Obesity is now killing triple the number of people who die from malnutrition........billions of pounds of fat will be packed on between Thanksgiving and the day after New Years Day......

 Watching Bobby Flay's "in the mood for a French Countryside-style brunch picnic", I was motivated, not having eaten in 17 hours, to recreate his delicious "fast and easy food" picnic items...... First up a bottle of Premiere Cru, a Tomato Tart drizzled with fresh herbaceous oil, Home Fries cooked in duck fat (Sarladaise Home Fries), Hard Boiled Eggs With Olive Tapenade and Orange French Yogurt Cake With a Marmalade Glaze, And to cleanse the palate, a pitcher of homemade Citronnade a la Menthe, a light mint lemonade. My motives, as usual, were more complex than just either being hungry or being hungry for some Provence Fare.........Doing an accounting of time and materials cost, I went to Whole Foods, gathered up the ingredients and returned to my kitchen.......3 hours later, a replication of Bobby's super high calorie mini-feast was on the table......My kitchen is a mess.....another hour of cleaning up.......and my wallet is out 100 bucks.....The Ugly American equivalent would be a bottle of grocery store wine, frozen pizza, McDonalds' fries, grocery plastic pack of deviled eggs, Sara Lee pound cake with Smuckers marmalade and a pitcher of Minute Maid lemonade........not so much clean up.....lots of paper and plastic garbage for the landfills.....and the increased likelihood of obesity, heart disease and cancer........but with a savings of 60 bucks......