Korean pop sensation (and part-time Westwood resident) Psy is looking for a personal chef. Somehow, he's leveraged this staffing need to include a sponsorship opportunity with a major food brand, a competition and a concert where all 50,000 attendees will wear white. Let us explain...
Via Wikimedia Commons Psy
Not sure if this one is such a great idea, particularly if you're at all worried about everyone in your life (including that traffic cop) thinking you're sloshed all the time. But regardless, we thought it was worth bringing to your attention, just in case you love bourbon so much you want to reek of it even when you haven't spilled it on yourself or consumed so much of it that it's coming out your pores. 
Courtesy Scodioli Creative Scoldioli Aged Bourbon Kentucky Single Barrel Perfume/Cologne
Behold: Bourbon perfume/cologne. Made by Scodioli and available through their Etsy shop, the perfume carries this descriptor:
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There it sits on a plate, shiny and quivery and not unlike a pile of raw sweetbreads. Intertwining sacks, bound by sinew, filled with creamy sperm. Cod sperm, to be more exact. And I'm going to eat a lot of it. Without gagging. In fact, I'm going to enjoy it.
Erin Lyall Shirako Nigiri at Hamasaku
Hamasaku, a Japanese restaurant tucked in a strip mall near the 405, has long been a power-dinner, Hollywood-player kind of place, with dozens of elaborate sushi rolls named for the stars who created them. But two months ago a new sushi chef, Yoya Takahashi, arrived and things started to change. He's the spunky guy responsible for the sperm.
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Last week the CBS sitcom The Big Bang Theory offered a spot-on observation about something funky in the world of cereal. As the brainiac crew of scientists settled into breakfast, astrophysicist Raj (played by Kunal Nayyar) began to rattle off the names of cereal mascots like Tony the Tiger, Toucan Sam and Snap, Crackle and Pop. He had made a startling discovery: All of the mascots are males. 
E. Dwass It's a guy's world
Inspired by his rant, we headed over to the neighborhood market to do a little research of our own, and we couldn't find one girl cereal mascot on any box. Instead, just as Raj pointed out, the featured characters were Count Chocula, the Trix Rabbit, Cap'n Crunch, the Lucky Charms Leprechaun, Dig'em Frog, and Buzz the Honeynut Cheerios bee, to name but a few. (Ironically, Raj will have trouble telling an actual woman about his discovery, because, in an ongoing joke, he can talk to females only when he's drunk.)
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Civet poop is so yesterday for coffee connoisseurs. Coffee beans "laundered" through elephant dung is where it's at.
Flickr/jewdini A poo exhibit at the Miami Zoo
Called smooth and earthy in flavor, an exotic new brew is made from beans eaten by a herd of 20 Thai elephants and retrieved the next day from their dung, the Associated Press reports. The long gastrointestinal journey results in some of the most expensive coffee beans in the world -- $500 a pound.
Don't look for the "Black Ivory" blend at Starbucks anytime soon. It is reserved for the elite (and stupid?). For now it is only being served at a few luxury hotels in far-off places like northern Thailand, the Maldives and Abu Dhabi, at about $50 a cup.
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El Pollo Loco, you've got some explaining to do.
E. Dwass Chocolate nachos
For starters, we know some kind of mind game is going on. How else to explain the fact that late Saturday night we pulled off the 101 in Agoura Hills and sped to the chain's store on Kanan Road.
"We'd like an order of Chocolate Dessert Nachos," we announced, with no shame whatsoever, forgetting our usual concerns about whole grains, processed foods, fats and sodium.
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The phrase "gourmet mall food" seems like an oxymoron, especially when holiday shopping fatigue often leads to giant cinnamon rolls and pretzels. But now there's something new and upscale at area shopping meccas, a far cry from the fare at most food court stands. If you've got the taste and the wallet for it, you can buy gourmet caviar from vending machines -- yes, vending machines -- at Westfield Topanga, Burbank Town Center or at Westfield Century City.
Emily Dwass Caviar vending machine at Topanga Mall
The automated vendors house a full selection of caviar and other unusual foods, some we never heard of, and others we definitely can't afford, such as Imperial River Beluga for $500 an ounce. But there also are selections in much lower price points, like American Black Caviar for $30 an ounce.
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We all know that bees are attracted to colorful flowers -- but colorful candy shells that melt in your mouth, not in your hand? 
Flickr/mortsan M&M's
Bees are irritating normally sanguine French beekeepers because the insects are gathering sugar from a nearby M&M waste plant and coloring their honey in rainbow shades of green, red and sacre bleu! Um, blue.
Since August, beekeepers around the town of Ribeauville in the region of Alsace have seen bees returning to their hives carrying unidentified colorful substances that have turned their honey shades not seen in nature, Reuters reports. (Maybe these rainbow-loving bees just have a different kind of, er, queen ruling their hives?)
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Guzzle & Nosh Gelato at Gelato Bar
Last week, the Carpigiani Gelato Museum opened in Anzola dell'Emilia, Italy, just outside Bologna; the first in the world, it says, to "delve into the history, culture, and technology of artisan gelato." Inside, you'll learn about the history of the frozen treat, from an 11th century recipe for pomegranate sorbet to a collection of gelato machines. We don't know if the museum also pays tribute to the role of gelato on the liberated woman's journey to self-discovery, but we certainly hope so.
Gelato is the subject of just one of many, many museums dedicated to the food we eat (or, sometimes, don't). Turn the page for a few amusing, sometimes amusingly serious, museums of food.
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One of our new favorite web series these days is Kamikaze Kitchen, a collaboration between Good Food and sometimes L.A. Weekly contributor Eddie Lin (DeepEndDining) and Trippy Food blog author Valentino Herrera. The comedic duo just dropped their first episode on YouTube back in September and have plans to release several more episodes in the near future. 
screenshot from Kamikaze Kitchen Eddie Lin + sign
The point of the show invovles challenging L.A. chefs to "get real weird" -- to borrow a phrase from Workaholics -- with an unusual mystery ingredient. Thus Lin and Herrera drop in on chefs at their restaurants, give them a brown bag with the secret (and very strange) protein, watch the chefs cook with it, then sample the results.
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