Snacks

Restaurant patrons are increasingly going out to pasture, “grazing” their way through smaller servings instead of sitting down to longer and more expensive meals in a shift that has eateries rushing to adjust. Nearly half of diners now say they're snacking twice a day, compared with the quarter who said the same in 2010, according to research group Technomic . More than 6 in 10 customers said that the snacks they bought were impulse purchases. Snack brands at Stockton, Calif.-based Diamond Foods Inc. are doing well, the company said Tuesday , with Kettle chips and Pop Secret popcorn both seeing sales increases in the 12-week period ending Feb. 18. Sales from the Emerald nuts brand were up 29% compared with the same period a year earlier.

The two suspects in last week's Boston Marathon bombing weren't licensed to have guns, the Cambridge, Mass., Police Department confirmed Sunday. Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, 19, who was captured after a gun battle with police Friday, wasn't old enough to be licensed to own a gun in Massachusetts. The minimum legal age is 21. His older brother, Tamerlan Tsarnaev, 26, who was fatally wounded hours earlier, never had a license to own or carry a gun in Cambridge, where the pair shared an apartment, Cambridge Police spokesman Dan Riviello told the Los Angeles Times.

How do you say "They're grrrrreat!" in Chinese? Kellogg, maker of Frosted Flakes, Pop-Tarts and Eggo waffles, among numerous other not-so-great-for-you snacks and breakfast foods, has formed a joint venture to sell its stuff in China as early as next year. The company now makes most of its money in North America, where, coincidentally, an obesity epidemic is spreading among kids and adults. But Kellogg has determined that the real action going forward is in the developing world, where diets are still largely traditional and thus are relatively low in sugar and sodium.

If you've recently discovered your darling child is throwing away the apple you give her and buying a neon-green slushie and bag of cheese-flavored salt doodles from the school cafeteria's "a la carte" line, Tuesday's your last chance to sound off on snacks offered for sale at schools across the nation. The U.S. Department of Agriculture is ending a 60-day public comment period on a proposed slate of rules to govern the sale of "smart snacks in school. " First unveiled on Feb. 1, the new rules "will help to ensure all foods and beverages sold in schools contribute to a healthy diet," the agency said.

If you've recently discovered your darling child is throwing away the apple you give her and buying a neon-green slushie and bag of cheese-flavored salt doodles from the school cafeteria's "a la carte" line, Tuesday's your last chance to sound off on snacks offered for sale at schools across the nation. The U.S. Department of Agriculture is ending a 60-day public comment period on a proposed slate of rules to govern the sale of "smart snacks in school. " First unveiled on Feb. 1, the new rules "will help to ensure all foods and beverages sold in schools contribute to a healthy diet," the agency said.

Thousands of shimmering lanterns illuminate India's towns and villages in an otherworldly glow on Diwali, the Indian Festival of Lights. Hindu households set out rows of diya, small clay lamps, to create a symbolic path for Lord Rama on his legendary return home after 14 years of exile. The whole nation, Hindu or otherwise, throws itself into five days of frenzied celebrating with fairs, gift giving and nonstop family gatherings. Mention Diwali in the Southland and anyone from the subcontinent will share a favorite sense memory: the sound of firecrackers at 4 a.m., the smell of Grandma's vadas frying, a blur of blazing color from women's holiday saris in the streets and, maybe most of all, the taste of Diwali sweets.

Shari and Judi Zucker became vegetarians as teenagers, shared high school records in the mile and two-mile and became authors together at 17. "We've been walking our talk - running our talk - since we were 16," says Judi. Their first book, "How to Survive Snack Attacks Naturally," was featured in the Los Angeles Times on Jan. 10, 1984. Even then it was clear why their father, publicist Irwin Zucker, named them the Double Energy Twins - which conveniently has become http://www.doubleenergytwins.com.

Anyone who's paid the price of a snack at an airport won't be surprised by the results of our little informal survey in Los Angeles. We checked out the cost of a Hershey Bar and a Coke at a variety of locations. Los Angeles International Airport came in at the top or near the top. A 1.55-ounce plain Hershey Bar will set you back 75 at the airport, the highest price among seven locations surveyed. Only movie theaters sold candy bars for more per ounce. A 16-ounce cup of Coca-Cola costs $1.

Children can be influenced to eat sugary snacks that carry stickers of cartoon characters such as Shrek, Scooby-Doo or Dora the Explorer, but not healthier foods like carrots with similar stickers, according to a new Yale University study. Researchers at Yale's Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity asked children ages 4 to 6 which snacks they wanted: gummy fruit, graham crackers or carrots labeled with stickers of the cartoon characters, or identical snacks without the stickers.

Hot Pockets aren't quite as hot as they used to be. In the wake of static sales and increased costs, food giant Nestle is laying off 103 employees — about a sixth of the workers at its plant in Chatsworth that make the microwaveable snacks. The company informed the employees in December that they would lose their jobs as of Feb. 1, said Nestle spokeswoman Roz O'Hearn. Also last month, the plant's six-day workweek was cut to four days. "Consumers are a little more frugal, and competition is continuing to be very heated," O'Hearn said.

A New York food company is recalling 196,000 pounds of frozen quesadillas, pizza slices and mozzarella bites because they may be contaminated with E. coli bacteria, the U.S. Department of Agriculture Food Safety and Inspection Service said. Rich Products Corp. initiated the recall of its Farm Rich frozen snacks after reports of illness from consumers in several states. A sample of a Farm Rich frozen chicken mini quesadilla product from a New York case tested positive for E. coli, the food safety agency said.

The Blind Donkey Where: 53 E. Union St., Pasadena When: 4 p.m. to 2 a.m. daily Price: Whiskey, $5 to $48; burgers, sandwiches, snacks, $3 to $10 Info: (626) 792-1833; http://www.theblinddonkey.com

Congratulations, America! We've become a nation of healthier snackers. So says market research firm NPD, which has declared fresh fruit the most popular snack food in the country. Even better, the popularity of fresh fruit is continuing to grow. Over the course of a year, Americans snacked on fresh fruit an average of 10 times more than they snacked on chocolate and 25 times more than they snacked on potato chips, according to NPD's recent “Snacking in America” report . Fresh fruit, chocolate and potato chips were the top three snack foods identified in the report.

Without getting into the arcane details, here's what's happened to the NHL: There's a big honking wad of money, more money than you can imagine, more money than in Brentwood or Beverly Hills or Dubai. The owners, who already have big honking wads of money, want even more of it (that's why they're owners). The players, who are ridiculously overpaid, don't want to give up too much. Hence, there is no hockey so far this season. The hoped-for nudge that the holidays often bring to these kinds of proceedings - a kindness of spirit, a recognition of Visa bill balances and late mortgages - seems not to have materialized.

Think your children will snack only on chips? Researchers found otherwise - and kids who were served vegetables and cheese ate 72% fewer calories than the kids offered chips. Moreover, the effects were more pronounced among overweight or obese children, according to the study published Monday in the journal Pediatrics. Researchers from Cornell University randomly sorted 201 children from the Chicago area in grades three to six into four groups: just chips, just cheese, just vegetables, cheese and vegetables.

Be-dimpled Jeff Probst may not be changing the face of television as we know it - though he once did, with his hosting duties on the "Survivor" franchise, and would certainly like to yet again with his new daytime talk show. But what Probst has done to burnish his TV legacy is give those attending his syndicated show a clubby pre-show gathering place. At the Sunset Bronson Studios in Hollywood, attendees can grab a snack, check their email or get primped and freshened by professional stylists as if they were going to be hosting the show themselves.

The Pikey Where: 7617 W. Sunset Blvd., L.A. When: 6 p.m. to 2 a.m. daily Cost: Cocktails, beer and wine, $5 to $14; snacks, appetizers and entrees, $4 to $27 Contact: (323) 850-5400; http://www.thepikeyla.com

The Blind Donkey Where: 53 E. Union St., Pasadena When: 4 p.m. to 2 a.m. daily Price: Whiskey, $5 to $48; burgers, sandwiches, snacks, $3 to $10 Info: (626) 792-1833; http://www.theblinddonkey.com

Re "My Hostess envy," Opinion, Nov. 21 Much has been written about the demise of the Twinkie, and rightly so, but what of its sister snack foods, the CupCake, Sno Ball and Ding Dong? Wherefore the Ho Hos, Chocodile, Suzie-Q and even the humble Zinger? If you squeeze them, do they not ooze? If you bite them, do they not crumble? Enough on the Twinkie, I say. Let us celebrate its sister snack foods as well. They may not have the name recognition of Hostess' flagship product, but they deserve our notice and the respect that comes with it. Dan Gilvezan Sherman Oaks Re "Hostess says mediation has failed," Nov. 21 Kudos to the union bosses for telling their workers at Hostess Brands to hold fast and not make any concessions to their employer.

Today is Diwali, the Indian festival of lights that marks the Hindu new year and commemorates the homecoming of the Lord Rama after 14 years in exile. Times contributor Linda Burum recently wrote about the celebration in Southern California: "There is no more delicious way to capture Diwali's spirit than to follow the crowds to our favorite sweet and snack shops. Each place also serves dosas , chaat and other vegetarian meals, but at the moment all eyes are on the holiday goodies.