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Here are today’s five thing to know about Beer:

 

  • Germany serves beer ice cream in popsicle form. Its alcoholic content is less than that found in “classic” beer.
  • In 1962, Iron City beer was the brand used to test-market the concept of tab opening aluminum cans. By 1970, over 90% of all beer cans were self-opening.

 

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  • Prohibition, beginning on January 16, 1920, lasted 13 years, 10 months, 19 days, 17 hours, and 32-1/2 minutes, and was rescinded on December 5, 1933, at 3:32 p.m.
  • Centuries ago in England, pub visitors used a novel innovation that enabled them to get their beer served quickly. They used mugs with a whistle baked into the rim, the whistle being used to summon the barmaid. It has been suggested this practice gave birth to the phrase “wet your whistle.”
  • A beer lover or enthusiast is called a cerevisaphile.

 

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Today’s Food History

o    1859 Massachusetts created the first Inspector of Milk position in the U.S.

o    1869 John Wesley Hyatt patented celluloid, the first synthetic plastic.

o    1896 Opening day of the first modern Olympic games. The last Olympics were held 1,500 years ago.

o    1930 ‘Twinkies’ go on sale for the first time.

o    1932 C. Glen King, at the University of Pittsburgh, isolated vitamin C from lemon juice.

o    1938 Roy J. Plunkett accidentally discovered Teflon.

o    1947 John Ratzenberger, actor, was born. He played ‘Cliff Clavin, Jr.’ on the TV series ‘Cheers.’

o    1954 TV dinners are introduced. C.A. Swanson & Sons introduced the first TV dinner: roast turkey with stuffing and gravy, sweet potatoes and peas. It sold for 98 cents and came in an aluminum tray, so you could just open the box and heat the dinner in the oven. (No microwave ovens back then).

o    Supposedly executive Gerald Thomas came up with the idea when the company had tons of leftover turkey from Thanksgiving (Didn’t we all?). The idea for the aluminum trays came from the trays used for airline food. They were an immediate success, and Turkey dinners are still the most popular Swanson frozen dinner. Swanson stopped calling them TV dinners in 1962.

o    1988 McDonald’s opened its 10,000th restaurant in Dale City, Virginia.