GG Tokyo, the jewel box-sized izakaya in the Park South Hotel whose name is a nod to the bustling Golden Gai district of Tokyo, has added a new line of craft cocktails to its drinks menu. Conceived by beverage director Ivan Papic (Pastis, Balthazar, Macao Trading Company) and head bartender Sasa Radovanovic (Schilling NYC, Paul’s Casablanca), the concoctions include the Kamikaze (sencha infused Haku vodka, citrus syrup, lemon, and seltzer), the Tomadachi (Casamigos tequila, Ume plum liqueur, agave, butterfly pea flower, and furikake), and the Mermaid (beet-infused Ten to One rum, Laphroiag 10-year, sake, and yuzu).
Should the act of imbibing result in your locating your appetite, the food menu offers a few innovative and occasionally multicultural selections such as the tuna tartare, in which the dice of raw fish are dressed with a tonnato-style mayo and accompanied by garlic bread. GG Tokyo, 120 E. 28th Street, 212-204-0200.
Kraft Foods Sued Over False Packaging Claim
When Benjamin Franklin philosophized that time is money, it is doubtful he was thinking of the prep time for mac and cheese. It is a certainty he wasn’t thinking about a microwavable variation of the dish. But cook times and microwaves were very much on the mind of Amanda Ramirez of Florida, who on Nov. 18 filed a $5 million lawsuit against the Kraft Heinz Company accusing them of deceptive and fraudulent packaging. Ramirez’s beef? That Kraft’s Velveeta Shells & Cheese Microwavable Shell Pasta takes longer than 3½ minutes to prepare even though its packaging states “ready in 3½ minutes.”
The complaint filed in the U.S. District Court for Southern Florida reads in part:
To provide consumers with a Product that is actually ‘ready in 3½ minutes’ the Product would need to be cooked in the microwave for less than 3-and-a-half minutes, so that all the preparation steps could be completed in the 3-and-a-half minutes timeframe.
Ramirez’s specific grievance is with the last sentence of the directions, which maintains that the “cheese sauce will thicken upon standing.” This, the suit alleges, constitutes a longer “ready” time than the packaging claims.
Kraft Heinz responded to the suit in a statement reading, “We are aware of this frivolous lawsuit and will strongly defend against the allegations in the complaint.”
P.S. For readers who might be wondering whether macaroni and cheese existed during Benjamin Franklin’s lifetime (1706-1790), it did. A recipe for the dish appears in Elizabeth Raffald’s 1769 book “The Experienced English Housekeeper.”
See also…
‘Double Stuf’ Oreos Don’t Contain Twice as Much Filling? You Can Always Sue
