Welcome to Mushroom Adventures

Sounds illegal doesn't it? It's not, it's a cool place to get mushroom kits to grow legal, edible mushrooms at home. I'm going to try this, I love mushrooms!

Also try:
http://www.mushbox.com/
http://www.gmushrooms.com/POTS.HTM
http://www.fungi.com/kits/indoor.html
http://www.groworganic.com/seasonal-items/mushroom-kits.html

18th & Vine, Lee's Summit and P&L it's all your fault! We're just victims.

The Peachtree in P&L closed! Who didn't see this coming? The owners that's who. What did you think was going to happen when you moved to P&L? You sold out! You forgot the people who brought you up in the first place. Did you really think the largest, suburban destination hangout in town was going to support soul food? Where are you going next? Leawood? Please.

"The Power and Light district location was leased for Roy, my son, who wanted to remain close to the African American community and felt African Americans should have a presence in the P&L district."

I guess remaining close to the African American community means moving to the biggest white tourist trap in the city?  I guess remaining close to the African American community means abandoning an historic black neighborhood?

You chased the Cordish dollar and it ran you over. Now you cry about your poor business decisions in attempt to regain some credibility in the community. Always good food, always poor service and management.

Which ramen suits your lazy ass?

Hello Lazy is only one of the delicious flavors here. Other flavors include; Soup for Sluts, Din Din Fuk Chow and Wasted and Broke ramen.

"Let's face it - you're not lazy because you're making ramen. You're making ramen because you're lazy!"

Restaurant Week - KC Style

When I lived in D.C., Restaurant Week was a much anticipated event. Like baseball's opening day or St. Patrick's day, Restaurant Week became a city wide holiday for adults. The deals were outstanding and the food was amazing. It was not unusual for many restaurants in D.C. to be completely booked up during restaurant week.

It was with that anticipation that I recently reviewed the Restaurant Week being put on by the Power and Light District. This Restaurant Week was a sham. The menus were restrictive, over-priced, and generally not a value. As I stated previously, Power and Light just didn't get the essence of what drives a successful Restaurant Week promotion. (By the way, for any new readers, I am not a P&L basher intent on supporting only locally owned joints. I am an equal opportunity eater and have been to every one of the Restaurants in P&L, except maybe Ghengis Grill?)

Would my Restaurant Week craving go unquenched? NO! I have been saved by the upcoming second annual KC Restaurant Week. This event, co-sponsored by the Greater KC Restaurant Association and the KC Conventions and Visitors Association, is set to take place next week from January 21st until January 30th. What makes this event "legend"... (wait for it)... "dary" is that it has its very own free iPhone app!

The app lists all participating restaurants, a brief synopsis of the place and its food, their address, a link to their website, and most importantly... their Restaurant Week menus.

To provide a quick guide to the KC Restaurant Week festivities, the participating restaurants offer a lunch special for 15 bucks and a dinner special for 30 bucks. The goal for us average Joes is to get more food than what you are paying for. Unlike the P&L debacle, this event seems to get that principle.

If you want to go to a less expensive place like Pizza 51, the lunch special during the week will get you enough food to feed two people. If you go to a nicer place, like one of my seafood favorites, the Bristol, you will only get enough chow for one person but it will be great options like Grilled Salmon or a Petite Filet Mignon... for lunch... for 15 smack-a-roos.

In all, I have already charted out five eating destinations for that week. A few will be chosen because I haven't been there ever (or in a super long time) and a few will be chosen because they are simply offering an unbeatable value.

And most importantly, by participating in Restaurant Week, you are helping a worthwhile charity. A portion of the price of every meal ordered is donated to Harvesters. Last year over $55,000.00 was donated to Harvesters. So help out a needy group and get your "opening day" on.

A man and his pan

Or a woman...whatever, you know what I mean.

In this article, some guy from FT talks to some chefs about their favorite pan. My favorite pan is a cast iron grill pan I bought several years ago. I love this pan although my smoke alarms don't think it is as cool as I do. When I take the pan out of the cabinet, my smoke alarms go off in anticipation.

Words only food douches use. Go ahead..... try them out.

Are you a Deipnosophist? If so, don't bother looking at the Top 10 Food and Drink Words You’ve Never Heard.

Ruth Bourdain FTW!

The Eater of the Year Award goes to Ruth Bourdain. The folks over at Endless Simmer narrowed the list down to 5 and let the public decide the winner. Surprisingly, I wasn't in the running this year.

Here is the scoop on Ruth Bourdain.

A post about tired posts is..... also tired

Here is a list of fresh topics for local food bloggers. Just pick one and start writing. It's that easy.

1. Gas station eats
2. New cupcake boutiques
3. Anything Christopher Elbow or Ryan Maybee touch
4. Hip new "artisan" pizza places
5. Places to get an overpriced burger
6. Hotdogs
7. Tio
8. Mixologists
9. Recent closings of national chains
10. Brunch
11. KC's best BBQ

The Deep Sea Battle

Recently KC Food Guy and I were provided gift cards to sample the fare at Bonefish Grill and their "closest competitor". That comparable turned out to be Red Lobster. Way to shoot for the stars Bonefish. I'm sure your customers enjoy the fact that they are faced with the nightly dilemma of choosing you or Red Lobster. What about aspiring for The Bristol or even M&S?

Anyway our joint review of Bonefish is contained in our archives. (I guess if I was computer savvy this is when I add a link to that story, but you'll just have to scroll down and find the damn story for yourself). I recently hit up the Red Lobster "riding solo" to get a good comparison of the two places.

First of all, the service was fantastic. From the initial greeter to my actual server, I was made to feel welcome and cherished as a customer. Bonefish wasn't rude by any accounts; it was just that Red Lobster made me feel truly welcomed.

I ordered a shrimp and steak combo. I felt like this was representative of a good comparison with our meal at Bonefish. I didn't think it would have been fair to get a full lobster or something and then try and compare the two places. The price of the meal was fairly economical coming in at around 15 bucks. I upgraded my side to the grilled asparagus for a few bucks more.

First of all, all meals at the Red come with a side salad and their legendary cheddar biscuits. The Biscuits were as good as I remembered them. The salad was stuck in 1982 and sucked. Some crappy looking iceberg lettuce with pre-fab croutons and some slices of cucumber made me feel as though I was getting a salad from Winsteads (yes they have salads there!).

The meal itself was solid. The steak was a smallish 5 ounce cut that was tasty but unspectacular. The shrimp was cooked to perfection, and while slightly over seasoned, it was good. When I mean cooked to perfection I mean not overdone (as most shrimp offerings are in places like the Red). I confirmed that the shrimp was actually placed on the skewer at the restaurant. There is no way that Bonefish does this.
Overall, the meal was good. Service was great. Drink selection was normal.

The big complaint most folks have about the Red is the price. They don't mind spending more cash at a nicer seafood joint. They just feel as though Red Lobster should be more economical.

I want to sincerely thank Bonefish for giving us the opportunity to sample their fare and put it to the test with another restaurant. I just didn't see a marked difference between the two places. And in my opinion that makes Red Lobster the winner. You see, when you choose to go to Bonefish you are choosing to have a better dining experience. You expect to pay more and also get better food. The food at Red Lobster was average seafood. You expect that... nothing more.

So maybe Bonefish is a victim of its own aspired standards? I don't know. I do know that if someone gave me a free dinner and the option of going to Bonefish or Red Lobster... I'd choose the Red.

Define Neapolitan

Andrea from SPIN! invited us over to sample their menu the other day. It was my first visit, and maybe my last.

It wasn't bad pizza, it was very average pizza. We arrived around 11, and were the first people there for lunch. We met the owner, Gail Lozoff in the "ordering area", the area in the front of the restaurant where the menu hangs and people order at the register. You order your pizza and then move to your table to wait for it.

This procedure works fine at a deli where everyone is ordering individually, it doesn't work so well for pizza. People are picky about what they get on their pizza, everyone likes something different. As groups of folks file in the door, they must come to a collaborative decision on what they are going to order before sitting down. This is easy for some groups, and not so easy for most.

Does your group of six that has quickly decided what to order cut in front of the group of four that has not? There really isn't a formal line, just an area where groups sort of stand around and look at the menu.

By about 11:30 the confusion started. Groups are coming in the front door and the back door. Folks from the back door are going straight to the register bypassing those who came in the front door. Those from the front door are wondering if they should skip in front of the group of four in front of them who can't make a decision on a pizza.

Just let us sit down to order the pizza already!

I ordered the daily pizza special, four cheeses and mushroom. I added Italian sausage since Gail said they get it from Scimeca's. Terrence got the Pollo Arrosto E Chevre (chicken and goat cheese) pizza and Jim decided on the SPIN! sub and Minestrone soup.

The pizza came out on a stoneware plate as shown above. The crust was super thin and crisp but the pizza was cold. I wonder if the the stoneware plate cooled it off? Do they cook the pizza on the plate? Do they heat the plates before they put the pizza on them?

Before I'd taken a bite, Gail came over to see how we were doing. I noticed there wasn't any Italian sausage on my pizza and mentioned it to her. She said, "It really doesn't need sausage, it's a great pizza without it". It wasn't an excuse or apology for the lack of sausage, it was more like I was an idiot for messing with the perfect combination in the first place. That's not what I wanted to hear. I like meat on my pizza. She made no effort to correct the mistake.

I didn't know the definition of Neapolitan pizza until I went here today. After my visit to SPIN! I thought it meant thin, dry and cold, with very little topping. I really missed that Italian sausage now that I was facing a tiny bit of cold cheese and mushrooms on my pizza! Terrence's Pollo Arrosto E Chevre was better since it wasn't as dry, but the chicken, he said, was "tasteless". Jim said his sandwich was good although we thought it needed some vinegar and oil to help it along. The bread is made in-house but could use a crust. It was very fresh with a Wonder bun texture. The Minestrone reminded me of Chef Boyardee. I couldn't detect a hint of basil or oregano, it was way to safe, tasted mass produced. Jim liked it.

I could mention the antics of our over-shy, forgetful waitress but I have already made to many remarks about a truly unremarkable experience.

Tapas of New Places

I love Tapas. Unfortunately this article does not talk about any tapas. I just thought that it would be a good term to use in making a few local food observations. As I've stated earlier, I only like to create a formal review of a place after I have visited it a number of times. As I haven't sufficiently visited a number of places with future reviews in the works, I wanted to make a few food observations:

1) The Beer Kitchen in Westport is really good. The food is top notch. And they wisely abandoned their McCoy's brewed "BK Gold" house beer. Seriously, that crap tasted like cold piss. Well, piss that could eventually intoxicate you if you drank enough of it. But you get the point. On my last visit they were serving a McCoy's brewed Saison of sorts that was super yummy.

2) The Art of Pizza in Westport was not nearly as good as their Crossroad's sister. I'm not going to give them a formal review as I really hope that it was a case of me catching them on a bad day. P.S. Get your liquor license as eating pizza without beer sucks. Oh, and if you have gotten your license... why did you open a place without having one in place. I'm seriously gun-shy about going back in until I know if the place has beer yet. It's kind of bad form to walk out midway through ordering unless I want a extra topping of saliva the next time I'm there.

3) I am looking for a new "football food". You know, that speciality that you gobble why watching the Chiefs. I'm tired of the wings and the Rotel/cheese dip and the brats, etc. Help me out. I want something new.

4) I'm heading to Las Vegas this week. I'm looking forward to the gambling and the food. And I'm laying big money on Mizzou vs Kansas no matter what the spread is.

It's Veteran's Day!

Drive over to Linwood and Broadway or the Liberty Memorial today and thank a Vet! I did and it felt great!

Let's all sing along

Here are some truly horrible songs about cheese. # 3 made me want to crawl in a hole and die. I expect you to know the lyrics by next week. It'll be on the test. 1 2 3

Michael Ruhlman Had Something To Say

In this video Ruhlman talks about theories in the book Catching Fire: How Cooking Made Us Human, by Harvard Anthropologist Richard Wrangham. Very interesting stuff even if the style of shooting makes me dizzy!

Now get in the kitchen!

Food Deals Galore!

With the economy in the shitter, food deals have become all of the rage. From Muncharoo, to Living Social, to Find Specials, etc., deals are in. The premise is basic. Pay a certain amount, get a coupon (typically for double your purchase price) and eat away. I've used them on a number of occasions. Some have been great deals (Room 39... 25 bucks got me 50 bucks worth of grub), some have been not so good (I won't mention names but some of these deals require you to read the fine print as they may only be usable during obscure times).

The downside to consumers is that the gift certificates must be kept around for that special time you wish to use it. I've got a Le Fou Frog gift certificate gathering dust right now because I haven't made the time to use it yet.

There is also a downside to the restaurants as well. I spoke to one owner about the deals and he admits that they probably lose money on the deals, but they hope that it leads to new customers. The worst situation is when they see a regular customer using one of the coupons. Owners also sometimes get burned when users only tip on the final bill amount disregarding the coupon's inclusion.

My personal take is that these deals are great for the consumer, so-so for the restaurants, and ultimately will lose their appeal. Restaurants don't mind doing one of these deals a year. However, since these deals are sent out on a daily basis, you have to sift through the crap to find the good deals (Every other day features some sort of spa or hair salon... my "fro" doesn't need that shit).

Once folks have a chance to try out a few new places, all but the hard-core savers will begin to lose interest. Until then, suit up and coupon up!

Ah..... memories of green bean casserole

Check it out dude. 69, that's right, 69 pages full of pictures of our parents entertaining each other. You can almost smell the fondue and doobies while looking at these photos.

The Winter of Cheese

Some who know me are familiar with my habit of naming a season after an ingredient or dish. Throughout that season I try to use that ingredient or make that dish in many different ways. Last summer was the Summer of Lemons. I declare this to be the Winter of Cheese.

Check out this list of cheeses! Damn, that's a lot of cheese.

Are you a Turophile?

I am, and this is where I learn the terms to impress people with my turos vocabulary. It's a glossary of cheese terms. They also have a nifty Cheesecyclopedia.

Get your fail on

Since the boom of food television some folks think it is glamorous to be a chef. This is correct if you relate glamor to being over-worked, under-paid, hot, greasy and generally anonymous.

Are you looking for a school that teaches the cooking stuff? Here is a terrific website to help you on your way to failure. http://www.culinaryartscollege.org
I hear the kids out at JOCO are making some noise in the field. It's not listed yet, but I bet it will be soon. I'll let Cindy know about them. Oh.... wait... I just did.

Here is what Bourdain has to say about getting started in the field of cooking stuff for people. You know, being a cookerperson. This article is taken from his new book Medium Raw you gotta read it.

"I am frequently asked by aspiring chefs, dreamers young and old, attracted by the lure of slowly melting shallots and caramelizing pork belly, or delusions of Food Network stardom, if they should go to culinary school. I usually give a long, thoughtful, and qualified answer.
But the short answer is “no.”"  -Anthony Bourdain

I hope you are now even further inspired to prove everyone wrong. Now get over here and get your cook on! http://www.culinaryartscollege.org

Gin for the win!

You know I loves my Gin. This stuff looks awesome. Citadelle Gin.

"The unique flavor profile is the result of 19 botanicals sourced from around the world, ranging from Sri Lankan cinnamon to almonds and lemon rind from Spain, Grains of Paradise from West Africa and Moroccan coriander to licorice from China. But this heady mix is only introduced after the fourth intensive distilling process—which involves heating whole grain wheat from the Beauce region (the same used to make classic French bread) over a naked flame, and brewing with natural spring water to create the neutral spirit."