quotes and questions

[pengolodh_sc <pengolodh_sc@yahoo.no>]

--- In HPFGU-OTChatter, chanteuse thalia chaunacy wrote:
[snip]
> (CoSp58) strawberry-and-peanut-butter ice creams
> 
> [is anyone else relatively revolted by this idea? or am i odd? is
> this a normal flavour in Britain?]
[snip]

You are not odd, I believe, and it sounds like a typical flavour in 
Britain.  After all, the British traditionally like to eat their 
chips (i.e. French fries) seasoned with salt and malt vinegar - and 
if you look at some British names of dishes - such as bubble-and-
squeak, and toad-in-a-hole, and that unmentionable dessert which I 
believe John had the pleasure of sampling last weekend - that only 
reinforces that you are not odd, and that combining peanutbutter and 
strawberries not necessarily is out of character for the British.

It could be worse, of course - here in Norway, smalehove is 
considered a quite acceptable food in large parts of the country, as 
are codfish-tongues (normally fried, but I have heard of at least one 
instance where they were cooked with cabbage - the dinner-guests did 
escape alive and with their sanity reasonable intact, although 
reports were that the tongues were more comparable to fishy chewing-
gum than anything else).

--- In HPFGU-OTChatter, Shaun Hately wrote:

[snip]

> Amusingly this issue has a clear answer. Ketchup is *not* a food in
> the US. Back in 1981, the US Government attempted to claim that it
> was a food - specifically that it was a vegetable. 

[snip]

> That attempt was defeated so ketchup has legal status as a
> condiment - not as a food in its own right.

[snip]

Reminds me of something I heard of a lengthy legal case concerning 
Jaffa Cakes, which are small soft sponge-cookies, with a bit of 
orange-flavoured jelly on top covered by dark chocolate, produced by 
United Biscuits.  To quote BBC:

"...the infamous UK Jaffa Cake case. Biscuits and cakes are 
considered a necessity by UK law and are zero rated. Chocolate 
covered biscuits however are a luxury and subject to VAT at 17.5%. 
McVities and HM Customs & Excise argued over whether the Jaffa Cake 
was a cake (no VAT) or a chocolate biscuit (lots of VAT). The 
argument had to be taken to a Tribunal (kind of like a court) to be 
resolved. In the end McVities baked a 12" Jaffa Cake which convinced 
the Tribunal Chairman of the general cakeiness of the Jaffa Cake."  

See http://www.ubcareers.com/about/jaffa.asp and 
http://www.geocities.com/williamarthurs/jaffa.htm .  

According to the page in The Guardian linked at the second page, the 
outcome of the trial also depended on the fact that Jaffa Cakes 
become hard when they go stale.  Since cakes become hard when they go 
stale, and biscuits become soft when they go stale, Jaffa Cakes were 
ruled by the VAT Tribunal to be legally cakes (while I believe that 
in at least some dialects of the English language (such dialects that 
are not necessarily found on the British Isles themselves, nor the 
same hemisphere), it would be quite linguistically correct - if not 
legally so - to say that HM Customs & Excise is - has gone - 
crackers?).  

Best regards
Christian Stubø