Speedos

KIRK: And those are some self-portraits.
LORELAI: Aahh! Kirk, you’re nude!
KIRK: No no, I’m wearing Speedos. They’re kind of flesh coloured.

Speedo is an Australian brand of swimwear, founded in 1914 by Alexander MacRae, and now part of the British Pentland Group; in North America it is manufactured for and marketed by PVH. Due to its success, the name Speedo has become synonymous with racing bathing suits, particularly for men.

(In fact it turns out Kirk was actually naked, but Lorelai and Max agree never to discuss it again).

Nikon

KIRK: Actually, this would be my first official wedding gig. Or photography gig, for that matter. But believe me, I’ve got the eye. And my Nikon is state of the art.
MAX: Oh, I’ve got a Nikon too. It’s an N65 with 3D matrix metering, 35 to 210 zoom. What have you got?
KIRK: It’s a Nikon.

Nikon is a Japanese corporation which makes products including cameras and photography equipment. It was founded in 1917, and changed its name to Nikon in 1988, after its cameras. It is a member of the Mitsubishi group.

The N65 was a 35 mm film SLR autofocus camera which came out in 2001, and was aimed at the lower end of the amateur photography market. In other words, it’s an entry level camera for the average consumer, but Max gives its specifications as if it is something out of the ordinary.

Worcestershire sauce

LORELAI: But in spite of all that, I was kind of thinking, and you don’t have to, that maybe you could pull yourself away for a second.
LUKE: Ah, well I …
LORELAI: I mean, you know, finish the ketchup tonight, but maybe leave the Worcestershire sauce for tomorrow.

Worcestershire sauce, often just called Worcester sauce, is a fermented liquid condiment first created in the 1830s by English chemists John Lea and William Perrins, who went on to form the company Lea & Perrins, with the sauce first being sold to the public in 1838. Similar fermented anchovy sauces had been made since the 18^th century in England, and fermented fish sauces go back to the Roman Empire. Lea & Perrins Worcestershire sauce is now owned by Heinz, and other companies make it as well.

Non-Americans may be bemused by Lorelai’s pronunciation of the sauce’s name, as she says each syllable phonetically: war-SESS-ter-shy-er sauce, rather than the more usual WOOS-tuh-sheer sauce, or just WOOS-tuh sauce.

Heinz

LUKE: Ah, well, I just got kinda busy here.
LORELAI: Oh, yes, I can see that. Boy, they keep making that ketchup slower and slower, huh?
LUKE: It’s the Heinz family’s little joke.

The H.J. Heinz company, usually just known as Heinz, is an American food processing company founded by Henry John Heinz in 1869. They merged with Kraft Foods in 2015. The company makes thousands of products and sells them in over 200 countries around the world. Heinz makes the most popular ketchup (tomato sauce) in the US, with more than half the market share.

Kit Kat Bar

RORY: But I don’t want you to feel unimportant, because believe me, you’re not.
DEAN: I’m glad.
RORY: I mean it. The only way you could be more important to me is if you had a Kit Kat bar growing out of your head.

Kit Kat is a chocolate covered wafer bar that comes in several “fingers” of wafer that you break off. It was created by Rowntree’s, a UK comapny, who had several chocolate products called Kit Cat or Kit Kat, until a worker suggested making a snack that a man could take to work in his lunch box.

The Kit Kat as we know it was first made in 1935, and it has been produced by Nestlé since 1988. In the US, Kit Kat is made by the H.B. Reese Candy Company, a division of The Hershey Company.

Boca Burger

MICHEL: Go back to the cooking room.
SOOKIE: Not until you eat these and tell me what you think!
MICHEL: Sookie! I only eat fifteen hundred calories a day. If I eat that, I cannot have my Boca Burger later.

Boca Burger is a vegetarian burger patty made from soy protein and wheat gluten, first manufactured in 1979. Boca Burger products have been owned by Kraft Foods since 2000.

We learn here that Michel eats only 1500 calories a day. One Boca Burger has around 70 calories, while macaroon has over 400 calories and a chocolate praline cookie over 300. Clearly if Michel eats both cookies, as Sookie wants him to, he’s going to have to give up more than a Boca Burger – he will have eaten around half of his daily calorie intake on just two cookies!

Maybe he’s including the bread and salad to accompany the patty, although even that would only be around 400 calories. Or maybe he is calculating the calories of just one bite from each cookie, since he would only need a taste of each to decide which one he prefers.

1500 calories a day is about the lowest amount of food recommended for a man, and it probably wouldn’t be recommended long term, especially for someone who’s already a healthy weight. Even men on calorie restriction diets usually eat around 1800 calories a day, and still lose weight doing so. We never actually see Michel lose much weight on his strict diet, so maybe he’s having a few cheat days.

Lorelai seems to eat as much as she wants while remaining slim, while poor old Michel apparently starves himself just to maintain a normal weight.

Froot Loops

LORELAI: Okay, well, I’m not gonna be home late. And listen, I would reconsider calling Dean. It’s not his fault that you’re so fabulous he can’t think about anything else.
RORY: Bye Mom.
LORELAI: I mean, he just sits in his room, eating Froot Loops out of the box, saying your name over and over and over.

Froot Loops are a brand of breakfast cereal made by Kellogg’s since 1963, consisting of sugary, flavoured and coloured ring-shaped cereal pieces. They don’t actually have any fruit in them.