#194 - my last day of freedom.

mom. dad. hi. you've previously mentioned to me that you occasionally check out your favorite son's blog posts...even the ones on that website with a swear word in the name. that makes me extremely happy but in this case, i'd like to take this opportunity to suggest ahead of time that you skip this one. i mean, i wouldn't want you to think that i'm some sort of debaucherous lush or anything & when you're done reading, you probably will. sorry. i completely understand if you decide to go further though. after all, parents are pretty must just like kids, so when you tell them not to do anything, they usually do it out of pure curiosity. anyway, don't say that i didn't warn you.

...so after a calendar year that i was fully employed for about a quarter of, yesterday i started a new gig...one where i have to WEAR A TIE & report to work BEFORE 10AM. i know...OMG! for at least a half decade now, i've just slapped on a pair of jeans & rolled into work any time between 10am & 11am. yay, adulthood!

with my impending first day of work just three days away, on friday around 2pm i met up with an old friend (who will remain nameless) in midtown at lexington brass for a lil' "last free weekday" food & drink action.

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snackdown! - 3.12.10

this week, the entire food world was fixated on news out of nyc that klee's daniel angerer was making cheese out of his wife's breast milk. it's something that the village voice reported on almost ten days ago, but this week the story really picked up steam, getting national attention & a warning-of-sorts from the board of health. while it's made in a fashion that's similar to most other cheeses, the critics who sampled it thought it was "softer" & "more slippery" than regular cheese. regardless of what the critics thought, there's something about it that gives me the willies. on a related note, klee will be unveiling their spring cheese menu next thursday. breast milk cheese will not be on the menu. for that matter, it never has been, but it sure has created a lot of buzz for klee. luckily, the rest of the week's news wasn't quite so nasty.

• late last week, the FDA announced a recall of a ton of products containing hydrolyzed vegetable protein, a common flavor enhancer. this week, that list of products extended to include two meat-inspired pringles flavors--restaurant cravers cheeseburger & family faves taco night. while i've never tried the cheeseburger flavor, i polished off a tube of the taco night flavor a few weeks back & am happy to report that i didn't die as a result. i'm also happy to report that taco night pringles are strange but amazingly good. after all, they're inspired by tacos. (christian science monitor)


• on another taco-related note, austin's SXSW got under way this week & for attendees, they can rest easy knowing that when they wake up with the worst indie rock & tequila-inspired hangover known to man, they can nurse it with an austin delicacy--the breakfast taco. the ny times notes that "when it comes to breakfast tacos...austin trumps all other american cities." the breakfast taco, which is "inspired by mexico, but not mexican," is basically a tortilla filled with standard breakfast fare such as scrambled eggs, bacon & sausage. some places like torchy's tacos get creative & serve items like "migas tacos, made with a scramble of eggs and strips of fried corn tortillas, pocked with green chilies, capped with avocado slices, enveloped by flour tortillas." the best part? they're not just for breakfast. (ny times)


• with st patrick's day only five days away, it's time to start getting wasted & downing copious amounts of corned beef & cabbage, right? well, not entirely. you should still get wasted but it turns out that corned beef & cabbage, which has become shorthand for "irish food," isn't really an irish dish. in fact, most of the "irish food" you find in america, stuff like irish nachos & reuben egg rolls, has nothing to do with traditional irish fare. the reality is that a lot of traditional irish cuisine is rather bland & the stuff you typically find in irish pubs here in the u.s.--"burgers, chicken wings and pizza"--is often similar to what you'll find in pubs in ireland. there really is no "irish cuisine" to speak of. it's cool with me though. corned beef & cabbage sucks. (chicago sun-times)


• in a week where the producers of the academy award winning documentary the cove busted a restaurant in l.a. for serving endangered whale sushi, serious eats took a look at a more legal (& likely tasty) form of sushi--the sushi pizza. as they reported, a japanese tv show that profiles "wacky 'japanese' food" served at japanese restaurants in america" visited hyde park's edo sushi to try out their sushi pizza. to their surprise, they actually enjoyed the dish, which is made up of "a lightly toasted rice patty" topped with spicy mayo, chopped maguro, green onion & tobiko. sure it's not technically pizza, but it still sounds awesome. (serious eats)


• over the past year or so, nyc's become known for their vibrant food truck scene, but in the midst of all the food truck hype, not enough attention has been paid to another portable food trend that's on the rise--the pop-up restaurant. they're locales where chefs set up shop for a day or evening & hock their creations. since they're hip & trendy & only temporary, there are four lessons that the la times thinks are key to the pop-up experience: don't expect to stumble on a pop-up, expect to wait, stay current on twitter & go at opening time. if you keep those four things in mind, you'll be just fine. if not, they'll be gone before you know it. (la times)

snackdown! - 1.29.10

in a week where president obama delivered his first state of the union address & the world lost howard zinn, j.d. salinger & that short, slightly-creepy lady from poltergeist with the high-pitched voice, it was probably pretty hard for you to keep up with everything awesome that happened in the world of snacking. luckily, i have a brain capacity similar to that of christopher langan & the waking hours of a speed freak, so i was able to find enough brain power & time to concentrate on both snack news and presidents & celebrity deaths & whatnot. just kidding. that's not what happened. my brain's not that big. i just used google alerts & shit. anyway...happy weekend, eat!drink!snack! reader. we have to come up with a better name for you.

• do you like pancakes? how about AUTOMATIC pancakes? are you bummed that you've had trouble finding automatic pancakes anywhere on the entire north american continent? fret no longer, my friend. popcake, a company based in hong kong, announced this week that they've secured distribution of their automatic pancake machine here in north america. as a planet, "more than 20 million pancakes are consumed daily" & i assume that americans, with our love for putting butter & syrup on things, make up a large portion of that figure. just imagine what sort of damage we're going to do now that they're available automatically! (perishablenews.com)


• these days, the cast of jersey shore has essentially become the fourteenth representative from new jersey, but the nj star-ledger wants you to know that jersey's about more than orange skin, greased up fist pumping & displaying your abs. they're also about pizza & over the last six months, the star-ledger's "four-member pizza patrol drove 9,000 miles in the munchmobile, visiting 333 pizzerias and sampling 1,000 slices" to find new jersey's best pizza. all week, they're running pizza-related articles as part of a countdown to the announcement of jersey's best pizza. on a related note, i want a munchmobile. (nj star ledger)


• i'm just going to come right out & say it...five-star restaurants are wack. color me cheap, but i've never been one to swoon over the "experience" of spending hundreds of dollars on dinner. give me a couple tacos or a dolphin's worth of half-price sushi & i'm good to go. i bring this up because in 2010, fancy restaurateurs like david chang are trying to blur the lines between five-star food & regular people food by serving fried chicken. because of this, many have deemed fried chicken a food to watch in the new year. they can have their fried chicken. to be honest, i'd rather have some bacon. (seattle post-intelligencer)


• in south texas, they take their meat seriously. this past saturday, at a cafe in brownsville, the owner & a customer got into a slight brouhaha over the customer's order. the customer was all "i ordered the chicken but you gave me beef." eventually, he & the owner got into it, started tossing food at each other & the next thing you know, the owner hauls off & thwacks the customer with a plate. the moral of this story: in texas, if they serve you beef, don't start a beef. (washington post)


• if you've followed eat!drink!snack! for a while, you know that i think of snacking as an art form. the boston globe's devra first totally agrees with me in her article "a whole new world of snacking." the piece begins with the words "snacking is an art" & then she pretty much confirms everything i believe about eating. big meals are cool & all, but grabbing tasty, awesome snacks throughout your day is totally the way to go, the wave of the future. along the way, she names a bunch of places to eat in boston, places that serve things like a "bing" (china's answer to the slider), a "japanese doughnut, filled with red bean and curry" & lahmejune (armenian pizza). preach on, sister. (boston globe)

snackdown! - 1.22.10

during a week where the entire country was going apeshit over the special election in massachusetts for the late ted kennedy's former senate seat, there were a number of food-related stories that provided a bit of a distraction from the bombardment of political coverage. whether it was the demise of the deep dish or the death of a taco magnate, anything was a welcome relief from the constant "coakley is totally going to blow it" cycle of news.

• story numero uno...mamma mia! there's a trouble down at the pizzeria! on wednesday, boston-based restaurant chain pizzeria uno announced that, in an attempt to save the company, they were filing for bankruptcy. it's been rough going for them recently, what with the poor economy & rising cost of ingredients & whatnot, but i think we all know what the real reason behind their downfall is though...deep dish pizza is lame. (boston globe)


• on sunday, the world was saddened to learn of the passing of taco bell founder glen bell. at the same time, they were surprised to learn that taco bell was named after its founder. mr bell, who founded the chain back in 1962, saw the need to bring mexican food of sketchy origins to the american public. over the years, he achieved that dream & in the process, made a great impact on american cuisine. without him, we may have never known what the hell a "gordita" is...& that would just be sad. (npr)


• with this weekend's afc championship game between the ny jets & the indianapolis colts only two days away, the ny daily news' matthew lysiak has already headed out to indy for the big game. while out there, he's worked himself into a tizzy because he can't find authentic ny style food such as bagels & pizzas & egg creams. to this i offer a hearty "duh." you're in indianapolis, dude. you don't go to brazil in search of sushi. (ny daily news)


• since i'm a glutton, i shove food into my mouth all day long, pretty much right up until the point where i fall asleep. apparently i shouldn't be doing that though. according to lar rune foleide, some science guy who studies dreams, if you wolf down a couple of slabs of roast beef or a bucket of deviled eggs just before heading to bed, there's a good chance that you're going to have some messed up dreams. i guess that explains my "wall street banker/astronaut dog with the head of cuba gooding jr" dream from a few nights ago. (tahlequah daily press)


• monday may have been MLK day, but it wasn't the only important holiday this week, as tuesday was national popcorn day. the holiday, which celebrates the wonders of the air-popped corn kernel snack, is a rather mysterious one, as the national popcorn board doesn't even know how it got started. they do know that the average american eats a quart of popcorn a week though, so if you haven't had any yet this week, you've got a lot of catching up to do. (phoenix new times)

nosh nook #166 - monday, november 2, 2009

a pizza eating feat for the ages (link)
11.1.09 - slice - by daniel zemans

pizza may have become a staple of many americans' diets, but i have a love-hate relationship with it. growing up, whether it was ellio's or a regular pie, i ate a ton of it. from evenings where my mom was working & my dad had to make dinner to pizza parties at school & birthday parties at chuck e cheese, i ate it at least once or twice a week. at some point in the last few years though, because i'd eaten so much of it over the years, i sort of became sick of it. i still have a slice or two every once in a while, but those times are few & far between & when i do eat pizza, it's usually at someone else's urging.

some people never grow sick of pizza though. take chicago's craig scharoff. as slice (serious eats' pizza blog) reports, back in september, scharoff made a claim that he loved pizza so much that he could eat it every day for the rest of his life. his business partner challenged his claim, offering up a "four-figure sum" if he ate nothing but sausage pizza for every single meal during the month of october. over the past month, the pizza-eating drama has been playing out on LTH forum, a "chicago-based culinary chat site" & as slice notes, it really was no challenge, as scharoff "made it clear by the middle of october that he was an unstoppable pizza-eating force."

this past saturday marked the final day of the sausage pizza-eating challenge & since he passed the test with flying colors, he's now a little bit richer. in addition, "he never felt sick the entire month and, as of october 29, he lost 6 pounds since the challenge began." what's even more nuts is that he claims that "he could do another 30 days if not for all the pictures and documenting he had to do." in fact, according to slice, "tonight, this great man, this pizza-eating machine, this hero to us all...tonight, he plans to eat pizza."