Green Bay, Wis. — In the wake of last month’s massive recall of ground beef by a local meatpacking plant, PETA had hoped to place its blunt new anti-meat billboard in Green Bay, but the city’s billboard companies had other ideas. The billboard, intended to inspire Green Bay residents to chuck their Buffalo wings, steaks, and pork cutlets in favor of humane—and safe—vegetarian fare, has been refused space by city billboard companies.

The billboard reads, “Eat Meat and Die,” and lists bacterial infections such as E. coli, listeria, and campylobacter that are among the risks of eating meat. Urging viewers to “go vegetarian!” and steering them to PETA’s GoVeg.com Web site, the billboard would have come on the heels of recent news reports that Packerland Packing Company, based in Green Bay, recalled 59,000 pounds of ground beef from seven states because of possible E. coli contamination.

Orde Advertising told PETA, “Our marketing area includes a huge amount of dairy population in which we feel this copy would be offensive.”

What’s PETA’s beef with meat? Besides causing immeasurable suffering for the billions of animals cruelly raised and killed for their flesh, meat is also deadly to consumers. Eighty percent of food-borne illnesses are directly linked to meat consumption, but the threat of E. coli, listeria, campylobacter, and other bacterial infections is only the beginning. Consumption of meat and other animal products has also been conclusively linked to America’s top killers, including heart disease, strokes, diabetes, and obesity.

Animals pay the price, too. Chickens are drugged up and bred to grow so quickly that they can often barely stand. Cows are dehorned and branded and males are castrated—all without painkillers. According to U.S. Department of Agriculture meat inspectors, cows and pigs in slaughterhouses are often dismembered while still conscious, and chickens often drown in the scalding-hot water that is used for feather removal.

“Eating meat supports cruelty to animals and puts your health in jeopardy,” says PETA Director of Vegan Campaigns Bruce Friedrich. “If you want to get sick and fat and eventually drop dead of a heart attack, just keep cramming those Buffalo wings, pork chops, and beef stew down your throat.”

For more information, please visit GoVeg.com.

By Tim Greening

tigreening@gannett.com

Los Angeles residents Chris Formby and Heather McLean visit Shreveport occasionally to see Formby’s father, Tommy. And they know not to leave town before they get their fix of spicy chicken wings because they make them different here.

“When you come to a place like this you know you’re going to get the hottest wings,” Chris Formby said, wiping the sweat off his brow while munching on “Wings on Fire” at Wings N Things on Mansfield Road.

“In Los Angeles, they just don’t make them hot enough. Even when you go to Hooters and order their hottest wings, it’s like barbecue sauce.”

And when they return next time they’ll have more chicken wing places to choose from. Shreveport and Bossier City have seen no less than seven chicken wing-oriented restaurants that have opened or will open in the coming months.

Wingstop, a Dallas-based chain, got it started when it opened its Shreveport location in Old Rivermarket Shopping Center in July 2003. Just over a year later, we have Wings Express, Wings N Things (both on Mansfield Road), Wings to Go on south Youree Drive and Wing King in Bossier City. Soon, there’ll be a King of Wings on Line Avenue and another Wingstop location in Bossier City.

So the question is, why? Why are chicken wings the hottest trend in restaurants (no pun intended)?

“I don’t really know the explanation,” said P.K. Patel, co-owner of Wings to Go, a Dallas-based chain.

Patel said wing shacks are “a dime a dozen” in Dallas, where he’s from. His partner, Jay Patel (no relation), has relatives in Shreveport and when they would visit them here, he saw an opportunity.

“I said, ‘There’s no chicken wing places here,’” P.K. Patel said. They opened in July.

Mel Owen, owner of the local franchise of Wings N Things, also a Dallas-based chain, thinks it’s the convenience that attracts people to chicken wings.

“People like to nibble,” Owen said. “You can eat 20 wings and not think you’ve had a whole meal, as opposed to eating half of a chicken.”

“It’s finger food,” said Hyung Choi, owner and creator of Wing King. “People like to snack and watch TV and might not want a full meal.”

But let’s face it: It’s all about the sauce. Most of these restaurants have a dozen or more different flavors to coat the wings, and they’re usually extremely tangy, extremely spicy or a combination of both.

McLean, our visitor from Los Angeles, said it’s the variety of flavors that draw her to them.

“I like that you can get all the different flavors in one meal,” McLean said.

Bossier Parish Community College students Shane Barksdale and Brandon Pender, recent customers at Wing King, like the intense flavors and the fact that you usually get a lot of wings with a typical order.

“You get a lot of them and you just keep eating them. They’re just a different taste,” Barksdale said.

“I just like the flavor, It’s just something different, it’s not just like regular chicken,” Pender said.

All the restaurant owners and managers we talked to said their version of the classic Buffalo wing — the spicy, pepper-sauce-coated wings that are the granddaddy of hot wings — is their best seller. They also said take-out orders make up the majority of their sales.

One flavor that’s catching on at Wings Express, located in Daiquiri Express on Mansfield Road, is its Coca-Cola wings. The 5-year-old daiquiri bar just added its hot wing menu a couple of months ago and manager David Adkins developed the Coca-Cola sauce, adapted from a recipe he saw in a cookbook.

“It was too complicated so I simplified it,” Adkins said. He starts with Coca-Cola syrup and adds brown sugar and other spices.

He said most people are turned off by the name and order something else, but he’ll slip them a Coca-Cola wing.

“They try it and, boy, they love it,” Adkins said. “They’ll come back and order all Coca-Cola wings.”

However, most of the restaurateurs recognize they can’t just sell wings and offer alternatives.

“Not everyone likes chicken wings, and not everyone likes them every day. If you just do chicken wings, you’ll turn away half your customers,” said Owen of Wings N Things, adding that his hand-made hamburgers sell very well.

His menu of “N Things” also includes chicken fingers, shrimp and sandwiches, as does Wings to Go and Wings Express. Similarly, Wing King also sells fried rice and teriyaki rice bowls.

So, will the trend continue? Most certainly. Wingstop already has a Bossier City store in the works, set to be in the Kickapoo Motel area currently under renovation. Manager Reggie Taylor said it should open in January.

And Choi has big plans for Wing King. He wants to open another dine-in restaurant in Shreveport like the one he has in Bossier City, and then he wants to open three take-out-only stores in both cities.

“In the next month, I’ll start looking into it,” he said.

©The Shreveport Times
October 27, 2004

MARION — Where there’s smoke, there’s … hot sauce? The Marion City Schools and the local Buffalo Wild Wings restaurant are lighting a fire under area businesses and organizations to participate in the third annual charity hot-wing-eating contest. Proceeds from the event will benefit the 2004 United Way campaign.

Previously held at Taft, this year’s contest will move to the gymnasium at Grant Middle School (formerly Harding High) and be held at 1 p.m. Friday, October 29. “Being able to hold it at Grant gives us a lot of room to grow,” said Kathy Wink, BW3s Sales & Marketing Director. “We were maxed-out at Taft; the size of Grant’s gym will allow us to accommodate more teams and hopefully generate more money for United Way.”

Last year’s event raised more than $1,100 for the charity. A team of Taft Middle School teachers took home top honors, dethroning the defending champs from Wyandot Snacks.

United Way of Marion County’s 2004 campaign is currently under way and continues through Monday, November 1st. This year’s goal is to raise $1,231,500 in cash and pledges to help fund more than 50 programs at 26 area non-profit agencies.

Wink summarized the contest guidelines: “To field a team, you need five participants with at least one male and one female. You also need a minimum donation of $50 per team, though we encourage each team to collect as much money as possible. The team that eats the most hot wings (sauce rating of 10, with 12 being our hottest) in five minutes wins our rotating trophy. Contestants cannot ‘wash down’ the wings until the horn sounds, though we do provide plenty of milk and water immediately afterwards. Because the wings are pretty hot, we do require participants under 18 years to have their parents sign a waiver. Teams come up with wacky names and even costumes, uniforms or protective gear. The more outrageous it gets, the more fun people seem to have.”

Wink noted entry forms and additional information are available from Buffalo Wild Wings, phone 725-9464; from Shawn Jackson at the Marion City Schools, phone 223-4405; and from United Way of Marion County, phone 383-3108.

The deadline for receipt of entries is Oct. 22 though teams can bring their entry fees or sponsor sheets with them on the day of the event.

Beef Chili:
3 tbsp. vegetable oil, divided
2 lbs. boneless chuck or sirloin, cut in ¾-inch cubes
1 cup chopped sweet onion
3 tbsp. chili powder
1 ½ tsp. garlic salt
1 tsp. ground cumin
1 tsp. oregano leaves
¼ tsp. ground red pepper
14 oz. can beef broth
6 oz. can tomato paste
¾ cup each: water and beer
2 (15 oz.) cans black beans, rinsed and drained
Shredded cheese, chopped green onion and sour cream for garnish

Icy Orange Pumpkins:
5 naval oranges
½ gallon vanilla-flavored frozen yogurt
30 oz. can Libby’s Easy Pumpkin Pie Mix
5 long cinnamon sticks

Heat 2 tbsp. oil in pot over medium-high heat. Add beef. Brown on all sides. Remove beef; set aside. Discard fat. Heat remaining 1 tbsp. oil in pan. Add onion and cook for 4 minutes, stirring. Stir in beef and remaining ingredients. Bring to boil. Reduce heat. Simmer, uncovered, 1 ½ hours, stirring occasionally. Add black beans to pot just before serving. Top with shredded cheese, chopped green onion and sour cream.

For icy pumpkins, soften ½ gallon frozen yogurt. Fold in 30 oz. can Libby’s Easy Pumpkin Pie Mix. Refreeze overnight. Cut off tops of oranges. Hollow out oranges. Cut Jack-O-Lantern faces into each fruit. Pack pumpkin-flavored frozen yogurt into oranges, being careful not to let mixture ooze out of holes. Cut a hole into top of each orange cap. Place on top of oranges. Insert cinnamon stick through the hole. Freeze for at least 3 hours.

Bison to the Bone: Wing Eating Contest

The lower level of the Blackburn Center buzzed with curiosity and anticipation as participants and spectators awaited Thursday’s “RedHot Chicken Wing” eating contest.

Sponsored by Frank’s RedHot Sauce and National Lampoons film franchise, the wing-eating competition consisted of three preliminary rounds and a final eat-off portion for the $500 prize.

The event began unceremoniously due to apparent miscommunication between the DJ and Rob Bardunias, president of National Lampoons. The music was stopped and started a few times because of confusion about the rules.

Throughout the event, announcements were fumbled and a general disorganization was evident. However, that did not hinder the excitement for the audience once the contest got underway. Once the actual eating began, some students cheered for their friends and danced to the tunes being spun on the turntables. Others looked on, outwardly unemotional.

Two winners from each of the first three rounds were chosen to advance to the finals. One of the two from round one, freshman business management major John Cameron, who vomited halfway through the finals, said after his victory. “I’m [trying to] get this $500.”

He also said he would enter even if there was not a cash prize, and did not give much credence to the suggestion that the event promoted a negative stereotype. “That’s when people get too serious. It’s fun.”

As rapid chicken eating continued and the atmosphere intensified, senior radio-television-film major Cefis Johnson made no bones about his feelings toward the contest. “[I'm not going to] play myself to look like the dude scarfing down chicken wings for the h–l of it. [Isn't] that just some stereotypical stuff for a black college?”

RedHot picked up momentum as the rounds went on. Students showed more enthusiasm when current radio hits like “‘Nolia Clap” and “Go DJ” were played. The different contestants in each round also seemed to pick up steam, some feverishly ripping chicken meat from the bones splattering hot sauce everywhere.

Small mouths say bad things

John Rosemond

Before I write this column, journalistic ethics require that I make two disclosures of personal experience:

My first-grade teacher washed my mouth out with soap once. She took me into the bathroom, made me chew on a bar of Ivory or something, then brought me back out into the hall, where the rest of the class was waiting, and made me apologize. I had no idea why what I said was wrong, but I apologized because in 1953, when a Catholic nun told you to do something, you did it.

I like hot sauce. I use it liberally, even on meat loaf, and I have tried some of the hottest hot sauces made, including those made with habenero and scotch bonnet peppers, which according to the Scoville Scale (Google it!) are the hottest of the hot. I once engaged in a hot pepper-eating contest with another fool. That attempt at Latin macho resulted in significant indigestion, offset by a rather mellow endorphin high. I’d do it again, because I have an addictive personality, and I’m proud of it.

Now, onto the reason for this column: Of late, reporters have peppered me with questions about parents who, in response to “bad words” and “talking back,” wash their children’s mouths out with soap or put a drop or two of hot sauce on their tongues. They ask: Do you recommend it? Is it abusive? Does it work? What kind of soap/hot sauce should a parent use, and how much?

Let’s take the questions in order. First, I don’t recommend either of these practices. As regards children who use inappropriate language or speak disrespectfully to adults, I have recommended having the child in question write sentences and/or a letter of apology to the offended, confining the child to his/her room, taking away a highly coveted privilege for a memorable period of time, having the child stand on a public corner wearing a sandwich board that reads “I use bad language” (NO! I’M JUST KIDDING!), and the like.

Despite my unwillingness to endorse either washing the mouth with soap or hot-saucing, they do not move me to outrage, nor am I able to find evidence that they are abusive per se. Some pediatricians warn that hot saucing can cause swelling of sensitive mouth tissue and possibly trigger previously unknown allergies. I won’t argue with this, but I was unable to locate any substantiating clinical reports, which doesn’t mean they’re not out there, but only that the potential risks are probably quite low.

An emergency room physician I spoke with says he has never, in 20 years, treated a child for either a reaction to hot sauce on the tongue or soap in the mouth, but he concedes that the occasional child might have an idiosyncratic reaction. I would simply hope that the parent of a child who does have a physical reaction would not use the technique in question again.

As for hot-saucing, check the Scoville Scale before doing so and use a sauce that is discomforting, but probably not painful — a Jalapeno-based sauce perhaps. In any case, try it on yourself and your spouse before using it on your child. Needless to say, if either of you have a negative physical reaction, it’s a safe bet your child will as well.

A pediatrician friend of mine recommends that parents who want to try soap-in-the-mouth use a mild facial soap rather than a relatively harsh deodorant bath soap. “Less chemicals, less risk,” he said, but he’s never heard of a child having a physical reaction to any kind of soap.

Do they work? As one might imagine, social scientists have not researched this question; therefore, anecdotal reports will have to suffice. Concerning both soap-in-the-mouth and hot-saucing, the preponderance of self-reports suggest they are moderately effective, but certainly not reliable. The difference seems to be one of age — the younger the child, the more likely it is that the soap or hot sauce will deter future verbal offenses of the same sort. But then, the earlier one uses any form of discipline, the more likely it is that the discipline will “nip” the problem “in the bud.”

I’ve heard many a parent say they’ve tried using hot sauce to stop thumb-sucking, but not one has reported that it’s worked. Some children even seem to like it.

Maybe that’s where I acquired the taste.

Respondents run hot, cold on ‘saucing’
Maria Elena Baca, Star Tribune
October 26, 2004

“For lying and other offenses of the tongue, I ‘spank’ my kids’ tongues. I put a tiny drop of hot sauce on the end of my finger and dab it onto my child’s tongue. It stings for a while, but it abates. (It’s the memory that lingers!)”

This description of a disciplinary practice called “hot-saucing” is from “Creative Correction,” a 289-page parenting book that former child actress Lisa Whelchel published by Focus on the Family in 2000. Attention to this passage from a recent Washington Post article and a “Good Morning America” feature have created a firestorm on parenting Web sites and blogs.

While some reactions have been positive, others have been overwhelmingly negative. “Frightening,”vile” and “inhumane” are among words being tossed about on the Web. Paul McIlhenny, president and CEO of the McIlhenny Co., which produces the Tabasco label hot sauce, declined to be interviewed for this story, but told the Washington Post he viewed the practice as “strange and scary” and “abusive.”

‘Not meant to be cruel’

Hot-saucing has roots in the American South, and appears to be rare in Minnesota, but it exists.

Diane Butler, of New Richland, Minn., joined Whelchel’s e-mail list after hearing the actress speak at a women’s conference. She responded to an e-mail Whelchel sent, seeking parents who had tried hot saucing, and subsequently was contacted by producers for “Good Morning America.” The television interview, with Butler and her daughter, Melanie, aired in late August.

Butler said she used a couple of drops of Tabasco sauce to discipline her now adult children only a handful of times as punishment for lying or back talk.

“I just really want people to know that it wasn’t something to just be mean or cruel or any of that,” Butler said. “Each child is so different, and what works for one just may not work for another.”

She said she doesn’t remember where she got the idea and still doesn’t get the fuss.

The goal, she said, “is to raise children who love the Lord, and who are good and respectful people, and sometimes things work, and sometimes things don’t. As parents, all we can do is our best and to try to learn from our mistakes and go on.”

John Rosemond, a family psychologist, syndicated columnist and author of “New Parent Power,” said that while he generally thinks there are better alternatives to spanking and hot-saucing, he wouldn’t tell parents not to do it.

“I don’t think putting hot sauce on a child’s tongue is abuse, nor do I think it’s going to create psychological problems,” he said. “If a parent does something like this and it produces a couple of blisters, that certainly is not life-threatening. If the parent is aware that it produces blisters [and] that the child is extremely sensitive to this, I would hope the parent would stop. I guess the line is drawn where the parent knows this is causing physical injury — not just physical pain — and doesn’t stop.”

Nausea, pain potential dangers

In humans, pure capsaicin, the substance that makes peppers hot, can cause potentially fatal swelling of the tongue and esophagus, or cardiac arrest. Even lower potency hot sauce can cause nausea and extreme pain to children’s sensitive tongues, said Steve Setzer, education director at the Minnesota Poison Control Center.

Setzer warned that distraught children might also get hot sauce-laced saliva in their eyes and damage their corneas by rubbing to ease the pain.

Child-care centers in Michigan and Georgia were investigated for using hot sauce as a disciplinary tool, at the parents’ request. The practice also is actionable in Virginia.

The Minnesota statute defining child abuse does have a passage that covers punishments that involve forcing children to ingest non-prescribed substances. In practice, as with all disciplinary tools, child protection gets involved when the punishment results in injury such as cuts, bruises or blisters.

In Ramsey County, child protection workers open less than one hot-saucing file a year; in Hennepin County, these cases are similarly rare.

“We don’t get a lot of them, but we do get them,” said Carolyn McHenry, program manager for child protection at Hennepin County. “We do assess them. Often it’s a disciplinary practice people use not realizing how harmful it can be.”

Harvey Linder, program manager at Hennepin County Child Protection Services warns that punishments such as these are indicative of larger issues in society.

“We have to get away from the notion that harming people is the way to get a behavior,” Linder said. “Usually there’s a better way.”

He acknowledged that parenting can be difficult and frustrating.

“We live in a society that teaches us you have to get instant results,” he said. “Parents have to be consistent,” he said. “They have to be willing to keep doing the same thing over and over until it begins to work. What gets the desperate parents in trouble is they give up on a strategy before it begins to work … Sometimes you have to try something 20 or 30 times [so children get the message]: ‘It doesn’t matter how many times you do this, I’m not going to change my mind.’ Children learn from that.”

She stands by the practice

As for Whelchel, the former Mouseketeer and “Facts of Life” star who unwittingly has been cast as the poster mom for “hot saucing,” the fuss has been unwelcome and unsettling.

“I’m really not willing to lose my reputation for hot saucing,” she said. “It’s an idea, and if a parent feels uncomfortable with it, for goodness sake don’t use it. If explaining and reasoning is enough, and if they have children like that, then God bless them.”

But she stands by the practice.

“When my son was little, I took him twice a week every week [to an allergist] for nine months and stood by and watched a nurse poke a sharp needle in his arm while he cried,” she said. “I was willing to let him suffer a little bit of pain in the belief it would spare him a lifetime of misery. Was I abusing him? As I’m older, I have learned the best lessons that have shaped me by going through pain. I don’t think the goal in life is to avoid pain. We can learn a lot through pain.”