Food

The landmark Le Bec-Fin plans to close its doors for good after Saturday night service, and we asked readers to share their memories from meals there over the last four decades. Here are excerpts from some of the responses we got: Donald Strumpf, Bryn Mawr: It was 1970 and Le Bec-Fin had just opened. I was invited to lunch there by my childhood friend, Jay Guben. He had this idea that he should start a business that would teach people how to open small, fine restaurants. (That idea later blossomed into the Restaurant School.)

SWEET . . . Don't be afraid to indulge your craving for ice cream. So says Arun Kilara, a Pennsylvania State University food scientist. "Somehow people have the notion that ice cream and frozen desserts are major contributors of fat in our diets, and this is not the case," Kilara says. Although it does contain fat, Kilara says, ice cream also contains such nutritional pluses as protein, calcium and carbohydrates. . . . AND SAUER Sauerkraut on pizza? It's all the rage in Montana.

Editor's Note: This column is sponsored by TD Bank. The opinions and analysis expressed here reflect the views of the authors alone, and do not necessarily reflect the views of TD Bank, N.A. or its affiliates. Bryn Davis ate his way to entrepreneurship. Davis, who lives in Horsham, says he entered college a "lean-as-you-can-imagine" 170 pounds. By his junior year, he was stressing the scales at 240. A doctor scared him into committing to a healthier lifestyle. Davis took it one step further: He started a business featuring only healthy fast food.

QUASHEAM RICHBURG entered the small Trax convenience store with a 12-gauge shotgun shoved down his pants, while his buddy Marvell Hargrove distracted the clerk by asking to buy a bottle of aspirin. In seconds, Richburg's gun was in clerk Moustafa Shaker's face that early morning on May 26, 2011. The clerk tried to grab the weapon then threw something at the gunman. Two shots rang out. One blast missed. Another blew off the left side of Shaker's face, instantly killing the 50-year-old husband and father of two who was originally from Egypt.

A subcommittee of the LEAP Academy University Charter School charged with looking into the Camden school's food-service contract has found no irregularities in the choice of a new vendor for the 2012-13 year, according to a board statement. While the LEAP board - through its attorney, Nicholas Repici - declined to release documents from the May 14 subcommittee meeting that discussed the solicitation of bids and ultimate award of a food-service contract for the 2012-13 school year, the board issued a statement saying in part: "Following an investigation, the board found no evidence that any school official or board member violated or compromised any laws, regulations, or code of ethics.

Joseph Unanue, 88, who helped turn Goya Foods into America's largest Hispanic-owned food company, died died Wednesday at his New Jersey home in Alpine, Bergen County. His family said he died of natural causes. Mr. Unanue began working at Goya in 1952 and served as president of the Secaucus-based company from 1976 to 2004, at a time when Goya grew from a regional company to a global brand with 15 manufacturing and distribution facilities worldwide. A World War II veteran, Mr. Unanue was awarded a Bronze Star for his service at the Battle of the Bulge, his family said.

Today on PhillyDailyNews.com : View a Storify compilation with videos from protests around the country of fast-food workers demanding better wages. SHADEYA IVY, working at McDonald's while pursuing a degree at Community College of Philadelphia, considers herself lucky - and not just because she recently got a 25-cent pay raise, to 25 cents above the minimum wage. Mostly it's because Ivy, 22 - single, childless and living with a family friend not far from the fast-food outlet in Frankford - isn't in the position of some co-workers trying to raise a family or pull off a long daily commute on a paycheck that, even with a hard-to-attain 40-hour workweek, will place them well short of the federal poverty line for a family of four.

The landmark Le Bec-Fin plans to close its doors for good after Saturday night service, and we asked readers to share their memories from meals there over the last four decades. Here are excerpts from some of the responses we got: Donald Strumpf, Bryn Mawr: It was 1970 and Le Bec-Fin had just opened. I was invited to lunch there by my childhood friend, Jay Guben. He had this idea that he should start a business that would teach people how to open small, fine restaurants. (That idea later blossomed into the Restaurant School.)

HAVE YOU ever been hungry and thought, "Man, I could really go for some beef and mush"? Well, then you're in luck. This weekend, Eastern State Penitentiary visitors will be able to sample historic prison delicacies during "Prison Food Weekend. " The event highlights meals that inmates ate during the prison's 142-year history and offers a chance to sample three from different eras: salted and broiled beef with "Indian Mush" (cornmeal and salt), from the 1830s; hamburger steak with brown gravy and Harvard beets, from the 1950s; and, finally, Nutraloaf, a bland, tasteless brick that's served in today's prisons as a more nutritious equivalent to bread and water for punishment.

EVEN as fast-food chains tout their healthy offerings, they're also coming up with fatty new treats to keep customers interested. Case in point: Dunkin' Donuts is adding a doughnut breakfast sandwich to its national menu starting tomorrow. Dunkin' Donuts says that the Glazed Donut Breakfast Sandwich clocks in at 360 calories, which is less than the 390 calories for the turkey sausage sandwich it recently introduced. The latest concoction may seem to conflict with fast-food chains' efforts to attract people who say they want fresher, wholesome food.

June Sharkey Ferns, 72, of Gloucester Township, a former food service manager, died of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease Saturday, June 1, at Kennedy University Hospital in Washington Township. Born in Southwest Philadelphia, Mrs. Ferns attended John Bartram High School there. In the 1970s, Mrs. Ferns was the cafeteria manager at the headquarters of the Food Fair supermarket chain near 31st and Market Streets, her daughter, Theresa Leckerman, said Tuesday. "She worked her way up to management" from cafeteria cashier, Leckerman said.

WASHINGTON - Already heavily criticized for targeting conservative groups, the Internal Revenue Service absorbed another blow Tuesday as new details emerged about senior officials enjoying luxury hotel rooms, free drinks and free food at a $4.1 million training conference. It was one of many expensive gatherings the agency held for employees over a three-year period. One top official stayed five nights in a room that regularly goes for $3,500 a night. Another official, Faris Fink, stayed four nights in a room that regularly goes for $1,499.