Though vegans and other natural eating types have been using it for years, nutritional yeast is only just going mainstream. Besides the unappetizing name, however, there’s a lot to love in this mysterious new powder. Not only is it tasty, but it’s particularly healthy as well. The name notwithstanding, nutritional yeast is full of vitamins, but you’d never known it based on the flavor. That just begs the question, what is nutritional yeast anyway?

Nutritional yeast bears some relation to both bakers yeast and brewer’s yeast, which are used to make bread and beer respectively. Before you get caught up worrying that you’ll find your stomach fermenting like a fresh batch of sourdough, have no fear, nutritional yeast is specifically inactive. You can’t use it leaven bread, but that also means that its less savory flavor elements have also been neutralized.

The savory powder has become a darling of the ever-growing vegan and vegetarian movement for its intense umami notes, with a nutty, rounded edge that lends a cheesy quality to any food its added to. Of course, it also helps that most varieties of nutritional yeast are packed with a plant-based source of the crucial vitamin B12. While nutritional yeast is often a major component in any dairy-free, cheese-like recipe, it can also stand on its own as a seasoning.

One of the most sublime concoctions involving nutritional yeast that stays away from the arena of cheese substitutes is as a popcorn seasoning. Mixed with a little bit of salt and oil, the nutritional yeast coats each kernel with a bite of its savory tang. If you want to upgrade this even further, add in a sprinkle of garlic powder, or go for broke with some truffle oil, and you may never be able to eat plain popcorn again.

Do you remember That Girl, one of the most popular sitcoms from back in the ’60s? If not, you might have heard about this show from older generations or through articles like these. Either way, That Girl has been around for a while and it left a mark on the American TV scene. The show starred Marlo Thomas as Ann Marie, who was also one of the producers on set. However, given the time this show was produced, Thomas went through quite a lot of obstacles on her road. Here are 20 facts about this show that you probably didn’t know of!

Not only was Marlo Thomas the main star and the producer of the show, but she was also the one who came up with the whole concept for it. The plot of the show was quite female-centric and it introduced new ideas to the scene.

This 1966 show introduced a fresh concept in which the female character had everything she wanted in life. She wasn’t only a mother or a housewife, but an active member of society as well. This concept is what put Thomas on the map back in the day.

One thing Thomas disliked was the fact that the writing team during the first season was made up of all men. This led to the accumulation of bad jokes and stereotypes in the script, which Thomas was not happy with.

“I was constantly saying, ‘A girl would not say that to her father. A girl would not say that. She’d be more diplomatic about this,’” she explained in a 2013 interview with ThinkProgress. Thomas also claimed that male colleagues often body-shamed actresses on the set, too.

Interestingly, Thomas’ father in the show, Lew Parker, was also her real father — Danny Thomas. He often made quick appearances on the show and fans had quite liked his work. Sadly, he passed away a year after the show ended.

In an interview with AARP the Magazine back in 2010, Thomas explained how her father instructed her to give his eulogy — “…Don’t make it sad. People want to laugh and remember somebody that they love. They don’t want you to make them cry. They’re going to cry all by themselves. Tell funny stories.”

Thomas took a lot of freedom on the set to customize her own lines when she thought it was necessary. In one line where she says “I don’t know that I want to get married just yet,” the producers added the last two words to soften the statement.

After all, it was a pretty big deal back in the day for a woman to say that she doesn’t want to get married and that she wants a career instead. It wasn’t very usual for women to prioritize work over a family back in the ’60s.

Most people wouldn’t even care to think about this but the biggest fans of the show will find this detail interesting. Namely, if you watched the show, you probably saw Ann Marie wearing sunglasses on her head quite often.

The truth is, this wasn’t a fashion statement or anything of that sort. In fact, Thomas wore sunglasses to keep her hair in place because it kept getting in the way. Not only was it helpful, but it also turned out to be a very good look on her.

Ted Bessel played the character of Donald Hollinger, who was Ann Marie’s boyfriend on the show. Bessel’s character was actually a nice guy, which is not something you’d expect out of male leading roles back in the day.

In fact, Bessel wasn’t used to playing such unthreatening roles and he found the entire situation to be too difficult for him. Ironically, the role of Donald Hollinger was some of his best work throughout his entire entertainment career.

Prior to each episode of the show, the words “that girl” are said before the title rolls down and this was only supposed to happen in the first episode. The writers believed it would be challenging to keep this up constantly throughout each episode.

However, to their own surprise, the team of writers managed to nicely fit in those words before the title in every episode with unusual variations here and there. Although this was unplanned, it turned out quite great.

It is not uncommon to see actors and actresses leave shows in Hollywood, even in the middle of the season. Broadway actress Bonnie Scott made this decision when she chose to drop her role of Ann Marie’s neighbor, Judy.

Not only was Bonnie’s role less significant but it was also taking a lot of her time and, as a parent of two, she couldn’t afford to work 18 hours a day. As years went by, Bonnie made a career shift and became a designer instead of an actress.

If you pay attention to what Ann Marie is wearing throughout the whole show, you would get the impression that she was quite wealthy for that period of time. However, she was rarely seen working or making any money on the show.

At times, she didn’t even have enough money to buy food, although she had an expensive New York apartment and plenty of fancy clothes. Even Thomas claimed that the character couldn’t really afford all those things but the riches did help the show progress.

Originally, Thomas wanted the show to be called Miss Independent because, well, it was all about a woman who wanted to be independent. She even had personal reasons as to why she chose this name.

It was due to the fact that her father used to call her Miss Independence, because she was that kind of person herself. It would have meant a lot to her for the show to be called that, although the idea didn’t make it through.

As you can imagine, men weren’t quite happy to have a woman in charge telling them what to do. It was just the reality of the time the show was filmed in. However, Thomas was aware that she had complete power over them.

“I had all the power. It was my company, I signed the checks. I was the boss. There were meetings in which a male producer would get up and say, ‘I can’t do this,’” she explained in one of her interviews.

Believe it or not, even Thomas wanted to leave the show at one point. This was after the fourth season when she felt like the story was coming to an end. Her leaving the set would also mean the end of the show.

However, the producers convinced her to stay one more year, which she did in the end. The reason she wanted to leave was that the show was starting to get more conventional as Ann Marie got engaged to Donald.

Even though Thomas was strictly against making the show seem conventional, the network wanted it to end with a wedding between Ann Marie and Donald. Still, although the characters were engaged in season five, Thomas refused to end it with a wedding.

“I couldn’t do it. I can’t say to all of these girls that this is the only happy ending. Everybody else can get married but let this one show go off without a wedding,” she said. The show ended with Ann taking Donald to a feminist meeting.

As you can probably tell by now, Thomas felt quite closely related to her character on the show. However, she didn’t want the series to define her. She wanted to be remembered as more than just Ann Marie from a ’60s television sitcom.

“Of course, ultimately when you do a TV series for that long, that’s going to be the thing you’re remembered for. When she passes away, it’ll be ‘That Girl Dies,’ and not all the other stuff that she’s done,” said Stephen Cole, the author of the book the show was based on.

Even though many men didn’t like working under Thomas, Ted Bessel was never one of them. The two were actually good friends and they kept in touch in their private lives. Sadly, Bessel passed away at the age of 57 in 1993.

“When my father passed, he drove me around Los Angeles for days — talking to me while I cried. The minute you needed him, he just showed up, like an angel,” said Thomas about her co-star on the show.

It was no surprise that fans went completely crazy for this show because it brought something new to their television screens. After all, Thomas had created one of the best shows for women that inspired them to be independent and rise up.

“You did not have to be the wife or the daughter of somebody or the secretary of somebody, but that you could be the somebody. The story could be about you and what you wanted in life,” Thomas explained in a 2003 interview with Television Academy.

Believe it or not, there were actually plans to turn this sitcom into a movie back in the day. Before he passed away, Ted Bessel commented on this idea and said “As long as we’re still alive and kicking, I think it’s a mistake not to do it.”

Sadly, after he suddenly passed away, it was clear that the big-screen adaptation would never happen. No one was expecting this outcome since Bessel was perfectly healthy throughout the last few years of his life.

There was no doubt that this sitcom and its whole concept changed Thomas as a person. She became a symbol for feminism and she found meaning in helping women rise up and fight for their rights.

One thing Thomas was shocked about was that there hadn’t been many or any feminist organizations back in the day where women could turn to for advice. This led her to become a radical feminist and actively fight for women’s rights.

It was originally planned for Donald Hollinger to present himself as part Cherokee Indian since his full name was Donald Blue Sky. Even though this wouldn’t have been politically correct nowadays, it was allowed back then.

Ted Bessel, who played the role of Donald Hollinger, had no Native American heritage and hence this kind of representation would be considered wrong. However, Thomas wouldn’t have minded it even if they went along with the original plan.

One odd thing that the fans of the show might have noticed was that Donald Hollinger never stayed around Ann’s apartment. He would leave for home at the end of each episode because the producers didn’t want to keep potential intimacy in question.

The network executives were extremely uncomfortable with this whole idea that they wanted Ann to actually live with her aunt and remove any opportunity for potential encounters with Donald.