Lastest Stories by Colman Andrews

Whether we watch them at drive-in theatres (yes, they do still exist) or multiplexes, or on our TV sets, laptops, or smartphones, movies are a part of our life. They divert and entertain us, make us...
“Sa-a-a-d movies always make me cry,” sang Sue Thompson back in 1961. Okay, but what do bad movies do? They make us cringe, nod off, guffaw (when we’re not supposed to), and sometimes just walk...
It would be hard for many of us in America today to imagine life without credit cards. We use these small but potentially powerful plastic rectangles for everything, from our morning latte to...
Today’s consumers use credit cards for even minor purchases and often pay their bills online, and mobile payment systems like Apple Pay, Samsung Pay, and Google Wallet have proliferated. It’s not...
Pies may be filled with meat, poultry, seafood, or vegetables, but when most people think of pie, they probably envision a pastry shell filled with cooked fruit or custard, sometimes with more pastry...
There are more than a million restaurants in America, the National Restaurant Association estimates, from the local McDonald’s to high-end destination places. Exactly how many new restaurants open...
Fast food chain restaurants are a part of the American landscape, both literally and figuratively. Be it a fast food burger joint, a burrito takeout place, or mass-market sandwich shop, chain...
Restaurants open, restaurants close. Food service, at whatever level, from fast food chains to elegant fine-dining places, is a volatile business. Today’s Michelin-starred, can’t-get-a-table...
From meat-free burgers and alcohol-free cocktails to exotic spices and powders made from nutritious vegetables, today’s diners and home cooks have an ever-changing wealth of ingredients and means...
Christmas, like Thanksgiving, is a family holiday, a time for friends and relations to gather around a festive table to eat and drink and celebrate. While Thanksgiving dinner is usually a reasonably...
The cacao tree is native to either Central or South America. The people who probably first roasted and ground its beans into a powder, to make beverages and gruel, were the Olmecs in southern Mexico,...
The United States is, in general, a well-fed country — at least in the quantity of what we eat. Americans consume an average of 3,682 calories per capita daily, well above the recommended 2,000 to...