Friday, April 11, 2008 by Julie Cancio Harper.

The Los Angeles Times sponsors a food blog called Daily Dish, which I read and enjoy (and have now added to the blogroll).

There is an unfortunate error in their post dated April 9: “Chicken and waffle feud”

What they claim is a case of copyright infringement is actually a trademark dispute, as reported in an Associated Press article available from the LA Daily News. See “Roscoe’s sues Rosscoe’s over trademark rights” for accurate yet brief coverage.

I’ve been thinking about blogs lately, and the responsibility I have to readers as a blogger. Bloggers are publishers in the sense that we put print (and other content like audio and video) into the universe. We don’t need much more than access to the Internet and basic word processing skills to do it. We each decide on our own editorial standards. We look up to our mentors and try to outshine our competitors, in a sibling rivalry sort of way.

This is a pretty loose type of writing, so there is a wide range of content and quality out here in the blogosphere. I accept that errors happen. Sometimes readers give a shout when something’s amiss, and bless them for reminding us to get it right because we’re not singing to ourselves alone out here.

But having the Daily Dish, which is staffed by professionals at the LA Times, post such a serious error is a bummer. I take my responsibility for accuracy and fact-checking seriously, even as a beginner. If it was a misspelling or a punctuation error, I would think “must be a typo” and leave it without comment. But there is a pretty extreme difference between copyright and trademark. And anyone working in any kind of publishing should either know the difference or make sure to pass on the newswire transmission word-for-word.

The U.S. Copyright Office defines copyright as “a form of protection provided by the laws of the United States (title 17, U.S. Code) to the authors of ‘original works of authorship,’ including literary, dramatic, musical, artistic, and certain other intellectual works.” Many creative works qualify for copyright protection, but business names do not. They are protected by trademark.

According to attorney Lloyd J. Jassin who provides “Trademark Basics” at Copylaw.com, “trademark law protects names, titles, short phrases and other symbols that distinguish the source of one product (or service) from another” and affect business and marketing efforts. The “other symbols” mentioned by Jassin include business logos, such as the waffle background and chicken foreground made famous by the original Roscoe’s in Los Angeles.

See “Copyrights vs. Trademarks: Related but Different” at Copylaw.com and the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) for more information.

In the lawsuit involving two houses of chicken and waffles, the famous Roscoe’s in Los Angeles objects to another restaurant’s similar name and logo because those marks of trade make it difficult for the businesses to be distinguished from one another. The suggestion is that Rosscoe’s deliberately means to deprive Roscoe’s of sales. This is especially important now that the famous Roscoe’s is opening a restaurant in the Chicago area where Rosscoe’s currently does business.

So, for the record and as a public service dedicated to accuracy in the blogosphere, I present this information.

And now that I have, I’m pretty much starving for chicken and waffles. Where the heck did I put that waffle iron?

Posted in blogs & blogging, publishing, copyright & permissions, los angeles, attitudes, trademark, editing | 4 Comments »

Monday, March 31, 2008 by Julie Cancio Harper.

The first thing that Eric ever cooked for me was Chinese pie. When he described what he was making, I said, “You mean shepherd’s pie?” And he said, “I guess, if that’s what you’d call it.”

Back then we were still sorting out our regional differences — which mostly had to do with having different names for the same thing. I grew up in Youngstown, Ohio and Eric grew up in Dracut, Massachusetts. No one told me until I went to college that I was from the Midwest. I grew up with an extremely liberal father and had always felt as though I belonged to the East coast cultural experience. We make maple syrup, they make maple syrup. How different could it be?

I was visiting him at his dad’s house one summer and was baffled by long conversations the two of them would have each night before we’d go out to dinner.

His dad would ask him, “Are you wearing dungarees or chinos to dinner?” And Eric would say, “Well, where are we going?” And they would discuss the restaurant options, and for anything that wasn’t a pizza parlor, his dad would say, “Maybe I should wear chinos.” And Eric would say, “No, no people wear dungarees in there all the time. Chinos are too formal.” And his dad would say, “Are you sure? I usually wear chinos.” To which Eric responded, “You dress too formally. I’m sure dungarees are fine.” And this would go on and on as they tried to get dressed.

I was already starving and ready to go, sitting in the parlor and thinking that I wished they would sort out the apparel debate so we could get out the door. But I couldn’t offer help because I had no idea what they were talking about.

I knew they were talking about pants. But I couldn’t figure out what KIND of pants.

Growing up, there were no restaurants that I ever went to that had any sort of dress code — implied or spoken. As long as you wore a shirt and shoes and bottoms of some kind (pants, skirt, shorts, etc.) you were in the clear. So I had no idea why Eric and his dad were so troubled by the formality of their outfits. And, dungarees and chinos sounded like cowboy words to me.

Not wanting to sound like a rube by asking, I kept my mouth shut and puzzled over it myself. Eventually I figured it out: dungarees are jeans, chinos are khaki pants.

So what about Chinese pie? Is it just another term for shepherd’s pie?

Not quite. It has similarities: a layer of ground meat is topped with mashed potatoes and baked until golden brown and bubbling. But Chinese pie has a middle layer of corn (either canned, creamed, frozen or a combination) between the meat and potatoes. The meat — usually ground beef — is sauteed with onions, and sometimes green peppers. Each family recipe differs slightly, but Eric’s experience and Wikipedia agree that Chinese pie is a valid term with origins in the New World.

Chinese pie is a nostalgia food for Eric. He does not make it often, but when he does it means more than dinner. It is one of the dishes his mom used to make, and since she died when he was 16, cooking Chinese pie is a way for him to get back in touch with what dinner and family meant to his mom.

I’m a tinkerer. And when Eric’s not in the mood to make strait-laced Chinese pie, I offer variations.

We once made a “Tex-Mex” Chinese pie where one pound of organic ground beef was cooked with cumin and garlic, the mashed potatoes were full of sharp cheddar, and the corn layer was similar to Mexicorn® (corn with peppers), which is a registered trademark of General Mills and which I ate often when I was a kid. This gave me the chance to feel nostalgia connected to the Chinese pie experience, too.

Since I had the separate ingredients on hand and lacked brand-name Mexicorn®, I prepared my version of the corn layer from scratch: dice one onion, one jalepeño, half a red bell pepper; sauté in butter; add frozen corn, salt and pepper to your liking; cook through until hot.

It was very tasty.

I also have visions of an Irish-style pie where the mashed potato layer is replaced by colcannon. Perhaps the corn layer can be replaced with cubed carrots? Or parsnips? I haven’t decided yet — this one’s still in development.

Well, all the tinkering over time inspired Eric last Saturday. While I sat at my computer typing away, he sneaked off to the kitchen. It was not long before I peeked my nose around the counter to ask, “What is it that you’re cooking?”

It was a new Chinese pie. The organic ground beef was sautéed with one-inch slices of onions and diced green bell pepper. There was cumin and garlic and . . . something else in the beef. I wasn’t sure. It smelled exotic. “Cinnamon,” he said, and smiled. Whoa! A curveball from the traditional New Englander!

We made the mashed potatoes with non-fat yogurt (32 oz. on sale for $1!), a bit of cheddar, and a drizzle of olive oil to smooth them out.

“It’s my best Chinese pie EVER,” he said. I think and hope he meant “so far.” We don’t know what to call this one, but it doesn’t matter. The food, the enjoyment of cooking, and the memories of home, family, and love are all evolving each time.

Posted in cooking, youngstown, new england, trademark, nostalgia, love, dealings w/feelings, pie | 5 Comments »