Articles by Jess Zimmerman

Jess Zimmerman was the editor of Grist List.

All Articles

  • ConAgra pulls a dirty frozen-meal trick on food bloggers

    Hey, remember those ads where they used to secretly replace people's actual made-from-beans coffee with freeze-dried Flavor Crystals? Those were a laugh riot, right? So obviously the most genius possible marketing plan for frozen dinners -- basically the food equivalent of instant coffee -- would be to make people think they're eating real made-from-food food, and then alert them that they've been baited and switched. It can't fail! You know, unless the people involved are food bloggers who care about eating organic, fresh, and healthy ingredients rather than mass-fabricated sodium-enhanced spun and capped protein strands. Then they might get pissed.

    But ConAgra, makers of such food-adjacent items as Chef Boyardee and Reddi-Wip, didn't see that one coming when they set up a supposed luxury dinner with a group of food bloggers and their guests. The host, chef George Duran, served -- and implied he had cooked -- a main course of lasagna and a dessert of, um, "razzleberry pie." Once the bloggers had gotten it down their necks, Duran told them the food was actually frozen Marie Callender dinners. Smile, you're on ConAgra Camera!

    Jess Zimmerman Food

  • Toilet-sharing app CLOO' turns your home into a public bathroom

    Hey, we all love sharing, right? It lets you live comfortably while limiting consumption and waste. And you have that bathroom, and you're not using it all the time, right? What are you, selfish? Put your money where your mouth is, toilet-hog, and offer up your bathroom to strangers with a deuce to donate. Otherwise the terrorists win.

    If you're seriously willing to hang an "Open to Strange Butts" placard outside your lavatory (what are you, nuts? We were joking), a new app called CLOO' will let you take shit from just about anyone.

    Jess Zimmerman Culture

  • Bear steals Prius

    Here's a cautionary tale for hybrid owners: A Prius-owning family in California lost its car to a joy-riding bear. 

    Jess Zimmerman Technology

  • Light pollution is stealing our night sky — here's how to get it back

    This (left) is your sky. And this (right) is your sky on ONE MAJOR LIGHT SOURCE. So it's no surprise that suburban starscapes have been totally desaturated by the lights on buildings, roads, and parking lots. Less than half the U.S. -- and almost none of Europe -- has dark enough night skies to see the Milky Way.

    Jess Zimmerman Health