Annui: produced by ages of repetition, an impish sense of fun: February 2009

Saturday, February 28, 2009

Deliciousness Abounds! Grilled Cheese Invitational

I love grilled cheese sandwiches. I reallly love grilled cheese sandwiches. On March 14th Austin will have it's 2nd Annual competition. I am so there! I want to compete but I'll probably wait until next year. My friends "The Lunch Ladies" will be there SERVIN' IT UP! Check it out. Link

Video Game Review: Tales of Vesparia XBOX 360

I hate RPGs for the most part, they seem tedious and long winded to me. Tales of Vesparia satisfied my need for button mashing punch-kicky and that seems to be what I craved when it came to this genre of gaming. I'm more interested in action and reward then hunting around, grinding and leveling up when I play video games. I loved this game, although I personally don't give it much replay value. The colors are fantastic and the graphics are beautifully illustrated. The creators really seemed to delve into stylizing the characters and giving them emotion and their own personalities. The storyline was good but could be quite long winded and a tad bit confusing at times. The monster illustrations show imagination and the bosses are fantastic. One of the best parts of this game is the local multi-player function. J and I got to play it together. I played as Yuri, the hero; and he was Repede, his faithful canine companion. Although you could choose to play as any of your party's members at before any battles, we often stuck to the same characters. I'm sure it was just because we had memorized our character's special moves and had their preferences set just right. Another great feature about this game is that the members of your party level up even if they aren't involved in battle. One downfall of the local multiplayer feature is game acheivement points can only be gained by the main profile player. J is currently playing his own profile just to get those points he missed out on. I had rented this game through Gamefly and we were a little confused without the manual about some of the features in the game. We purchased it and much was cleared up after having access to the instructions. Cooking in the game is a great way to save your player's potions. I underestimated it's value until late in the game. Recipes are hidden throughout the game and released to you by a chef disguised as a different item in each city. Overall, I highly recommend this game if you are looking for something to immerse yourself in.

Food Labels Explained

What does light really mean? What can Fat Free do for me? Here's the skinny on why it's not as great as you think:
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration allows the following definitions on food labels:
FAT-FREE: The product has less than .5 grams of fat per serving.
LOW-FAT: The product has 3 grams or less of fat per serving.
REDUCED or LESS FAT: The product has at least 25% less fat per serving than the full-fat version.
LITE or LIGHT
:
# The product has fewer calories or half the fat of the non-light version.
# The sodium content of a low-calorie, low-fat food is 50 percent less than the non-light version.
# A food is clearer in color (like light instead of dark corn syrup.

CALORIE-FREE: The product has less than 5 calories per serving.
LOW-CALORIE: The product has 40 calories or less per serving.
REDUCED or FEWER CALORIES: The product has at least 25 percent fewer calories per serving than the non-reduced version.