As a child of 13, I went to the Elephant Bar in Palm Desert and loved the perpetually moving straw fans on the ceiling. Of course, that was all it took for me to like a restaurant at the age of 13. Now things are a little different. Those fans still cater to my easily distracted mind, but my taste buds require something more. A quick look at the menu made me feel like the Elephant Bar was suffering from mild schizophrenia. While most of the menu was filled with American fare, for some reason a whole page was devoted to Asian stir-fry-esque meals. This threw me off and made me feel like this place wasn’t made for Asian food. I flipped back to the American comfort zone and found what I wanted.
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‘california’
Being Seasonal at Mimi’s Cafe
February 4th, 2010 Tweet Facebook Digg Stumble RedditRecently I paid a visit to the desert, aka Rancho Mirage, to visit my grandparents. For dinner one night we headed to Mimi’s Cafe, which is apparently a chain that I had never heard of and was very appropriate for a meal with the grandparents. This was all new to me, though, so I was excited to see an entirely new menu of good food. It was obviously prepared with the health-conscious in mind, since it had its own little healthy section. Some of this section was even unvegan, but I was not in the mood for health. Instead, I found my way to their seasonal menu and their Brie Chicken.
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Legendary Meat at Langer’s Deli
December 21st, 2009 Tweet Facebook Digg Stumble RedditAll-too-often restaurants claim to have “the best” blah blah blah in the world, but sometimes there is a restaurant that makes no claim to have the best of anything and lets the customers tell the good news. Langer’s Deli is one of the latter. Located in the not-so-posh neighborhood of MacArthur Park, Langer’s has become known for their pastrami. Many who have tried it have claimed it is the best ever, so to do the unvegan world a favor, I had to try it out myself.
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Road Tripping to the Mad Greek Cafe
November 30th, 2009 Tweet Facebook Digg Stumble RedditMy usual drive to Las Vegas involves getting there as fast as possible to gamble and returning as fast as possible to cry into my pillowcase after losing copious amounts of money. This trip, however, was a bit different. Rather than a rush back home, we took our time and stopped for lunch.
Anyone who has made the drive between Los Angeles and Las Vegas knows of the Mad Greek Cafe. Billboards seem to advertise the “Best Gyro” every few miles, so for our little road trip lunch, we thought a trip to Baker, California and a stop at the Mad Greek Cafe would be worth our while.
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Not Quite the Best of Mediterranean
November 18th, 2009 Tweet Facebook Digg Stumble RedditIt was a night for delivery and looking through LAbite, we found a good-looking Mediterranean place to order from it was called Best of Mediterranean (BOM), which is quite a boast to be put in a name, even for a place in West Hollywood. Obviously a place by that name had to be checked out. I was too hungry for a schwarma sandwich, so I ordered the chicken schwarma dinner plate. This came with hummos, tabouli, rice and garlic sauce. Knowing that tabouli is some strange mix of greens, I tried to order without it, but the website wouldn’t allow me. This was a big fail on the part of both LAbite and BOM, because many other restaurants allow you to customize dishes. Unfortunately, I knew that vegetables would be dying for my sake that night and wouldn’t even have the pleasure of being digested.
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Even Jim Cramer Likes Carl’s Jr.
June 3rd, 2009A friend of mine told me that Jim Cramer did a special on Mad Money about Hardee’s/Carl’s Jr. Apparently he loves their stock, but “…wouldn’t enter a Carl’s unless 24’s Tony Almeida had planted a canister full of pathogen there, millions of lives were on the line and [he] was the only person who could diffuse it.”
As a result, Andy Puzder (the CEO) came on the show to talk with Cramer about his company, their burgers and, most importantly, their sexy ads with Padma Lakshmi and Paris Hilton. In the end, Cramer tried one of their burgers and loved it.
Looks like I’m not the only one who enjoys a burger from Carl’s Jr.
A Biblical Valentine
This year I got biblical for Valentine’s Day. No, not like that you sicko. Instead of having a boring, fancy meal with my girlfriend, we decided to get cooking. And not just any kind of cooking, we decided to use Lobel’s Meat Bible, which was sent to me by Chronicle Books a few months ago for free. I knew this book would be incredible just based on the cover, but the back cover really sealed the deal for me because it says, “Armed with Lobel’s Meat Bible, carnivores will find themselves with more delectable meaty choices than ever before.” Mmmm meaty choices.
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