The Observer, March 7, 2008
Volume XL, Issue 20
NEWS You Can't Use
Michigan restaurateur builds a 134-pound hamburger
A Detroit restaurateur believes that he has broken the world record for "largest hamburger commercially available."
Steve Mallie, owner of Mallie's Sports Bar and Grill, spent 12 hours preparing and baking the burger, finally emerging with a 134-pound hamburger last week.
Mallie called his creation the "Absolutely Ridiculous Burger," which is made with beef, bacon, cheese, and a 50-pound bun. It sells for $350, and orders require 24 hours notice.
Flipping the burger required the help of three men using two steel sheets.
As advertisement for the hamburger, Mallie told The Detroit News that he wanted to show that he has the biggest and best burgers.
Authenticating Mallie's claim will take a few weeks, though. His burger would outweigh the 123-pound burger made last year by Denny's Beer Barrel Pub, of Clearfield, Pa.
Pot school takes
students higher
Welcome Oaksterdam University, a new California trade school that gives a whole new meaning to the term "higher education."
The trade school, based in Oakland, Calif., prepares students for jobs in the medical marijuana market. For the small price of $200 and a few textbooks, students learn how to cultivate and cook with cannabis, study which strains of pot are best for which ailments, and are instructed in the legalities of the business.
"My basic idea is to try to professionalize the industry and have it taken seriously as a real industry, just like beer and distilling hard alcohol," said Richard Lee, 45, an activist and pot dispensary owner who founded the school in a downtown storefront last fall.
So far, about 60 students have completed the weekend course, and the course is sold out through the end of May.
In the laboratory component of the course, Lee explained to his students how to prune and harvest plants, handing the clipping shears to a woman who wasn't sure how close to the stalk to cut without damaging it. He offered his thoughts on which commercial nutrient preparations are best, as well as the advantages of hydroponics, or soil-free gardening.
Students had various reasons for enrolling in the course. Some said they were curious, while others wanted advice for growing their own pot; but judging by their questions, a few were all ready for the graduate seminar Lee recently added to the school.
Oaksterdam U. gets its name from the nickname for a section of Oakland, where some of the state's earliest medical marijuana dispensaries began. The nickname, of course, was inspired by Amsterdam, in the Netherlands, where pot use is legal.
Michael Chapman, an assistant agent with the Drug Enforcement Agency's San Francisco office, said he was aware of Oaksterdam U. but has no reason to shut it down. Chapman commented that talking about marijuana is not illegal. The school does have small amounts of pot on the premises, but the DEA tries "to concentrate our case work on the most significant violators," he said.
Still, Chapman said he doesn't like the idea behind the school.
"I think they are sending the wrong message out to the community and it's something that could only facilitate criminal behavior," he said.
