adoxograph

All through school for me it was the holy trinity - the Chocolate Eclair, the Strawberry Shortcake and the Toasted Almond bar. I, too, was heartbroken by the recipe changes. The only one that is clase to what it was in my mind is the Shortcake. Shouldn't there be a recipe somewhere on how to fake those?

Make of this what you will, I recieved it as a gift, read it, returned it, and bought something else. Something good. Caveat being I am not a fan of the "chick lit" variety of writing to begin with, and this seemed to be firmly entrenched in that genre.

It would be great to have "streets" where a part of the city known for a specific type of cuisine could put up a variety of different offerings for comparing/contrasting - for example, there could be a "Devon Ave" highlighting a variety of Indian foods. That way, the tourists would know where to go if they wanted to try more.

Deep Dish Demolition Derby! Last pizza standing gets bragging rights for the year.

In case you didn't know, traffic is being re-routed already as they set up for the Taste this weekend. I'll be in the Family Tent with Adler staff on Monday afternoon if anyone comes down to the chaos for lunch. :)

The best thing the 'rents did for my sister and I growing up was insist that we wouldn't be influenced by their preferences - we ate stuff Dad didn't like when he was out of town, and vice versa. We too were CT Yankees, but mom's food had more of a French influence and Dad's food was were we learned about hardcore chili and spicy food. And, of course, there was all that good New England Protestant Seafood. However, my neighbors were all over the ethnic map (Italian, Lebanese, Asian) and I always felt we had the boring food. Mom's spaghetti was notoriously horrific, she had no idea what a wok was, and items like artichokes and fondue seemed mundane. I still feel like I have a lot to catch up on in terms of my own taste, but now I think that's because I was exposed to so much as a kid that I can appreciate the variety now.

As much as I enjoyed your planet mnemonic, truly the one you should be using is: My Very Excellent Mother Just Served Us Nine Pizzas. At least, that's the one in all of our shows here at the Planetarium. :) I'll come up with something original in a bit.

A few questions from my ever shy, retiring self. When, if ever, is it appropriate to ask to see/speak to the chef? Is it best to simply ask waitstaff to pass along compliments? I've seen people ask to pay compliments directly and it's all I can do to not say "leave 'em alone and let them cook for crying out loud!" If one would like to photograph one's food, who and how should you ask? And then a real doosy: What's the best way to get in without a reservation?

I am so glad that you allowed yourself to be tagged, Mongo. So how much did you spend on food this week? :) Best compliment I can give is to say that I've got green mangos at home right now, and I'm making chutney tonight. Thanks.

I think Culver's is a lost in translation thing, personally. The custard is good, but not as good as other frozen custard places in Wisconsin. The food that I've had is fine, but again, not as good as elsewhere. In some places where there isn't many other options, Culver's might seem a haven, but if there is any potential local variety, you can probably do as well or better elsewhere. Some of the daily special custard flavors (they have a different "flavor" each day, made from some variety of vanilla or choclate custard and toppings mixed in) are worth it when you're craving them. I, however, checked out their nutrition flyer last time I was there (I should totally know better) and noticed that many of their sundaes have more than 1000 calories. For half my daily caloric intake, I really want something more than a couple splorks of okay frozen custard and a topping. But I'm still going to use that Culver's gift certificate Santa put in my stocking this year.

Live dangerously, live for the blog! Try #3.

So you would take your $10,000 and fly elsewhere and eat street food, sounds good to me, when are we leaving? It seems to me that one of your complaints is that ethnic food here isn't as good as street food there. Actually, we have damn good street food here, but it's hamburgers, hot dogs, pizza - American street food - and only occasionally, with the trend towards larger cities with more diverse populations, can you find good street food that would qualify as "ethnic". I wouldn't expect yakitori here to compare to yakitori in Japan because, as you have lamented in the blog so far, you just can't get all the same ingredients in both places. And, not everyone who comes to American and cooks here is the best representative of that country's cuisine, if they are even cooking the cuisine of their home country. On the other hand, how has your experience been with the quality of "American" food in your small city? In fact, when you are talking about restaurant quality are you specifically looking at "ethnic" restaurants, or restaurants in general? Not knowing many Colorado statistics, how large a minority is the Hispanic population, and how much of that minority lives in your area?

I like poaching pears in it. I don't feel like I'm wasting a wine I'd like to be drinking, and the flavor is pretty nice.

My hard of hearing mother had this great trick - she'd turn off her hearing aid. Lacking the ability to do that, if I'm busy, I'll just not pay attention except to key focus words like "fire", "death" or "Sifl & Olly are back on TV." So talk all you want, but I can't guarantee I'm listening. I do the same thing when I'm reading a book.

Ok, fine, I'll jump in with an opinion on small city cuisine. I would like to say it has something to do with ley lines, and I'm not willing to completely discount supernatural influence in certain cities - especially in California. Freaky place. However, I think what we see now is a combination of self-fulfilling mythology and practical necessity. An innovative chef who wants an audience (I'm not saying all of them do) needs to decide if one want to go where the audience is, or hope to draw the audience to wherever one is working. Practically speaking, cities like Chicago, NYC and LA not only have a built-in audience, but have already developed reputations as places where people travel to eat outside of their normal comfort zones, even if they are eating something like pizza. If our imaginary chef instead decides to establish himself in a smaller market he will have to cope with issues of ingredient availability, costs, as well as his audience just plain not getting it. Now, our chef may become a Thomas Keller (a small fraction), attracting devotees far and wide. Or possibly something of a local legend (a few more than that). Or, he may just not cut it at all (how many restaurants go under in the first year?). And so, a restaurant owner with champagne wishes and caviar dreams - or at least the goal of a successful venture - might choose to stay with the secure reputation of the city as a food destination, rather than break new ground. So, you get more big city restaurants, more innovative big city restaurants, people learn it is a big city destination for food, and the cycle continues, relegating all but the most successful in other locales to the status of local favorite or whispered legend. Break the cycle! Move to Nokomis, Illinois! Actually, I hope that with some of our modern conveniences we will change the food landscape in our small and mid-size cities. Some would argue that we have, but I don't think we're there yet. But hey, in this, I think the internet may be one of our most valuable tools. If we use sites like this one to explore where the good food is in places like Binghamton, NY, then that may be the first big step from a consumer's perspective - we're acknowledging that there can be good food outside of the big cities. Now, we all need to eat at those places. So yeah, like I said. Ley lines.

Sure, fine, everyone needs a scapegoat. Eat something, will ya? :)

Not rehearsed so much as mulled over. You tend to start considering weird questions of philosophy when you spend your time explaining to people that you aren't just looking through space, you're also looking through time. That and trying to prove to yet another person that, yes, we really landed on the moon. :) The blog may be over - and I know the next one will be interesting no matter what the blogger may think - but anyone who would like more information can PM me. And I'll try to get that cinnamon roll recipe in recipegullet this week. And maybe, just maybe, a picture of me in a brand new Bill's Toasty shirt will appear tomorrow. Heh.

Only if cocktail sauce is special. :)

Well, I can make a case for the importance of both, but consider this: all of the atoms, the elements, the most basic parts of what we are have come from stars born, died and recycled. The beauty of the universe is that we start from something that cannot be created nor destroyed, so each new thing made - star, sauce or person - has come from the bright points that pepper our sky. So really, as we discover a new dish, aren't we rediscovering an old star? Thank you all for reading, writing and letting me enjoy doing this blog. The comet passes over, and now, time for a quick stop at the Tastee Treet!

Time for one snack and one last meal, before passing the torch... Did you know there is Shrek microwave popcorn? I had to include this stuff because it is seriously green. There are times when the word "overkill" comes to mind. Sunday Dinner tonight took us to Edinburgh (pop. 1200. No, I'm not missing a zero.) To Uncle John's Family Restaurant with Sarcasmo's parents, aunt, uncle, cousin, a friend of his cousin, his sister, her boyfriend, Sarcasmo and myself. We were the biggest crowd inside the orange room, but given the number of meals we saw in take-out boxes, there was no sense of a slow night. I explained why we'd be taking pictures of the food to the waitress, and I'm not sure what she found more flattering - that I was going to talk about the food here, or that I had come from Chicago for the catfish. Probably the Chicago part. We started off with Uncle John's Cheese Balls. More battered, less breading than Bill's Toasty, and more salt than cheese flavor. It was also served with cocktail sauce for some reason. I'll take Bill's. Then came dinner. The Sunday night special is All-you-can-eat Chicken and Spaghetti, which was popular at our table... Sarcasmo had the native favorite, the Horseshoe. A Horseshoe is a meat product of some sort, usually a burger, served on white bread with the fries in the sandwich. This one is a bit weird, but if you look closely on the left you might see the bread, and a bit of bacon. Sandy, Sarcasmo's aunt and our unverified Springfield, IL food historian, claimed that the Horseshoe was invented by a bar owner in Springfield who had to feed jockeys in a hurry between races. The fries were added on the sandwich so it would take less time to eat. The only part of that I can claim truth to was that there were horse races at the Illinois State Fair each year. Oh yeah and there was the catfish... And then there was less catfish... And there were bony bits. I forgot to eat my potato. I think Sarcasmo's family likes bringing me here because this place is one of the few places they've consistently seen me just dig in to food and get messy- messier than everyone else, if napkin counts are anything. By asking early, we managed to get the last two slices of pie they had in the place saved for our table, but by the time they came out, I wasn't interested. That was a lot of catfish. And really, I think that's a great last meal for a very simple reason. This is a town where you wouldn't expect much of anything, culinarily speaking. I mean, there's 1200 people in Edinburgh! And yet, here it is, a simple, great meal, that would be appreciated anywhere by anyone - provided they appreciate the bottomfeeders that catfish are. :) Sure, you can find all sorts of great food in Chicago. It's one of the reasons I love it there. But that doesn't mean I'll stop looking anywhere else.

Behemoth - Taylorville is about 25 miles southeast of Springfield, IL - Slightly below middle of Illinois. I'll stop by there today and see if its something you can order and get shipped. I'll PM you with details. :)

TO explain what a Demolition Derby is - take a whole bunch of junk cars, remove their windows, add a roll bar. Put them in a space where they can deliberately run into each other repeatedly. Do so. Do so again. And Again, and again. Keep bashing until only one car still runs. that last car is the winner. There are apparently other rules like, you have to bash a car within a certain time limit, so you can't just drive around until everyone's done. I just don't know all those rules.

It's 1:30 in the morning. You're Hungry. You're in Taylorville, or it's surrounding environs. You have two choices. The 24 hour Super Walmart, or Bill's Toasty. And you may not actually have Bill's Toasty because even though the sign on the door says 24 hours, if one of the 5 employees (It says in the phone book they have 5 employees. Why it says that in the phone book, I don't know.) gets tired, they just might close up shop. So if you have the option, you should probably get in there. This is not the kind of place I would picture myself in during daytime hours. For me and my east coast Diner Daydreams, this is where I would be having breakfast anytime at 3 in the morning. There are a couple of two person tables, but mostly you just plonk down on a tattered stool. Three signs in front of you explain that you can't have it your way, that mean people are charged $10 and you'd better like it. The most expensive thing on the menu is the triple cheeseburger with bacon, at $7. The cheapest is toast, for 55 cents. A burger is 1.70. Cheeseburger, $2.20. Fountain drinks, shakes, and you can have it all carry out, or have a seat. If you like, get a green camo t-shirt or cap printed with "Bill's Toasty, Better Burgers, Taylorville, IL." No other color for the shirts, just green camouflage. We opted for carryout while still at home, and I admit that I regretted it when we got there. I saw the grease-stained paneling, the grilltop covered with a couple dozen burgers, the remains of someone's sandwich in front of me, the bug sitting on the counter in front of Sarcasmo. I loved it instantly. We had a bit to wait while our food was finished, the place was pretty well packed with half a dozen tickets above the grill including ours. It was about 1 am. A couple regulars were finishing doubles and triples, a couple kids waiting like we were for cheese balls and fries. One gentleman, obviously not from around these parts, drifted in for a couple shakes, called one of the two women working "young lady" when she was obviously 20 years his senior. She completely blew him off. I loved her. The only truly weird thing about the place is that I couldn't smell food at all, just cigarettes - no namby-pamby non-smoking here. They must have a hell of a ventilation system because I was maybe 15 feet from the grill. Then, before I could watch longer, our food was ready - a cheeseburger, two fries, and an order of cheese balls. $7.28. We left, but not before I decided that one of the sexiest things on the planet would have to be a woman in chef's whites with a Bill's Toasty shirt underneath. How could it not be? And the food? You have to get to it first. It's wrapped in foil, and put in a bag, which is put in a bag. This is a newer innovation, apparently. Sarcasmo regaled me with fond stories of food breaking through grease-smeared double bags of the past. I think he missed that. Our food? How could it not be great. The cheese balls will bring me back. I wondered aloud what sort of cheese they were. "Cheddarish." Works for me. Better than simply describing it as orange.The fries were hot, crispy, the oil just old enough to be perfect. The cheeseburger was was the perfect level of grease, juice meat and salt (I had a nibble. Don't tell Sarcasmo.). He took these pictures and wanted me to point out that these are 10 inch plates. T'aint no small burger, that. After eating, I slipped into a happy, greasy slumber on the couch. Beavis and Butthead reruns on satellite TV. I'd seen my first Demolition Derby. Nice day in Taylorville.

I AM THE MASTER OF TECHNOLOGY! And now, pictures... Where are we? Is not Chicago... And what did we do when we got there? We went to the Tastee Treet, of course. They have a drive-up window, around the back of the building, where 8 and a half million laminated pieces of paper display your ice cream options... But you're only there for one thing. This stuff is the absolute best lemon soft serve ice cream anywhere. It is a perfect balance of lemon flavor and creaminess - this is ice cream after all - and if you are feeling truly decadent you can have a raspberry swirl added in. Maybe I'll do that tomorrow. And what about that Demolition Derby? Just a sample here.. The car on the left won, if you can believe it. And now that I have pictures, only now can I begin to describe..... Bill's Toasty.

Yes, someone has been tagged, and I'll let it go at that. I know who it is and you don't, nyah, nyah. First, the Demolition Derby. Let me say that I have never before been to one, and afterwards sounded like I had been screaming for four hours. I hadn't been. At one point I suggested that this might well be the most damaging thing I've ever done to my lungs. With the stars of Leo and Bootes above us, my companions stated that Yes, it was the worst thing I had ever done to my lungs. We got right up to the fence, near the ditch that separated us from large, bashed up hunks o' metal. It was loud, smelly, loud, bright with the arena lights, loud, and a great deal of fun. The recent rain provided a nice layer of mud so that the announcers in the judges podium couldn't see the numbers of the people left when it got down to 8 cars. (Derbys have judges?) We missed the compact car division, but I'd rather see old wood panelled station wagons like the ones I grew up with bash each other into oblivion. The old hats I saw the derby with remarked cynically that compacts were better. Party poopers. Now, what cuisine do the have at the Derby? Is there escargot, well aged cheese, perhaps a nice Cab? Um, no. You got your BBQ (of an indeterminate type, on a roll) or your hot dog. You got your beer - MGD, thank you very much - and your soda. None of that citified salad on your hot dog either. It was a hot dog, on a roll. Plain. When we got there it was later in the event, (we waited until it was free to get in, rather than $10 a head) and they were doing the BBQ for a buck, while it lasted. Not long enough for us to get to it. Most maddening for me was the occasional wafting scent of funnel cakes, somewhere. Look for funnel cakes, watch the derby, look for funnel cakes, watch the derby? I admit it, sparking, flaming hulks of metal won out over food. See, they have these exhaust pipes coming out of the hood that belch out fire. Fire, man! How could I ignore that? This was the first derby of the season (Derbys have a season?) and apparently, like the farmers' markets the food selection gets bigger as the season progresses. I have been promised another Derby over Labor Day weekend, which happens to be my birthday. Maybe they'll have some nice caviar tastings by then. (Can you just see that? The Taylorville Demoltion Derby and Caviar Tasting. Someone has to market that.) As for today, we'll be heading over to that one place for a catfish dinner, and then I'll be saying goodbye to you all from Taylorville Illinois. But before that happens, there will be green popcorn, Bill's Toasty and hopefully, I'll figure out a way to get some of the 85 derby pictures up. :)