table talk
Where the haggis and the antelope play…
News reaches us that Stahly Quality Foods is planning to assault the US market - with haggis. The Glenrothes company is teaming up with a Chicago meat processor to find a way around the strict health and safety rules that make direct exports to the USA tricky.
The plan involves sourcing the key ingredients - sheep's heart and stomach - from the USA, with Stahly supplying the secret recipe. However, the US market isn't easy to crack. A previous attempt to bring tinned haggis to North American kitchens failed, and according to a recent survey, a third of US visitors to Scotland think the haggis is a wild animal found in the Highlands.
Not tonight, dear… I'm asleep
In pub toilets across the country, condom vending machines are now dispensing painkillers as well. Durex has teamed up with Nurofen in more than 3,500 pub and bar toilets. Ladies, you won't be able to shirk your bedroom duties any longer. That well-worn excuse "I've got a headache" just won't wash any more.
I'm a sweep (honest) - get me out of here!
A man who allegedly tried to rob a restaurant in Texas pleaded for help after getting stuck in a chimney. The man and an accomplice tried to break into the Rotisserie for Beef and Bird in Houston. When the man became wedged in the chimney, his friend broke a window and tried to free him. But that set off an alarm, causing the second man to flee the scene.
His friend was left with his feet dangling from the dining room fireplace. A police dog alerted officers to the man, who pleaded: "Oh please, please get me out of here. I don't mind going to jail, just get me out."
Firefighters were called and lowered a knotted rope to the man from the roof. The man managed to climb back out and told owner Joe Mannke his parents visited the restaurant quite often.
Mannke said he was amazed at the amount of soot the would-be burglar had on him. He said: "In all the years I've had this restaurant, I've never had the chimney cleaned. Now I don't need to."
Burger King Whoppers start shedding the bread
Burger King has begun selling hamburgers without buns. The move to sell breadless Whoppers has been prompted by the craze for low-carb diets. Smaller chains have already dumped the bread from some hamburgers, going lettuce-wrapped instead.
The price of the new Burger King product is the same as a whopper with a bun. Burger King took out a full-page advertisement in the newspaper USA Today to tout its unlikely new product, showing a giant Whopper with dotted lines marking the outlines of where a bun would normally be.
The Miami-based chain is selling them in plastic salad bowls, with knife and fork, after an increasing number of requests for them over the past year. It's also introducing Whopper meals that substitute salads for French fries and bottled water for soft drinks and promising a new line of salads, so company officials aren't staking their future on a bunless trend.