Tag: eggnog

Keeping Score at the Grocery Store

In the chaos of the supermarket a few days before Christmas, milk, eggnog, and a package of those Li’l Smokies sausages fell into our shopping cart. These items don’t usually find their way into our frig but the year-end holiday meals somehow demanded them. If the market wasn’t so frantic I would’ve also whipped out my phone to see if these purchases deserved my dollars. After all, just about everything we use in the kitchen (and bathroom) these days has a little numeric value lurking just below the surface.

Nacho Cheese Doritos are now a “5” in my world.  You might say pretty good! until I tell you that’s on a scale of 1-100.  But let’s say you choose Blue Diamond’s Almond Nut-Thin Crackers instead.  The number skyrockets to 84.  A roll of Wint-O-Green Life Savers earns a 28 while a box of Tic Tac Freshmints doubles the number.  Nature Valley Granola Bars? 51. Heinz Ketchup? 33.  And in the ultimate insult to products considered “food”, perfectly round Nabisco Oreos earn a perfectly round 0/100.

What’s with all the tallying, you ask?  The numbers are simply the output of a little smartphone app called Yuka, which joined my personal parade of subscriptions last May.  In the words of its young French founders (Julie, and brothers Francois and Benoît), Yuka “deciphers product labels and analyzes the health benefits of foods and cosmetics”.  Plain English: Scan the barcode of anything in the supermarket and Yuka tells you whether to buy it or not.

Candidly, it wasn’t the numbers that sold me on Yuka.  Rather it’s this: the app is completely ad-free because brands cannot pay Yuka to advertise their products.  In other words, the numerical ratings I’ve shared are generated objectively, using common perceptions of the health benefits of ingredients.  Yuka has rocked the small space known as my kitchen pantry.

Never is this overhaul more evident than with “cosmetics”, Yuka’s catch-all for everything you find in the bathroom.  In the last eight months I’ve swapped out my deodorant, mouthwash, shaving cream, shampoo, and face wash for items with better Yuka numbers.  Five products I used every day and purchased for years just went flying off my medicine cabinet shelves, replaced by other products that are healthier on and in me (including Aveeno’s facial cleanser, which earns a perfect 100).

Yuka (the name is a nod to Yucatán) is about more than scan-and-score.  You can also simply search on products, mining a database of five million entries.  Even if a product isn’t in the database you can enter the ingredients from the label and Yuka will give it a number.  And if that number is lousy (like it is for your Oreos or my L’il Smokies) Yuka will point you to a list of alternatives with better numbers.  Again, Yuka doesn’t recommend one product over another; it just presents the numbers for you to consider.

In a nod to the healthy habits of Europeans (who favor fresh foods), Yuka’s founders realized its app was most popular in America, where we are so fond of packaged products.  So they packed up their French offices and French families and moved to the middle of Manhattan – temporarily – to better connect with their target audience.  Eventually they’ll head back home but not before Yuka is sure to land on the smartphones of millions of Americans.

Here’s one more aspect of Yuka I appreciate: the founders take time to communicate with their users.  In the eight months I’ve subscribed, they’ve sent me twelve emails with interesting articles about healthy eating, healthy “cosmetics”, and the entertaining evolution of their little company (which includes a dog as an employee).  They also sent me a fun video of their first few days in New York City.  And just last week I received a year-end recap of my app use (93 products scanned with an average score of 46).  No advertisements and no product pushes.

The subscriber version of Yuka is $15/year (you can try a more limited version for free), which includes the convenient scan-for-a-score feature.  Furthermore, your subscription dollars are what keeps Yuka in business, instead of funding manufacturers who’d like nothing more than to push their products on you.  That’s just one of the reasons I now keep score at the grocery store.

Beyond Quenching

Last week on Thanksgiving, I drank the following beverages in a start-to-finish order I may or may not recall correctly: water, coffee, more water, eggnog, water again, wine, and just before bed, a final gulp of water. Eggnog aside (and wine only occasionally) it was a typical day of liquid consumption. But on the list of reasons why I drink anything at all, I find it interesting “quenching thirst” settles to the bottom of the pool.  Closer to the surface are the more interesting intentions.  Collectively you might refer to these habits as my daily fluid dynamics (DFDs).

When I wake up, the first thing I do (make that the second thing I do, after walking the dog) is to down a glass of water; a full sixteen ounces.  I used to knock back just enough to chase my daily vitamins but then I read how you should drink water first thing in the morning, because technically you’ve been dehydrating for the last eight hours.  So I started filling ‘er up to the top of the glass, a two-cup habit I’ve maintained for a long time now.  Let’s list that habit as DFD #1: To help swallow things (like vitamins).

My top-o’-the-mornin’ water stands in the way of the one drink that truly matters in life: coffee (or tea for the rest of you).  My daily dose of caffeine is always the same: twelve ounces of the rich and robust stuff, with just a splash of cream to take the edge off.  Coffee takes me from foggy to functioning in a matter of sips.  Post-coffee Dave is alert and ready to conquer the day.  Call it a chemical dependency?  Hardly.  I can skip my “daily grind” here or there and be none the worse for wear.  But morning brew is undeniably one of life’s simple pleasures.  DFD #2: To deliver a morning wake-me-up. 

Let’s make a brief rest stop on our tour of daily fluid dynamics… literally.  My morning coffee comes with one utterly inconvenient side effect: the recurring “call of nature”.  Something about caffeine seeks to clear out every available drop of moisture from my body, until I might as well be dust.  It’s like one of those juice presses, only press down uncomfortably on the fruit every, oh, twenty minutes.  If I could down an entire liter of cold brew, not only would I be bouncing off the walls but I’d also lose at least ten pounds in water weight over the next hour.  Maybe I’ve discovered America’s next diet craze.

Okay, we’re back from our visit to the “powder room”.  I’m chugging water several more times during the day (indeed, high/dry Colorado made my faithful companion a water bottle, wherever I go).  But is all this water because I’m thirsty or because I can’t get the old saw out of my head, the one that recommends “eight to ten cups a day”?  A similar water saw says to consume half your body weight in ounces, but let’s be real: I never get to that number (nor do I believe in one-rule-applies-to-all).  Yet getting enough H2O still rattles around in my brain.  So, DFD #3: To hydrate the body.

Eggnog done right (meaning it’s often done wrong) is my favorite drink of the holiday season.  Conveniently, the creamy concoction also serves as a throat-soother when you’re sick.  It’s cold, with a thicker-than-milk consistency that settles on your throat for a fair amount of time.  Reminds me of the old Pepto-Bismol jingle (“the pink stuff”), how it “coats, soothes”.  Eggnog might be as effective as a cough drop and it tastes a whole lot better.  DFD #4: To ease a sore throat or cough.

Wine makes my fluids list regularly, and it would even if I had no argument for a DFD.  But I do.  Like today’s college “pre-game” drinking (or tomorrow’s holiday party you’re dreading), sips of wine dull the senses, warm the insides, and melt away stress.  Loose lips are a common side effect, but wine in moderation typically makes the conversation flow.  Plus, the right vintage simply tastes great, time and again.  DFD #5 then: To act as a “social lubricant”.

Last (and least), water is not only my top o’ the mornin’ but also my close o’ the evenin’ drink.  After the toothpaste, the floss, and the oral rinse, the water goes in and comes right back out.  Swishing, gargling, rinsing, and spitting – it’s all an effort to restore order beyond the lips, so you head to bed without the breath of the dead.  The only more effective approach would be a fire hose on full blast. So, DFD #6: To cleanse the mouth.

Maybe you’re a little more introspective about your consumption of beverages now (and you’re welcome).  Like I said, quenching thirst is somewhere near the bottom of the pool.  So the next time you’re taking a sip, and someone notices you being particularly thoughtful about it, just tell them you’d like to explain a little something called daily fluid dynamics.