"denver" news and stories

The newest issue of Cooking Light, which is their 20th anniversary issue, has the magazine's choices for the top 20 cities in the US, based on 15 criteria that they feel embody their "Eat Smart, Be Fit, and Live Well" philosophy. They looked at fitness, health and exercise data from the Centers for Disease Control, the number of parks and recreation areas (and how often they're used) from the Trust for Public Land, restaurant ratings from the Zagat Survey and James Beard Foundation, and the USDA's farmers markets listings. Everything was evened out on a per capita basis and the cities with the most of everything made the top cut.

One of the top ten cities will be featured each month in the magazine this year, so readers will have access to information about all the things that got the city their ranking.

1. Seattle, WA
2. Portland, Ore.
3. Washington, D.C.
4. Minneapolis, MN
5. San Francisco, CA
6. Boston, MA
7. Denver, CO
8. Milwaukee, WI
9. Philadelphia, PA
10. Tucson, AZ

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Adam over at Adjab posted a story about how Salt Lake City's One World Cafe and Denver's SAME Cafe are offering customers organic meals and telling them they can pay whatever they like. If you can afford $10, pay that. If you can only afford 10 cents, pay that. And if you don't have any money at all, then you can wash dishes or do other work at the restaurant to pay off the bill.

Seems like a cool idea to me (I've heard of other restaurants doing this too, so maybe it's a trend), though I wonder how political something like this could get. The restaurants ask richer customers to pay more, so they can balance things out when some customers don't pay anything. Seems like a classic Republican/Democrat debate, only at one particular business, a restaurant.

I also like the idea of some sort of barter system for restaurants and other businesses. Though I once tried to buy a new Lexus with a bunch of oranges and they just laughed in my face.

There was a time when a vending machine simply dispensed chilled sodas. After that, they carried a full range of candy bars and salty snack products. There were even vending machines that brewed you a cup of coffee and heated your instant cup o' soup. Soon other industries beyond food will be able to stock their wares in these machines, traditionally only food-delivery systems. The Denver Post reports that Safeway supermarkets in Colorado have been testing these machines in stores since late last year. Nestled amongst food products, the Zoom Shops carry such goods as iPods, Playstations and DVD sets. Don't dig out the retractable quarter on a string from your childhood, though. That trick may have gotten you a free Coke, but these new machines only take credit cards. Will there eventually be a middle ground between 65¢ packets of pretzels and iPods - like a blender or a mid-range toaster oven? Only time will tell....

 

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