We’re all about making lists that make your mouth water. A few years ago, we put out a list of 10 things that taste like Generation Y childhood. Retro things like that combined with the coming Halloween holiday got us thinking of all of the treats that, good or bad, are no longer available in this day and age.

Here are 20 of them.

20. Gator Gum

Drinks and gums are a bad idea, but that didn’t stop Gatorade from releasing lemon-lime and orange gum in the 1970s, again in the 80s, in the late 90s and finally i the early 2000s.

Never a commercial hit, the gum did quench thirst. It was manufactured by Fleer, which we also know for its sports cards.

19. Yoo-Hoo chocolate bar

Yoo-Hoo commercials were all over the airwaves when we were kids, but we didn’t do much to help the chocolate drink succeed as a chocolate bar.

Described as “chocolatey coated nougat,” the candy was essentially a lighter 3 Musketeers bar.

If you’re a big fan, the Yoo-Hoo: Chocolate Flavored Bars Freezer Pops are still on store shelves.

18. Heinz EZ Squirt

Someone thought this was a good idea, and some people actually liked this.

In 2000, Heinz gave the world mustard-style squeeze bottles. Great. But they didn’t stop there. They released their signature ketchup in purple and green colors. It completely backfired. As it turns out, (most) people do not like eating food covered in what looks like boogers and puke.

The product was quickly pulled due to poor sales.

17. The Arch Deluxe

Odds are we never even ate one of these as a kid. The McDonald’s Arch Deluxe was marketed at our sophisticated, burger-enjoying parents.

Trouble was, they didn’t eat it either.

Introduced in 1996, the “burger for adults” arrived with a $100 million advertising campaign. It became one of the costliest flops in fast food history.

The burger was essentially a quarter-pounder with a circular piece of peppered bacon on top, with the usual fixings and special sauce. I don’t know what’s so sophisticated about that.

16. PB Crisps

“Peanut butter with a crunch” — PB Crisps were cookies filled with peanut butter introduced in 1992.

They were delicious, and that was a problem, apparently. More than 2,000 people have signed an online petition to bring the snack back, but Kraft has said it has no plans to re-introduce PB Crisps.

15. Butterfinger BBs

We were actually shocked to learn that BBs had not only been discontinued, but they’ve been gone since 2006. The Bart Simpsons-endorsed Butterfinger BB’s were similar to Whoppers.

In 2009, Nestle brought the product back as Butterfinger Mini Bites. But it’s not the same without the implication of gun violence that BBs gave us as kids.

14. French Toast Crunch

Another victim of the great junk food purge of 2006.

This artificially flavored cereal was launched in 2001. It originally looked like mini slices of bread, but General Mills eventually made it look more like Cinnamon Toast Crunch before pulling it off shelves.

If you are obsessed with French Toast Crunch, you shouldn’t have too much trouble finding it. It’s still produced and marketed in Canada, in the original bread slice design, as “French Toast Crunch” and “Croque pain doré.”

13. Pepsi Blue

Pepsi Blue was only around for two years, but it’s product placement is forever etched into our early 21st Century popular culture, with advertisements by Britney Spears, Sev and Papa Roach and a very memorable appearance in “The Italian Job” as well as “Garfield: The Movie.”

But Pepsi Blue was a nightmare. It was marketed as “Pepsi, but berry” but it was way too sweet and sugary, tasting like cotton candy more than cola. It also used the controversial Blue 1 color that was actually banned in several countries when Pepsi Blue was released.

Today, Pepsi Blue is still available in Malaysia, or you can buy Jolt Blue CX2, which tastes strikingly similar.

12. Magic Middles

These were gooooooood.

But the 90s was a turbulent time in the food world, and these delicious cookies with the hard exterior and melty chocolate center were not meant to last.

11. Ecto-Cooler

This wasn’t even a product that was meant to last more than a few months or years, but Hi-C’s Ecto-Cooler, a tie-in to the 1987 animated series “The Real Ghostbusters” (based on the 1984 movie) lasted until 2007, when Minute Maid finally pulled the plug.

The box and the drink’s popular commercials featured the Ghostbusters character Slimer. It was an orange/tangerine/green drink that was delicious and tasted like summer and movies and everything that was great about being a kid in the 90s.

In 2001, Ecto-Cooler was renamed Shoutin’ Orange Tangergreen, and Slimer was replaced with a weird “lip monster.” In 2006, it was renamed Crazy Citrus Cooler. A year later, it was gone.

Earlier this year, Dog and Pony Show figured out how to make a drink that tastes exactly like Ecto-Cooler.

10. 3D Doritos

These sucked. Clearly some people disagreed, and there is a Facebook group with nearly 8,000 fans of 3D Doritos, a thinner snack, puffed out into more of a nugget than a corn chip.

3D Doritos sold poorly, and it didn’t help that an open bag of these things smelled like a wet dog. Not a great marketing trick.

9. Squeezits

The Squeezit actually had an impressive run during the sugary snack heyday.

This non-carbonated soft drink was sold by General Mills from the mid-1980s until 2001. It came in a plastic container, and the premise was simple: Open it and squeeze to drink.

Flavors included Chucklin’ Cherry, Berry B. Wild, Grumpy Grape (later changed to Gallopin’ Grape), Silly Billy Strawberry, Rockin’ Red Puncher, Mean Green Puncher, Smarty Arty Orange, and Troppi Tropical Punch. For a limited time there were mystery flavors in Black Bottles.

There are rumors that Squeezits were making a comeback this year, but we could not confirm.

8. The Supersize

This one you’ll really never see again. The malign-ment of fast food in this decade (and rightly so) has caused restaurants to reshape their offerings so it doesn’t look as obvious that they are feeding you pure death in the form of salty fried potatoes and processed beef.

But back in the day, we ordered our Supersize fries after the multicultural group of skinny kids on the television commercials looked like they were having so much fun eating at McDonald’s every day.

7. Orbitz

Before the gum or the travel website, we had Orbitz, the gravity-defying drink with the floating orbs.

The fruity beverage was marketed by Clearly Canadian in 1997. It was a complete flop — visually appealing but not delicious in the least.

Orbitz got its spacial effect from gellan gum, which created a microscopic spiderweb effect that allowed the edible falls to float around.

We really had some weird foods back in the day…

6. Surge

In 1996, Coca-Cola wanted to compete with Pepsi’s successful Mountain Dew green citrus soft drink. Surge was originally introduced in Norway as Urge, where it is still available for sale today.

Surge cold well in the US for a few years, but it quickly started to slip when people realized that the “extreme sports” marketing was bogus — it was just a bunch of sugar and caffeine that was bad for you nad not as tasty as Mountain Dew.

Today, Coke’s Vault is similar to Surge, only with more caffeine.

5. Crispy M&M’s

Weird. People generally just loved these M&M candies with the crispy rice center, but they were discontinued in 2005 after six years.

The problem might have been an overabundance of good things. A lot of different M&M varieties came out over years, including M&M’s Minis, dark chocolate, mint, almonds, orange chocolate, coconut, pretzel, cherry, and peanut butter.

Crispy M&M’s are still available in Europe, Australia, and southeast Asia.

4. Jimmy Dean Chocolate Chip Pancake-wrapped Sausage On A Stick

Oh Jesus.

This might have had a chance if it were released in the 80s, or even the 90s, but not the late 2000s.

Speaking of too much of a good thing — chocolate chips, pancakes, and sausage … on a friggin’ stick.

This lasted about a year. Thank God.

3. Crystal Pepsi.

Here’s the thing, 20 years ago a marketing gimmick emerged promoting “clearness” as equal to purity and goodness. It wasn’t started by or limited to soft drinks.

But in 1992, Pepsi introduced four markets, including Providence, to Crystal Pepsi. It sold well, so the company released the product nationwide.

It was a miserable failure, given the millions of dollars in marketing Pepsi had invested. The product was gone within the year.

There is a rumor that Pepsi is releasing a clear cola again next year. We shall see.

2. Waffle Crisp

This cereal is not officially discontinued, but good luck finding it on the shelf at your local Stop & Shop or Market Basket.

The maple syrup-flavored corn cereal bits were launched in 1996 with a gaggle of grannies seen in commercials laboring away to make more cereal.

The cereal is readily available online if you want to relive your glory years of sugary sweet breakfast.

1. Oreo O’s

This cereal IS gone — except in South Korea, of all places.

Oreo O’s was launched in 1998 and discontinued in 2007. It is a perfect example of a cereal whose box is better for you to eat than the actual food inside.

There was also something called Extreme Creme Taste Oreo O’s, which contained marshmallows that tasted like Oreo cream.

Why can’t you get them anymore? About three years ago, Kraft and Post parted ways. Post owns the recipe to the cereal, but Kraft owns the trademark and rights to use the Oreo name, leaving no company able to make Oreo O’s cereal. Doh.

Honorable mention: Dad’s Root Beer

You can still find Dad’s at specialty stores and on Amazon.com, but it’s all but disappeared from grocery stores. Monarch Beverage Company, which bought the rights to the root beer in 1986, helped make it the second most produced root beer in the US before it all but died out in the past decade. Today, you pretty much can’t find it in the Northeast, and some people have complained that online bottles, which can go for $3 a piece, don’t taste the same and are made with corn syrup instead of sugar.

(Media credit/Phil Dragash)

American eaters are very serious about their hamburgers. In fact, it would be hard to imagine a more American food than the all American burger.

Now, after sampling those sought after sandwiches from dozens of chain restaurants, Consumer Reports has named the McDonald’s hamburger the worst-tasting burger.

The magazine surveyed 28-thousand people nationwide to come up with the rankings on a ten point scale. Of course, not every hamburger chain was covered in the survey. For example high end chain The Counter was left out of the survey. Five Guys and In-N-Out Burger topped the list. McDonald’s biggest rival Burger King came in tied for next to last place in burger taste tests.

So, why do McDonald’s burgers score so low? My discriminating burger palette tells me reason number one that the Golden Arches fail the taste test would be that their ground beef patties are frozen. When meat is frozen, the freezing process pulls the natural moisture out of the meat. So, when the meat is defrosted, much of that natural moisture "runs off" leaving a drier, less rich tasting product.

Second, because of the speed in which McDonald’s, or any other fast food burger restaurant has to serve their burgers, the patties are cooked ahead of time. Who knows how long that burger has been sitting there in the warming unit? Even though McDonald’s, Burger King and the rest of the chains have standards on how long they hold their burgers, it would be reasonable to assume that the burgers are not "cooked to order".

From a quality and taste comparison, it would be hard to compare a McDonald’s burger (especially their "Dollar Value Menu" hamburger, which has a much smaller pattie and distinctly inferior taste to their higher end burger offerings) to a Five Guys or an In-And-Out Burger as in both of the latter restaurants, the burgers are almost always cooked to order. Of course, you pay for this higher quality and better taste in higher prices and in longer cook times. At either Five Guys or In-And-Out Burger, you’re looking at up to 10 to 15 minute cook times. Can you imagine sitting in a McDonald’s drive thru for 15 minutes, without threatening to McFlurry the kid behind the window? So, certainly convenience, speed and price, rather than taste, have a lot to do with McDonald’s burgers selling billions of their burgers each year.

On the other hand, why do McDonald’s fries continue to do so well in taste tests? McDonald’s fries are frozen as compared to Five Guys whose fries are fresh cut. In the old days, though, McDonald’s fries were also fresh cut and fried in a blend of beef tallow (fat) and cotton seed oil that made the fries delicious. My spies deep within the Mickey D’s organization (OK, a high schooler I know who works there after school) tells me that McDonald’s fries are made with a "natural" seasoning that duplicates the taste profile of the original fries cooked in beef tallow. I’d also theorize that human beings’ tastes are determined in the first years of their lives. So, after generations of Americans have been raised on Happy Meals, we are programmed from toddlerhood forward to love McDonald’s fries.

What makes Five Guys and In-And-Out Burger score so well with those surveyed? Both serve fresh ground beef cooked to order and served on freshly baked buns, but, moreover, at both of these places, you can pick whatever combination of ingredients you desire to top off your burger. Hand leaf lettuce, fresh cut tomatoes, saut©ed mushrooms, saut©ed onions, raw onions and lots more.

Americans have strong opinions about what makes a great burger. And, it appears that Five Guys and In-And-Out have the right recipe for success; instead of quick and pre-fabricated, burger barons want their fast food chains to start off with great quality ingredients, and then let them "have it your way" when it comes to putting it all together. Hmm, haven’t we heard that jingle somewhere before?

MIDDLEBOROUGH, Mass. — Did somebody say McDonald’s?

Oh my god this is painful. I am working on‚ a story for the Boston Globe here in Middleborough, and the only place I could find with wireless Internet to file my story is … a McDonald’s.

I’m totally not a paying customer. I’m not buying anything, especially French fries.

Blast got to have an in depth talk with “Pushing Daisies” creator Bryan Fuller. We talked about what we can expect from its second season, the 12 Emmy nominations it got for its nine aired episodes, and just how much we both love McDonald’s deep-fried pies:

BLAST: How goes the filming of “Pushing Daisies”?

BF: It’s going really well; we’re filming episode seven right now. We start episode eight Friday [August 29], and we’re moving along. We just turned in our outline for episode 10 and are story doc-ing it for episode 11 and about to turn in our story for 12 and we have 13 episodes ordered and so we have one more to go in the order before they have to tell us if we’re doing more or not. So it’s very exciting.

BLAST: You guys got cut really short last year. How did that change the story progression?

BF: You know, there’s a lot of stuff that we’re doing this year that we were going to do in the first season, but I think what really helped us is the fact that this is the second season and there were some stories the network was really nervous about like “I don’t know if that’s a first season story or if you should save that for second season.” It really actually helped us to come back with the second season so we could do some of the stories they were nervous about letting us do in the first season, since we had such a short first season, we got to do right away in the second season. It also really helped us kind of get perspective on the show. When the shut down happened, when it was like “Pencils down” from the Writer’s Guild, we were almost at the end of our scripts anyways, so we were scrambling to get another script ready, and then the shut down happened, so we didn’t have to worry about that. So a lot of those ideas we kind of got back-burnered but the specific episodes; we redid like one or two of them and there are still quite a few that we want to do from last year that were going to be part of the first season. The good thing is that we were just able to get perspective. So we took a step back from the show and being on break and working the terrors of production gave us a chance to just stop and say “Okay, what’s the story that we want to tell?”, “Where are these characters going?” It just gave us the necessary breathing room to chart out a second season which I am really proud of and very excited by. I think the writer’s strike allowed us to not get trapped in the sophomore slump of shows and you feel kind of a lag in the creativity because you see it literally go right from one to the other, and in this case it really allowed us to recharge our batteries, consider what was working on the show and maybe what was not working as well and just have a much more invigorated approach to the second season.

BLAST: Can you give us a preview of what we might be seeing in the second season?

BF: Well all the cliff-hangers that we had; we had the cliff-hanger with Swoosie Kurtz’s character Lily, that plays a big factor in the first three episodes. Really, beyond that, it really is just a big game changer that affects all of the characters; we understand why that secret was kept and why Lily made the choices that she did to not be honest with Chuck about their relationship and we see what happens when Olive, who has been keeping all these secrets from everybody, how her breakdown sends her off to a nunnery to keep those secrets and what happens when she comes back and lets Chuck know and where does that take Chuck, what’s Chuck’s reaction. She’s in a difficult situation because she can’t just go to Lily. Here are these two people like mother and daughter who both think the other one is dead, and it puts them in a really odd situation that we’re going to have a lot of fun with that drama of that particular situation. We also are introducing a character in episode five named Dwight Dixon played by Stephen Root, and he will have a shared history with Chuck’s father and Ned’s father and will stir up a lot of hullaballoo for Ned and he becomes a catalyst to really bring the aunts into the story of the Pie Hole in a way that we really hadn’t seen last year because it was one of those things we were forced to do because of Chuck’s situation and people not knowing she was alive again was to keep the aunts separate. In our first episode, we have the aunts marching through the front door of the Pie Hole and what happens to our characters when that world starts to encroach on theirs and how do they react. It really is about trying to put the characters in really fun situations where they’re forced to keep the secrets that they’ve been trying to keep keeping but may not be able to for long because the walls between worlds are crumbling down.

BLAST: So is it safe to safe to say that Chuck’s secret becomes more tenuous? That it might be harder to keep, which we were kind of seeing at the end of last season?

BF: Yes, definitely. We’re definitely steering towards as much drama as we can mine from that idea as possible. Last year we had an episode “The Fun in Funeral” where Chuck discovers that a watch that was buried with her was stolen by the funeral director, and she gets it back. That watch basically plays a pivotal role around the middle of the season, and we understand that there is significant weight on that watch and that people want it for various reasons.

BLAST: Last season, surprisingly for it being cut short, felt very un-rushed; the progression still felt really natural. Where will the second season pick up?

The second season picks up ten months after the first season. They’re kind of in the same place where Chuck and Ned ‚ we saw last season were in an emotionally difficult place and those wounds have healed and they’re moving forward, but who hasn’t ‚ healed is Olive who’s been forced to be the keeper of a great many secrets. We pick up in a way that that picks up kind of where we left of, except a lot of time has passed which kind of allows Olive to buckle under the weight of all the secrets she has been keeping, that spurs a very dramatic decisions on her part to quit the Pie Hole and leave and set out on a life of her own where she doesn’t have to be keeping his secrets from so many people.

BLAST: So does she end up actually leaving, or is that part of the drama that unfolds?

BF: That’s part of the drama that unfolds; she quits the Pie Hole the first episode and joins a nunnery.

BLAST: What was the decision behind throwing [Kristin Chenoweth] on the show? I hear she’s going to have more musical numbers too.

BF: She is. Barry Sonnenfeld, who directed the pilot, is one of our executive producers that just worked with her on a movie called “RV” with Robin Williams, and we talking about who Olive was and how she has a relatively small role in the pilot and that role would get bigger as the series develops. And because of how much story telling we had to get done in the pilot because being a primus story there wasn’t a lot of room to do a ton with Olive. As we got into the season, we really fleshed out her role, and basically had this conversation; Barry and I got on the phone with Kristin and made her promise that if you do this show we will not let your talents go to waste. That’s why we created the musical numbers for her and one of the things about doing an ensemble show is that there’s an ebb and flow with the characters so we will have some characters be featured more in some episodes and others less so and so we have a great arch for all of the team this season and then she is… not relegated to the background, but she becomes so much a part of the crime solving team that we’re able to see much more of her this season than we were last season. Kristin is Carol Burnett. She has such fantastic comedic timing. She’s also a wonderful dramatic actress. She really is the Carol Burnett for our generation.

BLAST: At Comic-con, you were saying that the idea for “Pushing Daisies” came from a future idea you had for “Dead Like Me.” Is there ever going to be a similar foil that can kill people like your character in “Dead Like Me” who is introduced in “Pushing Daisies”?

BF: There’s no plan for that right now. There are going to be some small crossovers between “Dead Like Me” and “Wonderfalls” and “Pushing Daisies” planned throughout the season, but just letting an audience know that those three series exist in the same universe. Right now we have so many stories to tell with Ned and Chuck and Emerson and the aunts that right now I can’t imagine being able to squeeze in that. But maybe that’s a fun thing to do in the third season, knocking on wood that we get one.

BLAST: You guys have been nominated for 12 Emmys. Give me your response to that great critical feedback.

BF: It’s a pretty fantastic ratio for having only done nine episodes to get 12 Emmy nominations. It’s always the “I’m so happy for everyone who got nominated” and I’m thrilled that I got nominated for writing the pilot and I also wanted Ellen and Swoosie and Chi and Anna to be nominated but I was thrilled that Kristin and Lee were nominated and Barry was nominated and that a production designer. It’s a wonderful acknowledgement that everybody’s back-breaking work from last season, and everybody was functioning on all cylinders and so committed to this show and the creative vision that it just makes me proud.

BLAST: It’s definitely something to be proud of.

BF: Well thank you.

BLAST: Can you tell me a little bit more of where the creative vision came from? It definitely has a very unique feel to it.

BF: It’s very much like decorating a Christmas tree. The idea started back on “Dead Like Me” when I thought “Okay, Georgia is a character who touches people and takes their souls and wouldn’t it be interesting if she had a romantic foil for somebody who touches people and gives their life back.” Then I put that idea in my back pocket and it just kept on percolating. I had a deal with Warner Bros. to do a pilot for them. I pitched several ideas for TV series and by that time I was like “You know, I’m just going to write ["Pushing Daisies"] as a feature. I tried for several years to get it done and they seemed very interested in doing it as a TV series. So I thought, “Okay, I’ll just do it as a feature.” As a last minute thing I pitched it in that pitch session and Susan at Warner Bros. Television was like “That’s the one. That’s the idea that we’re doing.” What I pitched was that a guy can touch dead people and bring them back to life, but if he touches them twice they go back to being dead and he falls in love with a dead girl and he can never touch her again. That was kind of the pitch of the show. So the pie-maker came after that. I was like “What’s that one-liner that’s kind of odd.” I just kept on thinking “Well what does this guy do? Well, I like pie, so maybe he’s a pie-maker. I love reading, I like to read just voraciously, so she’s a shut in who reads every book that ever comes across her path,” and literally just started putting one ornament on the tree after another, and then some ornaments would come off and others would go on and I would add tinsel and light and finally the star on top. It’s strange how these ideas are developed because they are living breathing things in and of their own light and a lot of times the show will tell you what it wants to be. It really is a fascinating process because as much as I would like to say “This was the plan, and I carried it out with precision” it’s just so random and you have to see what fits and what looks good and if it’s something that’s too much then you take it off and the whole process of creating a TV show is really an interesting arch.

BLAST: It’s very much developed.

BF: Developed is such a great word because it’s something that, like you’re preparing a dish, so you add ingredients and you take ingredients away and you bake it for a certain amount of time and then you have to pull it out of the oven and butter the crust and there’s so many steps that can either ruin the dish or make it better than you imagined all along the way that it’s alchemy.

BLAST: What about the look for the show?

BF: There’s big inspiration in “Amelie” for all sorts of reasons; tradition reasons and the story telling and also the look, the saturated colors and the hyper-reality and then there’s also the working with Barry Sonnenfeld who is such a fantastic visualist. What I love about Barry and his approach to making anything is that he wants it to be pretty. He’s like “Okay, this has to be pretty. This could be prettier.” He’s got an aesthetic where he appreciates beauty and sometimes we see movies and television and they revel in kind of like ugly images and Barry is not that guy. He appreciates beauty and wants to create it. It couldn’t have been a better pairing.

BLAST: Some of the content on the show; you guys touch on bulimia and the doll and [a character] thinks she’s a human, but you guys take it with such a grain of salt and such comedy, was that ever an issue trying to get some of the problems that they had to use detective work on into the show?

BF: Not a big problem. There were some stories that we weren’t able to do because sometimes we tipped the scales a bit on certain issues. Usually for the bulimia and the episode dummy it was just a small flavor of who this character was and there wasn’t too much… The network tends to get nervous when we go big and gross, so we try not to go to big and gross places. But if it’s a matter of, once again, alchemy’s a great word; it’s a matter of finding that delicate balance of things in the right ratios that make them much more digestible than if we had significantly spent time in the bathroom stall with that character and her vomiting than it might now be as… fun. So like suggestions of things I find go much further than the visceral brutality of other things.

BLAST: How did you develop that sort kind of relationship, especially between Ned and Chuck where they’re these adults but they still have this childness to them?

BF: I think that’s really my outlook on life, that there is a sense and an appreciation to life. I think that’s what is so great about Ned and Chuck and their relationship, is that they have awe for each other and I think that the world could do with more awe. ‚ Being able to step back and say “Wow that’s neat,” and for me consciousness is enough to make me go “Gah” about being alive, because this base between the backs of your eyes and the back of your head is thick that it can’t be measured and for me that’s enough for me to believe in a power that’s much greater then I will ever be, and appreciate my role in the universe, however small it is. It’s pretty awe-inspiring.

BLAST: Never has a show made me more hungry than this show, I swear. With all the pie, I’ve been craving a nice apple pie for like the past month or so. Can you talk a little bit more about the whole choice for the pie?

BF: You know, really for me it was just sitting down to do this show, I just wanted to fill it with so many things I love. I couldn’t do Criminal Minds or CSI, because you have to live in a very dark head space and a very dark outlook on the human condition. Working on a TV show really is in a lot of ways a prison sentence; you live it, you breathe it, you sacrifice your personal life because it just demands so much of you. I wanted to fill it with so many things I love, that when I have to be here all hours of the night that I was here with things that make me happy. And I love pie. I love a good cherry pie.

BLAST: Every episode just doesn’t leave you alone, it’s like “Oh my god I want pie so much right now!”

BF: I miss those old McDonald deep fried pies.

BLAST: Oh my god, yes!

BF: Remember those?

BLAST: Oh absolutely. I think they still do the apple pies there don’t they?

BF: Well they used to have them in these little hot pockets, and slide them. I think they had a lot of law suits, because people would bite into them and take off all the skin from the inside of their mouths. But I miss those. That was one of my happiest moments; going through the McDonald’s drive-thru and getting a cherry pie.

BLAST: They had cherry pie and I think they had peach at one point, and I would get the apple and they had them two for a dollar and I would just be like “Ah, this is heaven.”

BF: [laughter] The cherry was always my favorite. And you know, a great apple pie is so hard to come by.

BLAST: Yes, yes. Diners are the classic place to go and get pie, and they look so great on shows like “Gilmore Girls,” and then I go to a diner and they aren’t quite up to snuff.

BF: No, no. I mean like, “Twin Peaks,” their pies, yum yum yum.

BLAST: We’ll be on the search for the perfect pie. But back to the show!

BF: That’s a good aspiration.

BLAST: Are we ever going to see Alfredo again? He had this brief two episode stint where Kristin Chenoweth realized she had this potential for another relationship and then he didn’t come back.

BF: Well, we were going to have him come back this season, but he booked a play. As soon as he’s available and we can squeeze him in, we absolutely want to get him back. We have a new romance that’s going to be a brewing for Kristin this season, and what we want to do is get knee deep into that hot and heavy, and then bring Alfredo back. So that there is a big conflict on whom does she choose?

BLAST: Well at least she’s finding some happiness instead of being upset the whole time about Ned and Chuck.

BF: Yeah, we got to give her some happy.

BLAST: Okay, and for my final questions, is there any hope for Ned and Chuck?

BF: In terms of…?

BLAST: Their relationship continuing versus just being on the brink every second hoping that there is no accidental touch that’s going to send Chuck back?

BF: I think there is a tremendous amount of hope for Ned and Chuck. We’re going to see all sorts of devices. I’m excited about an episode were doing now, episode eight, where something really big happens in the story and it’s something where you just want to see Ned and Chuck hold each other and you cut to, Ned and Chuck spooning, where Ned has his arms around her holding her tight and then you reveal that there’s a plastic divider that’s he’s pulling a plastic bubble holding her. So we’re coming up with all sorts of ways we can get them to touch without touching. What’s really fun about this season is that we’ve sexualized Chuck and Ned’s relationship. It’s a family show so we don’t go too far, but we definitely treating them as two sexual adults. There is some nudity, but it’s eight o’clock, so not that kind of nudity, but there’s bare backs and stuff like that. It’s nice to see them grow in that direction.

BLAST: They aren’t going to be kissing each other through Emerson or anything like that though, right?

BF: Like Ned kisses Emerson and Emerson kisses Chuck? [laughter] No, we won”Ëœt be doing that. We do have by proxy high fives and stuff like that that Emerson helps out in. No, he will be out of their bedroom business. He wants to stay away from that.

Dear EarthTalk: I really want to eat healthy and organic but am constantly traveling and on the go. How can I eat fast food without having to always end up at McDonalds and Burger King? – Dylan Baker, Seattle, Washington  

The latest trend in fast food is healthy and organic, and luckily for conscious consumers, several chains offering just such fare are taking root in different parts of the U.S. One of the leaders of this small but scrappy pack of fast food upstarts is O’Naturals. The small chain currently runs two stores of its own in Maine (Falmouth and Portland) and one in Acton, Massachusetts, and franchises out additional locations in Kansas and Florida. O’Naturals’ menu contains lots of vegetarian-friendly items, including “build-your-own” flatbread sandwiches, salads, noodle stir-frys and soups. The meat the restaurant does serve is grass-fed and hormone-free, while the chickens are free-range and the Alaskan salmon is wild.  

Another healthy option is EVOS, which currently runs five “quick-casual” restaurants in Florida and is planning a major expansion into the western U.S. Vegetarians can rejoice in the chain’s wide selection of vegetarian and vegan items. While its hormone- and antibiotic-free burgers are still only about as healthy as red meat gets, their soy burger satisfies without the guilt or the cholesterol. Also, EVOS uses organic field greens in its wraps and salads, organic milk in its milkshakes, and fresh fruit in its smoothies. Additionally, the restaurant air-bakes its fries and other typically deep-fried items to keep the fat content as much as 70 percent lower than the same kinds of foods found elsewhere. 

Meanwhile, Seattle-based Organics-To-Go, with five locations in Washington and California, lays out a wide array of “grab-and-go” organic and natural foods so customers can make up their own meals out of a cornucopia of healthy choices. Other fast food alternatives offering lots of health (as well as vegetarian and vegan) options include Au Bon Pain, Bruegger’s Bagels, Noah’s Bagels, and World Wraps, while Subway and Quizno’s alike can be good options for those willing to study the menu carefully.  

Even though many alternatives exist, it is hard to beat the reach of the major fast food chains, several of which are making small steps toward healthier menus and will undoubtedly continue to do so if consumers bite. McDonald’s, KFC, Burger King and Wendy’s have reduced or eliminated trans-fats. Burger King now offers a veggie burger, and McDonald’s is testing one in California. Taco Bell offers many non-meat options, including a bean and cheese burrito, a veggie fajita wrap, and a 7-layer burrito, which can be had without the cheese and sour cream. Carl’s Jr. also has many tasty and healthy vegetarian options despite an otherwise standard fast-food menu. Vegetarians and vegans looking for more ideas about what to eat when time is of the essence should consult any number of websites with pages devoted to the topic, including Vegetarian-Restaurants.net, VegCooking, FitWise and Vegetarian Resource Group.  

And remember, nothing beats seeking out local restaurants when you’re on the road, to soak up some of the local culture. And with trends as they are it shouldn’t be too difficult to find many that do serve healthy menus-just not quite as fast as “fast food” but probably fast enough. 

CONTACTS: O’Naturals, www.onaturals.com; EVOS, www.evos.com; Vegetarian-Restaurants.net, www.vegetarian-restaurants.net; VegCooking, www.vegcooking.com; FitWise, www.fitwise.com; Vegetarian Resource Group, www.vrg.org.  

Dear EarthTalk: Are sunscreens safe? Which ones do you recommend that will protect my skin from the sun and not cause other issues?     – Bettina E., New York, NY 

Getting a little sunshine is important for helping our bodies generate Vitamin D, an important supplement for strong bones, and f or regulating our levels of serotonin and tryptamine, neurotransmitters that keep our moods and sleep/wake cycles in order. Like anything, though, too much sun can cause health issues, from sunburns to skin cancer. For those of us spend more time in the sun than doctors recommend-they say to stay indoors between 11 AM and 3 PM on sunny days to be safe-sunscreens can be lifesavers. 

Getting too much sun is bad because of ultraviolet radiation, 90 percent of which comes in the form of Ultraviolet A (UVA) rays that are not absorbed by the ozone layer and penetrate deep into our skin. Ultraviolet B (UVB) rays make up the rest. These rays are partially absorbed by the ozone layer (which makes preserving the ozone layer crucial for our health), and because they don’t penetrate our skin as deeply, can cause those lobster-red sunburns. Both types of UV rays are thought to cause skin cancer. 

Yet while most sunscreens block out at least some UVB radiation, many don’t screen UVA rays at all, making their use risky. According to the non-profit Environmental Working Group (EWG), by far most of the commercially available sunscreens do not provide adequate protection against the sun’s harmful UV radiation and may also contain chemicals with questionable safety records. 

In all, 84 percent of the 831 sunscreens EWG tested did not pass health and environmental muster. Many contained potentially harmful chemicals like Benzophenone, homosalate and octyl methoxycinnamate (also called octinoxate), which are known to mimic naturally occurring bodily hormones and can thus throw the body’s systems out of whack. Some also contained Padimate-0 and parsol 1789 (also known as avobenzone), which are suspected of causing DNA damage when exposed to sunlight. Furthermore, EWG found that more than half the sunscreens on the market make questionable product claims about longevity, water resistance and UV protection. 

As a result, EWG has called on the U.S. Food & Drug Administration (FDA) to establish standards for labeling so consumers have a better idea of what they may be buying. In the meantime, consumers looking to find out how their preferred brand stacks up can check out EWG’s online Skin Deep database, which compares thousands of health and beauty products against environmental and human health standards. 

The good news is that many companies are now introducing safer sunscreens crafted from plant- and mineral-based ingredients and without chemical additives. Some of the best, according to Skin Deep, are Alba Botanica Sun’s Fragrance-Free Mineral Sunscreen, Avalon Baby’s Sunscreen SPF 18, Badger’s SPF 30 Sunscreen, Burt’s Bees’ Chemical-Free Sunscreen SPF 15, California Baby’s SPF 30, Juice Beauty’s Green Apple SPF 15 Moisturizer, and Kabana’s Green Screen SPF 15. Natural foods markets stock many of these, or they can be found online at websites like Sun Protection Center and Drugstore.com. 

CONTACTS: Environmental Working Group, www.ewg.org; Skin Deep Cosmetic Safety Database, www.cosmeticsdatabase.com; Sun Protection Center, www.sunprotectioncenter.com, Drugstore.com, www.drugstore.com. 

GOT AN ENVIRONMENTAL QUESTION? Send it to: EarthTalk, c/o E/The Environmental Magazine, P.O. Box 5098, Westport, CT 06881; submit it at: www.emagazine.com/earthtalk/thisweek/, or e-mail: earthtalk@emagazine.com. Read past columns at: www.emagazine.com/earthtalk/archives.php.

From our PRrag blog:

From WFTV Florida: (video on their website)

“A 75-year-old woman was arrested at a Clearwater McDonald’s drive-thru because police said she wouldn’t pull her car forward.”

The grandmother of eight asked for fries without salt. The fries took extra time to cook special, and employees told her to wait there for a few minutes.

Well that didn’t sit right with the cop waiting in line behind her.

He ordered the grandmother to pull forward in the drive-thru. Waiting for her coffee and special salt-free fries, she told the officer the McDonald’s employees asked her to wait there.

The cop called for backup, arrested the woman, Jean Merola, handcuffed her, took her to jail and searched, photographed and fingerprinted her before releasing her 90 minutes later.