Dear America
May 19, 2005
Dear America,
I’m enjoying a tasty snack of some imported Triscuits, and I was wondering -- can I ask you a question?
On the back of the box, there is an advertisement for “Pre-Cut Natural Cheese.” Apparently these “Cracker Cuts” are “Pre-Cut For Crackers!”
America, I know you have no time to make breakfast, or lunch, or dinner. I understand that, I really do. You work hard. There’s no shame in cold cereal, a deli sandwich, some sushi or pizza delivered. I wish you would not eat at McDonald’s so much, but I understand.
But these "Cracker Cuts," I do not understand. What's the matter? You have time to “Satisfy Your Mid-day Munchies,” but you don’t have time to pick up a knife, push it through a block of cheese to create a “Slice,” and lay it on your “Cracker”?
Or are things worse than I imagine? You have run out of knives, perhaps, or the strength to wield them?
Warm regards,
Robin
I recently saw an advertisement for the pre-cut cheese, and my thoughts were exxxxxxactly the same as yours.
This outdoes even those "Milk & cereal" bars.
This reminds me a lot of Uncrustables, those peanut butter and jelly sandwiches that come without crusts, since the crusts are cut off and the two pieces of bread are melded together with a pie crust type edging. Crazy America, always with the weird food "advances."
The answers, I believe, are as follows:
* What's the matter? Nothing, this is more business as usual. If we can put peanut butter and jelly in the same jar, this isn't much of a leap.
* We don't have time? We have time, but that isn't the way we want to spend it. That is, among those of us who will buy this product. And let's face it, this is a step up from sprayable cheese product which was the previous one-step solution to getting something cheesish onto a cracker.
* Things are worse? Yes, they are. Or better - it depends on your point of view.
* Knives? We gottem, but if you use them, then you gotta clean them etc. And no, we aren't going to admit to being too weak to "wield them" because first we have to look up "wield" so in the meantime, we'll deny it.
Thanks for listening!
The cracker cut cheese is a good example of what I call "the individually wrapped hot dog phenomenon". It's when a product is based around fixing a problem that doesn't exist. Hot dogs don't need to be individually wrapped, either for storage purposes or for cooking. They are so full of preservatives, I'm sure you could probably leave them out on the counter for days and they would still be fine. And they don't even need to be cooked at all, let alone heated up in a specially designed pouch. And yet, there they are in the store, in layers of bubbles packs, hermetically sealed - for those folks who crave tubes of salty, ground offal, but demand that it seem as fresh as possible!
