Tag: Brand Names

Twinkies

LORELAI: Uh, uh, well, pens are very nice, but I just bet there is a fabulous fancy dessert just sitting out there in that kitchen of yours.
EMILY: As a matter of fact there is. Twinkies.
LORELAI: What?
EMILY: Well, Rory told me that was her favorite dessert.

Twinkie is a brand of snack cake formerly owned and made by Hostess Brand. First invented in 1930, they were conceived as a sponge cake filled with banana cream; when bananas were rationed during World War II, the company switched to vanilla cream, and it proved so popular that it remained the predominant flavour.

Emily’s cook Antonia makes her own Twinkies to reproduce Rory’s favourite dessert – of course Emily could never just buy a box of Twinkies. Home made Twinkies are more difficult to make than Beefaroni, but well within the range of a competent home cook. A professional like Antonia would have no problem, but oddly enough doesn’t make them ahead of time, so the Gilmore girls never get to try them.

Emily supplying Rory with her favourite foods, even though her choices must have made her grandmother shudder, is a callback to when Emily served Lorelai and Rory pudding, one of their favourite desserts. Lorelai was so impressed by Emily’s effort that she must have thought she’d try it again.

Beefaroni

RORY: Grandma, I can’t believe you found the recipe for Beefaroni.
EMILY: It wasn’t easy. Antonia thought I’d gone insane.

Beefaroni was earlier mentioned as a food Rory liked, and now we discover it is actually her favourite meal, requested for her special dinner.

Because home made Beefaroni is basically just macaroni, beef mince, tomato puree, and cheese, even a very average home cook could easily make up their own recipe for it. Non-cooking Rory is amazed to discover that homemade Beefaroni even exists, while equally non-domestic Emily apparently had great trouble finding a recipe.

If Antonia the cook is from Europe, and most especially from Italy, no wonder she thought Emily had gone insane with her request. She had probably never even heard of Beefaroni before.

Emily said the “secret” to Beefaroni isn’t beef. She may have got Antonia to reproduce Beefaroni based on the list of ingredients on a can, which involves all sorts of things that a regular home recipe would omit, including textured soy protein, caramel, yeast, ammonium chloride, citric acid, and the like.

Lorelai and Rory seem to assume she means the Beefaroni is made from some kind of mystery meat, and quickly stop eating. We never discover exactly what Emily means.

Corona

LORELAI: Uh, well, I’ll have a white wine and Dean’ll have a beer.
DEAN: What?!
LORELAI: Corona, right?
DEAN: No, I don’t want a beer!

Corona Extra is a brand of Mexican pale lager produced by Cervecerio Modelo, first made in 1925. It is the top-selling imported beer in the United States.

All three Gilmore females take a slightly malicious pleasure in torturing Dean by pretending that he wants to drink beer. It’s a callback to the night of Rory’s winter formal, when Emily questioned Lorelai about Dean, including asking if he drank.

You can’t help feeling there’s a bit of payback for accidentally keeping Rory out late on the night of the dance, which led to an almighty family row. You can see Rory as either joining in with it, or trying to defuse the situation with humour.

“Silly rabbit”

RORY: When is dinner ready?
LORELAI: Do I look like a timer?
RORY: I thought you might have set one.
LORELAI: Silly rabbit.
RORY: Timers are for kids.

Lorelai and Rory are referring to the advertising campaign for Trix – a corn-based, very sugary, artificially coloured and flavoured breakfast cereal manufactured by General Mills, and first brought out in 1954. The highly popular marketing campaign began in 1955, and shows a cartoon rabbit who tries to trick children into giving him their cereal. The tagline is, “Silly rabbit – Trix are for kids!”.

Whether the breakfast cereal had anything to do with Richard Gilmore’s pet name for his mother is unknown, but he would have been ten or eleven when the cereal came out, and part of the company’s target demographic.

Tater Tots

LORELAI: Do you want Tater Tots also?
RORY: That’s a rhetorical question right?

Tater Tots are a frozen food product of deep-fried, grated potato made by Ore-Ida; the brand is owned by Heinz. First sold in 1953, Tater Tots are a popular item in American school cafeterias.

Luke Hears Lorelai’s News

With great trepidation because everyone has made it seem like such a big deal, Lorelai tells Luke that Max proposed to her. He has already guessed (or heard it on the Stars Hollow grapevine), and deliberately behaves in a nonchalant manner.

She is already taken aback, when he begins questioning her about what her plans for married life with Max are. Of course she doesn’t have any – she hasn’t even decided whether to marry Max or not, let alone thought about the reality of it.

Luke’s questions, which are quite rude and intrusive, have the effect of making Lorelai realise in a panic that she and Max haven’t had even one conversation about where they will live as a married couple, whether Max expects Lorelai to keep working, if they plan of having children together, or even how they will manage their joint finances.

Incidentally in this scene, you can get a good look at the coffee brand that Luke uses in the diner. It’s Hills Bros. Coffee, a brand from San Francisco sold since the early twentieth century. It was owned by Sara Lee in 2001, and is now owned by Massimo Zanetti Beverage USA.

Hills Bros claim their coffee has a bold, smooth flavour, but reviews for it tend to say it smells better than it tastes, and is generally pretty mediocre, although very strong and good value for money. Somehow Luke manages to make this average, budget-wise coffee taste amazing – which is quite a feat for someone who doesn’t drink coffee and doesn’t approve of it. Perhaps Lorelai and Rory aren’t as fussy about coffee as they think they are, or they are heavily biased by their love for Luke.

Popsicles

LORELAI: Okay, I’m sharing something with you. Sharing is not making a big deal, sharing is a nice gesture. Like when you’re a kid and you have one of those Popsicles and you break it in two and offer half to another kid. That is sharing, that is what I’m doing.
LUKE: You offered me half a Popsicle?

Popsicle is an American brand name for those sweet frozen snacks on a stick that might otherwise be known as ice pops, ice lollies, ice blocks, or icy poles. Popsicles were invented at the turn of the 20th century, and first manufactured in the 1920s. The brand is now owned by Unilever. Popsicles are easily fairly broken in half in order to share.

Kinko’s in Groton

TAYLOR: Oh, this is absolutely ridiculous. Do you subscribe to this troubadour mystique?
RIVAL TROUBADOUR: I run a Kinko’s in Groton.

Kinko’s was an earlier trademarked name for FedEx Office Print & Ship Services, a retail chain providing an outlet for FedEx Express and FedEx Ground Shipping, as well as printing, copying, and binding services. It is the main competitor to UPS Stores. Founded in 1970, the name was changed in 2004, although the older name is still advertised.

The town of Groton in Connecticut was discussed earlier, as the former home of Lorelai’s deceased relative, Claudia. It is about an hour’s drive from the area where Stars Hollow appears to be located. In real life, it doesn’t have a FedEx Office today, and may not have had a Kinko’s in 2001. Does this cast doubt on the rival troubadour’s story? Perhaps he has mystique too, but just has a different way of going about it.

Ring Pops

MAX: Oh, oh, I forgot. (Max pulls two Ring Pops out of the bag) One for you, and one for you.
RORY: What are these?
MAX: Those are rings. And the diamond is actually candy, so you can eat it.

Ring Pops are fruit-flavoured lollipops sold as a large plastic wearable ring with a candy “gemstone” that can be sucked. Manufactured by Topps, they were invented by Frank Richards in 1979.