’s over because they say they’re tired of