Do you want fries with that?

1. Zimmerman on Iron Chef and the love of Disney (MSP MAG)
2. Bart Simpson’s All Syrup Squishy Bender – VIDEO (HULU)
3. A Chinese Imperial Feast A Year In The Eating – AUDIO (NPR)
4. Man Who Said He Was ‘Massaging’ Meat Gets 10 Years (NY TIMES)
5. Burger queen Sharon Stone (M&C)
6. Moosewood author’s new cookbook is aimed at kitchen newbies (NATIONAL POST)
7. Italy’s spicy culinary history (FINANCIAL TIMES)
8. Snookie Sandwich — Jersey Shore Cast Turns Michael Cera Into a Guido (NY MAGAZINE)
9. Author Julie Powell on Meat and Marriage (TIME)
10. Battling Obesity in America – VIDEO (CBS)
11. A Newly Frugal Generation Revives Discount Dining (NY TIMES)
12. Garlic in a new hue: Black (R&I)

Hot off the grill!

1. It’s healthy snack time! On The Simpsons, Marge goes to Wellness Foods — and spends Homer’s Whole Paycheck
2. Traveling gourmets will want to check out National Geographic’s new Food Journey’s of a Lifetime: 500 Extraordinary Places to Eat Around the Globe
3. Grub Street reports Oprah’s former chef Art Smith will host TLC’s new food-travel show Craving Comfort
4. In San Francisco, La Cocina’s food-focused Gift Fair will be held Dec. 4th from 4-9pm
5. Hulu for the Holidays food programming includes Food Network favorites Bobby Flay and Alton Brown
6. National Public Radio’s Thanksgiving Treats from an Earlier Time features a recipe for old-fashioned mince meat pies

PROFESSOR AMY FARRELL’S recent appearance on The Colbert Report takes a humorous look at the serious matter of what is being called America’s Obesity Epidemic (video available here).

Host Stephen Colbert also jokes about the former Ralph Lauren model — tiny Filippa Hamilton — whose image was digitally slenderized and is now reporting the apparel maker did not renew her contract because she was “too large.”

Although many American models are dangerously (and ridiculously) thin, numbers posted by the National Center for Health Statistics show that more than 34-percent of Americans overall can now be classified as obese.

In the United Kingdom a Scottish doctor is so concerned that Britons are taking after rotund Americans that he has recommended the government tax chocolate.

Meanwhile, the U.K.’s Department of Health is spending a million dollars (US) to sponsor episodes of The Simpsons. Ending a fried food-rich diet — including doughnuts, the staple food of Homer Simpson and American cops — will be the advertising campaign’s aim.

Mexico — the world’s second fattest country — will, presumably, aim its new Public Safety diet campaign at the elimination of churros and hot chocolate from police officer’s afternoon siestas.