Does This Taste Funny?

After having a lot of fun touring around Canada's Maritime provinces with my solo show Funny, Daddy in 2013 with great media and audience reviews, I'm getting ready for a fall 2014 tour of my new 1-hour solo show Does This Taste Funny?

Prepping for my specialty: Entertained Squab.
Photo by Keith Hawkins

My new show will be an hour of food-related jokes and stories. It's the tale of why, despite graduating from a great culinary school and working in amazing kitchens in Canada and Europe, I'm not a chef today. Mixed in with the food jokes will be funny stories from behind-the-scenes of the restaurant biz!

I'm working out the details and dates and of course the script now, and I want to make sure this tour is as well-organized as possible. In order to ensure that, there are a ton of up-front expenses (booking venues, advertising etc). So, after talking to a few people who have used crowdfunding websites like IndieGogo to help pre-fund their tours and/or shows, I have decided to launch an IndieGogo campaign of my own.

I'm hoping to find a bunch of people who would like to help me get this tour off on the right foot by contributing to my IndieGogo campaign. You can find my campaign by clicking here.

 In exchange for your contribution, you will receive some cool perks. You can receive one of my favourite recipes monthly for the rest of the year, or if you play your cards right, I'll come to your house and cook you dinner for 4 before a show! Check these out:

*All contributions of $25 or more will be added to the Lloyd's Llunch Counter Recipe of the Month Club. You will receive 1 of my favourite recipes by email monthly throughout 2014, with details like where I got the idea & how I made it my own. With each recipe I will include 1 of the food-related jokes or stories I'm working on for Does This Taste Funny?

$2 (Contributor level: Cook) - Each $2 sponsor will receive a digital download of Does This Taste Funny?
All sponsor levels will be thanked in the show program.

$10 (Contributor level: Chef's Apprentice) - Each $10 sponsor will receive a ticket to a Does This Taste Funny? show of their choice. ($15 value). If you're not near a show, I'll donate your ticket to a deserving local charity.

$25 (Contributor level: Demi-Chef) - Each $25 sponsor will receive 2 tickets to a Does This Taste Funny? show of their choice, PLUS a free digital download of the show. ($35 value) 

*All contributions of $25 or more will be added to the Lloyd's Llunch Counter Recipe of the Month Club. You will receive 1 of my favourite recipes by email monthly throughout 2014, with details like where I got the idea & how I made it my own. With each recipe I will include 1 of the food-related jokes or stories I'm working on for Does This Taste Funny?

$50 (Contributor level: Chef de Partie) - Each $50 sponsor will receive TWO pairs of tickets to a Does This Taste Funny? show of their choice, plus a free digital download of the show ($65 value) PLUS you'll be added to the Lloyd's Llunch Counter Recipe of the Month Club throughout 2014.

$100 (Contributor level: Sous Chef) - Each $100 sponsor will receive FOUR pairs of tickets to a Does This Taste Funny? show of their choice, plus a free digital download of the show PLUS a Bay of Funny Comedy t-shirt ($145 value) PLUS you'll be added to the Lloyd's Llunch Counter Recipe of the Month Club throughout 2014.

$250 (Contributor level - Executive Chef) - Each $250 sponsor will get 5 pairs of tickets to a Does This Taste Funny? show of their choice, + a digital download of the show + a Bay of Funny Comedy t-shirt + a bottle of wine ($50-$75 retail) delivered to your home pre-show + cab fare to and from the show (on account of the wine) (approximately $280 value) + you'll be added to the Lloyd's Llunch Counter Recipe of the Month Club for 2014.
If you're not near a show you'll get a liquor store gift card & I'll donate your tickets to charity

$500 (Contributor level - Restaurateur) - Each $500 sponsor will receive TEN PAIRS of tickets to a Does This Taste Funny? show of their choice, plus a free digital download of the show plus a Bay of Funny Comedy t-shirt plus a bottle of wine and cab fare to and from the show PLUS a $150 donation in your name to the charity of your choice, post-tour.(approximately $580 value)
PLUS you'll be added to the Lloyd's Llunch Counter Recipe of the Month Club throughout 2014.

$1,000 (Contributor level - Minister of Food) - Each $1000 sponsor will receive 10 PAIRS of tickets to a Does This Taste Funny? show of their choice, + a free digital download of the show + a Bay of Funny Comedy t-shirt plus a bottle of wine and cab fare to and from the show plus a $150 donation in your name to the charity of your choice, post-tour PLUS Lloyd Ravn will come to your home and prepare a 3-course dinner for 4 people before the show.(priceless?)
PLUS you'll be added to the Lloyd's Llunch Counter Recipe of the Month Club for 2014.

I hope you'll jump on the Does This Taste Funny? bandwagon and make a contribution in exchange for one of the perks outlined above, as well as share my campaign with your friends on Facebook, Twitter and e-mail. Here's the link again:  http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/does-this-taste-funny-2014-comedy-tour

Thanks for your support!

Lloyd

Swingers Club

Have you ever been to a swingers bar? Ever wondered what it's like? Here's a video I made about a couple who visited a swingers bar for the first time.

Advertising so bold, I will gag

Is it just me, or is the current billboard campaign for Bullseye Barbecue Sauce the least appetizing advertising for a food product ever?

SAUCE SO BOLD PORK WILL PULL ITSELF

Now, I love me a pulled pork sandwich. mmmm. But the idea of pork "pulling itself" puts two, equally revolting images in my head.

First, I imagine a sad little piggy, cutting off its own shoulder, slow-roasting it, basted in a little Bullseye and then pulling it apart (one-handed of course) into tender pieces for my sandwich. I think it would be hard to eat while Porky is crying in the corner.

Secondly, and even more disturbingly, I imagine a pig tasting the sauce and finding it so amazing that he can't resist, ummm, "pulling" himself. By that, I mean pulling one specific part of himself. You know. Down in his bathing-suit area. If pigs wore bathing suits. And if pigs had opposable thumbs.

I love barbecue sauce, however I have never found the flavour to be erotic, but apparently it is like oysters to a pig.

I just hope that the next campaign isn't Bullseye's all-new Hollandaise sauce.

I didn't know he worked in a grocery store

I saw this sign on a display of apples at my local grocery store.

Apples McIntosh FCY

The FCY part threw me off. I know that it means "Fancy" which is a grade of apples. But when I read it, I thought it was saying "Fucky" which is what angry stand-up comedian Darren Frost often calls audience members. For a split second, I thought Darren had been hired to write these things. Which would be awesome. I also imagine he'd put up signs like:

"They're carrots, dumbfuck."

"These are condoms, please use them so we don't get little fuckies like you."

"It's chocolate cake. You might as well eat the whole thing, lard ass."

"This is non-alcoholic beer. Pussy."

Dear McDonald's

Dear McDonald's,

I appreciate your efforts to save our planet, with your "One meal, one napkin" program:

"May we suggest that you use one napkin per meal?"

Thanks for the suggestion, McDonald's.

If you want us to stick to one napkin per meal, may we suggest that you ensure some kind of consistency in your ketchup application? If I knew that there would only be one squirt of ketchup on each quarter pounder, I could feel confident grabbing only one napkin. But one in three quarter pounders has at least three squirts of ketchup, two of which end up on my chin.

Also, since we're making environmentally friendly suggestions, may we suggest that when we say "no thanks" to the "do you want ketchup?" question, that you don't put 40 ketchup packets in the bag. Imagine how many tomatoes are thrown out around the world every day in the form of 40 ketchup packets per drive through visit, plus the extra ketchup squirts on the quarter pounders. Next time there is a tomato shortage, we know who to blame.

Thanks so much. Llove,

Lloyd

In this economy, diets are changing

A picture taken on my Blackberry at the Real Canadian Superstore at Don Mills and Eglinton in Toronto:

"Cooking and your Community: Kid Cooking Classes"

I wonder when the Superstore marketing team identified "Fairy Tale Witches" as their target market?

Unreasonable terms

Taken on my Blackberry at Sobey's grocery store in Sussex, New Brunswick:



Ready when you are Frozen Food.

I hope never to be Frozen Food, so I guess Sobey's will never be ready. It just seems unfair.

I wonder how the brownies are

Can anybody explain the sign on the side of Mystic Muffin on the corner of Jarvis and Richmond in Toronto?

"World's Best Apple Cake"

I understand that part. But it's not true, by the way. My mother makes the world's best apple cake.

"Must be legal eating age for a slice."

What is the legal eating age for a slice?

This place got an awesome review on Torontoist.com a couple of years ago here, but I don't care how great the food is, I can't trust any place whose advertising makes my brain hurt.

Bread and Butt-er

In my experience, no matter how much work you put into a product trying to make sure that everything is perfect, you will look at the finished item and realize that that something is wrong. This happens 100% of the time, according to unscientific studies by the Lloyd Institute of Product Development.


I imagine that the publishing team behind this book I found on my mother's bookshelf went through the same process of making sure everything was perfect.



More of Canada's Best Bread Machine Baking Recipes by Donna Washburn and Heather Butt.

So I would have loved to have been there when they first noticed the spine of the book:





Who decided that putting the author's last names on the spine like that would sell cookbooks?

mmmmm.... "Washburn Butt" makes my mouth water.

Don't know much about geography

Earlier this year, I posted about a frozen food brand called "Europe's Best" that alerted me to the fact that Europe had expanded. Since then, I have found more examples. Check this out:





Europe's Best Summer Fruit Salad...





Product of Chile. The latest member of the European Union.



And there's Europe's Best Chef's Spinach:




Product of...



...China.
I missed the headlines about Europe's population explosion.

I hate when companies make their brands an out-and-out lie. It's bad enough that their frozen fruit and vegetables wouldn't make the "best of" list for any continent. But as far as I can see, none of their product is actually Europe's best, second best or even worst.

But then again, I suppose "Earth's Mediocrity" doesn't make a very good brand name.

Too much of a good thing

Here is a picture I took a few months ago of a sign advertising featured dishes in the cafeteria at Bloorview Kids Rehab in Toronto:

Split Pea and Butternut Squash Soup.

I love split pea soup.

I love butternut squash soup.

But the thought of combining them makes me throw up in my mouth just a little.

Confi-dunce

Here is a picture of a junk-mail piece we received a while ago for a service in Toronto called "Dial-a-bottle" who will deliver booze to your house for you when you are already too drunk to go get more yourself:

Do you see the problem with this ad? They list the products they will deliver like this:
Beer
Liquor
Wine
How can we have any confidence in a company that specializes in booze, but clearly doesn't understand the first rule of drinking? Every self-respecting drunk knows "beer before liquor, never been sicker."
Amateurs.

Golden Honey

This is the first page in a Winnie-the-Pooh book our kids have:

Winnie-the-Pooh loves honey.

Honey? Look again.


Is it just me, or does it look like Pooh is peeing in the jars. Is "honey" a code word? Is Pooh Bear into "watersports"?

Breakfast Wars

A tray liner at McDonald's:

I knew that when Tim Hortons put out their breakfast sandwich, it hurt Egg McMuffin sales, but now they're down to just one a day? Is that per restaurant, or across Canada?

Thanks Tropicana!

I loves me some Tropicana orange juice. mmmm.

For a while now, Tropicana has offered 10 free Aeroplan miles with each jug of juice you buy. That's right. 10 free Aeroplan miles. (for the non-Canadian readers, Aeroplan miles are the frequent flyer points for Air Canada).


10!


So, if I drink a jug of juice per week all year, I will have 520 extra points.

Check the Aeroplan website and you will see that they offer flights "starting at 15,000 points". So, if I drink Tropicana for 28 years, I will be able to afford Air Canada's cheapest flight!

So, get ready Thunder Bay. I'll be coming your way in 28 years!

A strange way to make a statement

Someone at Jodi's work recommended fuZion wine, so she bought a bottle. I wasn't impressed. But then I looked at the name again. Not only was it not so great wine, but it is anti-semetic!

F.U. Zion? Who takes out their hatred of Zionists by starting up a winery? That's odd.

More Unfortunate Branding

The Nursery School my son Eric attends is located within a public school in Scarborough. Across the hall is also a day care centre. Of course, the day care centre feeds the kids hot meals each day. I noticed one day that the holding dish thingies that they use have a confusing looking brand.

I think it's supposed to say "Duke" but when I look at it, my first thought is always...


Puke. Do you see it too, or is it just me?

An Open Letter To A McDonald's Drive-Thru

Love, Toronto's insomniac community.

Geography Lesson

A few weeks ago, Jodi was out of town for work over a few days, so it was just me and the boys at home. I wanted to make things as simple as possible, so bought a lot of convenience foods for us to eat. Canned stuff, dried stuff, and frozen stuff. Like a bag of "Europe's Best" frozen potatoes. They looked delicious, but tasted much less so.

As I was cooking them, I noticed something on the back of the bag:


Product of...


India .

What does that say about Europe when their best comes from India? Or has Europe annexed India somehow? I haven't really been following the news lately. I might have missed that.

Appetizing

"Elephant Pass Cookings" on Markham Road in Scarborough. My new favourite restaurant name in the world.

Great name, but I wasn't brave enough to test the cookings that were passed by an elephant. Instead, we went next door to McDonald's for cookings that were passed by a clown.