Combo Plate: Germs, skulls, breakups and more

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-- Pass the butter: By and large, the online food world is a pretty great place to be. Nice peeps. Friendly atmosphere. Lots of conviviality, congeniality, blah blah blah. Which is why I just couldn’t keep from clicking on this headline: How to bake bread and make your friends feel inadequate. (Thanks to Naa Ako-Adjei and her blog, Eat Dessert First.)

-- EWWW! I wish I’d never clicked on this: The 8 germiest public places.

-- Is this really news? Britons used skulls for cups is the Reuters headline making the rounds Thursday morning. But doesn’t everyone do that? Um. Or is it just me?

-- In ‘Top Chef’ news: Finally, a shocking exit.

-- How can this be? I would have assumed that something called ‘caramel coloring’ would be good for me. But now I find out that, alas, it might not be. So says the Center for Science in the Public Interest: ‘The ‘caramel coloring’ used in Coca-Cola, Pepsi, and other foods is contaminated with two cancer-causing chemicals and should be banned.’ The organization has filed a petition with the Food and Drug Administration. More on it all here:

-- I’m being deprived of my right to vote: Food Press has a new poll asking the food world’s equivalent of the chicken-and-the-egg question, ‘If you had to choose salty or sweet, what would it be?’ I couldn’t vote because there isn’t a ‘Duh. Both.’ button.

-- My, what tasty sleuthing: The search for the best dumplings in New York’s Chinatown.

-- Love hurts: It started out as a week dedicated to love. But as we head into the weekend, it seems like all the news is about breaking up: In addition to our story about Andrew Kirschner parting ways with Wilshire, the Daily Byte puts together this list of restaurants and chefs who are calling it splitsville.

--Rene Lynch
Twitter /renelynch