Question – what is the most stolen food in the world? Place your bets – alcohol, meat, sea food. A chocoholic would vote for chocolate. You just went bust. The top stolen food is cheese. 4% of cheese made is stolen.
Why would it be the top stolen item? Well, it’s easy to hide and available everywhere in any store. It doesn’t carry security tags like the expensive electronics. And packaged cheese is a hot item on the black market so it’s easy to resell.
508 million pounds of cheese are stolen every year. How heavy is that, exactly? If the weight of an average car is roughly 4,000 pounds (via the Environmental Protection Agency), then cheese thieves steal the equivalent of 127,000 cars worth a year. That’s a lot of cheese.
As it turns out, most cheese is stolen in large quantities for resale to other markets and restaurants. “Take the time in 2017 when Italian police undertook “Operation Wine and Cheese” and succeeded in capturing 10 masterminds behind the theft of 168 wheels (or $110,000 worth) of Parmesan.”
Simply put, cheese is expensive. And despite the numerous health conditions associated with eating tons of cheese regularly, the average per capita consumption of cheese in the United States is up to about 40 pounds a year. It’s safe to say we can expect more cheese heists in the future.
According to mashed.com, the easiest way to steal cheese may be to have an inside man. In October 2019, Dairy Herd reported that police had captured two men who stole $50,000 worth of cheese from Leprino Foods between 2017 and 2019. One of the thieves reportedly worked at the California plant, which happens to the world’s largest manufacturer of mozzarella cheese. Police were eventually able to identify the cheese based on the serial numbers blocked on to it.
Various sources relate that one of the easiest ways to steal the cheese is just by asking for it. In 2011, two women walked into an Oregon Whole Foods and requested a box full of cheese. While one went to the register, the other walked out the door. What was in the box? $300 worth of Gouda and $270 worth of blue cheese.
Finally, you can steal it the old-fashioned way by planning and executing a heist from the outside. In 2018 French thieves took off with 700 blocks (the equivalent of $11,000) of Saint-Nectaire. In 2019 a Canadian thief, posing as a delivery man, successfully stole $137,000 worth of cheese from Saputo Dairy Products in Ontario. As local constable, Ed Sanchuk noted, that’s “quite a large amount of cheese to get rid of.” Maybe Jerry is behind all this mob cheese activity? Tom needs to up his game time.
Fashion fads come and go. Seldom do they create riots. Actually, you would think it is the female in the fashion world that would create the chaos. But those darn ole men just gotta break that unwritten rule.
In 1922 an 8-day riot broke out in New York City. Don’t laugh – it was over straw hats. And the men started it. In the 1920s men agreed straw hats were acceptable in the summer. However, when autumn came, those hats had to go right back into their hat boxes. So, when some rebels decided that they would refuse to box up those straw hats in September, there was bedlam in the streets.
Admittedly the straw hat rule was a fashion thing, no legal law. But if someone violated that unwritten rule, hat bashing would ensue. In 1922 a gang of teens began roving the streets looking for those straw hats. They enjoyed knocking the hats off and stomping on them as a sign of public ridicule.
Then they picked on the wrong crowd. When a group of dock workers were attacked, the workers hit back. The ensuing brawl shut down the Manhattan Bridge which brought in the police to break it up.
It didn’t stop there. More gangs searched for straw hats to destroy. The mob eventually swelled to over 1,000 teens. Police swarmed the streets, arresting the ‘hat attackers’.
Fortunately, annual straw hat riots didn’t become a thing. Straw hats gradually fell out of fashion and it became more acceptable to wear them year around.
It’s that time of the year when you are still looking for something to cool down with. Ask a kid and they will tell you how great this invention was. Do you know who is recognized as being the inventor of Popsicles? It turns out an 11-year-old boy created that mixture. He accidentally invented this treat on a cold night in 1905.
He mixed up his favorite soda powder and water and left it out overnight. By morning it was frozen and to his delight – delicious. Frank Epperson called it an Epsicle for Epperson plus icicle.
Frank started selling his treat to other kids in the neighborhood. The Epsicle was so popular he took ‘em to a local amusement park. By 1924 Frank took out a patent on his ice pop, including instructions of the best materials for the Popsicle stick.
Eventually, his kids had some improved ideas. They had always called the treat Pop’s ‘sicle. They encouraged Frank to change the name from Epsicle to Popsicle. Soon the Popsicle became an international sensation and today we enjoy 2 Billion popsicles a year. Hopefully you don’t eat that many a year by yourself. So enjoy a popsicle while wearing your straw hat.
Did you hear about the gloomy jack-o’-lantern? It needed to lighten up