Courtesy of http://www.thenibble.com/REVIEWS/main/candy/old/the-best-salt-caramels.asp

The three little words hovering on every lip are: downsizing, local and green. It is essential to keep up with what’s happening in order to keep steering our own ship with the winds of change blowing our sails.

Almost every enterprise is struggling. Brides are buying gowns from thrift shops and inviting guests to backyard barbecues instead of grand receptions. Restaurants are offering lower priced family meals. Food services of all kinds are paring their choices. Six seems to be the magic number for items on menus.

The pendulum is swinging again. The more we try to economize, the more we justify our sacrifices by indulging in affordable luxuries. Just lately you may have noticed the new affection for salt with caramel. Of course this doesn’t mean any old salt, but salt harvested from a location as exotic as the source of the bottled waters we once drank. Caramel, always a sweet treat, has now soared into the stratosphere of our affections.

We are also “into” tea leaves and chocolate and coffee beans that have been harvested from a single plantation. An increasing number of commodities are falling under the umbrella of “fair trade“. The growing enthusiasm for farm to fork and our new affection for small (but exquisite) bed & breakfasts are all part of the same trend — away from big and yet bigger to small and yet smaller.

You will remember how this is merely an echo of what has happened before?

There was a time when a drink of fizzing brown chemicals held enough liquid to fill a child’s wading pool. A sandwich was as thick as as a copy of War and Peace and a decent size portion of mashed potatoes was one into which we could sink both buttocks.

Then we turned our attention to small: one bite bagels and one chew cheesecakes. Zucchinis became so small, we thought that soon they would just be painted on the plate as part of the pattern. Now we’re seeing small(er) doughnuts, small(er) cupcakes and vanishing endangered head waiters and fishes of all kinds. In short, sushi has become the new pizza.

So, with everything shrinking, how is it, nearly of us are expanding?

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It’s worth noting: bagels should not be confused with doughnuts though both are round. Both have holes and both are hand-held devices that provide instant gratification.

Bagels and doughnuts are not alike. A doughnut hole is something you fall into when you have swallowed more drugs than the government thinks you are entitled too.

A bagel hole is just a hole surrounded with dough. A doughnut is fried. A bagel is boiled before it is baked.

The bagel comes in many varieties including but not limited to: pumpernickel, rye, sourdough, whole wheat, multi-grain, cinnamon-raisin and blueberry, and may be baked with different toppings among them poppy seeds, sesame seeds, onions or coarse salt.

Doughnuts are not the same thing at all. Doughnuts are sweet and soft. Bagels are hard and chewy.

I was pondering these samenesses and differences when it occurred to me that everybody, male and female, young and old, like both doughnuts and bagels. So wouldn’t it be a great idea to sell both of them–doughnuts and bagels–from a cart to passersby? You have to get a license of course, but how difficult could that be?

I’ve been told that a nimble-on-his-feet hot dog vendor at a ball game can hit average sales of 150 – 200 dogs a game, and earn something approximating $30,000 a year while catching an occasional glimpse of the action on the field. The All American Hot Dog Company will sell you the equipment you need (plus a supply of Sabrett hot dogs if you decide to expand the menu for $2,499.00. (That’s one dollar less than $2,500.00.)

I’d like to wager that selling a sweet cream-filled doughnut or a cream cheese-stuffed bagel would be a sure bet!

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