Yesterday, I changed things up a bit, and grabbed a medium sized (4 1/2 oz) bag of Cracker Jack. Cracker Jack and I go way back. As I'm sure it does for a lot of people. Cracker Jack, according to the website, was first introduced at the 1893 World's Fair in Chicago. It took its place in popular culture when it was included in the song "Take Me Out to the Ball Game" in 1908. Bottom line...its been around a long time, and most everybody has tried, or is at least aware of the "popcorn, peanut, and caramel confection". Cracker Jack is a comfort food, it still tastes the same to my taste buds as it did when I was four. My grandfather used to take me to the Loyola Theater to see matinees when I was small, and he would get me Cracker Jack. I don't know if he bought it there, or if he brought it with him, my memory is a little vague, but I remember my grandfather and I remember the Cracker Jack. Maybe he had taken me to circus, or a freaking carnival...I don't know...but the two are somehow connected. There is also a bit of nostalgia, and longing for childhood innocence worked in there too, but I digress. Like I said, Cracker Jack is a comfort food, and it seemed like the right call as I was checking out with the rest of my stuff.
I opened the bag a little later that evening, and sent myself back to the soft theater seat, or circus bleacher, or whatever I was sitting on when I was four, with the salty sweet combo of flavors. The caramel coat on the popcorn was just as I remembered it, but something wasn't quite right. I realized quickly that it was the absence of peanut. While popcorn is the true foundation of the recipe, the peanut is secondary only in quantity. When it comes to overall flavor impact, the peanut is just as much a role player as is the popped corn. The salty-sweet end result satisfies all of your mouths desires, and is equally complimented by soda or beer (I prefer the latter, but will go with the former when looking for full nostalgic impact). On this occasion the combo was definitely hurting when it came to peanuts. I looked down into the open bag and didn't see any. I shook the bag a little and looked again...nothing. Now I understand that the contents of the bag, during transport, experiences some "settling". The heavy stuff will find its way to the bottom of the bag as it is jostled on its journey from the factory to the store. But even with that in mind, I wasn't seeing near enough peanuts. I continued to eat my way through the bag until I got about an inch from the bottom, it was here that my hound-dog-like investigative reflexes kicked into action, and I decided to...well...investigate.
I poured the remaining contents of the bag into a pie tin, and separated the popcorn from the peanuts. Keep in mind I had not eaten a single peanut from the bag yet. I counted thirteen whole peanuts, and fourteen half peanuts...a grand total of twenty peanuts, all of which were sitting in the rubble at the bottom of the bag, pretty much ruining the whole flavor experience. This pissed me off. I paid $1.29, plus tax, for the bag...my grandfather paid a nickle...a fuggin nickle! I was most certainly being hosed. I did some more calculations, and in approximate terms, based on the size of the bag, the number of popped corn kernels left in the bag when I dumped it out, taking into account the aforementioned "settling of contents in transport", and deducting, of course, the area occupied by the peanuts, it was determined that each bag would have in it between 375 and 425 popped corn kernels. For purposes of the investigation, I split the difference and called it an even 400. So we have a 20 peanut to 400 kernel ratio...or 1 peanut for every 20 kernels. When you consider that an honest mouthful of Cracker Jack requires 2 to 3 kernels to a peanuts, for maximum flavor, it is more than apparent just how terribly wrong, and completely unacceptable, this ratio is. There should be a minimum of 125 to 135 peanuts per bag in order to achieve an acceptable balance between the corn and the nut.
The more I though about it, the more pissed I got. There were definitely way more peanuts in the bag when I was a kid. Waaaay more! Not only that, the nuts were stuck to the corn by the caramel...not laying impotently at the bottom of my sack like they do now. They are taking advantage of us. They are putting one over on us people! We're being hornswaggled! We're being bamboozled! They are taking us to the cleaners and laughing all the way to the bank. All for a buck...your buck...my buck...my grandfathers buck (after he bought twenty). A buck twenty-nine actually. The bastards. Commie pinko's. They'll make excuses about packaging weights, and the cost of the peanut. They'll point the finger at shipping costs, and import taxes, but it's all a load of crap. We need to rise up people and demand some satisfaction. We are the consumer dammit! Without us they're nothin'! They expect us to just lie there and take it. To just sit on our fat asses and shovel their almost entirely popcorn product down our gullets. But we can do something! We can write our congressman! Perhaps a letter to the editor of Rolling Stone or Newsweek? Or maybe just call the customer comments toll-free number on the back of the bag. Whatever the case, let's make a change for good America. Lets send a message that we know what's worth fighting for in this country today. Lets tell whoever will listen, "We want our nuts back!"
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