Left at the Fork

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Willie Mae's chicken is dipped in a wet batter before frying.

LAF in the A.M. November 4th, 2014

November 4, 2014 / / 0 Comments

A Morning Menu of Stories We Think You’ll Find Interesting

A Thorough Guide to NOLA’s Fried Chicken

Sara Roahen has compiled, for New Orleans Magazine, the most comprehensive comparative analysis of fried chicken in New Orleans that we’ve ever seen. We’ve grazed around the Crescent City many, many times, and even enjoyed some spectacularly good fried chicken. Yet somehow we never quite accepted the city as a fried yardbird mecca. Ms. Roahen said it best: ” [W]hen offered a choice in this town surrounded by water, I’ve historically chosen catfish or shrimp or oysters when in the mood for something fried. I now know that fried chicken isn’t only a safe bet, especially in our most community-oriented neighborhood restaurants, but often the best choice of all.” Continue reading

Free ice cream! This is a scoop of Build Me Up, Buttercup: a butter pecan base with Butterfingers and peanut butter cups.

Checking In at: Swal Dairy, Allentown NJ

November 3, 2014 / / 0 Comments

After a late breakfast at Woody’s, we thought we’d stroll around town until Swal Dairy opened for the day. Little did we know that this was Swal’s last day of the season. And little did we know that on the last day of the season, Swal dishes out a free scoop of their homemade ice cream to anyone who shows up! Sometimes, the stars align just right. Continue reading

Dahlonega's Smith House is an inn built on a vein of unmined gold. They are famous for the bountiful spread of country cooking served daily.

LAF in the A.M. November 3rd, 2014

November 3, 2014 / / 0 Comments

Gold and Fried Chicken

The Smith House in Dahlonega, Georgia is an inn with a history. The house was built atop a vein of gold that remained unmined because the 19th-century town fathers did not want the noise and disturbance to the town that mining would bring. Today, The Smith House is famous for the generous feasts they put out daily. You might want to give some thought to spending your Thanksgiving here, when The Smith House pulls out all the stops. Here’s what will be on this year’s Thanksgiving menu: Continue reading

A Rose's Special hoagie from Carmen's Deli in Bellmawr, NJ is a tour de force of two kinds of provolone, hot capicola, prosciutto, sopressata, roasted peppers, tomato, onion, oregano, and oil.

Carmen’s Deli, Bellmawr NJ

November 2, 2014 / / 0 Comments

REVIEW

Carmen’s Deli has achieved a measure of national fame from a visit by The Next Food Network Star winner Aaron “Big Daddy” McCargo, Jr. His sandwich of choice for The Best Thing I Ever Ate was a Carmen’s cheese steak with fried onions and cherry peppers. That combo is now listed on the menu as the Big Daddy, and we gave it a try (“we” being Bruce and the ayersian couple of Chris and Amy). It was quite alright, with plenty of meat, but it didn’t blow us away. Needed more onions and cheese, and the peppers were sparse and too timid. Better than average but not LAF-worthy. Continue reading

The Cherry Hut will be selling pies for the holiday season for the first time this year.

LAF in the A.M. November 2nd, 2014

November 2, 2014 / / 0 Comments

A Morning Menu of Stories We Think You’ll Find Interesting

The Cherry Hut’s Pies Available for the Holidays

The Cherry Hut has been known for things cherry in northern Michigan since 1922. The restaurant in Beulah has closed for the season but, as is the usual practice, they keep a storefront open in nearby Bensonia where folks can purchase jams, jellies, candies, dried cherries, and anything else that they can stick cherries into. They’ll also ship those products. Unfortunately, up until this year, they never offered their famous cherry pies for sale once the restaurant closed in October. This year, for the first time, the Bensonia store will offer The Cherry Hut’s cherry pies! Continue reading

Sugar on snow is made by boiling maple syrup to the right point, and then pouring it over snow or crushed ice.

Vermont State Fair, Rutland VT

November 1, 2014 / / 0 Comments

REVIEW

The Vermont State Fair’s origins go way back to 1846, when it was known as the Rutland State Fair. Thirteen years later the fair moved to Rutland County Park, where it’s been held ever since. It didn’t become known as the Vermont State Fair until 1972, 126 years after that first fair! The owner of the fair property deeded it to the fair under the condition that an agricultural fair be held every year on the grounds. Otherwise, the property reverts to the heirs of the original owner. But the Vermont State Fair has been in trouble lately. Continue reading

The Nor'Easter from New England's Portland Pie Co

LAF in the A.M. November 1st, 2014

November 1, 2014 / / 0 Comments

A Morning Menu of Stories We Think You’ll Find Interesting

Eat Pizza, Drink Beer, Help the Community

The Portland Pie Co., based in Portland, Maine, was founded in 1997. PPC offers four kinds of dough, including basil, wheat, garlic, and beer, and exotic combinations of toppings. They also like to be good community citizens. They work with area groups by often designating one evening, usually a Thursday, when they donate a portion of their receipts to a designated charity or community group. Usually the donation is something like a buck a pizza. Continue reading

Fried seafood at Markey's is utterly grease-free. The clams are excellent but the scallops are superlative.

Markey’s Lobster Pool, Seabrook NH

October 31, 2014 / / 0 Comments

REVIEW

In the far northeastern corner of Massachusetts, around Ipswich and Essex, you’ll find the best fried clams in America. Head about 18 miles up the coast, to Maine, and you’ll begin to find America’s finest lobsters. So doesn’t it seem reasonable that those short 18 miles between the Massachusetts and Maine coasts would be an equally rich source for great seafood? Yet, have you ever heard of anyone heading to New Hampshire for seafood? Well, that’s not quite what we did, but we did stop in Seabrook on the way to Maine, where we found worthy fried clams and lobster rolls that are well-known to locals but mostly a secret to visitors passing by on the interstate. Continue reading

Ribs smoking at Joe's Kansas City

LAF in the A.M. October 31st, 2014

October 31, 2014 / / 0 Comments

A Morning Menu of Stories We Think You’ll Find Interesting

Maybe Billy Butler Shoulda Had the Brisket

Professional baseball players, on the whole, are a pretty superstitious bunch. If they called their mother and didn’t shave the morning of a win, you can bet Mom will be receiving wake-up calls and that beard will continue to grow as long as the team keeps winning. KC Royals DH Billy Butler had lunch at Joe’s Kansas City Tuesday and the Royals that night proceeded to win game six of the World Series 10-0. Butler had a double and an RBI. So there he was at Joe’s Kansas City again Wednesday, dining on ribs, beans, and Mountain Dew. Unfortunately for Butler and Kansas City fans, Butler singled in four at bats and the Royals lost the final World Series game to the Giants, 3-2. Continue reading

Maple French Toast, garnished with caramelized bananas, bacon marmalade, and walnuts. Stunningly good!

Original General Store, Pittsfield VT

October 30, 2014 / / 0 Comments

REVIEW

What’s happening to the Vermont general store? It’s actually quite simple. They are becoming unnecessary, made obsolete by highways and easy access to the big boxes. It’s amazing that they’ve lasted as long as they have. And yet… there are large constituencies that mourn their continued disappearance. There are the old-time Vermonters who have grown up with general stores, the Vermont newcomers who came here, to some degree, precisely because this was a region that had clung to the old ways, and the tourists (fueling a large part of the local economy), who want to experience the Vermont of legend and lore. Continue reading

Prince's Hot Chicken is Nashville's original fiery chicken purveyor.

LAF in the A.M. October 30th, 2014

October 30, 2014 / / 1 Comment

A Morning Menu of Stories We Think You’ll Find Interesting

Carla Hall Giving Out Free Hot Chicken in Philly

Carla Hall is working towards opening her first Carla Hall’s Southern Kitchen in New York, and to help her with the project she’s enlisted culinary students from Drexel in Philadelphia. They’ll be testing out menu items by taking over a food truck in front of Drexel and handing out free hot chicken, macaroni and cheese, braised greens and fresh lemonade. The date is November 5th, the time is 5:30 p.m., just before a 6 p.m. Drexel basketball event. If you’re in the area head over and grab a sample! Continue reading

Would you like some jelly with your toast? Then you'll have some fun selecting your flavors from the kaleidoscopic presentation. All homemade.

Hash House, Las Vegas NV

October 29, 2014 / / 0 Comments

REVIEW

For some reason we feel compelled to make this confession whenever we are about to recommend a restaurant for its hash: we like canned hash. OK, not “we”; one of us does (we won’t say which one, but we will say that his wife finds the tightly packed, greasy, cylindrical-shaped substance with an aroma uncomfortably close to dog food to be, how to put this delicately… vile). Hopefully, you’ll take that as an indication of a real love of hash, not a real lack of taste. Because if you trust us, we can direct you to a Las Vegas breakfast jackpot called Hash House, which really is a HASH house. Continue reading

Many deli mavens name Katz's on Houston Street in New York as America's greatest deli.

LAF in the A.M. October 29th, 2014

October 29, 2014 / / 0 Comments

A Morning Menu of Stories We Think You’ll Find Interesting

The Future of Katz’s Deli

The ever-present disquieting thought in the backs of the minds of New York deli mavens, as they wait for their Katz’s Deli slicer to build their pastrami sandwich is, how long can this good thing last? The neighborhood keeps improving, real estate prices keep rising, yet here remains Katz’s, slicing cured meats since 1888. In Jordan Weissmann’s fascinating story for Slate about Katz’s, and its owner Jake Dell, we learn that there are additional financial pressures on the deli business in general. For instance, wholesale brisket prices have tripled since just 1988. Delis pretty much sell cured meat as a loss leader, making most of their profit on everything else. Continue reading

Pardon the poor photo but at least the thick-sliced bacon and quality bun is evident. Every element of a Worthy Burger is worth eating on its own.

Worthy Burger, South Royalton VT

October 28, 2014 / / 0 Comments

REVIEW

If you are predisposed to steer clear of hipster restaurants try to get past that bias in the instance of Worthy Burger. Yes, it can be insanely crowded, but the provenance-tagged, locally sourced ingredients are impeccable,  the local brews are eminently quaffable, and the prices are downright low by big-city standards, which South Royalton, Vermont most assuredly is not. It may not seem like a town as small as South Royalton can have a wrong side of the tracks, but here it is. The location may be improbable but the 20- and 30-somethings have found Worthy Burger and made it theirs. Continue reading

Who would figure you can get cheap eats at Le Parker Meridien in central Manhattan? Yet, here it is, at The Burger Joint.

LAF in the A.M. October 28th, 2014

October 28, 2014 / / 1 Comment

A Morning Menu of Stories We Think You’ll Find Interesting

Less Than $10 in NYC: 7 Finds

New York City is notorious for finding ways to separate you from your money, especially when it comes to dining out. But it is possible to find bargains, if you look hard enough, or start with a crib sheet. And that’s where this story from Wall St. Cheat Sheet comes in. They’ve found seven spots to dine well for under $10, from Chinese dumplings to falafel to tacos to the burgers at The Burger Joint in Le Parker Meridien. Check it out. Continue reading

Cheese frenchees are a favorite Eastern Nebraska snack.

Don & Millie’s, Omaha NE

October 27, 2014 / / 0 Comments

REVIEW

The cheese frenchee (on some local menus you’ll see it spelled frenchie) might be the quintessential bar food: a salty, fatty, gooey, thirst-inducing snack. Invented at a now-defunct regional chain named King’s Food Host, it shows up on the fast-food menus of a few eastern Nebraska restaurants, including Don & Millie’s, a mini-chain with about half a dozen locations between Omaha and Lincoln. Continue reading

Graeter's strawberry chocolate chip ice cream

LAF in the A.M. October 27th, 2014

October 27, 2014 / / 0 Comments

A Morning Menu of Stories We Think You’ll Find Interesting

Graeter’s Watch

The newest Graeter’s ice cream shop opened Friday in Norwood, a city surrounded by Cincinnati, in the University Station development. Continue reading

We admire any seafood chef who gets a good crust on sea scallops without overcooking them.

Tozier’s, Bethel VT

October 26, 2014 / / 0 Comments

REVIEW

Do you love side-of-the-road eateries from the early days of motor touring? They are really quite scarce now, most having been razed for chain restaurants, shopping malls, and housing developments. That’s why we were especially delighted to find Tozier’s, very much as we imagine it must have looked in 1946 when Rip and Gwen Tozier purchased Rood’s Ice Cream Stand and cabin court. It was the Toziers who initiated the tradition of seafood at this restaurant in a New England state without a coastline. Today’s Tozier’s (motto: Tastes of the Ocean) still serves the fresh Ipswich clams and scallops, clam chowder, and lobster rolls that the 1940s Tozier’s was famous for. Continue reading

The Grand Central Oyster Bar in New York City has a constantly changing, but enormous, inventory of oysters.

LAF in the A.M. October 26th, 2014

October 26, 2014 / / 0 Comments

A Morning Menu of Stories We Think You’ll Find Interesting

Oysters and Beer in Brooklyn

There are now three franchises of New York City’s venerable Grand Central Oyster Bar: in Newark Airport, in Tokyo, and, since December of last year, in Brooklyn. Currently, the Brooklyn location is running a special fall beer and oyster pairing menu. Four oysters with four five-ounce beers sounds like a great idea and, at $14.95, a great deal too. Read about Kate Kolenda’s experience with the pairings at The Daily Meal. Continue reading

Bissinger's chocolate covered fresh blackberries are one of the world's great candies.

Bissinger’s, Saint Louis MO

October 25, 2014 / / 0 Comments

REVIEW

The original Bissinger’s store in St. Louis, a dark wood-lined jewelry store of a chocolate shop, is no more. There are other, more modern branches in the St. Louis area, but it’s not for the St. Louis bricks-and-mortar chocolate shops that we sing our highest praises. Continue reading

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