Philadelphia's choicest mystery meat-cheesesteaks can, of course, be found at Center City food carts and at food trucks throughout the Delaware Valley. But what do other cities do when they look for cheesesteaks of cheap price and dubious origins?

Well, until recently, New York had the $4.99 steak truck. Originally discovered by the strangely engrossing Midtown Lunch, it served foot-long cheesesteaks for $4.99, while another nearby cart sold $4 cheesesteaks that come in either hoagie rolls (err, hero rolls) or (!) pita bread.

However, just a week after they blogged about them, the cheesesteak truck raised their price to $5.95. Scary, eh?

On another note, we really hope some enterprising food vendor will start selling NYC-style chicken & rice. Sweet Jesus that stuff is good.

Philly Cheesesteak Street Truck Cart Lunch [Midtown Lunch]

[Image via Midtown Lunch]

Philly celeb chef Jose Garces of Tinto and Amada was the subject of a recent profile in the Chicago Sun-Times.

The reason for the profile is the recent opening of his Chicago restaurant Mercat a la Planxa. Garces was mentioned along with fellow chefs Marcus Samuelsson, Laurent Gras and Terrance Brennan — all of whom have opened new Chicago restaurants in 2008.

But what about our hometown chef? Here's what the Sun-Times had to say:

Garces graduated from Chicago's Kendall College with a degree in culinary arts, but built his hefty resume in New York and Philadelphia at award-winning restaurants.

"I've been wanting to get home for 13 years," Garces says. "Chicago's come to the forefront as a very modern culinary town. Along with Grant [Achatz of Alinea] and others who work here in town, that's transformed [this] from a meat-and-potatoes town to a culinary mecca."

At his two spots in Philadelphia, Tinto and Amada, Garces took bold approaches to Spanish cuisine. He's taking it farther at the 162-seat Mercat a la Planxa, with grilled-to-order meats and seafood at center stage.

For research, Garces and his team made a pilgrimage to Barcelona, Spain, to sample food inside the city's famed Mercat de la Boqueria and local tapas joints.

Sounds good to us.

Their kind of town [CST]

Continuing our damn extensive James Beard Award coverage, we've got good news for one Mr. Stephen Starr.

The restaurateur is a front-runner in the Outstanding Restaurant Design category:

Perhaps no movement in dining design is more evident to the average New York diner than the rise of the mega-restaurant, epitomized by the gargantuan spaces found on Tenth Avenue, including restaurateur Stephen Starr's Morimoto — named for chef Masaharu Morimoto.

Glass walls that begin upstairs in Morimoto appear to continue on the basement level. Bathroom stalls are equipped with mirrors tricked out to show infinite reflections of suspended flowers. An undulating canvas ceiling in the dining room is meant to evoke the rakings in a Japanese Zen sandbox. Even Morimoto's designer Tadao Ando — a vaunted Japanese architect — is a big deal.

Morimoto also signifies restaurant design's current willingness to play with light and technology. The space's most famous aspect is arguably a room-dividing wall of 15,000 clear plastic Ty Nant water bottles, backlit in shades of pale blue and green by hundreds of LED lights.

Cheers, Stephen.

New York's James Beard Design Nominees [New York Sun]

Hilarious. You know, there can be a lot of fun in translation. Just ask the folks at Engrish. But rarely do you get a gem of this caliber. Ass-hot chicken? You know it! A plate of ass steak? Nothin' butt! (sorry-that was cheeky) Too bad there's no Ass hot dog up there. Ah, the golden age of film...

Anyway, here's why this exists: It's a menu for a burger stand in Quebec, where they speak Franglais. "Ass" stands for "assiette," which basically means "assortment plate," according to Neatorama. But dude, by this time they have to know how funny it is. You got to hand it to them for the sheer commitment. "Ass 2 pain?" We bet.

And what's with the soft-porn lamp hanging down there on the right? That thing deserves a menu board all its own.

Ass Burger! [Neatorama]
Title Credit: Adam P

• MP: Boston eats cute, delicious rabbits.

• MP: Chicago found a damn fine looking pizza.

• MP: San Francisco found the impossible... a good Cubano in SF.

• MP: South Florida has plenty of awesome Cubanos on her turf... and blackened shrimp BLTs.

Let's talk about Stephen Starr's new Atlantic City hotel. The Chelsea is scheduled to open this summer with two Stephen Starr restaurants, a 7500 square-foot spa and a 15,000 square-foot pool. Locationwise, it's across the street from both the Tropicana and Caesars. But what really interests us is the Paul Sevigny connection.

In New York, Paul (aka Chloe Sevigny's brother) runs popular celeb hangout the Beatrice Inn. But this morning, we woke up to find — in our inbox — news that Sevigny and partner Matt Ambramcyk have teamed up with Starr to oversee the hotel's nightlife. Here's the good word according to developer Curtis Bashaw:

“It will be SoHo House-y [...] All on the fifth floor, you’ll have a library, a game room, an oval-shaped bar and a Stephen Starr restaurant, which connect like a big house and spill out onto an enormous pool deck.”

In other words, they're going straight for the heart of the SoHo House/Beatrice Inn demographic. It's an ungainly mix of minor European nobility, new media titans, indie rock royalty and assorted Olsen twins hangers-on. New York nightlife blog Down by the Hipster seems kind of doubtful about it, but our local friends at The Illadelph are a bit more positive.

The question remains: Can Atlantic City attract the kind of crowd that would rather spend their time cajoling free drinks/scenestering around Nolita or Echo Park lounges than gamble at the Taj Mahal? We'll see.

The Chelsea [Official Site]
SoHo Meets HoJo in Atlantic City [NY Times]

• MP: Boston is on the trail of raw food ravioli.

• MP: Chicago is on the trail of old-school Chicago cuisine.

• MP: San Francisco is on the trail of the taco truck killer.

• MP: South Florida is on the trail of wonderful, wonderful vino.

• MP: Boston is fixated on Bostonian scallops.

• MP: Chicago has found the best sausage sandwich ever.

• MP: San Francisco is fighting the liquor bans.

• MP: South Florida knows that it's time for spring training.

Chef, author and unofficial MP icon Anthony Bourdain just gave an interview to Fodor's where he revealed his favorite New York spots. As a matter of fact, he recommends legendary sushi restaurant Masa as a first date litmus test:

I'll go where the food is. I think the Time Warner Center is the ugliest building in the universe, but I'd walk through hell to eat at Per Se or Masa. I just signed a contract for a nice advance for a book, and I'm looking to totally reward myself and do something really outrageously expensive and self indulgent. A woman might go out for an Hermès bag, I go to Masa. That's also a really good first date place. Take someone to Masa and if they don't eat absolutely everything, there's no possibility of a relationship.

Top Chef Travels - Anthony Bourdain [Fodor's]

• MP: Boston has discovered the joys of Coolio's cooking show. Shaka Zulu!

• MP: Chicago celebrated Valentine's Day in a culinary manner.

• MP: San Francisco is watching food bloggers on PBS.

• MP: South Florida is weighing Morton's upcoming Florida invasion.

As part of an effort by the Israeli government to reduce the number of foreigners working in Israel, their Ministry of Industry is planning to ban Chinese, Japanese and Thai restaurants from employing Asian cooks. It's... evil. It's... inhumane. Do these people seriously expect to stop Jews from enjoying edible Chinese food? Israeli newspaper Ha'aretz interviewed an Israeli bureaucrat:

"Everyone can make Chinese food it's not impossible to learn," said Shoshana Strauss, a lawyer working on foreign worker issues for the Ministry of Industry, Trade and Labor.

Err... Has Strauss ever had Chinese food cooked by a white person? It's not very good. At all. We're not going to name any national chains or local restaurants, but there's something to be said for cultural traditions in food.

Lobbying group the Israeli Ethnic Restaurant Association is taking the case to the Israeli Supreme Court.

In the meantime, Israel's Asian restaurants went on a one-day egg roll and spring roll strike on Tuesday to protest the plan.

As is, a Chinese diplomat publicly complained about Israeli Chinese food back in 2005.

Asian eateries cut menu over plans to rid kitchens of foreign chefs [Ha'aretz]

[Image via Delaranja]

Television chef Jamie Oliver just found out the apartment where he filmed his first cooking show is up for sale. Apparently, in the UK, cooking shows are actually filmed in people's apartments. Cool, eh? Here's the good word from Oliver as reprinted in The Independent:

It's been revamped and extended. There's a waterproof screen in the spa bathroom, fibre-optic mood lighting and a gym – and it's only five minutes from my restaurant Fifteen. Lovely jubbly! I rang the old estate agent to see what they had to say. Spoke to the lovely Zoe. Turns out they want two million quid for it! And it's only got two bedrooms. She told me the current owners thought my urban kitchen was a bit poxy, so they did it up. Reckon they might even get more than two mill for it, thanks to the fact that I used to live there. Should be one of those blue plaques on the wall, if you ask me.

Yes, for around $4 million, Jamie Oliver's Shoreditch apartment can be yours.

For sale: A snoop around the flat where Jamie Oliver made his name [The Independent]

When we think of junk food vacations, Wisconsin isn't the first place that comes to mind. Central Pennsylvania, that chocolate/pretzel making place? Definitely.

Though in all honesty we'd rather be hanging out in a beach in the Caribbean or Hawaii... But that's besides the point.

In any case, the New York Times just ran a travel piece on Wisconsin's "Candy Delta." Sample graf?

The dueling pistol in this skirmish is the meltaway. A meltaway starts where a 3 Musketeers bar ends: more chocolate on the outside, more chocolate on the inside, denser in the hand, yet lighter in texture. Hughes’s meltaways are the size of a large Lego block; the Oaks version is the Melty-Bar.

With its Art-Deco wrapper and hotel-soap shape, the Melty-Bar is true to its slogan, “The Aristocrat of Candy Bars.” And a version with a healthy dose of malt turns the Melty-Bar into a Malty-Melty.

A Tour of Candyland in Wisconsin, Timeless and Sweet [NY Times]

[Image via NY Times]

Ex-New York Daily Newser Lloyd Grove just interviewed legendary restaurateur Sirio Maccioni — the man behind the infamous celebrity favorite Le Cirque. The full interview is well worth a read... and Grove's a lucky man. When he interviewed Maccioni at Cirque, his meal consisted of foie gras ravioli, langoustine and venison fallow with creme brulee and chocolate souffle for dessert. Running a fancy restaurant? It ain't easy:

Here you need to do a minimum of $12 million a year. Otherwise we are broke. And there is no restaurant in Europe like that.... Yesterday we had a little Italian-style bolito. The bolito is what the farmers used to do. You have the sausage. You sauté. You have a little bit of oil, garlic, and tomato. And it was a thing that my grandmother used to do.

The right dish. This bolito, it's very different the texture, and I hear two or three persons say, "This is good." Eventually, when I'm ready, I'll put it on the menu. But how can you do that with somebody by the name of whatever you said his name is [Frank Bruni]? They have a complex of inferiority! Because they're afraid that you want to buy them! I still work six, seven days a week, 14-hour days. I don't want to buy anybody!

An Interview With Sirio Maccioni [Portfolio]

Crap. The owner of a Seattle cheesesteak shop was killed in a gang-related incident. Rey Davis Bell is charged with one count of murder in the death of Philadelphia's Best Cheesesteak owner Degene Barecha. Here's the official word from Seattle alt-weekly The Stranger:

According to Sergeant Deanna Nollette, the shooting at Philly Cheesesteak may be connected to a domestic violence incident which took place in West Seattle a few hours ago.

Just before 11am, SPD responded to a domestic violence call on the 5900 block of Delridge Ave SW. A bullet had been fired through a window at the house, but no one was shot.

SPD believes the man involved in the domestic violence incident is the same suspect in the Philly Cheese Steak shooting.

Police say the suspect is believed to be heavily armed and are concerned there could “additional incidents.”

Prosecutors File Charges In 23rd and Union Shooting [The Stranger]

With today being Super Tuesday, we thought we'd take a look at how the political reporters are eating. A few months ago, in Iowa, the press corps got to enjoy the goods at Davenport's Duck City Bistro. When it came time to work in Florida, there's Cuban food in Miami... However, for our money, we thought the menu at College Station, TX's C&J BBQ was the most impressive. Just check this stuff out:

Now, I typically fall on the side of those who think that barbecue comes exclusively from animals that oink.

But I also am not stubborn enough to, when in College Station, not do as the Aggies do.

So a two-meat platter with beef brisket and jalapeño cheese sausage it was.

Within the first bite of each, I began to wonder whether these Texans were onto something. Still, I didn’t go full Lone Star — I took advantage of the sauce on the table but ignored the fixin’s bar. It’s one thing to eat beef at a barbecue joint, but it’s a whole ’nother step to put pickles, onions and jalapeños on your meat.

Barbecue banquets and deli dallying [The Politico]

• MP: Boston is tracking the Super Bowl... Food style!

• MP: Chicago reports on the Chicago incarnation of Finn McCool's.

• MP: San Francisco is doing some exhaustive salmon reporting.

• MP: South Florida reports on some very cool bathroom doors at a FL restaurant.

Courtesy of Serious Eats, we just came across this 1980s vintage commercial for an Idaho steakhouse. Just watch it. You can thank us later.

Prime Cut Meat Market Commercial [Serious Eats]

Where would the real life versions of Michael Scott and Pam Beasley go to get coffee? We like to think that they would go to Scranton's Northern Lights Espresso Bar. As part of our mission to occasionally document the outer fringes of the Philly metroplex, we thought we'd note that not only do they serve beans from the legendary upstate NY/Brooklyn brewer Gimme! Coffee, but that the all-around experience seems... pretty primo:

Walking in, it's a two-floor space with a wonderful furniture arrangement and beautiful art hanging on the wall. The line is usually healthy and the place almost always hopping.

The coffee is Gimme! out of Ithaca, which was a welcome surprise. The coffee brewed was about up to par with Gimme! straight from the native spout (i.e. little blundering in the brewing at Northern Lights) and they seemed to serve the better coffees (Gimme! has a few dark roasts that make me cry). The espresso was pretty good, as it was pulled decently but for some reason, it just didn't wow me. The tea I think is free leafed.

Northern Lights Espresso Bar [Pure Coffee]

[Image via Pure Coffee]

• MP: Boston is making the culinary establishments of NYC and Boston rumble in the Food Super Bowl.

• MP: Chicago charts the goings on at a Balkan restaurant.

• MP: San Francisco is celebrating Burns Night with some haggis.

• MP: South Florida is going on a stone crab picnic.

A Chinese restaurant just opened in Baghdad. That Baghdad.

The "Chinese Restaurant," located in the upscale (though war-torn) neighrbohood of Karrada, is operated by Chinese emigrants Yan, Tsao, Lo and Wo. Tsao, a native of Yunnan province, has been in Iraq for two years. Yan is his wife and Lo and Wo are friends whom he persuaded to move to Iraq with him.

As for the food, menu items are limited due to the difficulty of obtaining supplies in the middle of a warzone. Guests can choose from dumplings, fried chicken, Chinese breads and sweet pepper and chicken salad. But ultimately, it's not that much different from here in the States:

"This is the only Chinese restaurant in Baghdad," boasts Tsao in the few Arabic words he knows.

The furnishings are simple -- plastic tables and chairs, with small Chinese red paper lanterns hanging from the ceiling. Two posters on the pink walls show film stars Jackie Chan and Bruce Lee in fighting poses.

The cooking is done on a small raised platform in front of customers, who can either eat in or order a takeaway.

Wo, a black woollen hat on his head, prepares dumplings and spinach on a gas cooker. The impressive chef expertly dips a fritter in a pan of sizzling oil.

The dishes of the day are displayed along a plastic rack on cheap crockery. On the menu: "Dumplings, fried chicken legs, Chinese breads, and sweet pepper and chicken salad," recites Tsao.

Under the rack, two bowls of salad are arranged beside a pile of dried sardines. On a stool is the inevitable rice pressure-cooker.

Cooking pots are piled up in the corners between mounds of plates, cleaning cloths and boxes of paper napkins.

Wearing sneakers with built-up heels, Yan washes the dishes in an imposing art deco washbasin that stands out amid the scruffy decor.

The wife of the patron has the hardened hands of a country woman, and she scours the pots and pans with vigour.

"The menu is limited for the moment but it will improve," says Tsao reassuringly. "Like security in Baghdad, it will get better."

The last Chinese restaurant in Baghdad closed two years ago due to violence.

Baghdad gets taste for Chinese Takeaway [Middle East Online]

[Image via Middle East Online]

• MP: Boston is in passionate love with the Google cafeteria.

• MP: Chicago is in worried observer mode about Mike Huckabee's culinary love for squirrels.

• MP: San Francisco is freaked out by supermarket Starbucks.

• MP: South Florida is up in arms about Burger King's difficulties in Florida.

Since Atlantic City falls within the area of our blog coverage, we thought that a recent article about AC's struggle to draw celebrity chefs would be of interest. Numerous local boosters and buisnessfolks are trying to create a more Las Vegas-like restaurrant scene centered around the Borgata. The Borgata already has restaurants operated by Bobby Flay, Wolfgang Puck and Michael Mina. Here's the word from the AP:

If Atlantic City wants to elevate its dining choices, it must continue bringing better restaurants as Las Vegas did, said Bobby Flay, a popular Food Network celebrity chef with restaurants in New York, Las Vegas and since last year, Atlantic City.

"I think that there's definitely a trend in better food," he said. "What's really interesting is that Vegas has taken a lot of their gambling dollars and shifted to them to entertainment and dining."

Atlantic City's gamble: Can it draw top chefs for eateries? [Newsday/AP]

• MP: Boston also likes Patton Oswalt.

• MP: Chicago is involved in an imbroglio over the ethics of restaurant reviews.

• MP: San Francisco realizes that noone gets angry at bad service like a restaurant employee does.

• MP: South Florida is the legalization of jamon iberico.

Forget about the Wing Bowl. For the vegans, the real buffalo wing eating competition is around 105 miles away in Williamsburg, Brooklyn.

That's because W-burg veggie fast food joint Foodswings is sponsoring a "Vegan Buffalo Wing Eating Contest" on Wednesday, January 16. To quote the Brooklyn Paper, who just wrote the event up:

In an event that can only be called revolutionary, once timid, tree-hugging, animal-loving vegans are being invited to take off their gloves (organic cotton, of course) and get up to their elbows in spicy wings just like those thug-like omnivores. Foodswings, a vegan fast-food joint in Williamsburg, will be starting a fun, cruelty-free tradition when they hold the first ever “Vegan Buffalo Wing Eating Contest” on Wednesday, Jan. 16. Contestants, herbivore and omnivore alike, have registered to battle for prizes including cash, T-shirts, tattoo gift cards and of course, ultimate bragging rights in the soy flesh eating community. Bikers, hipsters, musicians and artists are just some of the people stretching their stomachs for the big day.

The event is sponsored by Frank's Red Hot Sauce.

No buffalos were harmed [Brooklyn Paper]
Foodswings [MenuPages]
Foodswings [Official Site]

[Image via Brooklyn Paper]

• MP: Boston is celebrating the return of The Wire with crab cakes, as well they should be.

• MP: Chicago discovered a mighty fine looking tempura red bean ice cream.

• MP: San Francisco is all about the crap-poor san Francisco weather. 80mph wind gusts. Awesome!

• MP: South Florida is celebrating the intersection of shady Russian oligarchs and Miami restaurants.

Singapore's Clinic is a medical-themed restaurant and bar (pictured). It's designed in a complete medical theme, with an interior that features wheelchairs, hospital beds, operating lights and test tubes. The restaurant was created as a tribute to Damien Hirst and the menu offers cocktails like "Nitro-Sangria" and "Sex on a Drip." It's like someone crossed University City's Pod with the Penn Hospital. So wrong yet so right.

Clinic [Official Site]

Now that the Iowa caucus is over, the candidates are moving on to New Hampshire. For the owners of one Greek diner in the city of Manchester, NH, it means that things will be very busy. You see, the Merrimack restaurant is where candidates go for their on-air cameos:

Bill Richardson will be the first one to show up for his cameo, at 9 a.m. The main draw of the day, Hillary Clinton, reserved the lunch hour for her visit to the Merrimack Restaurant, where fish and chips is the Friday special. As always. Connie Farr and Maria Saitas have owned this place with the brick-red banquettes and Formica counters for 27 years and have been a quadrennial part of the presidential process all along. "Fox will be in the back room," Maria informs her sister, as anxious network advance people listen in. "Charlie Gibson has got the front, and it will be fine without anyone bumping into each other," she says.

For the record, Gary Hart started the tradition of dining at the Merrimack in 1984 when he set up his headquarters above the restaurant. Connie and maria's favorite eater among all the politicians? Bill Clinton. He stopped by two months ago, said he was on a diet and ordered the chicken fingers and onion rings.

In Manchester, N.H., a Diner Serves the Candidates Over Easy [Washington Post]

[Image via WaPo]

An interesting Associated Press article concerning French foodways made its way into the Daily News. Philippe Gauvreau, chef of Lyon's Michelin-starred La Rotonde restaurant, hosts monthly food nights for children. Each month, his children join 30 other kids to watch chefs prepare a traditional meal and, of course, eat it. This being France, the lessons tend towards things American children would never be allowed to try:

During the lesson, chickens that were to be ground into sausage lay - intact - on the stainless steel counters, their unplucked necks bent at an alarming angle. The younger children blinked in disbelief as Gauvreau deftly relieved a chicken of its appendages: Off came the claws, the wings and finally, with a flourish of the glinting knife, the white feathered head. Brandishing severed drumsticks, he explained how to distinguish healthy chickens from hormone-filled factory farm varieties. If the meat sticks to the bone, it's a free-range bird that built muscle through exercise, not hormones, he said. He passed around a leg and the kids pushed and pulled. The meat resisted their prodding. For Gauvreau, such awareness is more important than teaching techniques for chopping onions or whisking cream. "We're giving the kids the tools they need to make decisions about what to put onto their bodies," he said. Gauvreau doesn't dumb down his repertoire for his young students, and there are no simplified, kiddie variations on his recipes: He and his assistant chefs teach the children to prepare the dishes just as they would for the restaurant's clients. And it can get complicated. Boudin blanc sausage requires dozens of steps, and one misstep can turn a dessert's caramelized bananas into a sweet goo. Perhaps it's for the best, then, that lessons are taught in the old-school French style: The instructor demonstrates and pupils look on. Gauvreau delegated certain tasks - separating egg whites, grinding bread into crumbs, slicing chicken breasts into food-processor-friendly chunks - but the show remained decidedly his.

Ultimately, France deals with bad food just like America does. Homegrown fast food chains are everywhere, and, alas, they love mediocre white bread just as much as we do. The children attending Gauvreau's classes also have parents who can pay the steep tuition and come from a mostly middle-class background. That means they're among the ones who are least likely to survive on a diet of cheeseburgers and greasy kebabs. But still.

Not so fast [Daily News]

[Image via AP/DN]

Aw. New Yorkers might finally get a Reading Terminal Market of their very own. A couple of grassroots organizations have started to lobby for a year-round indoor food market in Manhattan. First, the unused Battery Maritime Building in downtown was going to be converted... but they've decided to convert the space there to a space for food-related trade shows. Apparently, the Jacob Javits Center was too downscale. Go figure. But they're trying:

The place, whether at the historic old fish market, the new Penn Station or somewhere else, would be warm in the winter and cool in the summer, with a stand where you could buy a good sandwich or an espresso and gossip with other people who like to talk about cooking.

“New York really just doesn’t have that one place,” said Micah Arbisser, who, with his wife, Lisa, had bundled up their infant and made their way from the Lower East Side to the little market.

Like many New Yorkers who piece together a cook’s pantry from Chinatown shops, farmers’ markets, FreshDirect, Fairway and other stores, the Arbissers have market envy. It may be easy to boast that New York is the greatest food city in the world, but one trip through San Francisco’s Ferry Building and farmers’ market, London’s Borough Hall or Seattle’s Pike Place Market can be deflating.

Of course, Philly gets a condescending nod as well, when the paper of record writes that "at the moment, nobody has proposed a big indoor market to rival the ones in San Francisco or even Philadelphia." "Even Philadelphia"? Yeah, NYC parochialism is awesome.

Hungry for a Market, but Where? [New York Times]

We might share a name with him, but writer Neal Pollack gets on our nerves sometimes. The guy is just so damn... we don't know... Precious? Yeah, precious.

But, however, his essay about a Nashville fried chicken restaurant is right. damn. on.

According to Roadfood, Prince's Hot Chicken Shack offers birds that are "relatively dry and ferociously seasoned down to the bone; and their crust, which strips off in luxurious patches that are equal measures crunch and chew, is radiant with red-orange spice. It's salty but not throat-parching; and the miracle of it is that the flavor of plush chicken imbued with plenty of natural schmaltz (chicken fat) bursts right through the heat."

Sounds good to us.

Hot for Chicken [Epicurious]
Prince's Hot Chicken Shack [Roadfood]

A restaurant so good that you'll have to wait eight months for a table? That's Talula's Table, a grocery/cafe in Kennett Square opearted by ex-Djangoers Bryan Sikora and Aimee Oxley.

Here's the deal: There's only one table inside the grocery store, they only seat full parties of eight to 12 people and the $85 prix-fie eight-course meal, according to one patron, is full of "innovative, imaginative cuisine that not even Per Se and Michael Mina are doing."

That's good. And Food and Drinq reports that the earliest available reservations are for August.

Reservation list shown above, courtesy of Food & Drinq.

The hottest "res" around [Food & Drinq]

Can a restaurant kill? Can a lawsuit be frivolous? There's some craziness going on in New York.

Way back in 2006, a 28-year-old hedge fund manager named Sunil Varghese was dining at Del Frisco's Double Eagle Steak House. He started choking on a piece of steak and staggered to the restaurant's bathroom. Several minutes later, a colleague found him dead on the restroom floor.

Now Varghese's father is suing the restaurant for negligence... More than a year after his son died.

Go figure.

Steakhouse Sued In Fatal Choke [New York Post]

• MP: Boston is going retro.

• MP: Chicago has the longest foodblog post in the history of foodblogs.

• MP: San Francisco is offering post-holiday hangover tips.

• MP: South Florida loves pork belly. Mmm... pork belly.

They do things differently in Chicago. That's why we're eternally grateful to the MenuPages Chicago Blog for pointing us over to the glory of pot roast nachos at Mike Ditka's Restaurant: Tortilla chips topped with pot roast, sour cream, jalapenos, tomatoes, scallions and cheddar-jack cheese. Among the other artery-clogging meals at the restaurant... A sandwich of chicken-fried sirloin steak topped with cheese and a 24 ounce steak.

Makes us want to watch that old "Da Bears" sketch from Saturday Night Live...

Mike Ditka's Restaurant [MenuPages]
Mike Ditka's Restaurant [Official Site]

[Photo: Chicago Kate/flickr]

Hooters has numerous locations in the Philadelphia area. But the chain doesen't restrict their charms to the United States: Hooters just opened their first Israeli location.

How are the locals reacting to the combination of cute girls and wings? Well, Israeli newspaper Haaretz just sent their food critic over to Hooters:

After all, we have all sorts of things from the U.S. - Nile fever, McDonalds, and even a few poisonous snakes - so why not Hooters? The odd thing about all of this, even to the must curmudgeonly critic, is that none of this seems the least bit vulgar. As you talk to the waitresses a bit, you realize they seem to be nice post-army college and university students; that their costumes, as skimpy as they may be are more "cute" than "sexy"; and most of those dining here, ranging in age from 4 to well into their golden years, seem to be having a genuinely good time, taking it all comfortably in stride as if attending a show put on for their entertainment. Children are given balloons and toys with which to play and adults are treated with warm friendliness. The food is probably best described as traditional American fast food. Thankfully, as I discovered, it is far from junk food. We opened our meal with four dishes that arrived at the table at the same time. A Tex-Mex style quesadilla: a tortilla folded over melted cheese proved soft and full of flavor and the tomato salsa served with it was well made; the fried onion rings were tasty as well; and the cheese sticks we tried, of puff-pastry dough rolled about a soft, meted cheese were great fun to eat.

Thus, the Israelis discovered mozzarella sticks and they were good.

American, from the deep frying to the friendly service [Haaretz]

Soon South Floridians will get to enjoy those Morimoto truffles too...

If the New York Post's Page Six gossip column is to be trusted, chef Masaharu Morimoto is opening a Miami restaurant. According to the Post, he was recently spotted in Miami at restaurants Brosia and Domo Japones. Hell, the Post even has a quote (with 99.99999% possibility coming straight out of the Morimoto/Stephen Starr camp) to the effect of "he is very excited about a Miami restaurant." See — wage tax and government shenanigans to the contrary — good things do occasionally come out of Philly.

Iron in Miami [New York Post]

• MP: Boston has found the world's best gingerbread house.

• MP: Chicago is playing the ham-or-fish game.

• MP: San Francisco explores how one San Francisco journalist accidently sicced the liquor authority on an area restaurant. Damn!

• MP: South Florida celebrates the Guatemalan chicken invasion of Florida restaurants.

In honor of the end of Hanukkah, we thought we'd point out the artery-killing awesomeness of this sandwich. It's a brisket-on-potato latke (potato pancake for the non-Jews in the crowd) extravangza sold at Junior's in New York.

But we found a Philadelphia incarnation. Kibitz in the City sells a $14 pastrami and corned beef-on-latke sandwich. Someone try it out for us, alright?

Junior's Latke Sandwich [Serious Eats]

• MP: Boston found some damn fine pizza.

• MP: Chicago found us some reality show gossip.

• MP: San Francisco found us some Oakland soul food.

• MP: South Florida found us some.... stir fried wikipedia.

Central Pennsylvania is a strange, disturbing place. Despite Penn State's presence, the place is still unbelievably rural in a lot of ways.

Which is why it didn't surprise us one bit that the Associated Press just wrote about Penn State's deer carcass dressing class. The $99 adult learning course lasts a day and contains some, y'know, nontraditional instruction:

Venison 101 class isn't for the faint of heart.

For $99, a deer hunter, a cook, or the just plain curious can spend a day at Penn State's meat laboratory to learn the ins and outs of what to do with a prized carcass.

After an awkward moment of bashful looks and silence, Wolfgang's volunteers kneel down and go to work.

"It was great!" says Janet Huber, a sheep and cattle farmer from Bedford, Pa. "You really learn a lot in this class."

The daylong session covers everything from dressing and skinning a deer to slicing and dicing the carcass for steaks and sausage.

We always thought this was the kind of thing you learn from family or friends, but eh... what do we know?

At Penn State, a meaty topic for students [Inquirer]

[Image courtesy AP]

• MP: Boston had its heart stolen by stollen. Quit stallin'.

• MP: Chicago delved into the chain resto world to discover that Red Lobster has a blog.

• MP: San Francisco is (rightfully) upset that the SF City Council is considering banning late night pizza sales.

• MP: South Florida is all about sliders.

MenuPages HQ is in New York and we're sorry to report that it's just not much of a cheesesteak town. There's a local chain called Cheesesteak Factory (copyright infringement, anyone?) who's sorta ok, the hit-or-miss Carl's Steaks and the revisionist BB Sandwich Bar, who serve their sandwiches on kaiser rolls (horror!) with red pepper relish (double horror!!)

But then there's 99 Miles to Philly, who just got the Roadfood treatment:

99 miles to philly makes the best cheesesteak in New York (it's 99 miles to Philly from their front door). They have a pretty small menu; they know what they are, what they do well, and they stick to it. I'm a purist; I get mine "wit-whiz" (or is it whiz-wit? I can never remember). That means it comes with onions and Cheese Whiz. The steak comes finely chopped with a nice amount of grease, onions that are cooked down on the flattop 'til soft, and a nice thick vein of Whiz in the bottom of the roll. With cheesesteaks, bread is key and these rolls hold up nicely (they use Amoroso's bread, which is what is used in many cheesesteak shops in Philly). They also offer chicken steaks, vegetable "steak" sandwiches and Italian sausage sandwiches, but the classic cheesesteak is what you want here.

A good cheesesteak in NY? Why the hell not.

99 Miles to Philly [MenuPages]
99 Miles to Philly [Official Site]
99 Miles to Philly [Roadfood]

• Over at MP: Boston, we learned some damn good Thanksgiving cooking tips.

• Remember to stop by MP: Chicago for MP: Chicago's greatest hits.

• MP: San Francisco has the scoop on an (allegedly) criminally inclined restaurant owner.

• MP: South Florida is lets us know that Miami's restaurants are eagerly planning how to handle the crowds when Castro dies. As they should be.

• MP: Boston warns that Gordon Ramsay is loose on the streets of Boston.

• MP: Chicago found fulfillment with a good taco al pastor.

• MP: San Francisco reports on the great Dungeness shortage of '08.

• MP: South Florida warns that the only thing scarier than Gordan Ramsay that could come to your city is... Canadians.