It started when he posted a video of himself taking a bite out of an onion he found on the side of the road. TikTok went nuts.<\/p>\n
His partner was the one who pointed out that it was about eating. Most people don\u2019t eat stuff they find on the side of the road, she said. They don\u2019t even touch it.<\/p>\n
Really, there are two types of people in the world. One sees something lying in the street and thinks, \u201cTrash.\u201d The other sees something lying in the street and thinks, \u201cYes! A 30-pound package of frozen cookie dough!\u201d Geno Villafano, Ph.D. student and pro cyclist for Cannondale, is one of the latter.<\/p>\n
He scored the cookie dough along Storrs Road last summer. It was still frozen. Had to have fallen off a truck earlier the same day. Other stuff he finds isn\u2019t always obviously fresh, so he uses his background in biochemistry to judge safety.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m acutely aware of how many heat cycles that sandwich or bag of chips has gone through,\u201d Villafano explains. The finds come on his 30-mile commute to and from Rockville, Connecticut, to Storrs, specifically Leighton Core\u2019s genomics lab, where he is developing assays to measure how genes are expressed \u2014 so we don\u2019t question his precision calculation credentials. Other favorite food finds include fresh asparagus, sacks of potatoes, and oyster mushrooms.<\/p>\n