While Walnut Street in Shadyside is the typical haunt of my fellow students, Highland is another street in Shadyside that has a lot to offer. One of those offerings is Buffalo Blues, a sports bar with a fair amount of food options that you might expect at such a place. Wings dominate the menu, but there are also burgers, sandwiches and a few other things for those not so inclined towards the wings.

I, however, am a man who often inclines towards wings and this meal was no different. The food was a little expensive when compared to the beer prices, but still nothing to complain about. I ordered ten wings and chose two sauces. The first was Spicy Garlic and the other was Wet Cajun (their regular Red Hot sauce with a Cajun rub). Neither one disappointed. The wings were reasonably meaty and both went well in the blue cheese dressing. As usual, they came with celery, which I often fail to order without, but went untouched. Fortunately, celery is one of those veggies that doesn’t affect the outcome of the meal, but is still an annoyance.

I also have to put a plug in here for the Buffalo Blue Fries, which I had here on a later visit. These fries are topped with an incredible spicy blue cheese dip and pulled chicken and hit the spot no matter what mood I’m in. They eat like a meal, but they are also acceptable as an appetizer to split with a bunch of people. They will likely be the end of me.

So yeah, the wings were good enough to bring me back, but that dip is the real winner at Buffalo Blues. As a bonus, the place is slowly being converted into a Michigan bar.

Everyone knows The Cheesecake Factory for their namesake. And those people are also probably aware that The Cheesecake Factory is a full-on restaurant with a restaurant about as massive its portions. Sadly, when I went to Cheesecake in Beverly Hills, my stomach wasn’t treating me as well as it usually does. So naturally, as an unvegan, I turned to fried chicken. Yeah, that’s right.

So what fried chicken did I turn to? Cajun Chicken Littles.

At 13.95, these seemed to be well-priced and the sides of succotash and mashed potatoes seemed agreeable to my ways. But I have to say that this was not an easy decision. Like I said before, the menu is just immense and the portions are huge, so calling the chicken “littles” seemed perfect for a meal that I wasn’t very hungry for.

Well I was way off. While the pieces of chicken could (in some alternate universe) be considered little, the portion most certainly was not. On my plate I found a stack of 14 pieces of chicken. Yes, 14! Plus the mashed potatoes and succotash. No small portion indeed. I started my attempt to chip away at the chicken portion and realized I could do little damage, due to my hunger. Nonetheless, this did not get in the way of my enjoyment of the little I did eat. The breading had been fried to the perfect crisp and while these were essentially chicken strips, there was definitely a touch of Cajun spice in them. I would ordinarily have liked some stronger spice, but I think my tender stomach was happy the flavor was so subtle.

I was glad to see that the succotash was mostly corn and made sure to pick away at said corn while avoiding peppers, cucumbers and whatever other terrible veggies they decided to throw in. The mashed potatoes were packed with delicious skin and a flavor that needed no salt. They made a delicious side and certainly would have been a perfect buffer if the chicken had been spicy enough to require one.

So despite my stomach, I really did enjoy my Cheesecake Factory experience. The leftover chicken sustained me for two more meals and although the subsequently reheated chicken wasn’t as good as the original, I was still quite impressed. I’d love to head back to Cheesecake on a better stomach to tackle the Cajun Chicken Littles in one sitting, but this time I’ll be sure to ask them to add some more kick.

Tuckered out after a day of rides, standing in line and more rides, the girlfriend and I headed to Downtown Disney for some fine dining. We ended up at Ralph Brennan’s Jazz Kitchen, a New Orleans-style restaurant. The menu was pretty pricey, even for Downtown Disney, but with my 20% discount, we figured the meal wasn’t outside our price range. We took a seat in their upper level and decided what to order. When the waiter came, I was struggling a bit.

There were some delicious-looking entrees, but each one had a vegetable with it that was not welcome on my plate. The Grilled Medallions of Beef came with bacon and pecan-crusted green beans, while the Black and Blue Filet Mignon had butter-poached asparagus. Leaning more towards the medallions because at least their veggies had bacon, I decided to ask the waiter about substituting. Flashing a Disney smile, he told me I could substitute any of the sides. This pushed me over to the filet ($33), and I substituted the nasty greens for some andouille grits. The filet also came with blue cheese dauphinoise potatoes and was topped with a blueberry-Merlot demi glace. This all seemed to add up to tastiness.

Although I was content with just the filet, the waiter made a quick pitch for their Southern Garlic Cheese Bread ($8) and made it sound so good we had to order it. The bread came out relatively quick and looked beautiful. Cheese was oozing from the inside and I snagged a piece as quickly as I could. It tasted good, but something was missing. The waiter obviously noticed and pointed out the lemon on the plate. He told us it was strange, but effective, so I gave it a shot. And he was right. The lemon added a delicious new dimension to the bread that really made the order worthwhile.

Then came my filet and it looked beautiful. Sitting in a pool of blueberry whatever glaze, I sliced off a piece and found it was cooked perfect. The beef melted in my mouth and the blueberry stuff enhanced the flavor rather than masked it. After a few delicious bites, I took a break from the steak and tried out the sides. The grits turned out to be a delicious companion and also tasted great in the blueberry sauce. I just love that mix of sweet and salty. The potatoes were also an awesome part of the meal. Stacked neatly and sliced into perfect layers, the blue cheese made these potatoes very interesting. I’m more partial to regular old au gratin potatoes, but mixing in some blue cheese wasn’t such a bad thing.

Overall, I was a very impressed unvegan. This was definitely a restaurant that could stand alone outside of Disney. Then it came time to pay and I handed over my badge to get my discount. The bill with the discount applied came back and left us confused. I asked the waiter if the tip had been included and he adamantly stated it wasn’t, then he realized why I was asking. Only 10% had been discounted and apparently that was the policy of the Jazz Kitchen. Somehow they set themselves up a on a pedestal above the rest of Disneyland and didn’t offer the full 20% discount. This left a bad taste in my mouth, but fortunately the meal was good enough that the taste didn’t linger. I probably won’t be back to Jazz Kitchen out of principle, but it is certainly worth trying if you aren’t expecting to get 20% off. And even without any discount, the food is pretty worth it.

On day final of my sojourn into Boston, I lunched at Joe’s American Bar & Grill, a casual restaurant with a nice outdoor seating area. We took a table outside to enjoy one of the last remaining nice days in Boston’s summer season and then got down to menu business.

We arrived around that strange hour where you’re not sure if you want breakfast or lunch, so we were given both the Brunch menu and the lunch menu. After long deliberation between the menus, I settled upon lunch and the Blackened Chicken Sandwich. This sandwich was made with Cajun spices, cheddar and sauteed onions. It also came with all the typical sandwich fixing, like lettuce, tomato and pickles. I ordered mine without any of those, and also no fancy onions.

Luckily for Joe’s, my meal was prepared to my perfect specifications. The chicken was good, but the Cajun spices could have used a bit more kick. Overall though, Joe’s was a very safe restaurant choice for a casual American food lover like myself.