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Photo Roundup!


Hey Everyone!,

So I realized I had a bunch of stray pictures hanging around. I am the asshole you see snapping pictures of food at inappropriate times (“I know you are having that cookie because of your low blood sugar but it looks cool”…Snap!) but not all of my pics can be a whole blog post unto itself. So, here is a roundup of assorted pics that I thought would be cool.

First up! In a previous post, I drooled all over the internet about a Prime Rib that my cousin-in-law, Bob, the firefighter chef, had made. Well, what I did not mention was that his wife Chrissy cut me a giant piece to take home. So, later on, home alone on New Years Day, I wanted to eat it. But how? I cut it up, threw it in a cast iron skillet and started to just heat it up.

Leftover Prime Rib & Eggs

Leftover Prime Rib & Eggs

In a little bowl I mixed some ketchup, A1, sriracha, worcheshire sauce and water and threw it in so it wouldn’t get dried out. Then I thought, what should I eat with it? Duh.

It was a thing of beauty. The sauce had cooked down and caramelized on the meat and the eggs were cooked but the yolks were still kinda dippy. I sat in the green leather armchair in the living room with this plate on my lap and welcomed the first day of 2012 (yeah, I had to check) with reckless abandon. And lots of meat!

Changing gears…

I was in North Jersey doing some comedy awhile back with my friend Latice. It was a long drive and I was super crazy hungry. I ordered a burger (an aside: please don’t advertise a big giant burger and then give me a big giant…jetro frozen burger. It takes 20 minutes to make like 45 fresh burgers for the week. Salt. Pepper. Maybe something else if you wanna get crazy. It’s cheaper to buy a chubb (haha, yeah that’s what they call it) of meat from wherever you get your meat and make them yourself then to lie to me and make me angry.) and wanted nachos. I love nachos.

And what they served me made me so angry I wanted to burn the building down.

The Worst Nachos In The History Of The World

The Worst Nachos In The History Of The World

What we have here are the Worst Nachos In The History Of The World. They were over salted regular and blue corn tortilla chips with the bagged shredded cheese and old chili on them. Oh. And olives. Where are the other ingredients? They were on another plate (that I didn’t take a picture of due to being angry) in little cups. There was not enough for the both of us, which irritates the crap out of me, because nachos should be big enough to be shared by at least 3 people. THAT IS WHY THEY EXIST. Some idiot in the kitchen decides to make deconstructed nachos and then doesn’t even mention it in the menu. And then tries to pass off a frozen burger as homemade. For shame. FOR SHAME.

This is what nachos should look like:

Nachos at Urban Saloon

Nachos at Urban Saloon

There is everything you need there. They don’t make their own chips either, even tho it is simple, but there is height, heft and yes, DELICIOUSNESS.

(And the maraschino cherries for dessert? You really get me internet, you really do…)

Ahem.

Frankenstein Cake Pop

Frankenstein Cake Pop

My little cousin Matt turned 7 earlier this past year and he wanted a monster themed party (fitting for Matt, but you don’t know him, so this must seem very inside baseball. You’d be right. But, trust me.). So his mom Lorrie made a very cool cake and gave out these monster cake pops!

Lorrie makes such awesome baked goods that sometimes I daydream about keeping her in my basement to just make me baked goods all day long. But then I remember how silly that would be…my cellar isn’t big enough for that kind of operation. A girl can dream tho.

Anyway, aren’t they cool? The hair is oreo crumbs and the cake is a light and airy chocolate. Did I almost get into a fight with another 7 year old over one sitting on a table?

One may never know…(I sure as hell ain’t tellin’….)

Red Velvet Donut

Red Velvet Donut

I found myself out of my area of cheesesteaks and tastykakes and into another area called Brooklyn. It looks a lot like Philly but with much more annoying Yankee/Giants/Mets crap plastered to all the cards. So instead of making an afternoon out of keying cars, I ended up eating this…a red velvet donut.

I didn’t eat it when first given to me. It sat in the bag for a bit. While I do tend to write about baked goods, I really very rarely eat them because too much carby stuff turns me into a parade float. Ahem. Anywho, this beauty is from the Peter Pan Bakery on Manhattan Ave in the Greenpoint section of Brooklyn. This thing was freakin’ amazing. Could it have been better with cream cheese frosting? Perhaps. But it was like eating a cupcake, a cake and a dance on a ballroom floor and I’ll take that any day.

Awesome Cupcake

Awesome Cupcake

I’ll end this hodgepodge post with a cupcake. A plain vanilla cupcake. I don’t remember exactly where I had this thing (it might have been another one of Bob’s creations), but I remember the icing. I hate cupcakes that have skimpy sugar-ball icing. They have no flavor. No panache. No…soul.

This was a perfect cupcake. Cream cheese icing. Tiny sugar crystals. It took me awhile to get down to the cupcake but ya know what?

It was a holiday cupcake and I was in love with it. And that was just fine with me.

A Trio Of Burgers


There are few things I love more then a good burger. The more combos the better. Recently, I have had some interesting burgers and, while it took me awhile, I am gonna show you them now.

Burger at The Grey Lodge

Burger at The Grey Lodge

The Grey Lodge had, in the past, really disappointed me with a really nasty cheesesteak. Well, with their new chef Eric, they seem to be turning this around. They now make almost everything in-house, which is refreshing. It is so easy to trot down to Jetro in South Philly and load up on frozen burgers, fries and munchie food. It takes balls to step out of that shadow and stretch the boundaries of bar food, especially in Mayfair, where people are used to Chickie’s and Pete’s frozen crinkle fries.

They have some neat stuff on the menu, including a tasty Cuban sandwich I had one day. But the burgers are pretty good. You first figure out if you want the burger, then pick what kind of cheese from about 6 and then go to town customizing it. The burger you see above has mayo, cheddar cheese, a fried egg and pickles. The pickles are sliced deli pickles, which is a nice touch and added a nice crunch to the whole package. The bun was fresh and the egg was, well, an egg on a burger is always a great touch.

The fries were fresh, hot and overflowing. I hate it when they skimp on fries. I ordered the spicy mayo to dip in and it did not disappoint. It was spicy without your face on fire and I even found myself trying to dip my burger in it too. Overall, the burger was about 12 bucks, which might seem pricey but the base burger is 8 bucks. So, that’s about reasonable.

I am super excited about the food at The Grey Lodge on the upswing. They have fantastic beers and now they have food that’s catching up. Go check it out!

Jack Daniels Burger @ PYT

Jack Daniels Burger @ PYT

PYT is a burger bar joint in the Piazza. They have a burger of the week and this was one awhile back. It’s a burger with cheese and bacon that is basted in a Jack Daniels sauce. Also on this thing are fried pickles.

You would think the bacon would make this burger but the fried pickles actually sneak in and steal the show! Also stealing my heart is the dill mayo dipping sauce for the fries. It is subtle and dances in your mouth when it mixes with the fries and the grease. If I could, I would have swam in a vat of it. Yes, I have no shame.

Peanut Butter & Bacon Burger @ Urban Saloon

Peanut Butter & Bacon Burger @ Urban Saloon

This burger here I almost did not order. I originally ordered a chicken salad sandwich on whole wheat bread but the chef came out and told me they were out of it. So, I ordered this. Wow.

This, from Urban Saloon in Fairmount, is a burger with Peanut Butter and Bacon on Texas toast. While the fries were typical Jetro coated fries, the burger was pretty great! It was done exactly how I ordered it, medium, and the peanut butter was melted just enough to cover the burger but it wasn’t dripping down my arm. They are not skimpy with the bacon either, so extra mega points for that. The patty is a bit small but it does the job.

The only thing I did not like was the texas toast. I am not a fan of texas toast at all, and I think if this was on a nice potato roll, it would be a grand slam. As of now, it’s a home run 🙂

Finally, I did enjoy a Yards Pale Ale with the burger, altho I prefer the Philly Brewing Co’s “Philadelphia Pale Ale”, but they don’t carry the PBC stuff there. Let’s get with the program Urban Saloon!

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