Treats

Treats is a 1975 play by Christopher Hampton about a love triangle.

Plot summary

The play is set in 1974, London, in a single room in Ann's flat. There are three characters: Ann, her former boyfriend Dave, and her lover Patrick.

Ann and Patrick are contentedly sitting at home one night, listening to music and talking, when Dave breaks in. His violent temper is clear from the beginning: He punches Patrick on the nose, then refuses to leave, even as Ann threatens to call the police. It soon turns out that Ann used Dave's work trip to Cyprus to break up with him as she had long been planning to do. Now a colleague from work—her new boyfriend, Patrick—moved in with her. Dave refuses to accept the situation and demands an explanation, bullying Ann, and being overly friendly with Patrick. Ann seems determined not to listen to him, particularly when the two men bond against her. Dave tells her she would be bored out of her mind by Patrick and asks her to marry him. She refuses. Dave, however, is crafty and clever enough to succeed: he wins her back and moves back in at the end, succeeding in making both of them miserable.

Food coloring

Food coloring, or color additive, is any dye, pigment or substance that imparts color when it is added to food or drink. They come in many forms consisting of liquids, powders, gels, and pastes. Food coloring is used both in commercial food production and in domestic cooking. Due to its safety and general availability, food coloring is also used in a variety of non-food applications including cosmetics, pharmaceuticals, home craft projects and medical devices.

Purpose of food coloring

People associate certain colors with certain flavors, and the color of food can influence the perceived flavor in anything from candy to wine. Sometimes the aim is to simulate a color that is perceived by the consumer as natural, such as adding red coloring to glacé cherries (which would otherwise be beige), but sometimes it is for effect, like the green ketchup that Heinz launched in 1999. Color additives are used in foods for many reasons including:

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1/2 may refer to:

Cream cheese

Cream cheese is a soft, mild-tasting fresh cheese with a high fat content. Stabilizers such as carob bean gum and carrageenan are typically added in industrial production.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration defines cream cheese as containing at least 33% milk fat with a moisture content of not more than 55%, and a pH range of 4.4 to 4.9. In other countries, it is defined differently and may need a considerably higher fat content.

Cream cheese is not naturally matured and is meant to be consumed fresh, and so it differs from other soft cheeses such as Brie and Neufchâtel. It is more comparable in taste, texture, and production methods to Boursin and Mascarpone.

Origin

Europe

Early prototypes of cream cheese are mentioned in England as early as 1583 and in France as early as 1651. Recipes are recorded soon after 1754, particularly from Lincolnshire and the southwest of England.

United States

Baking powder

Baking powder is a dry chemical leavening agent, a mixture of a carbonate or bicarbonate and a weak acid, and is used for increasing the volume and lightening the texture of baked goods. Baking powder works by releasing carbon dioxide gas into a batter or dough through an acid-base reaction, causing bubbles in the wet mixture to expand and thus leavening the mixture. It is used instead of yeast for end-products where fermentation flavors would be undesirable or where the batter lacks the elastic structure to hold gas bubbles for more than a few minutes, or to speed the production. Because carbon dioxide is released at a faster rate through the acid-base reaction than through fermentation, breads made by chemical leavening are called quick breads.

Formulation and mechanism

Most commercially available baking powders are made up of sodium bicarbonate (also known as baking soda or bicarbonate of soda) and one or more acid salts. Typical formulations (by weight) call for 30% sodium bicarbonate, 5-12% monocalcium phosphate, and 21-26% sodium aluminium sulfate. The last two ingredients are acidic: they combine with the sodium bicarbonate and water to produce the gaseous carbon dioxide. The use of two acidic components is the basis of the term "double acting." Another typical acid in such formulations is cream of tartar, a derivative of tartaric acid. Baking powders also include components to help with the consistency and stability of the mixture.