Interesting. On a related note, just yesterday author John Scalzi answered a question on BlueSky from a reader about why the cover art for the large-print edition of one of his novels was different from the original. Scalzi said that the large-print edition was published by a third party which licenses the text from…

You beat me to it!

Agreed. I am in Middle Tennessee, three or four hours’ away, and while there are annoyances (stop-and-go, bumper-to-bumper traffic on the parkway that connects Sevierville, Pigeon Forge and Gatlinburg) there’s a lot to enjoy as well. I love the restaurant at the Apple Barn, where they bring you that juice drink and…

I had an experience like this with Steak & Shake, where their kiosk said I would be notified such-and-such a way and they did something completely different, and then treated me like an idiot for not somehow knowing what their policy was. 

Even weirder -- for a while, before Carl’s Jr. bought Hardee’s, Hardee’s owned Roy Rogers (it does not anymore), and even though those two chains also kept their separate identities, for a while the Roy Rogers locations were promoting “Now serving Hardee’s breakfast menu.” Hardee’s does have outstanding breakfast…

I live in Krystal territory (there are a few White Castles in Nashville, an hour’s drive north of me) and just about every holiday season, I see a recipe for Krystal stuffing — sort of a cousin to this, although not pureed, just chopped up and with other stuffing-related ingredients added. I have not gotten the chance…

I know I had fried clams years ago at a White Castle in Nashville (which is really Krystal territory but which has, or had, a few White Castles). 

You forgot Tom Hanks, whose “Hanx For Our Troops” coffee benefits veteran-related charities. It’s pretty good coffee, too; they have regular coffee “First Class Joe,” but they also have “Tom’s Morning Magic Blend,” which has a little malt flavor and is meant to be enjoyed with a little milk.

I’m a four-hour drive from Atlanta, and for several years I’ve wanted to do a little weekend getaway and go to the World of Coca-Cola, among other things. I went to the original location, across from Underground Atlanta, back in the 1990s, but haven’t been since they moved to their current facility. On trips to Kenya…

I understand the logic, but it still seems strange that they are keeping the bone-in chicken in their legacy markets (such as here in Tennessee) but the new states into which they are expanding are boneless-only. They’ll soon get to a size where national advertising will be a possibility, but I would think having two…

In the early 1980s, I was a student at Oral Roberts University, and for about a year Oral Roberts’ periodic nighttime specials were produced in California by the Kroffts (this was about the same time they were producing a network variety show for Barbara Mandrell and the Mandrell Sisters). I always thought it was a…

I live an hour’s drive south of Nashville, where RiffTrax does the majority of its live simulcasts, and I’ve not been to see one yet — I was a part of the Kickstarter for the last event, but the in-person show tickets were available at higher levels than the one I could afford. :) When I was a child, in the 1970s, my…

Agreed. Many of the other fast food chains seem to prefer dealing with corporate franchisees — franchisees that own multiple locations — while Chick-fil-A prefers single location franchisees who are *at* the restaurant and involved in the community, and it makes a difference. My small, rural town has its first CfA…

I have been a judge at our local cookoff numerous times over the years. I tried to enter one year and it was a disaster, but I want to take another run at it one of these days. Judging is a lot of fun. At our cookout, which I think is pretty typical, there are traditional red, chili verde, and homestyle categories,…

There are two chili-cookoff sanctioning bodies in the U.S.; CASI, which is tied in with the Terlingua cookoff, and ICS, which I think has more events each year than CASI. (Some cookoffs, including the one in my small town, are sanctioned by both groups, and just have separate judges and results for each of the two.)

Twenty years ago, the listicle-addicted American Film Institute

I got an e-mail less than a week ago announcing that Chili’s now has the It’s Just Wings wings and flavors on its menu. For those who didn’t know, It’s Just Wings is a virtual restaurant, delivery and carryout only, operating out of Chili’s and Maggiano’s kitchens (and owned by the same parent company). Up until now,…

I would think that the pizza chains would be in a different situation because delivery was a part of their model all along (and there’s not quite as much of a premium on pizza delivery). A lot of people who would never think of getting a burger or a bucket of chicken delivered have been ordering pizza delivery for…

Looked it up and found this: https://foodjunk.wordpress.com/2013/04/20/24-year-old-strawberry-jell-o-1-2-3-a-review/

They had a gelatin equivalent, as well -- Jello 1-2-3, which actually formed three different layers on chilling.