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Times may be tough, but there's still lots of be thankful for, especially if your Thanksgiving spread looks something like the photo on the right. That's not the case for a lot of people, as we noted in a post earlier today about increased demand at food banks.

If you'd like to help, check out the Daily Bread Food Bank, which has warehouses in Miami-Dade, Broward, and Palm Beach counties. There might still be some time to make sure that everyone gets a good Thanksgiving meal (and if not, we're sure your donation will go toward an also-very-important post-Thanksgiving meal).

Have a great Thanksgiving everyone! We'll see you back here on Monday.

Daily Bread Food Bank [Official Site]

Photo: turtlepatrol/flickr

• Looks like there's lots of Florida-grown stuff at Josh's Organic Market on Hollywood Beach. [Chadzilla]

• Still haven't made Thanksgiving dinner reservations? Check here for ideas. [Chowhound]

• Large portions of decent barbecue at good prices on South Beach — who knew? [FoodTastic!]

• Check out Gail's Thanksgiving spread. Then figure out how to snag an invitation. [Short Order]

• Rock shrimp! We're fans. Here are a few places to get it. [Chowhound]

• Food stamp use in this country is closing in on an all-time high. Not surprising, given the economic situation. [Washington Post]

• At the same time, food banks are having a hard time keeping shelves stocked, with increased demand and decreased donations. [USA Today]

• You thought we were done with melamine? Oh no. And this time it's hitting close to home: the FDA found traces of melamine in American-manufactured infant formula. [NYT]

• The Times suggests you take charge of the Thanksgiving meal by running it like a CEO does a company: delegate and assign tasks. [NYT]

• And because feel-good stories are hard to come by these days, we thought we'd share this one: a man in Central Florida who owns 27 Golden Corral restaurants will be feeding 20,000 people at the Salvation Army on Thanksgiving. [Orlando Sentinel]

It's a scant 48 hours (give or take) until we all sit down for Thanksgiving dinner, and we for one are kind of tired of reading about it. Instead, we're thinking of spring.

No, seriously. For a while now (like, years) we've been thinking that it's high time we took advantage of the outdoor space that's attached to our apartment, and we've got a mind to use this long weekend to set up a garden. We have a decent-sized terrace that gets great sunlight — it faces southwest and is hardly ever in shadow — and it's just completely criminal that we haven't yet channeled our Inner Alice Waters and done something productive with the matter.

Enter War Vegetable Gardening and the Home Storage of Vegetables, a 1918 publication of the National War Garden Commission, and helpfully scanned for all to see on Google Books. Though it's nearly a century old, the book is ideally relevant to today's prevailing food trends, melding together the frugality of That Darn Economy with the holier-than-thou gastro-chic of locavorism. Plus it turns out that autumn is the ideal time to start a garden! (Never mind that, for us, the first frost has already happened. Pish posh.)

For a slightly more contemporary reference, we're planning to turn to McGee and Stuckey's Bountiful Container, a guide to container gardening (as opposed to growing stuff in the actual ground) that comes with the highest recommendation possible — our housemate's mom's. We're thinking we'll start easy — cherry tomatoes, carrots, radishes, and — for the sheer surreality of seeing it waving over a third-floor balcony — a few stalks of corn. We're also planning to buy a pair of overalls which we will ostentatiously swoon around the garden supply store while wearing.

If all goes well, by next Thanksgiving we'll have an actual bounty to be thankful for, and won't have to make up some crap about being grateful for good health and family.

After the jump, some scans from War Vegetable Gardening.

War Vegetable Gardening [Google Books, via]
The Bountiful Container [Amazon]

[Photo: What we hope our balcony will resemble, via dawn_perry's Flickr]

It's the same old battle: conservationists vs. fishermen. This time, the controversy surrounds the soft-shell turtle. Conservationists and Gov. Charlie Crist want to stop the harvesting of wild turtles, while people who do exactly that for a living are, naturally, a little upset. The former group is issuing alarmist warnings about possible population decline, while the latter group points out that there are turtles aplenty:

In a recent letter, Crist urged the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission to make it illegal to take any freshwater turtles from the wild.

"With the world market demand for freshwater turtles, it is clear that the commercial harvest of our wild populations of turtles could result in long-term impacts very quickly," he wrote in a letter to commission chairman Rodney Barreto. "According to many turtle biologists, if the (commission) is not vigilant and does not act swiftly we could be in grave danger of irreparable damage to our turtle population."

Those who have fished for turtles in and around Lake Okeechobee for decades have a visceral, if simple, reaction to Crist's call for conservation: Hogwash.

"He's ignorant. No offense to the governor, but there's no other word for it: ignorant," said William Shockley, who grew up in Okeechobee as the son and grandson of commercial fishermen.

An electrical contractor by trade, Shockley still fishes for turtles to help his 16-year-old son make spending money by selling the critters that fetch between $1.25 and $1.50 a pound.

"I can take you to places near 20-mile bend where there's more turtles than there are people in Palm Beach County," he said.

Conservationists call for ban on freshwater turtle catches [Palm Beach Post]
China Turns to Florida After Eating Turtles to Near-Extinction [MP: South Florida]

• Despite a rash of pro-Spam coverage in major papers, Hormel's profits are down thanks to the skyrocketing price of ... turkey feed. [AP/CNN]

• Salt is the new bad guy. Lower-sodium foods (and advertising supporting them) are set to flourish in '09. [USAToday]

• A 3-Michelin-star Tokyo restaurant , Kagurazaka Ishikawa, apologized for selling bacteria-contaminated black beans. [Reuters]

• The rampant speculation about who will be the Obamas' White House Chef is "fantasy football for foodies," and also totally off-base, says Walter Scheib. [AP]

• Obligatory compare-your-ten-person-guest-list-to-the-army's-hordes pre-Thanksgiving article! [AP]

The Fontainebleau Hotel has re-opened in all of its renovated glory with seven restaurants for your dining pleasure. Only five — Gotham Steak, Scarpetta, Vida, Solo and Fresh — are currently open; the first two officially open tonight, while the other three have been serving customers since Friday. La Cote, a French Mediterranean restaurant, is due December 20, and Hakkasan, with an upscale Chinese theme, won't be open until the new year.

The fact that Alfred Portale — who's a great chef and has done wonderful things with Gotham Bar & Grill — has opened a restaurant in South Florida is exciting, except it'd be nice if the theme weren't so steak-focused. Seriously, how many more steakhouses can this area support? Especially in a recession. Anyway, the food, mostly steakhouse standards, will likely be great.

Scarpetta is the product of another New York City chef, Scott Conant, who is known for his seasonally-inspired and elegant Italian food. The restaurant has yet to send over a menu, but we're told it will look a lot like that of the original Scarpetta in Manhattan. If the food in the new location is as good as New York MenuPages reviewers say it is, then we're in for a treat.

Fontainebleau Hotel [Official Site]
Gotham Steak [MenuPages]
Fresh [MenuPages]

We were only sort of half-interested in reading about Margaret Fulton's remarks at the release of Greenpeace's True Food Guide Canola Edition 2009 until right at the end of this article, when she compared genetically engineered food to Adolf Hitler. Seriously:

At the guide's launch, Ms Fulton hit out at the big chemical companies for pushing the "benefits" of growing GE canola to farmers for their commercial gain.

"They're going to control the world," she said.

"We thought Hitler was a bad fella ... these guys could show him a thing or two - and they're creeping up on us quietly without guns or anything like that, but the poison is there."

Greenpeace released the publication to coincide with Australia's first genetically modified crop, canola, which critics say could be toxic. The guide identifies products that are free of genetically modified ingredients, which aren't legally required to be labeled as such.

Food guru Margaret Fulton likens genetically-modified food push to Adolf Hitler [The Australian]
New True Food Guide launched [Greenpeace]

[Photo: Via nieminskihomework]

• Jan's got the lowdown on area cooking classes and greenmarkets. Unfortunately, the gingerbread houses class is for kids. [Jan Norris]

• Those salt dome crusted beets look pretty amazing. Must try at home. [Chadzilla]

• Things we've learned from fast food news: never keep naked photos on a cell phone — you might leave it at a McDonald's and an employee might upload them to the Internet — and rats, much like humans, get fat from too many burgers and fries. [Short Order]

• Hazelnuts + green beans = YUM. [A Mingling of Tastes]

• Every time I read about the food at Google headquarters, it makes me wish I were more adept at this computer thing. [All Purpose Dark]

• Live from Nova Scotia: lobster season is on! There are many fears over plummeting lobster prices, but with tighter regulations and a total of 540,000 traps, perhaps the fishermen will stay afloat. [Chronicle Herald]

• The jury is still out on MSG, scientifically speaking, but consumers really, really don't like it. In light of that, it's somewhat surprising that Campbell's Soup waited until now to stop using it. In any case, expect a barrage of advertising announcing the change. [Chicago Tribune]

• A farm in Colorado decided to have a food give-away, after finding that they had a surplus of produce following their fall harvest festival. What they didn't count on? 40,000 people showing up. [Denver Post]

• The full-blown global food crisis makes it harder to justify using corn for ethanol, instead of for food, and there's a great deal of debate over how to find a middle ground. Let them eat cake? [AP/SF Chronicle]

• A tamale cart in Mexico City advertises its goods via robotic loudspeaker. It's like Wall-E, but with tamales. [LA Times]

• Cupcakes can provide a break in the Thanksgiving dessert monopoly held by pumpkin pie. [MP: Boston]

• Lion and bear meat are available for purchase in this great country of ours. [MP: Chicago]

• Pork on a spit that looks like doner kebab meat provides a double dose of delicious visuals. [MP: Philadelphia]

• All-you-can-eat pizza is on the rise! [MP: San Francisco]

• Winemakers on motorcycles are awesome. [MP: South Florida]

• Lee Klein sacrificed his Thursday afternoon to attend the Beaujolais Nouveau party at Casa Casuarina in the interest of his readers. We're sure it was a very difficult decision. [Short Order]

• Duke's Lazy Loggerhead Cafe sounds like a perfect place to spend a lazy afternoon, fish sandwich in one hand, cold beer in the other. [Jan Norris]

• Julie suggests a cornbread-chorizo stuffing for your Thanksgiving turkey next week. [A Mingling of Tastes]

• Mix-your-own granola? Sounds great! [Short Order]

• More steakhouses on the horizon. No, seriously. [Chowhound]

• A new study shows that keeping food diaries via text message might help kids stick with the activity, thus reducing child obesity. [Washington Post]

• Not helping to reduce child obesity? Fast food ads. [LA Times]

• High-end New York fromagerie Murray's Cheese goes Midwestern with stores inside supermarket chain Kroger. [New York Times]

• In a sort of Black Friday for the wine industry, vineyards nationwide will be holding events next weekend. [Wall Street Journal]

• Everything you wanted to know about tainted food, all in one place! [Slate]

Of the six dishes that Michael Schwartz prepared for last night's James Beard House dinner, it was a seemingly simple one that won over the hearts (stomachs?) of New Yorkers. Here's Grub Street's report:

His message of locally sourced, sustainable food sources may be familiar to New Yorkers, but the food was not, especially a pan-roasted golden tilefish. It was the La Tur cheese, Paradise Farms honeycomb, aged balsamic, and grilled walnut raisin bread (unjustly shown here) that best represented Schwartz’s food aesthetic. The dish looked beautiful and tasted wonderful — simple and wholesome and a joy to eat.

Miami Chef Surprises Jaded New Yorkers With Honeycomb [Grub Street]
Michael's Genuine Food & Drink [MenuPages]
Michael's Genuine Food & Drink [Official Site]

In the year 2200, when historians are looking back to the 2000s to figure out what made us tick, we sincerely hope that they think of doing a study of eBay. Actually, scratch that &mdash looking at eBay would only make them ten million times more perplexed about what our civilization was like. Why's this? Because what people will buy and sell on eBay is insane, particularly when it comes to food stuffs.

We saw something recently about buying good vanilla beans and chocolate on eBay for bargain-basement prices. This seemed reasonable enough, but after some poking around, we spiraled down a rabbit hole of pre-made cakes and the like. Then, we had the idea of looking for other foods on eBay, so without further ado, some important findings.

1. George Bush is toast. "This is an original George Bush toast portrait burned into premium potato bread! This is a very unique tribute to our 43rd president."

After the jump, more eBay food finds, all three of which are a harrowing looks into what people will try to sell.

2. Man-shaped Cheetos. "You are bidding on a cheeto that is shaped like a man singing one way and when you turn it, it looks like it is boxing. It is as big as a quarter. this cheeto has not been altered in anyway. The story behind this is i packed my daughter cheetos for her lunch and she found it in her bag."

3. Sweet potato hippopotamus. "This item is a sweet potato that formed in the general shape of a hippopotamus. It is presented exactly as it was harvested (minus a tiny tail which fell off during the process). The photos below are of the actual item you will receive."

4. Eagle-shaped bacon. "Here is the oddest item I have ever sold on ebay. It is a piece of bacon that I fried this morning. Notice the patriotic shape of our nations American Eagle."

There are no words.

If anything positive comes out of this terrible economy, it'll be a correction in long-inflated South Florida menu prices; we're starting to see the check already. I'm hoping more restaurateurs will consider doing just what de Palma has done: dispense with the million-dollar interiors and the $18 martinis and just start serving good food to their good neighbors. The restaurant biz has been in its own bubble — people have been gambling and making fortunes. Maybe it's time they started making an honest living instead.

– Gail Shepherd, in a review for Dolce de Palma

It's a Living [Broward-Palm Beach New Times]

• Victoria Pesce Elliott doesn't have much good to say about Le P'tit Paris in Coconut Grove, but breakfast is excellent and features "fresh, crusty, super-buttery croissants." Definitely want one of those. [Miami Herald]

• With a few exceptions, the food is great at Wish, but those prices — well, you'll need a fat wallet to pay that bill. [Miami New Times]

• Bengal offers a full range of dishes from all parts of the subcontinent, from northern India, to the south, and including some Bengali touches. [Miami Herald]

• Lucille's American Cafe has a soup called "Bubble & Squeak," which is kind of awesome. It's the place to go for comfort food: think meatloaf, mac 'n cheese and Southern fried chicken. [Miami Herald]

• The menu changes constantly at Dolce de Palma Paninoteca, a small place in an odd location that's been earning rave reviews from locals for the Italian fare. And the prices are reasonable too. [Broward-Palm Beach New Times]

• David's East Side Deli serves up some lovely, fatty pastrami, as well as lots of other Jewish comfort food. [Palm Beach Post]

• The FDA opens three permanant offices in China to keep an eye on exports after a series of scares over tainted products. [NYT]

• Le Beaujolais Nouveau est arrive! Such as it is, with the disappointing grape harvest in the supplying region. [AP/Chicago Tribune]

• A teenager shoots his father, then turns the gun on himself, after they fought when boy brought home the wrong fast food order. [Local 6]

• A recent study finds that cutting down on fast food advertising actually does affect childhood obesity. [LA Times]

• Food banks are feeling the economic pinch as would-be donors keep the canned goods for eating. [Washington Post]

Michelle Bernstein is at Books & Books in Bal Harbour tonight signing copies of her new cookbook, Cuisine a Latina and offering samples of some of the dishes featured in the book. The fun starts at 7:30 p.m., so don't be late!

Books & Books [Official Site]

Frank Bruni had better watch out; he's got a middle-schooler vying for his job. Well, not really, and even the kid in question, David Fishman, would admit that he should probably finish school first. He only just turned 12, but already he enjoys fine dining and keeps a notebook where he records his impressions of restaurants complete with Zagat-style ratings.

One restaurant in particular, Salumeria Rosi on New York's Upper West Side, thinks he's great. On his first visit, a solo one, the hostess had no problems squeezing him in on a busy night despite his unaccompanied-minor status. Of course, everyone, including Chef Cesare Casella, in the restaurant was curious about this kid eating dinner by himself:

But the young foodie has cultivated a new fan in Chef Casella, a burly man who generally tours his restaurants with a trademark sprig of herb in his pocket. Mr. Casella came over the evening of David’s big night out to extend a greeting, and sent him home with a gift of fine hazelnut spread. Though David was disappointed that the restaurant did not serve gelato, he got points with Mr. Casella for knowing a little something about Italian cuisine.

“He reminded me of me, when I was younger,” said Mr. Casella, who used to drive all over Europe by himself to try the best restaurants. “He is so cool, though — more confident than I am when I eat out by myself.”

Mr. Casella likewise made an impression on David. “He looked like a real meat guy,” David said. Like a butcher? “Like a butcher-slash-guy who would eat a lot of meat,” he clarified.

Here's an idea for David: Pitch your services as a kids' menu consultant to mid-to-high-range restaurants in the city, particularly those that see a lot of families. Help these places figure out some fun, interesting dishes that appeal to kids without being completely dumbed down. Hey, maybe they'll even pay you in something other than free meals. Those aren't bad, of course, but you've got to save for college, right?

12-Year-Old's a Food Critic, and the Chef Loves It [New York Times]

Photo: Eating in Translation/flickr

The name is changing too — now it'll be Miami Subs Pizza & Grill. Yep, you'll be able to order one of their new specialty pizzas through an online ordering system and have it delivered to your door. The plan: 500 stores in the next five years, including six in the immediate future (three in New York, two in South Florida, and one in South Carolina). The company also just opened an outlet in the Cayman Islands and another in Turkey, while two more are almost ready in Romania. (It'd be interesting to see why the company chose to enter those markets; offhand, they seem kind of odd.)

Five hundred restaurants seems incredibly ambitious, especially given the economic downturn, although it is precisely these kinds of fast-food places that might thrive in the next few years. So maybe it'll work.

For those of us down here for whom the neon Miami Subs signs are familiar, we'll be seeing some changes too, namely the addition of pizza to the menu and "a new store design that we feel will be more attractive to today's fast casual consumer," according to Rich Rudner, the company's director of communications. Which means that they'll update the decor for the first time since 1986. Not a bad idea.

Six Locations Race to be the "First" New Miami Subs Pizza & Grill
Miami Subs Grill [Official Site] [MarketWatch]

Many chefs like to ride motorcycles, and restaurants are important for selling our wine. We thought it would be a fresh, new approach . . . a Beaujolais Biker Brigade.

– Stephane Queralt, a winemaker at Les Vins de Georges Duboeuf, on why he's bringing Beaujolais Nouveau to Casa Casuarina tomorrow by motorcycle

Wine and chefs and motorcycles, oh my! [Miami Herald]
Loftin's at Casa Casuarina [MenuPages]
Loftin's at Casa Casuarina [Official Site]

• PETA released a video taken undercover at a West Virginia poultry plant that shows workers kicking, stomping, snapping necks and doing all sorts of other awful things to turkeys. [NYT]

• The UN moves into rebel-held territory in eastern Congo to distribute food to people who used to grow most of the country's food, until rebels confiscated their fields. [AP]

• If you happen to have any Lean Cuisine frozen dinners — specifically the pesto chicken with bow tie pasta, the chicken Mediterranean and the chicken Tuscan — you might want to get rid of them; consumers have found pieces of blue plastic inside. [Los Angeles Times]

• Wal-Mart is donating more than 90 million pounds of fresh food over the next year to Feeding America, the country's largest hunger-focused nonprofit organization. [NYT]

• Grocery stores. That's where the money is during a recession, apparently. And it's not surprising, really — people still need to eat, and they're cutting back on restaurant meals. [San Francisco Chronicle]

In our long observation of the world of food-loving people, we've noticed that a major tenet of foodieism is the I'll-eat-anything attitude. The movement is led by testicle-and-worm-chowing high priests Andrew Zimmern and Anthony Bourdain, who approach nearly everything with an open mind and an open mouth. A degree of gastronomic uninhibition is a matter of pride — we'll happily admit that we rely on our own culinary adventurousness, our willingness to try new things, as a cornerstone of our self-identification as a Food Person.

But a recent spate of anti-picky-eater backlash has gotten us thinking a little more critically about just how much an adventurous palate is a necessary element of being a gastronome.

In a post yesterday, Jezebel's Sadie Stein lamented that Barack Obama is a picky eater, a quality she finds intensely off-putting in a boyfriend — let alone a potential leader of the free world. A Serious Eats post on whether diners with aversions should fake allergies garnered nearly fifty comments. Perhaps most notably, on his blog, Michael Ruhlman calls out all those people who fake allergies or ask for substitutions as complicit in the creation of "A Nation of Culinary Sissies."

Here's where we take exception: The jumping-off point for Ruhlman's rant wasn't some dude in line at Subway ordering plain turkey on white bread, no condiments. He was moved to rage by the guests at the 20-course, $1500-a-head Keller-Achatz dinner, held last week at Per Se in New York, whose various dislikes and allergies piled up to the point where fully half of the tables present required various per-diner modifications of the set menu.

We think there are two big problems here. First, we would imagine that most of the diners ready and willing to drop a grand and a half on a meal that's been called a religious experience would bristle at the suggestion that they aren't fully fledged appreciators of good food and good drink. These are people who are demonstrating in an absolutely unambiguous way that they're committed ingredients, preparation, flavor, innovation, chefs, servers, restaurants — what more does Ruhlman want from them?

But second, and more insidiously, there's the fact that there is a stigma attached to having a food aversion. The stigma is so great, in fact, that people who merely dislike something (yogurt, eggplant, raw onion) will lie to their server in order to avoid the ingredient, shifting the matter from one of a prejudiced palate to one of medical necessity. What's the point here? Avoiding the server's scorn? Eliminating the possibility of the chef saying "no, seriously, they'll never taste it" and adding the anchovies (oregano, corn, garlic) anyway?

When did it become such a bad thing to want what you want? We think it's time to Take Back Dislike. We'll start: we freaking hate horseradish. MP:SF editor Adam can't stand eggplant. MP:Philly editor Elsa loathes bananas. MP:Boston editor Leila will not go anywhere near anything that contains mayonnaise. MP:South Florida editor Carolina likes chocolate and likes mint, but if they're together in a dish she will run the other way. And the five of us have as much gastronomic cred as anyone else you're likely to meet.

Being a person who loves food — call it a gastronome, a Food Person, a gourmand, a foodie — doesn't actually mean that you have to love all food, any more than being a music fan means you have to love Puccini as much as you love death metal. It's okay to be a picky eater. Leave the bat brains and the fermented shark to the Andrew Zimmerns of the world, and hold your head up high as you ask the kitchen to hold the mayo.

[Photo: Sandwich monster, via amyclaire123's Flickr]

Michael Wagner, the chef and owner of Lola's on Harrison, has been named one of three "Turkey Trendsetters" for 2008 by the National Turkey Federation. His winning recipe: pan-roasted turkey tenderloins with caramelized brussels sprouts, creamy polenta and pomegranate-sun-dried cherry gravy. So now you know where to go for Thanksgiving.

Michael Wagner, chef and owner of Lola's on Harrison, named a “turkey trendsetter” by the NTF [Examiner.com]
National Turkey Federation [Official Site]
Lola's on Harrison [MenuPages]
Lola's on Harrison [Official Site]

• Those new Chinese branches of the FDA? Lots of forced smiles going on over that. No one seems very happy. [AP]

• 11% of US households are experiencing food scarcity. Why is this only being reported in the British press? [Reuters/Guardian]

• The UN is back in Gaza issuing food supplies, but warns that they'll be out again in days unless Israel gives up their blockade. [AFP]

• Employees of Justin Timberlake's New York restaurant are suing him, claiming unpaid wages. [HuffPo]

• A new biography of Queen Sofia of Spain reveals that the late King Hassan II of Morocco was obsessive about food, and traveled with his own cooks because he didn't trust anyone. [NYT]

It was fun to read this morning's post on MenuPages in Portfolio's Odd Numbers blog. Writer Zubin Jelveh seems to grasp, intuitively, the most effective technique by which MenuPages ratings can be ranked. But he doesn't explain it explicitly. Nor do we, on the site, so let's do that now:

Basically, your restaurant search, like any inroad into a huge pool of data, will narrow its focus with each condition you apply. Say you start with a neighborhood — we'll use the New York site, since that's what Zubin writes about — so say you start with the Upper East Side. There are 587 restaurants listed in that neighborhood. How to choose where to eat?

Well, if you know what kind of food you want, that makes it easier (you can search by cuisine), but often times you don't. Often, you're thinking in terms of quality, price, and location, and you want a few options.

The best way to search is to first sort by rating. Then scroll down and scan with your eyes the number of dollar signs and number of reviews. The more reviews, the more you can trust the stars, which are created by readers like you. A restaurant with four and a half stars based on three reviews is not as solid an option as one with three and a half stars based on 50 reviews, but it may still be worth a shot.

It also may be worth your while to sort by the number of reviews. In our example, the restaurant with the most reviews is Pio Pio, which gets an average of four stars for food and four and a half stars for value, based on 123 reviews. That means it might be a good, mid-priced choice for, say, a weeknight. A theme among the most recent five reviews is inconsistent service, so it may not be the kind of place you go if you're in a hurry or trying to impress someone.

Depending on what you want, you can narrow your overall search based on type of cuisine and features required (delivery, al fresco, and so on). If you're a veteran user, you probably know all this already. Do you have your own special techniques for mining the vast reserves of raw MP data? Please share!

The Best and Worst Restaurants in Manhattan [Portfolio]
Pio Pio [MenuPages]
Pio Pio [Official Site]

Good news: Check, Please! South Florida will be back on the air in March 2009 with Michelle Bernstein as host. Keep an eye out on the show's blog for information on how to suggest restaurants or be one of the lucky few who get to go on TV.

Check, Please! South Florida -- Season 2 [Channel 2]

• Daikon cake! Sounds odd, but looks cool. [chadzilla]

• Did you make the mistake of planning to host a cocktail party this holiday season? Never fear — a few local chefs are here to help. [Short Order]

• Weigh in on the Nobu vs. Bond St. discussion. [Chowhound]

• Joe's Stone Crab is trying to survive the recession with a "bailout lunch special." [Chowhound]

• More early reviews for Zed 451. [Chowhound]

• China's reputation as food contamination central has earned the country some of their very own USDA offices! Three, to be exact &mdash and they just so happen to be the first to ever open outside of the United States. [AP]

• In what might be the weekend's most adorable food-related story, a 12-year old from Manhattan's Upper West Side is an aspiring food critic. Not only does he write up restaurant reviews in his journal, he also goes out to eat on his own at sophisticated restaurants. All together now: aw. [NYT]

• The business lunch suffers in these gloomy financial times. The problems are twofold, when you think about it: less business to lunch over, less money to spend on lunch. [Chicago Tribune]

• On the other hand, the economic downturn is a boon time for Spam? Hormel, the company that makes Spam, is ramping up production because Americans have traditionally turned to Spam during penny-pinching times. Important note: increased production is not the same as increased sales. [NYT]

• Good news for scallop lovers: the Eastern Seaboard is currently chock-full of young scallops, after six years of dwindling crops. Patience required though, as the little scallop babies won't be fished for another couple years. [Boston Globe]

I may have promised papa rellena from The Estefan Kitchen yesterday, but laziness took over shortly after the picadillo (which is stuffed inside the mashed potatoes for papa rellena) finished simmering. So instead, there's just picadillo: ground beef simmered with onions, garlic, green peppers and some other seasonings.

Picadillo nights at my parents' house was never a favorite. For some reason, I just never could quite get into it. And this is not a slight against my mother's picadillo, which was a very good version. That said, I actually prefer this version because of the sweetness; the tomatoes play a bit more prominently in the Estefan version than in most other picadillos I've had, and I like it. And if you want even more sweetness, add the optional raisins, which I skipped. (The full recipe is after the jump.)

This recipe was followed to the letter with one big exception: there was no vino seco (cooking wine) or dry white wine anywhere in the house. (We're big red wine drinkers here.) There was, however, a bottle of Corona, which was used instead, to excellent results. And while the recipe calls for white rice and plantains (and a fried egg on top, if you like), we opted for brown rice and steamed broccoli. Have to watch the figure somehow.

The Estefan Kitchen [Penguin Books]
The Estefan Kitchen: Sopa De Platano [MP: South Florida]

Picadillo

Yields 6 servings

4 tsp olive oil
3 lbs lean ground beef
1 green pepper, cored, seeded, and finely chopped
1 medium onion, finely chopped
3 cloves garlic, minced
2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp ground black pepper
pinch of cumin powder
1 tsp dried oregano
2 bay leaves
1 8-oz can tomato sauce
1 1/4 c vino seco or dry white wine
1/2 c ketchup
1/2 c raisins (optional)
1/2 c pimento-stuffed Spanish olives
2 tbsp capers (optional)

1. In a large pot, heat 1 teaspoon of olive oil over med-high heat. Add the ground beef, and brown the meat, stirring occasionally and ensuring that the meat is not scorched. Remove the browned meat and drain any excess fat from the pot.

2. Add the remaining olive oil and heat it over medium heat. Then add the green pepper, onion and garlic, and saute until the onions are translucent.

3. Return the browned meat to the pot, and add the remaining ingredients. Bring the mixture to a boil. Then reduce the heat to low, cover and simmer the picadillo for 30 to 40 minutes, stirring frequently.

4. Remove the bay leaves and serve over white rice with platanos maduros (tostones if you prefer) and black beans.

Reprinted with permission from The Estefan Kitchen, Celebra Books 2008.

• Go ahead, get biblical. [MP: Boston]

• Wanna know how to cook mussels? Think sex. [MP: Chicago]

• Get crabs! [MP: Philadelphia]

• Let us introduce you to The Game. [MP: San Francisco]

• Hogfish just sort of sounds dirty, or at least like cross-breeding. [MP: South Florida]

• Michelle Bernstein demonstrates how to make the shrimp tiradito from her new cookbook, Cuisine a Latina. [Miami Dish]

• Gail has a few good rules for how to treat your waiter when you dine out. [Short Order]

• Despite the slowing economy, some interesting new restaurants are coming to South Beach. [Short Order]

• Want to know what that crazy-looking monstera delicioso looks like when ripe? Check out these photos. [chadzilla]

• A step-by-step recipe for carne con papas, or a Cuban beef stew. Yum! [Cuban Home Cooking]

• Picadillo: a good way to feed a bunch of hungry firefighters. [Jan Norris]

• It turns out that the majority of fast food meat is derived from corn. [Time]

• Barack and Michelle Obama are simple, yet adventurous eaters, while Malia and Sasha prefer kid food like mac and cheese and French toast. [Seattle Times]

• Good news: access to food is improving in Iraq. [CNN]

• Bad news: access to food is decreasing in Gaza. [AP]

• Chinese milk is still tainted. [New York Times]

Curtis James Jackson III, probably better known to the world as 50 Cent was on the Tyra Banks Show talking about, among other things, his Vitamin Water endorsement deal. Well, okay &mdash he didn't talk about the deal , but he did talk about drinking Vitamin Water and why he likes it. So what, if anything at all, does this have to do with Alton Brown?

Fact the first: Alton Brown is the newest spokesperson for Welch's Grape Juice. The press release from Welch's states that

Brown will be appearing in television, print and online advertising, as well as in-store merchandising for Welch's 100% Grape Juice. In his own unique style, he'll blend ingredients of wit, wisdom, and science to explain what makes Welch's 100% Grape Juice, made from the entire polyphenol-packed Concord grape, so special.

Fact the second: Formula 50, 50 Cent's own flavor of Vitamin Water is grape-flavored. GRAPE! Really, it's like Alton Brown and 50 Cent are spirit animals.

We find the Alton Brown/grape juice pairing much more enticing than the 50 Cent/Vitamin Water one, but that has a lot to do with how much love we have for Good Eats. A tiny food/science geek part of us is excited to have Brown teach us cool facts about grapes and grape juice. However, the real question is this: now that grape juice and grape-flavor water have locked down celebrity endorsements, who will be in the tank for grape soda?

Alton Brown Joins Welch's in Standing Up to Free Radicals [PRNewswire via YumSugar]

A lovely fat package landed on my desk earlier this week: a copy of The Estefan Kitchen, the new cookbook from Gloria and Emilio Estefan. It's filled with anecdotes, lovely photography, and traditional Cuban recipes; no fusion or newfangled dishes here. Many of the recipes in the book are used regularly at the Estefan-owned Bongos and Larios on the Beach.

After assessing what was available in the kitchen at the moment, I decided to give the sopa de plátano (plantain soup) a try, as it was something I'd never done before. I did tweak the recipe a bit: I had no stock on hand in the kitchen (this is an aberration, I assure you — generally there is plenty of homemade chicken stock in the freezer), so that was replaced with water. And because I like a bit of heat, I added a pinch of chili powder. (The full recipe is after the jump.)

The result: Well, it wasn't photogenic. There are several photos of the finished product, none of which were deemed worthy enough of placing on the site. The soup needs a more skilled photographer than I to make it appear as something better than a bowl of unappetizing mush. That said, in person, it's a nice rich yellow color, and it's tasty. The whole book is about warm, satisfying comfort food, and this soup is just that.

Next up: papa rellena and flan de queso.

The Estefan Kitchen [Penguin Books]
Bongos [MenuPages]
Bongos [Official Site]
Larios on the Beach [MenuPages]

Sopa de Platano

4 qts beef or vegetable stock
1 cube chicken bouillon
6 large green plantains, sliced crosswise into medium-sized chunks
1/4 tsp salt
1 bay leaf
4 garlic cloves, minced
1 large onion, sliced
1 tbsp coarsely chopped fresh culantro, for garnish

1. Place the chicken or vegetable stock in a large stockpot and bring it to a boil over high heat. Reduce heat to medium and add the remaining ingredients except the culantro.

2. Cover, reduce heat to low, and simmer for approximately 30 minutes, until the plantains are tender. Remove the bay leaf.

3. Transfer the mixture to a blender and puree. Transfer the pureed soup back into the stockpot and cook over low heat uncovered for 15 to 20 minutes to allow the soup to thicken. Serve in bowls and garnish with culantro tips.

Makes 6-8 servings.

Reprinted with permission from The Estefan Kitchen, Celebra Books 2008.

• You won't find too much groundbreaking stuff at Ocean Prime, but you will get excellent steaks and fish. [Miami Herald]

•The food at Bengal fails to impress. [Miami New Times]

• The food at Red Thai & Sushi takes Linda Bladholm back to Bangkok, where she spent some time in the 1980s. That's definitely a good sign. [Miami Herald]

• Gail has stumbled upon a new meme in the restaurant world: homemade potato chips. They're everywhere, including at YOLO and Beach House Bistro. [Broward-Palm Beach New Times]

• After 27 years, Anthony's Runway 84 in Fort Lauderdale still serves crowd-pleasing Italian fare; customers show up looking for "fat meatballs, bowls of pasta, plump sausage and flavorful red sauce." Mmmm...that'll hit the spot. [Miami Herald]

• Charles Passy wants to know why no one is talking about Romeo's Ristorante, where the homemade Italian fare is great. [Palm Beach Post]

• The European Union lifts its ban on the sale of ugly, misshapen vegetables, much to the chagrin of cuter, more popular vegetables. [NY Times]

• Having had it up to here trying to remember what's tainted this week, the FDA has slapped a detention order on dozens of foods imported from China. [AP/Miami Herald]

• Whether its residents know this or not, it appears Los Angles is a city ripped by strife: Two bagel bakeries, with different styles, rule the breakfast scene. Are you Brooklyn Bagel Bakery or Western Bagel? [LA Times]

• The former director of a New York City nonprofit has been charged with stealing more than $500,000 in government aid to feed hungry children. [Newsday]

• A woman in the UK will avoid jail time after chasing a restaurant owner around his kitchen with a meat cleaver in a dispute over money. [The Scotsman]

A review for Cowgirl in New York came in just this week that caught our eye. It was pretty lukewarm, but there was one interesting part:

The potatoes were cold and the veggies very clearly came from a can or, worse yet, were frozen. They had chunks of okra thrown in to make it seem like they were fresh - they weren't.

So, we just thought we'd set the record straight. Here's the comparison, broken down into easily digestible components:

• Nutrition: In this regard, the two are the same. According to this study at the University of Illinois, "consumers should be confident that if a food is suggested as being 'high in nutrient X,' then the form (canned, frozen or fresh) will not alter that. So, for example, those canned tomatoes have just as much lycopene as fresh tomatoes. Advantage: Tie.

• Additives: Frozen veggies have none. They are sliced, diced, blanched (i.e. plunged into boiling water for a minute and then into ice water) and frozen, so no problems there. Canned veggies, however, have salt, and lots of it. It acts as a preservative, and though many companies now have lower-sodium versions, that's still extra salt that you don't need. And when it comes to canned fruits, they're generally swimming in corn syrup (sugar: another preservative), which adds lots of lovely calories. Advantage: Frozen.

• Taste: Absolutely no contest here. Despite what the reviewer above may think, frozen veggies win the taste test hands down. Why? Because they taste almost exactly like the fresh veggies in many cases. If you buy good frozen corn or green beans, you probably could not tell the difference once they were sauteed and plated. Try doing that with salty, soggy, overcooked canned green beans. Advantage: Frozen

So now you know. Fresh and in season is best, but when that's not an option, frozen beats canned. Of course, canned stuff is useful; think tomatoes, which don't freeze well and are very useful canned, and cucumbers, which also can't be frozen but when canned transform into lovely pickles. But for many 'side vegetable' staples, like peas, carrots, broccoli, green beans, corn and spinach, you're better off buying it in the freezer section.

Cowgirl [MenuPages]
Cowgirl [Official Site]
Comparison of selected fresh, canned and frozen fruits, vegetables, legumes and protein foods [UIUC]

Photos: paulidin/flickr and dieselgirl777/flickr

Surely you've read about the opening of Canyon Ranch on 69th Street and Collins Avenue in Miami Beach. There was even a handy Herald article about how the luxury resort's opening comes at such a perfect time, given the robust state of the economy. Even so, only about 10 percent of buyers have backed out of their crazy-expensive condos, which is a pretty good rate around these parts.

As far as food goes, Canyon Ranch has five different dining venues, although only Canyon Ranch Grill is open to the public. According to the site, there will be plenty of outdoor seating, a tapas area (?) and an exhibition kitchen. The food will, of course, have a decidedly healthy bent. The menu is on its way, and as soon as we find out more, we will fill you in.

Canyon Ranch Miami Beach [Official Site]
Tough times will test luxury MIami Beach hotel spa [Miami Herald]

• The UN warns that it has exactly two days' supply of food in Gaza and no more. [BBC]

• The four largest ethanol producers have teamed up to create a new lobbying group called "Growth Energy." The message: don't blame ethanol for high food prices. [US News]

• A survey of schools in South Carolina found some that had action plans for food allergic students, while others did not. If your kid has severe allergies, you might want to check with the school about what happens if he or she has an attack. [Reuters]

• A Georgia restaurant had its liquor license removed after authorities found photos of underage drinkers on Facebook. [AJC]

• The Hawaiian plate lunch — two scoops of white rice, macaroni salad, and meat slathered in gravy — may see its popularity rise with a Hawaiian-born president in office. [NYT]

Tonight, at Per Se in New York, two culinary titans will meet and do battle. Not against each other; rather, against the waistlines, livers, and prevailing economic sensibilities of a roomful of diners, each of whom ponied up a cool $1500 for a twenty-course meal (plus wine pairings) prepared by the extremely famous hands of chefs Thomas Keller and Grant Achatz.

While we have a mild obsesssion healthy journalistic interest in both Keller and Achatz, what we don't have is a spare $1500 lying around. (Even if we did, we'd be SOL: Keller's publicist told us that tonight's meal "sold out fairly quickly," though there are still a few seats available for its encore performance on December 2, at Alinea, Achatz's Chicago restaurant.)

Enter the New York Times, who remedy our poverty of knowledge (if not our poverty of wallet) by assigning Pete Wells to cover the evening. Pete has probably the best seat in the house: He'll be in the actual kitchen, watching as two of the most precision-oriented culinary teams in the world converge. And to get our mouths all a-watering, he has the menu — truffles, sturgeon, and lobster, oh my! — which he's amusingly tagged as "Mentor_Protege_Dinner.pdf"

That tag is only tongue partially in cheek: Achatz trained under Keller at The French Laundry before striking out on his own, and Keller's influence is present in much of what he does. In Wells' post, Michael Ruhlman, who's worked closely with both chefs (he wrote the introduction for Alinea and was a main writer for all three of Keller's cookbooks), takes a somewhat Freudian perspective:

“It’s probably more complicated from Grant’s perspective,” said Mr. Ruhlman. “Talk about the anxiety of influence, the need to slay the father. Keller looms so tall in this industry, I’m sure he does all he can to stay out of its shadow without alienating the friend and mentor to whom he owes so much.”

Maybe that $1500 price tag also offsets some therapy sessions? Or maybe sometimes Blackberry, Tobacco, Kola Nut, Nepetella (course 17) is just a cigar.

Thomas Keller and Protégé to Go 20 Rounds [NYT Diner's Journal]
What You Get for $1500 [NYT Diner's Journal]
Per Se [MenuPages]
Per Se [Official Site]
Alinea [MenuPages]
Alinea [Official Site]

[Photo: Tomato, by Lara Kastner, via Alineamosaic.com]

previously
Alinea Defends A $1500 Dinner Bill
National: Keller, Achatz Offer Body Blow To Bank Account

It's getting close to that time again, folks. That weird occasion each year when a pretty good wine turns great through the use of some simple marketing hype and a dash of mystique. That's right, it's Beaujolais Nouveau season. But this year, the tradition is changing a bit.

The low-priced, easy drinking red has long been considered kind of a big deal in the fall thanks to a buzz created by the strictly controlled release date: It becomes available on the third Thursday in November, at which point distributors compete not only to see who can get the wine onto store shelves faster, but apparently who can make the biggest racket about it. Restaurants put on special menus to go with the wine, and stores trumpet its arrival.

The classic thing is to see gangs of motorcycle couriers revving up to sprint the first shipments out of little towns in the Bueaujolais region, shouting, “Le Beaujolais nouveau est arrivé!” as they race to Paris.

This year, however, some bottles have been released early, loaded onto ships, and are on their way abroad in leisurely fashion.

Of course, the bottle you pick up in the wine shop would most likely not have arrived via frantic motorcyclist. In past years, it probably would have been flown, but a Reuters story today reported that producers this year are going to ship a lot more bottles by sea — a drastically more efficient method — and are using plastic bottles, in a bid to reduce their environmental impact:

Georges Duboeuf, the largest maker of Beaujolais Nouveau, struck a deal with the French government to allow an early release of his wine so that he could use ships to haul about 75 percent of his 2 million U.S.-bound bottles, instead of the one-third that usually arrives by boat.

“It significantly changes the (carbon) footprint and it keeps the cost level down to the consumer, as well as keeping it in that $10-$12 range,” explained Barbara Scalera, a spokeswoman for Duboeuf's U.S. agent W. J. Deutsch & Sons.

The move is expected to lower the freight costs by a third and the result is that the suggested price for Boisset's Mommessin Beaujolais Nouveau and Bouchard Aine & Fils Beaujolais Nouveau will be $12.99, instead of up to $14.99 for U.S. consumers.

When asked if shipping by air negated the carbon footprint benefits, [Boisset America spokesman Patric] Egan replied, “Because we produce less, more of it needs to be here more quickly.”

Although some wine lovers may not like the idea of plastic bottles, Egan said it does not harm the wine.

“It's not great for long-term aging. But for up to three years it protects the wine just as well as glass,” he explained.

Beaujolais Nouveau goes ‘green’ — in plastic [Reuters/NBC]
AskPablo: Glass vs. PET Bottles [triplepundit]

[Image: Via Carabin.fr]

Zed 451, a sort-of steakhouse with locations in Chicago, Orlando and Boston, has opened up a fourth spot in Boca Raton's Mizner Park. There's no set menu (which means, alas, that it cannot be listed on MenuPages); instead, you help yourself from the "harvest table," which has soups, salads, veggies, cheese, charcuterie and bread. The proteins — steaks, ribs, seafood, poultry, game — are brought to you tableside. Basically, it's similar to rodizio, but without the Brazilian bent and with more seafood options. Here's what one chowhound had to say about the experience:

as we sat we were directed to the 'harvest tables' which are filled with fresh breads, charcuterie, an assortment of cheese, grilled vegetables, and a number of beautifully presented sides. i sampled the grilled mushrooms, asparagus, squash, tomato and mozzarella, focaccia, roasted beets, tomatillos and perhaps a few others i can't recall. everything was perfectly fresh and well seasoned. upon returning to the table our 'sides' were presented; a moist and flavorful corn bread, tender sauteed spaghetti squash and rich goat cheese scalloped potatoes. now the real food begins to arrive, delivered by 'chefs' . . . top sirloin, moroccan chicken, mahi mahi, seared tuna, grilled wahoo and salmon along with various other items. everything was perfectly cooked and simply seasoned. prices will be about $55 for the full experience plus drinks and dessert, around $35 for the 'harvest tables' only plus drinks etc.

Zed 451 [Official Site]

• The changing food pantry demographic: Employable people who had never needed aid before. [NYT]

• Today in food aid: The UN will withhold aid to Gaza if Israel continues to keep the territory sealed. This is a savvy diplomatic move how, exactly? [AP]

• A study of fast food revealed what Michael Pollan was telling us all along: An overwhelming majority of animals used for meat in the industry are fed entirely on corn. This is a bad thing. [WiredBlog]

• Meanwhile Tyson, a major fast-food meat supplier, has noted that its profits are up 50%. [AP]

• Spend more than 80 yuan at a particular restaurant in Beijing, and you get a free joy ride in a Ferrari. [ChinaDaily]

Do you remember back in April when we wondered, with guarded optimism, if restaurants that charged customers on a sliding scale or voluntary basis could succeed? Well, it turns out at least one of them can't, but amazingly, the problem doesn't seem to be in the One World Everybody Eats business model, according to the Salt Lake Tribune.

“As the restaurant grew, I didn't have the expertise at running a kitchen,” acknowledged [owner Denise] Cerreta during a media teleconference call on Friday. “We needed more structure and a more professional kitchen.”
A recent review of the business showed the restaurant was overstaffed and management of employee time was poor. It never even had an employee time clock. The restaurant also had failed to keep concise records of food costs and fixed costs. All told, mismanagement cost the restaurant $8,000 to $10,000 a month, Cerreta said."

So it would appear that a few things necessary to succeed as a restaurant include well-managed money, a legitimate management presence, and, possibly charging money for the food. Possibly. The One World Everybody Eats cafe did survive for five years, and Cerreta insisted in the article that they're not going to close now. But darn, it seems that, on some level, Cerreta faces the choice of charging her customers or paying her employees. Oh, that's an easy one.

Restaurants That Rely On The Kindness Of Customers [MenuPages]
One World Everybody Eats [Official Site]
Nonprofit eatery can't bring home the bacon [Salt Lake Tribune]

[Photo: Via One World Everybody Eats

Dear MenuPages,

Sincerely, AS

Quite a few places, as it turns out. First, a bit of background for those unfamiliar with the fish. Hogfish, also known as hog snapper (even though it's not a snapper — it's in the wrasse family), is common throughout the Keys, where they hang out near coral reefs and feed on mollusks and crustaceans. It's an excellent fish for eating, with its mild, delicate white flesh. The fish doesn't take easily to a hook and line, so most are speared by divers.

On to the question at hand: where to find it? Several fish markets in the area carry it. At Casablanca Seafood Market on the Miami River, the fish is available for $4.99/lb. Pop's Fish Market (131 W Hillsboro Blvd in Deerfield Beach; 954-427-1331) has hog snapper regularly at $8.99/lb, but it sells out quickly, so make sure to call ahead and ask them to set aside a fillet for you. Cod & Capers Seafood in Palm Beach Gardens carries it sporadically, at about $8.99/lb.

As far as restaurants go, the fish is more common on Keys menus than mainland ones. At Castaway in Marathon, you can get hogfish stuffed with shrimp and scallops. Try the macadamia-crusted hogfish with mango sauce at Kaiyo in Islamorada. And Cafe Solé in Key West serves hog snapper with a roasted red pepper zabaglione.

On the mainland, you can find hogfish prepared simply at Captain's Restaurant & Seafood House in Homestead, Dune Deck Cafe in Lantana, and Captain Charlies Reef Grill in Juno Beach. For something a bit different, try the whole fresh hog snapper at Thai Spice, which is seared, baked and then served with your choice of sauce.

The brunch scene at San Francisco's Palace Hotel

A less-than-flattering history of brunch that ran today in Restaurant-ing Through History portrays the meal as having been invented by lazy students, popularized by drunks, and surviving today as a dumping ground for, as Anthony Bourdain puts it, restaurants' “old, nasty odds and ends.”

But in spite of its less-than-savory past, we love brunch, and we don't know anybody who doesn't. And RTH's treatment of the meal does not neglect its brighter points:

Beginning in the 1970s champagne, screwdrivers, and mimosas often formed a large part of the advertised brunch attractions. Many restaurants included a drink with the price of the brunch, while others charged extra but poured free refills...

Especially popular on Sundays and holidays, brunch often features food that is — or once was — regarded as “special,” such as Canadian bacon, Hollandaise sauce, and Belgian waffles.

And yet, most of your highest-echelon chefs don't really seem to bother with the midday meal. Perhaps it is considered a bit gauche to swill bloody Marys and hollandaise early in the day. But hey, that's fine. Some of the best things going on the brunch buffet need little change. How are you going to improve on a carving station? And, perhaps more importantly, no hungover diner wants a culinary surprise first thing in the "morning."

Let's do brunch — or not?
Does bacon get any better than this? [Chicago Sun-Times]

[Image: Via jay.tong/flickr]

• Rascal House is gone, but in its place is a fancy new Epicure Market with lovely overpriced food. [South Florida Food Review]

• Miami Dish's "Man on the Street" profiles Soya & Pomodoro, his favorite place for some pre-swim carb loading. [Miami Dish]

• The Biscayne Boulevard Battle: Upper Eastside Market vs. the Vagabond Market. [Daily Cocaine]

• The new restaurant in the old Jerry & Joe's Pizza spot, Il Sole Mio, serves some decent cheap pasta and pizza. Not bad for a night in with a movie. [Coral Gables]

• Brosia has tasty food, outdoor seating, and wifi. Sounds like a perfect lunch spot, no? [All Purpose Dark]

• All about the monstera delicioso: the fruit of the large philodendron that is all over South Florida. [chadzilla]

• The first review for Enso on Lincoln Road is in, and it's mixed. [Chowhound]

Captain Tony Tarracino, known for opening Captain Tony's Saloon in Key West, passed away recently at the age of 92. Conchs sent him off in style, of course:

Captain Tony Tarracino, known for his love of life in Key West was laid to rest not with tears but with a party. The city of Key West closed down a street so hundreds could party and celebrate the life of a legend.

Playing "When the Saints Come Marching In," a New Orleans-style procession filled the streets for a man who embodied Life in Key West. The current Mayor of Key West followed the procession from the church to Tony's Saloon. "He gave dimension to the saying, 'only in Key West,'" said Morgan McPherson, mayor of Key West.

...

Tony Tarracino came to Key West in 1948 with 18 dollars. Ten years later, he opened Captain Tony's saloon. He gained friendships even with Jimmy Buffet who wrote "Last Mango in Paris" based on Captain Tony.

Family, Friends Remember "Captain Tony" Tarracino [cbs4]
Captain Tony's Saloon [Official Site]

• Philly lawmakers voted to require calorie labeling from chain restaurants. Many of the city's fattening dishes (hello, cheesesteaks and scrapple!) are exempt, as most of them come from small businesses. [Philadelphia Inquirer]

• First the cocaine kielbasa business in Brooklyn, now a butcher shop in Staten Island! The market was the cover business for some mafia-types &mdash until the feds bugged the place and caught the meat mobsters. [NY Daily News]

• If you've noticed your grocery bill staying the same, despite talk of food prices going up, it's because products are shrinking to keep costs the same. For example, thanks to a clever new dimple in the jar, Skippy is 10% smaller, but costs the same. Totally legal, but sneaky, sneaky! [LA Times]

• Guess what else doesn't fare well in a financial downturn? Beer on the global market! People turn to local, cheaper spirits (see: Russia, vodka; Colombia, aguardiente) and majors brewers are worried. [Wall Street Journal]

• Birthday parties may or may not be legal in Saudi Arabia, but people keep having them, because celebrating is fun, and cake is delicious. [AP/LA Times]

• Lee Klein feeds some Gruyere to a mama possum with five babies. [Short Order]

• Natalie wasn't too impressed with Forte Di Asprinio. [Natalie's Nibbles]

• Hollywood Grill, on the other hand, earns a rave review. [FoodTastic!]

• This hazelnut-crusted fried egg (think a hard-boiled egg with hazelnut crumbs on the outside and a runny yolk on the inside) looks awesome. [chadzilla]

•...get drunk in basements! [MP: Boston]

•...slurp "Economy Soup"! [MP: Chicago]

•...eat brunch every single day! [MP: Philadelphia]

•...learn that persimmons don't have to make your mouth feel like wool! [MP: San Francisco]

•...catch up with Top Chef season three contestant Howie Kleinberg! [MP: South Florida]

This is ridiculous. Angelo and Maxie's, a New York steakhouse, is opening its second location at the Mayfair Hotel & Spa, according to the Coconut Grove Grapevine.

You can check out the menu at the New York location; MP users seem to really like the place. Great steaks, etc. Yippee.

New steakhouse opening in the Grove next weekend [Coconut Grove Grapevine]
Mayfair Hotel & Spa [Official Site]
Angelo and Maxie's [MenuPages New York]
Angelo and Maxie's [Official Site]

There was a semester in college when we thought it would be funny to keep a box of Franzia Chillable Red on our desk, and a couple of plastic dining hall glasses handy, so that we could offer people a really cheap drink when they stopped by the dorm room. Mostly this lead to lots of visitors and a decline in productivity that lasted about as long as we could afford this little stunt (not that long, you can be sure).

Since then, our tastes have matured, if only marginally, but we still harbor a fondness for Franzia. So we were elated to find, while poking around on Chow, a treatise/taste test on the stuff from 7x7 booze blogger Jordan Mackay. It was a bit of a disappointment to see Franzia declared "undrinkable," especially since Mackay and company only tried "legitimate" varieties, and not even Chillable Red. In the little video segment, one panelist compares the Franzia Chardonnay to, "Sweet, musky cologne that's been washed off by sweat."

Well, guess what, Robert Parker Jr., Franzia happens to be the most popular wine in the world, with 88,019,050 glasses sold in restaurants in 2005. So sip on that. In fact, don't. Its delicate flavors and bouquet would be lost on you.

Cutting Corners: For box wine, it’s back to square one [Chow]

[Photo: Via Diet Ov Worms/flickr]

With the openings of three new steakhouses in the past week or so (Fogo de Chao, Meat Market, and Rare Steakhouse), I began to think, do we really have more steakhouses than the norm per capita, or does it just seem that way?

So I set out to do a highly scientific experiment using MenuPages statistics and 2007 population estimates from the Census Bureau. Here are the numbers for a few of the other MenuPages cities:

• New York City (Manhattan only): 1,611,581 people, 123 steakhouses
• Chicago: 2,833,321 people, 65 steakhouses
• San Francisco: 744,041 people, 27 steakhouses
• Boston: 590,763 people, 25 steakhouses
• Philadelphia: 1,448,394 people, 29 steakhouses

And because I felt the need to throw in at least one city in a more traditionally steak-heavy area, I checked out the Dallas numbers on Citysearch:

• Dallas (not including Ft. Worth or any suburbs): 1,232,940 people, 39 steakhouses

When you divide these up into number-of-people-for-every steakhouse terms, Manhattan, not surprisingly, comes out winning; the city has long been renowned for its steakhouses (and the rest of its dining scene, but, well, that's a different post). On the island, there are 13,102 residents per steakhouse.

The surprise on the list is Chicago, which also has a reputation for great steakhouses. There, the number is 43,589 people per steakhouse. That's the second-highest after only Philadelphia. Dallas falls somewhere in the middle, with 31,613 people for every steakhouse.

Now on to South Florida. I count 188 steakhouses (including the three most recent additions) in Miami-Dade, Broward, Palm Beach and Monroe counties; the combined population for these four counties is 5,538,594. That gives us a figure of 29,460 people for every steakhouse. That's a pretty low starting point. Let's divide it up by county (excluding Monroe):

• Miami-Dade: 2,402,208 people, 72 steakhouses
• Broward: 1,787,636 people, 47 steakhouses
• Palm Beach 1,274,013 people, 58 steakhouses

Palm Beach definitely wins: that's 21,965 people for every steakhouse in the county. Then I thought, the greatest concentration of steakhouses is likely in the cities of Miami and Miami Beach, so I went and added the populations of those cities up (494,755) and divided by the number of steakhouses (32) and came up with 15,461 people for every steakhouse, which is very close to that Manhattan number.

So yes, South Florida, compared to other parts of the country, we do have an inordinate number of steakhouses, and new ones keep opening all the time, despite the fact that the economy is tanking and it's perpetually bikini weather down here. It's mind-boggling, really.

Fogo de Chao [MenuPages]
Fogo de Chao [Official Site]
Meat Market [Official Site]
Rare Steakhouse [MenuPages]
Rare Steakhouse [Official Site]

* I used people per steakhouse instead of the reverse because a steakhouse-per-person figure resulted in really tiny decimals. Also, I should note that I am most certainly not a statistician or even very good at math and this "study" took approximately 20 minutes. So, basically, take these findings with a grain of salt.

• The global financial crisis may well lead to a global food shortage, as farms in developing countries may not have enough money to keep on. [Business Day]

• Food industry economists predict that food prices will rise at least 7% in 2009. [Reuters]

• New Hampshire's food banks urgently need more food, as requests have sharply increased in the past few months. [Boston Globe]

• An examination of the practice of tipping raises more questions than it answers. [Wall Street Journal]

• In a strange twist to the standard tainted food story, a brand of dry pet food has sickened humans, but not pets. [New York Times]

It's been two days since Barack Obama won the election, and he is already in the process of populating his cabinet and White House staff. So far, only Rahm Emanuel has been announced as a definite staff member, but the next few weeks are bound to be filled with news of Obama's latest picks. Political picks are exciting, but what of the domestic side of things?

The White House Executive Chef typically weathers changes in administrations, but it's always possible that the Obamas will decide that they want someone else in charge of the kitchen. After all, Walter Scheib presided over the kitchen from 1994-2005, but was asked to leave by First Lady Laura Bush. Why? A 2005 Washington Post article about the change in guard had the following tidbit

Scheib, who had been hired in 1994 by Hillary Rodham Clinton, was told to pack his whisk and go -- a decision he said reflected Mrs. Bush's desire to have her own person in the kitchen. "For better or worse, I'll always be identified as Mrs. Clinton's chef," he said.

Scheib was replaced by the current White House Executive Chef, Cristeta Comerford, who is not only the first ever female to occupy the position, but also the first person of Filipino descent to fill the role. (Perhaps you disagree, but this actually seems very fitting for the new administration.) The same WaPo piece includes Comerford's menu for a dinner with the Indian prime minister which featured chilled asparagus soup and halibut and basmati rice with pistachio nuts and currants, among other things.

Actually, that sounds like something the Obamas might go for! After all, it's well known they are into healthy food and also that their taste skews 'elitist'. Still, with reports swirling that some of their most loyal Chicago friends and family members are going to be making the move to Washington with them, we can't help but entertain fantasies about a Chicago chef following them as well. (There have been rumors about Rick Bayless, chef at Topolobampo, a restaurant that the Obamas often frequent.)

Chefs aside, there are bound to be food and dining changes with the Obamas in town. These past two days, we have read quite a few articles about how the Washington social scene will undergo a transformation. For one, per an article in today's New York Times, Michelle Obama is "a get-it-done-efficiently Rachael Ray type [...] not given to elaborate Martha Stewart-like efforts." Also, alcohol will be admissible anew, since our President-elect is not a recovering alcoholic. (The Baltimore Sun had a blog post earlier this week about the "return" of beer to the White House.)

Toque of the Town: White House Names 1st Female Executive Chef [Washington Post]
Striking a Balance While Becoming a First Family [New York Times]
Topolobampo [MenuPages]
Topolobampo [Official Site]

[Photo: via PhiLAWdelphia]

• "Big personalities, big portions, big prices — nothing is subtle" at Manny's Steakhouse, according to Victoria Pesce Elliott, who pretty much pans the place. Expect lots of testosterone. [Miami Herald]

• Le P'tit Paris isn't quite up to par, despite having the same owners as Le Bouchon du Grove, which is just down the road and serves better French fare. [Miami New Times]

• The Herald reviews Gloria and Emilio Estefan's The Estefan Kitchen and Michelle Bernstein's Cuisine a Latina, both of which will be released this week. The former features more traditional recipes — including many recipes from the Estefan-owned Bongos. [Miami Herald]

• Fork on the Road features Paris Gourmet, a mom-and-pop spot in Hallandale with simple bistro-type fare. And did we mention the homemade desserts? Pastries, petit fours, tarts and cookies — yum! [Miami Herald]

• The rave reviews for Forte Di Asprinio still keep coming in, and while there's usually a good crowd on the weekend, weeknights have been a little slow. Gail Shepherd is asking you to get out of the vote, so to speak, for one of her favorite spots on Clematis St. [Broward-Palm Beach New Times]

• Need a good Pan-Asian fix? Check out one of the four Lemongrass locations (Fort Lauderdale, Delray, Boca and Boynton). [Miami Herald]

Local 10 has a great list of restaurants that are pulling the old bait-and-switch when it comes to fish on the menu. Most offenders that have been cited are using imitation crab meat instead of real crab meat and swai for grouper.

Like Wreck in Marathon, which has grouper on the menu although invoices showed that the restaurant hadn't bought any grouper. Or Thai Sushi Express in Deerfield Beach, which admitted to using tilapia instead of red snapper because "it is the same kind of fish." F&M Cafeteria in Hialeah Gardens is the only one mentioned that used basa instead of grouper; you definitely do not want to eat that, since most basa comes from some very polluted rivers in Southeast Asia.

If you're having trouble figuring out if your fish is actually the fish you ordered, check out an old MP post about telling grouper apart from the fakes.

Restaurants Cited For Switching Fish [Local10]
Grouper, And The Fish That Want To Emulate It [MP: South Florida]

Not normally big on covering fast food chains, we will make an exception for this story about beating KFC's $10 dinner challenge thing because we've been in heated discussions with a friend all week about just this kind of stuff.

The challenge, proposed in a KFC commercial, is that you can't feed a family of four a chicken dinner comparable to the chain's 7-piece offer for $10. A family goes to the store to take the challenge, and finds they can't get the ingredients for less than the fast food meal.

But, and here's the shocker: It seems the ad is misleading!

Grist ran a story last week in which their own writer/chef/grocery maven takes the same challenge, and comes up with more food for less than the $10 in the challenge:

The bottom line? The KFC meal, including Iowa state sales tax of 6 percent, is $10.58. I made the same meal (chicken, four biscuits, mashed potatoes, and gravy) for $7.94 -- and I got three extra pieces of chicken and a carcass to use for soup.

Of course, Friese is also doing this in Iowa. Those of us on the coasts, especially big cities like Boston, San Francisco, and Miami, have to contend with higher grocery (and everything else) prices, while KFC can average out its costs and profits nationally, taking a loss on artificially low prices in some areas while making greater profits in others.

So in the end, reader, the conclusion seems to be that the challenge can be beat, but the question still remains as to whether you can beat it. If you try it out, please let us know how it goes!

Colonel of Truth: How I beat KFC's 'family meal' challenge [Grist]
KFC $10 Challenge [YouTube]

[Photo: Via ninjapoodles/flickr]

• Production has been stopped at a Chinese drug manufacturer after three deaths were linked to the company's herbal supplement. [AP/Chicago Tribune]

• Yes, yes, there will be new cabinet secretaries and whatnot, but what of the new food and entertainment trends to come in Washington? [NY Times]

• Female waitstaff have a hard time of it, dealing with a stressfull job and a host of other nonsense male waiters never do. [LA Times]

• We're looking at a worldwide record wheat harvest. Why is this not fantastic news? [Reuters]

• Finally, a man who dumped a beer over the head of a restaurant employee who was smoking outside his window won't face charges. [Chicago Tribune]

We came across an odd "blog" — it's more like a series of articles, all of which are lists — on a site where one can look up x-ray technical schools. What x-rays have to do with the top 100 yoga and meditation or parenting blogs is unclear, although the 25 Weirdest Things Eaten by a Human is more on topic. (Also, incredibly bizarre. Like the man in France who slowly ate a Cessna over two years' time.)

Anyway, here's what caught our attention: the 100 Foods No Environmentalist Should Ever Eat. It starts off easy enough: avoid 1) highly packaged food, 2) highly processed food and 7) out of season food. Then there's this:

Conventional food: Conventionally grown foods use pesticides that can get into our waterways and other parts of the environment. It is also believed to have fewer nutrients than organic food.

Organic food: While organic food tends to be cleaner for the environment, it’s often more energy intensive and inefficiently produced.

Um, OK. No milk, imported wine, or coffee for you either. And while we're on beverages...

Too much water: Water is a precious resource, and although many health experts recommend consuming as much water as you can, drinking more than you need is wasteful.

Yes, because your having a second glass of water with lunch is what is draining our water supply. Not, oh, say, thirsty golf courses. The list goes on and on: no veggie burgers, tea bags, chips, soda, candy bars, canned foods, Girl Scout cookies, rice, bread, meat, cheese, eggs, apples, potatoes, strawberries, celery, peaches, spinach, sugar, yogurt, ice cream, honey, olives and vegetable oil. And that's just a partial list — there's more. It's like this woman starting researching the potential ills of different types of food and just slapped them all into one document, while failing to realize that when viewed as a whole, the list leaves people to eat a diet of ... nothing. Well, maybe not nothing. Enjoy your lettuce and tomato salad tonight (only if they're grown in your backyard). And no, you're not allowed any dressing.

The 100 Foods No Environmentalist Should Ever Eat [x Ray Technician Schools]

A great vegetarian restaurant will open in Miami. Hey, if an African-American with the middle name “Hussein” can get elected President, anything can happen. Repeat after me: Yes it can! Yes it can! Yes it can!

– Lee Klein in Riptide

Cita's Italian Chophouse is now offering lunch on weekdays and brunch on Saturdays and Sundays. On the menu: green eggs and ham. (Don't worry; they make it green with pesto.) Or you can go a less-Seussian route with blueberry pancakes, buttermilk waffles, croissant French toast or grilled steak and eggs.

Lunch will be served Monday through Friday from noon until 3 p.m., and brunch will be Saturdays and Sundays 9 a.m. to 3 p.m.

Cita's Italian Chophouse [MenuPages]
Cita's Italian Chophouse [Official Site]

Did you stay up late over last night's election? Cheering on your guy or practicing your stalwart-but-gracious attitude of concession? We sure did.

So please forgive us if, this morning, we're a bit electioned out. Too much nerves, too much shouting, too much politics. This calls for a very simple story involving a distant country, hilarious ingredients, and nothing whatever having to do with our recent change in leadership:

Via Serious Eats, we've been chuckling about a small AP item that came quietly out of Switzerland during the United States' election turmoil yesterday: Police in a rural area near Kuettigen, alerted by emergency calls, followed a trail of blood along a rural road:

A police statement Tuesday said officers followed the blood for 12 miles to the town of Kuettigen only to find that a butcher's supply van had spilled its cargo.

A barrel of pork blood had overturned inside. The van had been headed for a local sausage factory.

Naturally, this has us thinking about black pudding, that European sausage made from cooking down the meat filling with blood. For some reason, it's just not that popular stateside, but you can often get it at British or Irish pubs, and it's great hangover fare, which you may need today if you took last night's election parties a little too far. Check out the Paddy's mixed grill at Paddy Mac's Unique Irish Restaurant & Pub which comes with black pudding, or the black-and-white pudding breakfast at Slainte.

Swiss Police Look For Blood Trail, Find Pork [Serious Eats]
Swiss police follow blood trail and find bacon [AP]
Paddy Mac's Unique Irish Restaurant & Pub [MenuPages]
Slainte [MenuPages]
Slainte [Official Site]

[Photo: Via For The Thrill Of It]

• Kids who have at least one parent who smokes are more likely to be underfed and undernourished, according to a new study. Apparently cigarette money is coming out of the food budget, which is tragic. [Washington Post]

• Newark gets its own Zagat guide! [Newsday]

• A priest and two nuns walk into a restaurant ... and beat up the manager. Seriously! It happened in Italy. [BBC]

• Meet the cacao farmers of the Kallari cooperative, a group in Ecuador that eliminates all middlemen by producing and marketing their own chocolate. [NYT]

• Lots of people say China's melamine problem is only going to get worse. [Time]

A while back, MenuPages reported on a group in Lebanon who were planning to sue Israel for the rights to hummus. And apparently this agitation over the origins of hummus came to the attention of everyone's favorite Election Day Personality, Ralph Nader. Who apparently is running for president today (who knew?!), and used the Great Hummus War Of 2008 as a fundraising hook:

...My mother Rose was born in Lebanon.

And she made perhaps the best hummus I’ve ever had.

And I’ve had a lot of hummus.

Hummus is nutritious.

And delicious.

It makes you stronger and healthier.

So, Bloomberg’s report on the Lebanese claim to hummus got me to thinking about an idea that would help us raise funds to push our substantive agenda onto the front burner of American politics.

Here it is:

If you donate ... we’ll e-mail to you Rose Nader’s hummus recipe tomorrow.

My Mom’s Hummus Recipe

That simple.

My Mom’s Hummus Recipe [VoteNader, via Endless Simmer]

[Photo: Hummus and falafel from the Abu Nader restaurant in St Paul, MN, (no relation!) via anthonylibrarian's Flickr]

Previously
National: Lebanon, Israel Battle Over Hummus

Need a place to get a drink tonight? Try the Hilton Ft Lauderdale Beach Resort, where cocktails will be two for the price of one from 6 p.m. until 10 p.m. tonight. The polls on the west coast won't even be closed by then, so you'll have plenty of time to get home and watch the results come in. Oh, and there are free tapas too, each one inspired by the presidential and vice presidential candidates. Can you guess which dish belongs to whom?

A) Sour milk biscuits and poached chicken
B) Soft flour tacos with sauteed beef tenderloin
C) Braised pork belly and cranberries
D) Seared halibut with snow peas, crab and ginger

And over at Sushi Samba Dromo, appetizer-sized specials are $2-4 all day long. Vote for your preferred candidate with your drink choice; there's the Obamarama (lemon, blueberries, sugar, blueberry vodka, Blue Curacao, club soda) and the Maverick (raspberries, sugar, raspberry rum, Triple sec, Grenadine, unsweetened white tea). Honestly, both drinks sound good, so I imagine there will be more crossing of party lines than usual.

For more parties, check the Election Party Guide at Miami.com.

Sushi Samba Dromo [MenuPages]
Sushi Samba Dromo [Official Site]
Hilton Ft Lauderdale Beach Resort [Official Site]
Election Party Guide [Miami.com]

*Answers: A) Joe Biden, B) John McCain, C) Barack Obama, D) Sarah Palin

At the 7-Eleven across the street, the voting results seemed more immediately apparent. “Sorry, we’re out of Obama cups,” the cashier informed an inquiring customer. A stack of red John McCain cups remained.

– Patrice Yursik, in an election-day report from a Kendall polling place

There's something to be said for bribery, especially when you're the one getting bribed, and especially when the currency is sweets and coffee. That was the theory, as you may have read in today's FYI, of Krispy Kreme, Starbucks, and Ben & Jerry's, when they announced free goodies to people who show an "I voted" sticker.

But then, a Washington State elections official named Captain Buzzkill put it out there that it's kind of illegal to reward people for voting. The Associated Press reports:

David Ammons, spokesman for the state elections division of Washington state, had said earlier that a promotion tied to whether people voted could be construed as rewarding someone for voting and could violate federal and state law. He said the state's attorney general's office contacted Starbucks about the issue on Monday.

Krispy Kreme seems the most sullen about the bribing kibosh:

Krispy Kreme is giving star-shaped doughnuts with red, white and blue sprinkles to anyone who mentions the promotion, said spokeswoman Ayana Hernandez, but they won't be required to show an "I voted" sticker.

The company's 85 company-owned stores will be participating, along with an unknown number of its 145 franchisees, she said. Krispy Kreme estimates it'll give away about 200,000 of the doughnuts.

"It's just another way to give customers a free doughnut," Hernandez said. "It's not in any way tied to you have to be a member of a certain party, political party or anything like that."

[Image: Via Krispy Kreme]

• China's food-safety concerns aren't likely to go away any time soon, thanks to massive supply chains and spotty enforcement. [Time]

• A California couple blog about what it's like to live on $1/day and make the New York Times. (Meanwhile, countless billions worldwide do the same and yet somehow don't quite fly at radar level.) [NYTimes]

• OMFG: A Haitian migrant resorted to cannibalism while adrift for two weeks en route to Puerto Rico — he and three others are the only ones of the 33 in the boat who survived. [AP/Tribune]

• Just like in politics, food brands are unafraid to run smear campaigns against their rivals. [NYTimes

• Hunters in South Dakota can donate their excess venison and antelope meat to local food pantries! Neato! [KXMC News]

Bonus 6!
• In a groundbreaking synergistic move, the MenuPages blog network has formed secret alliances with Starbucks, Krispy Kreme, and Ben and Jerry's — go in today with proof of voting and they'll give you free food. You're also welcome to let them know how much you love MP, but it's not required. [AP/Tribune]

We haven't been able to tear ourselves away from the fascinating OCD diet, to which we were directed by Coldmud. It's absolutely disgusting, but so amazing: The only requirement is that all foods rhyme, so you get meals like waffles with offal and lamb's heart treacle tart. Now, why it has to be stuff like that, when you could have, say, steamed greens and pinto beans, or scrambled eggs and chicken legs or something else vaguely disappointing but not necessarily gut-wrenching, we couldn't say. It certainly wouldn't be as hilarious.

As it is, the diet seems to have worked, most likely because it's impossible to eat too much of things like ham, spam and jam flan, described thus:

This dish is a real winner in terms of rhymability. It also looks pretty awesome if you put a little effort in - and pardon me, but who the fuck knew Spam smelt so damn good!?! Sadly it tastes like shit. It's also missing vegetables, again (I really wanted to add a yam, but they don't sell them at Tescos). I just about managed half a flan before I began to feel physically ill.

But this got us thinking, could you do the same exercise at restaurants? It seems you'd have to rhyme your food with the name of the restaurant, in order to keep the same cadence as OCDD's dishes. So, one could live on yum gai at Bow Thai or tamago (and masago) at Japango. Or feast on croquetas de jamón at Don Ramón.

The OCD Diet [Official Site]
Bow Thai [MenuPages]
Japango [MenuPages]
Japango [Official Site]
Don Ramón [MenuPages]

[Photo: Via The OCD Diet]

You'll remember him from Top Chef's Season 3, where he wowed the judges with his pork dishes and earned a nickname that will grace the awning of his soon-to-open barbecue restaurant in North Miami. We caught up with Kleinberg to talk about the restaurant, the economy and his new-found affinity for bulldogs.

MP: So, Bulldog BBQ. When are you planning to open?
Howie: We’re about a month away from opening. We’re finalizing our build out and getting details taken care of. It’s smooth sailing from here as far as I can see. We’ve been working on it full time for five or six months. Until you go through the process, you never know what kind of bumps you’re going to run into. We’re happy with where we are.

MP: Why a barbecue restaurant?
Howie: I did a lot of soul searching after the show. A lot of people were saying, ‘you need to go to New York, you need to go to Europe.’ And I said I want to do honest simple food and get back to what excites me about cooking: feeding people. And I think the trend I’m seeing is a lot of chefs are going into more comfort foods, especially with the economy the way it is.

There’s never been great barbecue or any real barbecue to speak of in this area. I used to spend summers in the Carolinas with my family, and when we came home, we could never find barbecue. One day, my partners and I were sitting around having a conversation about the restaurant, and it kind of sparked.

MP: Tell me about the menu. Which region most influences the ‘cue?
Howie: Mostly based in the Carolinas, but we’re going to have a Texas-style brisket. We’re not going to tie ourselves down. A little bit of the best parts of all the different types of barbecue. In this area, you’ll get a lot of Jewish clientele, and a lot of people aren’t going to want pork. And as a chef, I never want to be pigeonholed into doing one style of cuisine. So it will be mostly Carolinas but will borrow from some other regions.

MP: What's the smoker setup like?
Howie: We'll be doing hickory wood smoking. It's a small space, so we've got cabinet smokers. I think a lot of barbecue places tend to oversmoke; they'll leave the meat in there eight to ten hours and then you end up tasting a piece of charcoal. I'm not going to be a slave to any recipe. My brisket is a cross between Jewish brisket and Texas brisket. We’re going to get that smoke and that flavor, but just adjust it to our taste. Every chef and every person has their own thoughts on food, and this is just one of mine.

MP: Is the menu mostly set, or are you still working on it?
Howie: The menu is 99 percent done. We’re going to have great sides. One of the things we want to do is offer great salads, some good sandwiches. You can’t eat barbecue over and over again, especially not in South Florida where everyone’s watching their weight. It’s not just barbecue; it’s a cuisine that’s going to give me an opportunity to be creative. I know what this neighborhood wants, and they want a place where they have options.

We’re going to have Southern grits, skirt steak, a hot dog, a hamburger, and a couple of interesting sandwiches. We’re going to do a wedge salad, a Southern-style steak Caesar salad, cornmeal-crusted oysters, and our version of chicken wings. We’re not going to be the Cheesecake Factory and have a page of salads, but we’ll have three or four options.

MP: Are you apprehensive at all about opening a restaurant in this economic climate?
Howie: You always have to be a little apprehensive, but I think the concept is right for the economy. The economy is bad, but I still eat out and I see plenty of other people eating out. They’re going to eat out less, but the onus is on the chef to provide value on the dollar.

MP: You’ve really embraced the bulldog nickname. Did anyone ever call you that prior to Top Chef?
Howie: It was the first time, and I really kind of liked it. I’m a dog lover, and what I know about bulldogs is that they’re loyal and tenacious and they have a lot of fight in them, and that they are a little misunderstood. I actually have adopted a bulldog recently, and there are so many characteristics that we share. Sara [Mair] really hit the nail on the head. So when I decided on a barbecue place, the name just kind of all fell into place.

We are a multi-talented group here at MenuPages. We eat a lot, we edit menu content, we even blog. But did you know we also go home and do other stuff? For example, MenuPages Boston editor Leila Cohan likes to write comedy sketches that she then produces with her troupe, Rhoda. In fact, they just finished the following. See if you can pick out the influence of Leila's day job:

"Single and cooking is not about me burdening you with my problems. It's about making beautiful meals, so that's just what we're going to do today. Let's see, step one: crack open a beer." Hilarious. Though for some reason we're a little pessimistic about Single and Cooking's chances of getting picked up by the Food Network. Now, when they start the Passive Aggression Network, look out!

Rhoda [Official Site]

• Have just one night in South Beach? Head to Sardinia Ristorante. [Chowhound]

• Chad shares his recipe for barbecued marshmallows. No, not barbecued over an open fire, but marshmallows with barbecue sauce in them. [Chadzilla]

• Please help this LA native with some restaurant suggestions; he'll be here tomorrow as an election monitor in the Hialeah area. [Chowhound]

• Natalie's pumpkin pie creme brulee looks delicious! [Natalie's Nibbles]

• The New Times' Pairings event is coming up, so get your tickets online soon! [Short Order]

• The owner of a five-table restaurant in Hastings-on-Hudson, NY is trying out a novel solution to keep his restaurant afloat. He's selling "V.I.P. cards" for his restaurant, which entitle card holders to free meals up until they consume the price of the card plus 20% (they start at $500 and go up to $10,000). Like a CSA, but for restaurants! [NYT]

• The newest 100-calorie snack pack on the block is a diet-friendly packet of Twinkies. Each contains three bite-size morsels of hyper-processed goodness and is expected to do well in this economy &mdash because people are packing lunches, and all. [AP/Boston Globe]

• China seized and destroyed 3,600 tons of melamine-tainted animal feed this weekend. Really, China? Really? We'd say that it's getting embarrassing, but it is so far past that point that there really aren't any jokes to be made. [NYT]

• Profits are up by 2% at Burger King. It's nothing but a hunch, but could this be tied to the economy? [Chicago Tribune]

• On the other hand, Ferran Adrià purports to be puzzled and bemused by all this talk of a financial crisis, because people are still clamoring to eat at El Bulli, as well as posh London restaurants like Pied a Terre. [Bloomberg]