‘Bacon’
It might not quite be new anymore, but Public School 310 in Culver City isn’t showing any signs of slowing down. With its novelty school theme, beer menu and interesting food menu, it is a place I definitely had to check out. So check it out I did, with a huge group that gave me the opportunity me sample a bit more than I usually would. This was certainly going to be a change from the food used to eat growing up in public schools.
Once upon a time I was a student at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. Sure, Ann Arbor may be famous for having the school, but it is almost as famous for having a little deli called Zingerman’s. Well, back in 2003 they opened a non-deli restaurant called Zingerman’s Roadhouse far off campus and I paid them a visit. At the time, all I needed to be happy was a $1 slice of pizza (okay very little has changed) and I wasn’t much for the fancy stuff. So, at the time Zingerman’s Roadhouse did very little for me and simply didn’t feel special.
Hot’s Kitchen in Hermosa Beach recently made the news for finding a loophole in the California’s foie gras ban. And while this reminded me of the place, it had originally made the news to me a year or so ago when my buddy told me they had an awesome selection of burgers and wings. Not knowing totally what to expect of the place, I set out with the wife on an adventure and found the city of Hermosa Beach as dead as the zombie apocalypse.
Slater’s 50/50 first jumped on my radar when they released the ‘Merica Burger back in July. This burger was composed of an entire bacon patty, loaded up with even more bacon. But Slater’s, only existed in Orange County and San Diego, thus only serving these burgers down there. The opportunity for a ‘Merica passed me by, but just a couple weeks ago Slater’s opened their first outpost in LA County. Sure, it’s probably just as far away from me as Orange County, seeing as it’s in Pasadena, but I didn’t want to miss out on the place and met up with some fellow burger lovers for lunch.
Sometimes you find a restaurant that seems like it was made just for you. I don’t mean that everything tastes good, or you go there regularly. No, I mean that you look at the menu and get the impression that the chef was thinking of you when they came up with every dish on it. That’s the feeling Fat Sal’s Deli (which isn’t really a deli) gave me when I first looked upon their menu.
As a man who loves to take down burgers, I was a pretty excited man when Short Order rolled into town at The Farmers Market next to The Grove. But then the mixed reviews came in and I pushed Short Order down in my burger eating priority list. It didn’t help that it wasn’t exactly in a part of town that I find myself in too often. My chance came when meeting some friends from the East Side and I was ready to see how it would stack up to those mixed reviews.
Until my most recent visit to Phoenix, the only Windsors in my mind were a Canadian city across the river from Detroit, a castle in England and way to tie a tie. But now I know better, because the Windsor in Phoenix that Heather and Albert brought me to rivals all of the other Windsors combined. Why? This Windsor has possibly the most productivity-annihilating happy hour I’ve ever experienced. From 11 am to 5 pm, Windsor offers wine, cocktails and mini beer pitchers for the low price of 5 bucks. In other words, lunch break becomes drunk break.
In Phoenix and in need of anything not called cold cuts, I found myself at Delux Burger. With a pleasant blue-colored theme, the look of the restaurant was almost cooling in the sweltering Arizona summer. The air conditioning didn’t hurt either. The three of us each took a stool at the counter that runs through the middle of the restaurant. Strangely, the stools were nailed to the ground and I found myself sitting much closer to the random dude next to me than I would have liked, but figured he was a good man and burger lover due to his being at Delux.
My story of breakfast from Corner Cottage in Burbank is one of blind trust and bacon. My morning started out like any other when I received one of the greatest text messages of my life. It read:
“Hey Zack. I’m going to pick up a burrito from Corner Cottage this morning. Want one? Bacon, sausage or even double bacon is really good.”
It came from one of my coworkers and my response was a “Hell yeah!” followed by a request for double bacon and to avoid all vegetables. Like most well-informed and educated people in the world, he was aware of my meat blog and disdain for vegetables, but I still had to make the request.
I like to think of myself as a simple man. My needs are simple and if you’ve noticed by my food blogging, I am often happier with a simple, well-executed meal that gourmet nonsense. Because of this, I was intrigued by Simplethings in Mid City despite the fact that they took a seemingly simplistic name and made it into one word. Simplethings bills itself as a sandwich and pie shop (restaurant), which both also seem simple, but not here.