Giant fish overcomes chocolate addiction

Staff at the Sea Life London Aquarium have helped a chocoholic Giant gourami (Osphronemus goramy) give up its addiction in favour of a more healthy diet.

Gary, the 4.0-kg, 40-cm fish, had been fed a steady diet of Kit Kat bars by its previous owners and would eat nothing else but the chocolate-covered wafer bars.

Staff at the aquarium, who inherited the fish, were initially puzzled as to why the fish refused to eat, until they learned of its sweet tooth.

Aquarium staff then stuffed crushed Kit Kat pieces inside grapes and slices of banana, feeding these to Gary to wean the fish off its unhealthy diet.

Giant gouramis are omnivorous in the wild, and eat a wide variety of plant and animal foods. Gary, estimated to be about 7–10 years old, did not appear to have suffered from its sugar-rich diet. According to Gary’s handler, Rebecca Carter: "I have never heard of a fish being fed chocolate, let alone being brought up entirely on the stuff.

"However, we would not recommend feeding fish confectionery of any kind."

Gary is not the only fish in the aquarium to have picked up unusual habits from its previous owner. Its neighbour, a catfish named Ed, will only eat if fed by hand and enjoys being stroked on the head while it eats. Ed has also taken to head-butting a pufferfish in the same tank that competes for food.

Behind the antics of these fish lies a more serious issue of aquarists being unable to adequately care for fish that have grown too big.

"Many people don't do the right research when they buy fish and end up unable to care for them," added Ms Carter. "Catfish are a good example and we have a number here that outgrew their homes.

"We're delighted we could find a home for Gary, but the fact is we simply do not have the space to accommodate the vast number of re-homing requests we receive."


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Source: Practical Fishkeeping

Chocolate you can Mold and Shape Into fun Designs

What if chocolate were like modelling clay that you could press, shape and mold into your own designs and then eat when finished? Now it actually is with the launch of Magic Choc Flexible Chocolate, the first chocolate product to feature a "secret recipe" that enables it to be molded and shaped. New in the UK, this candy is the innovation of the week from Datamonitor's Product Launch Analytics.

Adding "play value" to candies is an obsession for many confectionery companies, but few have gone as far as the I Want Group with its Magic Choc Flexible Chocolate. Said to be made of 100% Belgian chocolate, the product comes in a mixture of white, dark and milk chocolate pieces that can be squished and shaped into almost any design imaginable. Among the possibilities are animal shapes like a cat, sheep, rabbit, crocodile, and dog as well as other fun designs like a rocket, ghost, witch hat or flower. The consumer has complete control to create whatever design they want, and then eat the end result.

Tom Vierhile, Innovation Insights Director for Datamonitor, says, "We have reported clay-type, sugar-based candies in the past that mimic moldable dough, but this product kicks the concept up a notch as it is actually chocolate-based. And because it can be molded 'as is' without having to melt the chocolate, it adds up to a tasty and creative new way to capitalize on the popularity of do-it-yourself crafts."


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Source: PR Newswire

Why You Should Feed Your Kids Chocolate for Breakfast

It’s not often that we discover a food we think of as decadent and indulgent, is actually good for us. This has probably happened less times than I’ve eaten all the spinach set in front me (clue: less than 5, more than 1). Two such examples that spring to mind are fruit – yes, really, and butter – again, yes really.

Until the 19th-Century, raw fruit was regarded with suspicion. It was special occasion food, not for everyday sustenance. Some childrearing manuals recommended children not be given any fruit until they were five-years-old. Other more liberal, less orthodox guides suggested only well-cooked fruit was passable. Today, the USDA recommends feeding 6-month-old babies mashed banana, and 8-month-old babies soft, fresh fruits such as pears and peaches.

As for butter, we only just weaned ourselves off the stuff, when avant-garde nutritionists and health experts started encouraging us to eat it again. The old guard warned us that with all its saturated fat it would lead to high cholesterol, narrowed arteries, and cardiovascular disease. The argument has gone full circle, and advocates today say butter actually contains nutrients that stave off heart disease - including vitamin A, a vital antioxidant, and lecithin, which helps the body metabolize cholesterol and fats.

Now, I’m going to add another bad-food-turned-good to the list: Chocolate spread, or more precisely, Nutella. Ok, I’m not suggesting that you consider Nutella a health food (as much as I would love to), but what I am saying is that it has been unfairly maligned. Fererro claims it comprises part of a healthy and balanced breakfast; hordes of nay-sayers disagree, and two Californian women are actually suing the makers of Nutella for misrepresenting the spread to them as salubrious, when in fact they were told it resembles candy. When considered in the context of other perfectly permissible breakfast fare such as children’s cereals, or jellies and jam on white Wonder bread, a robust slick of Nutella on a slice of wholewheat toast, trumps the lot.


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Source and Photo: Forbes