Because it's a darn good barbecue restaurant! Laura and I spotted it on Tennessee Street, where Carlos' Cuban Cafe stood for many years, and brings back high school memories of Leon for me. *sniff* Now that location is the home of "Up In Smoke", a BBQ joint with a cute sign that sputters smoke out of the top of it sometimes. It just opened in the last week or two apparently, so we decided to give it a try.
The place is surprisingly spacious compared to how it looks from the outside, and for that matter, for how cluttered the parking lot is. There were hardly one or two spaces left for us to park during the lunch rush, and yet when we made our way inside, we were lead to a completely empty bar area - the rest of the restaurant was packed though. Apparently their bar serves beer and wine, duly noted. But for the lunch break, we came to eat. We also noticed they serve hot wings, but we resisted the temptation... we came here for barbecue, and I was determined to have ribs.
The menu posed a good variety, and many cleverly named items, some creative approaches too. One of the first two things that caught us were among the side items: Four cheese pretzel Mac, and Cucumber and onion salad. Laura ordered a pulled pork plate, and I opted for a 3-combo platter, choosing ribs, 1/4 chicken, and a hot sausage. We both went with the intriguing side items. Like any good BBQ restaurant, Up In Smoke makes a handful of its own sauces: regular, sweet, hot, and mustard. We couldn't wait to try these.
But before applying sauce to anything, we had to see what it was like on its own. Laura didn't fare as well as I did... her pulled pork, while it tasted good, was a little on the tough side. On the other hand, I brought home quite the haul. The ribs fell off the bone like they ought to, in fact, when I got to the sauce tests, I couldn't keep the meat ON the bone long enough to sauce it - gravity did all the work for me. More importantly, the dry rub that they used on the ribs and the chicken was absolutely superb! You can taste it a lot stronger on the chicken though, it was rather subdued on the ribs, but you could still taste it. It's a nice, complex, smokey and dull spicy flavor, perhaps Mesquite, except the only Mesquite I'm familiar with comes on a potato chip. :( But it tasted a lot like that, strong without being overpowering, very rich. The sausage was fairly hot, and very beefy, reminded me of an Andouille sausage, which it may have been, but wasn't labeled as such. As far as the sauces went, they weren't terribly impressive, but not bad either. The "normal" sauce is surprisingly sweet, in fact we debated whether or not it was actually sweeter than the "sweet" sauce. It seemed rather vinegar based, probably a lot of molasses. Good, though, and my second favorite sauce among them. The sweet sauce tasted similar, maybe with a touch of honey in it, and again, arguably as sweet as the regular sauce or a little less, even. The "hot" BBQ sauce was rather disappointing for us, as spicy food veterans, in fact we could hardly tell if it had any spice in it. At least it wasn't sweet like the normal sauce, but it certainly wasn't hot. The mustard BBQ sauce might be the best, though it was fairly similar to run of the mill honey mustard, just a bit smokier. To be honest, the dry rub is so good that I hardly used the sauces after I'd tried them all, just a dab to moisten the meat a bit, and mostly I just enjoyed the excellent dry rub it came with.
The side items were pretty good. The mac and cheese was a little underwhelming, only in the sense that when we saw "pretzel" in the title, we got our hopes really high. Truth is, it's standard - but very good - creamy macaroni and cheese with various noodle types, drizzled on top with crumbled pretzel as a breading or crust, like an old fashioned mac n' cheese. But really, it just tasted like any old bread crumbs, it wasn't particularly salty or had any "baked" flavor, if it added any flavor at all. It really was just texture, a very mild crunch. However, don't misunderstand me as an overall rating, it was good macaroni and cheese! Just don't let "pretzel" fool you into thinking it's really fancy, in fact if it intimidates you, don't let it. As for the cucumber and onion salad, I really enjoyed it, Laura wasn't about it. In fact it's similar to a cucumber salad recipe that's been in my family for years. They take carve up cucumber into chips and slice some white onions, then let it soak in a mixture of sour cream and vinegar, which winds up being a rather thin "soup", and throw in a few other subtle spices, probably just salt and pepper. It was rather tangy and a little sour, approaching the taste of a pickle, but much more smooth rather than tart. I thought it was delicious, but you should probably know what you're getting into.
I should also mention that the service was very quick and accommodating. We will definitely be revisiting so that Laura can try some of the other things, and so I can try the rest of the options, and both of us need to see what their hot wings are like! The prices were reasonable, and I had plenty of food on the combination platter. And as mentioned, there are a good handful of other creative-looking items on there that I'm dying to try. And quite honestly, that dry rub alone is enough of a trump card that I might not be visiting Sonny's any time soon. Again, the quality of their meat was top notch, and slow cooked to perfection, the way good authentic barbecue should be. Up In Smoke, Tallahassee's newest BBQ restaurant, is located at 402 E Tennessee St next to Leon High School.
Wednesday, October 19, 2011
Monday, October 25, 2010
Monk's Train Wreck Wings Had Many Survivors
Laura spotted on the menu at Monk's that they had wings for an appetizer, with a small selection of flavors that were surprisingly unique and varied, but among them "Train Wreck" jumped out at her. It was described as "a fiery collision in your mouth". As usual we were very skeptical, but then again, the Idareya wings lived up to their promise. We decided to challenge ourselves to this as well, having already survived that.
Before we move on, in case you haven't heard about it, Monk's is a little bar and grill on Tharpe St. near High Rd. that is very popular with the college and grad student crowd. For a small place, it's always packed at nights, and there's not much for parking. Pretty much everything they make there is homemade, as much from scratch as possible, a lot of novelty items, and they have a wide selection of beer. They are best known for their hamburgers, including their feature to build your own from a huge list of strange ingredients. One of my friends concocted what he calls the "Heart Attack Waiting To Happen", you won't see it on the menu since he made it up like you could too. But basically it was the burger, bacon, a fried egg (you heard me), mayo, cheese, BBQ sauce, and probably some other stuff, and nothing healthy on it. But you can make whatever you want, including pineapple and avocado or whatever. Also for entertainment, their back porch is kinda nice, and includes a cornhole court.
So, we were curious what a hipster hamburger hut could offer for hot wings, and especially after our last adventure, how hot could they really get? Concerned about size as an appetizer, we asked the waitress about the wing dishes, and were delighted to hear they are in fact 10 piece wing baskets with celery and ranch or blue cheese dressing. That sounded like a meal a piece for us! So we ordered two baskets, one with Train Wreck and one with "Sweet Heat", another of their specialties, just in case we did get burned by the Train Wreck.
We were surprised at both of these flavors, they were both absolutely delectable. First off, the Train Wreck is not scary. It's hot, but maybe as hot as plain hot from Beef O'Brady's, not even the extra hot stuff. If you like hot food, you won't be afraid of these. But to its merit, it's a very complex wing flavor, we couldn't even tell what all was in there. The sauce has a very mealy texture, a thick gravy like sauce, it looked like minced garlic filled it for the most part, but didn't taste heavily of garlic, surprisingly, just a touch. Also mixed in there might have been honey, might have been caramelized jalapeños, maybe some chipotle or cayenne in there. The real shock was that while it was definitely a bit on the spicy side, it was also so sweet, but the more we paid attention to it, it was also smoky, and just rich in so many flavors. I would recommend this to anyone who can handle a little spice, a very good wing sauce. Plus the meat itself was cooked well, tender chicken.
The Sweet Heat was also a pleasant surprise. The first thing we both noticed immediately was the texture of the chicken, unlike the Train Wreck, Sweet Heat's chicken seemed crisp. The outside of the wings was singed and delicate, almost like a salmon skin sushi, very satisfying crunch without going through a crusty layer. The sauce was thinner and a bit runny, about the consistency of a teriyaki sauce, which this tasted a little similar to, but probably had honey in it as well. It was more sweet than hot, yellowish brown in color, with a few little bits of some pepper of some kind in there, probably again the caramelized jalapeños. They were almost like bits of jelly in there. After chewing on them a while, I couldn't help but feel like I was eating fish or something Asian somehow, for some reason it really reminded me of eating barbecued eel sushi, but in chicken wing form. I couldn't place that one either, but it was really good, especially for your wimpy friends. :P
So in short, I definitely recommend the wings at Monk's (apparently also known as Wells Brothers, but you'll see "Monk's" on the sign and the building and the menu and everywhere but the website...?). Of course, if you're looking for a fancy delicious burger, or a place to grab an import or microbrew beer with a couple folks at a slightly quieter place, you should also check the place out for that. Since, you know, they're more famous for... all that, and not the wings.
Before we move on, in case you haven't heard about it, Monk's is a little bar and grill on Tharpe St. near High Rd. that is very popular with the college and grad student crowd. For a small place, it's always packed at nights, and there's not much for parking. Pretty much everything they make there is homemade, as much from scratch as possible, a lot of novelty items, and they have a wide selection of beer. They are best known for their hamburgers, including their feature to build your own from a huge list of strange ingredients. One of my friends concocted what he calls the "Heart Attack Waiting To Happen", you won't see it on the menu since he made it up like you could too. But basically it was the burger, bacon, a fried egg (you heard me), mayo, cheese, BBQ sauce, and probably some other stuff, and nothing healthy on it. But you can make whatever you want, including pineapple and avocado or whatever. Also for entertainment, their back porch is kinda nice, and includes a cornhole court.
So, we were curious what a hipster hamburger hut could offer for hot wings, and especially after our last adventure, how hot could they really get? Concerned about size as an appetizer, we asked the waitress about the wing dishes, and were delighted to hear they are in fact 10 piece wing baskets with celery and ranch or blue cheese dressing. That sounded like a meal a piece for us! So we ordered two baskets, one with Train Wreck and one with "Sweet Heat", another of their specialties, just in case we did get burned by the Train Wreck.
We were surprised at both of these flavors, they were both absolutely delectable. First off, the Train Wreck is not scary. It's hot, but maybe as hot as plain hot from Beef O'Brady's, not even the extra hot stuff. If you like hot food, you won't be afraid of these. But to its merit, it's a very complex wing flavor, we couldn't even tell what all was in there. The sauce has a very mealy texture, a thick gravy like sauce, it looked like minced garlic filled it for the most part, but didn't taste heavily of garlic, surprisingly, just a touch. Also mixed in there might have been honey, might have been caramelized jalapeños, maybe some chipotle or cayenne in there. The real shock was that while it was definitely a bit on the spicy side, it was also so sweet, but the more we paid attention to it, it was also smoky, and just rich in so many flavors. I would recommend this to anyone who can handle a little spice, a very good wing sauce. Plus the meat itself was cooked well, tender chicken.
The Sweet Heat was also a pleasant surprise. The first thing we both noticed immediately was the texture of the chicken, unlike the Train Wreck, Sweet Heat's chicken seemed crisp. The outside of the wings was singed and delicate, almost like a salmon skin sushi, very satisfying crunch without going through a crusty layer. The sauce was thinner and a bit runny, about the consistency of a teriyaki sauce, which this tasted a little similar to, but probably had honey in it as well. It was more sweet than hot, yellowish brown in color, with a few little bits of some pepper of some kind in there, probably again the caramelized jalapeños. They were almost like bits of jelly in there. After chewing on them a while, I couldn't help but feel like I was eating fish or something Asian somehow, for some reason it really reminded me of eating barbecued eel sushi, but in chicken wing form. I couldn't place that one either, but it was really good, especially for your wimpy friends. :P
So in short, I definitely recommend the wings at Monk's (apparently also known as Wells Brothers, but you'll see "Monk's" on the sign and the building and the menu and everywhere but the website...?). Of course, if you're looking for a fancy delicious burger, or a place to grab an import or microbrew beer with a couple folks at a slightly quieter place, you should also check the place out for that. Since, you know, they're more famous for... all that, and not the wings.
Thursday, August 5, 2010
Corner Pocket's "Idareya" Wings Beat Us
Laura found out a few weeks ago that Corner Pocket, a pool hall and grill on Apalachee Parkway, near the Whataburger and where Circuit City used to be, had a selection of hot wings. In particular, a flavor called "Idareya". For some reason I read this as "EYE-duh-REE-uh" the first time, but it's supposed to be "I dare ya". D'oh. Anyway, seeing as how I've succeeded at the BW3 Blazin' Challenge and eaten plenty of Indian and Thai hot food, including eating supposedly the world's hottest pepper straight (so rare that I can't even remember the name of it), I was non-plussed at this challenge by the title.
So last Friday Laura and I went out with a co-worker, Rachael, to see what this was all about. They had other strange flavors there too for wings... including "Old Bay." Yeah, that stuff you boil crab in. We ordered some of that, and spicy BBQ (which at most places isn't spicy at all). We also got an appetizer, Bleu Cheese Chips, which was nacho chips with blue cheese, lettuce, and pico de gallo on top, maybe some other stuff, and it was incredible. Could have been a meal to itself. Definitely get this and share with some friends.
Then the Idareya wings came. We could smell them widening our nostrils as they were lowered to the table. And I was all right with that. Each wing basket had some veggies shoved into their corner with some ranch. I decided, should the Idareya wings really be so hot, that we should start with the other flavors first while we can still taste them. The spicy BBQ was surprisingly pretty spicy, not too hot of course, but enough that it did give me a little kick. The Old Bay was unfortunately pretty underwhelming. It's such a mild flavor anyway, it really only could take to crab. On wings, they just tasted like salt and pepper wings, quite the disappointment.
I subconsciously put my fingers down to grab a wing from the last basket, since it was right in front of me even though I wasn't eating out of it before, and Laura stopped me as I made contact with the wing, "--Wait! Those are the Idareyas! ... Are you ready?" I said "Yeah. Yeah, I thought I was going for a BBQ, but that's fine. Whatever." As I picked up the drumstick, a little nub of meat fell from the fat part of it, you know that one protrusion on the end of most hot wing drumsticks, and it rolled on the table toward me. I picked it up with my other hand and tossed it in my mouth, before moving on to bite into the wing. But before I could sink my teeth in, I realized that little bitty piece was making my mouth roast already. Already. I paused for a moment to consider this, and Laura's eyes widened as she watched me stop. But then I figured, with hot food, you really need to get eating fast if you intend to finish it. If I stop to savor this little bit, I'll never finish the basket of wings. So I jumped headlong into my first bite of the Idareya wing.
Ho. Lee. Shoot. In the time it took me to chew down on the meat about three times, my entire mouth was on fire. I can't even really describe how it tasted, just plain hot. Not really like garlic or earthy, nor vinegar sour, I suppose it was more bitter than anything else, and then just plain hot. I quickly swallowed that bite and took the rest of the meat off the bone and put it down. I chewed, and rushed to swallow, and my throat was also on fire. My eyes were huge, and Laura's jaw dropped just watching me, she was speechless. Rachael began to giggle. I started exhaling with a rounded mouth, trying to air out, but it wasn't helping. I tried a celery stick with ranch, followed by some beer. The ranch did nothing, the beer helped a lot, for as long as I had it swishing in my mouth anyway. But as soon as I swallowed that beer, the burn came right back. "I don't know if I want to do this anymore," Laura says, without ever having even lifted a wing. Rachael just made snarky comments about us being idiots and/or wusses. "I dare YOU to eat it!" I snapped back. "Oh no no, I'm not making claims to be a wing queen here, this is all you," she said dismissively.
I sat breathing and taking the occasional beer wash for about 10 minutes, no joke. I was crying and the works, the tears flowed so quickly and easily. I actually started debating whether or not I was have a second wing. A SECOND wing. We had TEN, the minimum order. I urged Laura to at least try a wing. Trembling with much fear, she did step up to the challenge and took a bite. Her reaction was much the same as mine, her eyes exploded and she tried to guzzle beer... she didn't even make it to her second BITE. She couldn't finish ONE wing. These things are not meant to be taken lightly. Rachael again guffawed at our misfortune.
We sat panting, and suddenly I looked up at her and said "I'm gonna wash my hands!" and she nearly interrupted me "GOOD IDEA!" and we sprang up and made our way to the bathrooms. Anyone who's eaten really spicy stuff knows that eventually you make the mistake of touching your eyes, scratching your nose, or worst case scenario, using the bathroom later and touching your other sensitive parts, and giving yourself a major external spicy burn, and that HURTS. So we headed off to avoid that possible crisis.
When we got back to the table, Rachael got up to go to the bathroom too. I saw the vegetables in the basket with the Idareya wings, and I didn't want them to go to waste... though some of the sauce looked like it had grazed them. With the care of a surgeon, I gently wrested the veggies away from the wings and out of the basket, and put them into the BBQ basket. I pointed out to Laura that I was doing this and told her to watch out, in case she pulls the wrong vegetable. I mean, we still intended on eating these, but we just wanted to be prepared. We were still panting, afterall.
Rachael came back and continued to mock us. Whatever. We ate the rest of the food, but none of us dared reach for the Idareyas again. We had some more beers. Then sweet justice came... When Rachael had eaten all of her food, and all the veggies in front of her, she reached across the table for the spicy BBQ basket, and took out some celery. Laura and I hardly noticed. But when Rachael bit down, she caught one of the bad ones. All she needed was the tiniest dose, a glancing blow of the Idareya wings sent her into a crying fit immediately, and blowing mighty gusts of exhalations, choking herself on some beer. While the schadenfreude was delightful to me inside, I was so beaten, and saw that beaten part of myself in her, that I really couldn't bring myself to laugh back at her. Laura and I just nodded and frowned a little at her. But now she, too, knew the raw power of this stuff.
If you're out for death by capsaicin, go to Corner Pocket and be prepared to drink a lot of beer afterwards. It's a pool bar primarily, there's also darts, but there's a good selection of other food too. Kind of a rough and tumble place as many bars tend to be, but for a hole in the wall they do a huge business, actually. You can visit their website at http://cornerpocketsportsbar.com/ for more info.
So last Friday Laura and I went out with a co-worker, Rachael, to see what this was all about. They had other strange flavors there too for wings... including "Old Bay." Yeah, that stuff you boil crab in. We ordered some of that, and spicy BBQ (which at most places isn't spicy at all). We also got an appetizer, Bleu Cheese Chips, which was nacho chips with blue cheese, lettuce, and pico de gallo on top, maybe some other stuff, and it was incredible. Could have been a meal to itself. Definitely get this and share with some friends.
Then the Idareya wings came. We could smell them widening our nostrils as they were lowered to the table. And I was all right with that. Each wing basket had some veggies shoved into their corner with some ranch. I decided, should the Idareya wings really be so hot, that we should start with the other flavors first while we can still taste them. The spicy BBQ was surprisingly pretty spicy, not too hot of course, but enough that it did give me a little kick. The Old Bay was unfortunately pretty underwhelming. It's such a mild flavor anyway, it really only could take to crab. On wings, they just tasted like salt and pepper wings, quite the disappointment.
I subconsciously put my fingers down to grab a wing from the last basket, since it was right in front of me even though I wasn't eating out of it before, and Laura stopped me as I made contact with the wing, "--Wait! Those are the Idareyas! ... Are you ready?" I said "Yeah. Yeah, I thought I was going for a BBQ, but that's fine. Whatever." As I picked up the drumstick, a little nub of meat fell from the fat part of it, you know that one protrusion on the end of most hot wing drumsticks, and it rolled on the table toward me. I picked it up with my other hand and tossed it in my mouth, before moving on to bite into the wing. But before I could sink my teeth in, I realized that little bitty piece was making my mouth roast already. Already. I paused for a moment to consider this, and Laura's eyes widened as she watched me stop. But then I figured, with hot food, you really need to get eating fast if you intend to finish it. If I stop to savor this little bit, I'll never finish the basket of wings. So I jumped headlong into my first bite of the Idareya wing.
Ho. Lee. Shoot. In the time it took me to chew down on the meat about three times, my entire mouth was on fire. I can't even really describe how it tasted, just plain hot. Not really like garlic or earthy, nor vinegar sour, I suppose it was more bitter than anything else, and then just plain hot. I quickly swallowed that bite and took the rest of the meat off the bone and put it down. I chewed, and rushed to swallow, and my throat was also on fire. My eyes were huge, and Laura's jaw dropped just watching me, she was speechless. Rachael began to giggle. I started exhaling with a rounded mouth, trying to air out, but it wasn't helping. I tried a celery stick with ranch, followed by some beer. The ranch did nothing, the beer helped a lot, for as long as I had it swishing in my mouth anyway. But as soon as I swallowed that beer, the burn came right back. "I don't know if I want to do this anymore," Laura says, without ever having even lifted a wing. Rachael just made snarky comments about us being idiots and/or wusses. "I dare YOU to eat it!" I snapped back. "Oh no no, I'm not making claims to be a wing queen here, this is all you," she said dismissively.
I sat breathing and taking the occasional beer wash for about 10 minutes, no joke. I was crying and the works, the tears flowed so quickly and easily. I actually started debating whether or not I was have a second wing. A SECOND wing. We had TEN, the minimum order. I urged Laura to at least try a wing. Trembling with much fear, she did step up to the challenge and took a bite. Her reaction was much the same as mine, her eyes exploded and she tried to guzzle beer... she didn't even make it to her second BITE. She couldn't finish ONE wing. These things are not meant to be taken lightly. Rachael again guffawed at our misfortune.
We sat panting, and suddenly I looked up at her and said "I'm gonna wash my hands!" and she nearly interrupted me "GOOD IDEA!" and we sprang up and made our way to the bathrooms. Anyone who's eaten really spicy stuff knows that eventually you make the mistake of touching your eyes, scratching your nose, or worst case scenario, using the bathroom later and touching your other sensitive parts, and giving yourself a major external spicy burn, and that HURTS. So we headed off to avoid that possible crisis.
When we got back to the table, Rachael got up to go to the bathroom too. I saw the vegetables in the basket with the Idareya wings, and I didn't want them to go to waste... though some of the sauce looked like it had grazed them. With the care of a surgeon, I gently wrested the veggies away from the wings and out of the basket, and put them into the BBQ basket. I pointed out to Laura that I was doing this and told her to watch out, in case she pulls the wrong vegetable. I mean, we still intended on eating these, but we just wanted to be prepared. We were still panting, afterall.
Rachael came back and continued to mock us. Whatever. We ate the rest of the food, but none of us dared reach for the Idareyas again. We had some more beers. Then sweet justice came... When Rachael had eaten all of her food, and all the veggies in front of her, she reached across the table for the spicy BBQ basket, and took out some celery. Laura and I hardly noticed. But when Rachael bit down, she caught one of the bad ones. All she needed was the tiniest dose, a glancing blow of the Idareya wings sent her into a crying fit immediately, and blowing mighty gusts of exhalations, choking herself on some beer. While the schadenfreude was delightful to me inside, I was so beaten, and saw that beaten part of myself in her, that I really couldn't bring myself to laugh back at her. Laura and I just nodded and frowned a little at her. But now she, too, knew the raw power of this stuff.
If you're out for death by capsaicin, go to Corner Pocket and be prepared to drink a lot of beer afterwards. It's a pool bar primarily, there's also darts, but there's a good selection of other food too. Kind of a rough and tumble place as many bars tend to be, but for a hole in the wall they do a huge business, actually. You can visit their website at http://cornerpocketsportsbar.com/ for more info.
Monday, July 12, 2010
Mongo - The Cheaper Mongolian Grill
I've always dug Mongolian grill as a dining option. In the northern mid-west, there's a couple major chains that do it, like BD's Mongolian Grill, but we don't have that stuff down in Tallahassee, unfortunately. Super China Buffet used to have it every Wednesday night between like, 6pm-9pm or something, haven't been there in years.
In case you didn't know, Mongolian grilling involves having a long "salad bar" style table of raw foods, typically including noodles, rice, meat, vegetables - yeah you read that right, raw meat - eggs, spices, and sauces. You heap whatever you want onto a plate and take it to the griller, a restaurant employee who slathers your stuff on a big, round, hot surface, kinda like a hibachi stove, and they fry it all up typically using either huge meter-long chopsticks, or meter-long "swords" that are curved or angled in one side to assist in scooping. Usually several customers' meals are on this big single hot plate at once (it's like a 1.5m diameter) and the griller rotates around the whole surface and delivers the food on fresh plates back to the customers waiting in line.
Besides Super China Buffet's special nights, there really wasn't another game in town for Mongolian grilling for a long time. Now suddenly there's like three of them. I heard Genghis Khan's Mongolian Grill on Apalachee Parkway was the more expensive one, and I found myself at the smaller, cheaper, lesser known one uptown instead - Mongo. It's off of Kerry Forest in the left-hand plaza, right next to where the Red Elephant used to be, and next to Bayou Rouge Cajun restaurant. Mongo's a smaller area, not too classy but not real dingy either, about the caliber of your standard strip-plaza Chinese food "stand", but with more tables. The grill and everything is in the back, and that's really all there is to it. I don't think they served alcohol there. It ran me about $10-12 once I threw in a drink, but the fare was pretty decent. There was some variety, nothing too crazy for sauces, but of course you can mix and match. It hasn't seemed to crowded the few times I've been, so your service is pretty fast and it's a pretty casual atmosphere.
I guess I don't have much else to say or rave about it, but I liked it. The funny thing about Mongolian grilling is that if your food tastes bad, 9/10 times it's your fault, after all you're the one who picked the ingredients. Considering it's the complete other side of town from Genghis, it's a good location to distribute the cuisine evenly around town. Of course, a friend of mine did make the observation that for the format and what you're getting, you can get 90% of the experience for considerably cheaper by going to 1Fresh Stir Fry, which has several locations in town, but... I don't know, 1Fresh, good as it is, has its limitations, and you can really go crazy on a Mongolian grill recipe. Good observation though if you're looking to save a buck.
In case you didn't know, Mongolian grilling involves having a long "salad bar" style table of raw foods, typically including noodles, rice, meat, vegetables - yeah you read that right, raw meat - eggs, spices, and sauces. You heap whatever you want onto a plate and take it to the griller, a restaurant employee who slathers your stuff on a big, round, hot surface, kinda like a hibachi stove, and they fry it all up typically using either huge meter-long chopsticks, or meter-long "swords" that are curved or angled in one side to assist in scooping. Usually several customers' meals are on this big single hot plate at once (it's like a 1.5m diameter) and the griller rotates around the whole surface and delivers the food on fresh plates back to the customers waiting in line.
Besides Super China Buffet's special nights, there really wasn't another game in town for Mongolian grilling for a long time. Now suddenly there's like three of them. I heard Genghis Khan's Mongolian Grill on Apalachee Parkway was the more expensive one, and I found myself at the smaller, cheaper, lesser known one uptown instead - Mongo. It's off of Kerry Forest in the left-hand plaza, right next to where the Red Elephant used to be, and next to Bayou Rouge Cajun restaurant. Mongo's a smaller area, not too classy but not real dingy either, about the caliber of your standard strip-plaza Chinese food "stand", but with more tables. The grill and everything is in the back, and that's really all there is to it. I don't think they served alcohol there. It ran me about $10-12 once I threw in a drink, but the fare was pretty decent. There was some variety, nothing too crazy for sauces, but of course you can mix and match. It hasn't seemed to crowded the few times I've been, so your service is pretty fast and it's a pretty casual atmosphere.
I guess I don't have much else to say or rave about it, but I liked it. The funny thing about Mongolian grilling is that if your food tastes bad, 9/10 times it's your fault, after all you're the one who picked the ingredients. Considering it's the complete other side of town from Genghis, it's a good location to distribute the cuisine evenly around town. Of course, a friend of mine did make the observation that for the format and what you're getting, you can get 90% of the experience for considerably cheaper by going to 1Fresh Stir Fry, which has several locations in town, but... I don't know, 1Fresh, good as it is, has its limitations, and you can really go crazy on a Mongolian grill recipe. Good observation though if you're looking to save a buck.
EDIT: Sorry to get your hopes up, but Mongo has sadly gone out of business. :(
The Wing Queue
Laura and I constantly have to remind each other to go out to try wings somewhere new... and then we have to sit and think for about 15 minutes to try to remember where we planned to go. Here's a list of the places we plan on visiting in the next several hot wing outings and now we won't have to remember.
- Wing Zone - crazy coupons, and...shrimp?
- BW3 - ...how did we miss this?
Friday, January 22, 2010
The Breakfast Club Post
This will be one of the less interesting posts, but possibly one of the most useful. Do you like to go out for breakfast? Do you ever get bothered by the time limits of when and where you can get breakfast? Ever confused as to when what restaurant stops serving breakfast?
Well this is going to be your one-stop-shop for all dine-out breakfast info in Tallahassee, from IHOP to McDonald's. I like to stay out late and sleep late, and I have a nasty habit of needing to eat breakfast as soon as I wake up, whether that's 8:00am or 2:00pm, and sometimes I try to get a head start and eat breakfast at 5:00am - right before I go to bed after a long night. So I am constantly having to ask myself, "Where can I get breakfast at this hour?" This is going to be my personal set of notes to answer that question, but I'm going to be awesome to all you readers out there and make it accessible for you too.
*NOTE: This post will likely need constant updating... feel free to comment to help out!
Village Inn - Breakfast all day - 24 hours!
McDonald's - Until 10:30am
Burger King - Until 10:30am
Whataburger - Until 11am
Steak 'n Shake - Until 11am
Ray's Steel City Saloon - Sundays 10:30am to 2:00pm
Jim & Milt's - 6:30am to 10:00am?
Chick-Fil-A - Until 10:30am, closed Sundays
Hardee's - Until ...?
Steak 'n Shake - After 11pm
Waffle House - 24 hours!
Sonic - 24 hours!
Pita Pit - 24 hours!
IHOP - Dunno how long it's open, but later than 2pm anyway
Village Inn - 24 hours!
Denny's - JUST KIDDING YOU WON'T FIND ONE HERE :( All 3 locations closed in 2000, go fig. - Update: Apparently there's one hiding on-campus somewhere.
Well this is going to be your one-stop-shop for all dine-out breakfast info in Tallahassee, from IHOP to McDonald's. I like to stay out late and sleep late, and I have a nasty habit of needing to eat breakfast as soon as I wake up, whether that's 8:00am or 2:00pm, and sometimes I try to get a head start and eat breakfast at 5:00am - right before I go to bed after a long night. So I am constantly having to ask myself, "Where can I get breakfast at this hour?" This is going to be my personal set of notes to answer that question, but I'm going to be awesome to all you readers out there and make it accessible for you too.
*NOTE: This post will likely need constant updating... feel free to comment to help out!
Big, Real, Dedicated, Dine-In Breakfast Restaurants
IHOP - Breakfast all day - 24 hours on Monroe!Village Inn - Breakfast all day - 24 hours!
Breakfast Early/Sometimes
Jenny's Lunchbox - 7:00am to ...? Sundays 8:30am to ...?McDonald's - Until 10:30am
Burger King - Until 10:30am
Whataburger - Until 11am
Steak 'n Shake - Until 11am
Ray's Steel City Saloon - Sundays 10:30am to 2:00pm
Jim & Milt's - 6:30am to 10:00am?
Chick-Fil-A - Until 10:30am, closed Sundays
Hardee's - Until ...?
Breakfast Late Night/24 Hours
Whataburger - After 11pmSteak 'n Shake - After 11pm
Waffle House - 24 hours!
Sonic - 24 hours!
Pita Pit - 24 hours!
IHOP - Dunno how long it's open, but later than 2pm anyway
Village Inn - 24 hours!
You'd Probably Never Think of Lindy's for Wings
Lindy's Chicken is an old time Tallahassee restaurant chain specializing in - you guessed it - fried chicken. Their chicken is really good, in fact all their food is really good, and well priced too. It's all down home southern food, like black eyed peas, collared greens, as well as french fries and other standbys. You can get white meat, dark meat, and even weird stuff like gizzards and liver, which I personally would never try.
Today I decided to revisit Lindy's for chicken wings, which is not their specialty, but it's nearby work and I pass it almost every day, and suddenly had the urge to get some this week. Let me tell you, while they have great fried chicken and even a great fried chicken filet sandwich - and right next to Chick-Fil-A on North Monroe, how gutsy is that? - their wings are not to be dismissed.
Why? What makes them so special? Especially for a place that doesn't specialize in wings? Well... nothing, really, but that's the beauty of it. Like everything at Lindy's, the recipe is straight forward, no nonsense. Quite honestly, Lindy's chicken wings are the quinetessential buffalo wing to me. The sauce is smooth, and gravy like, almost ketchup consistency, but not syrupy, and they use unbreaded fried chicken. They don't have any fancy flavors there, your options are mild, hot, or barbeque, and the hot wings taste kinda like your basic, generic hot wing. Except it's the perfect example of what a basic hot wing should be. It's a bold buffalo flavor, with just enough sting to open your nostrils, but won't give you a runny nose (unless you're really sensitive to that kinda thing). Best of all, if you get the special, 10 hot wings and either veggies or fries, it's only $6.45 plus tax. Honestly, most wing places charge about that much for 10 wings by themselves, no sides, and when they throw in "a side", it's 4 tiny celery sticks, and a dip if you're lucky. Not here. Lindy's hooks you up with a heaping handful of carrots and celery sticks, AND a ranch or bleu cheese dip for that $6.45. In all honesty, this is a very solid deal for a very solid wing. Nothing fancy, but a standard setting meal.
If you're out for hot wings and don't feel like getting fancy, and still want to watch your wallet, find your nearest Lindy's and give these a try. There are five locations around Tallahassee, and one in Crawfordville and one in Quincy. The Crawfordville location has their own website, http://crawfordvillelindys.com/ which features the full menu that you'll get at all locations. And even if you're not looking for wings and just want some no-nonsense, good old southern fried chicken, pass on KFC, and even Publix Deli chicken (which is also good!), and give Lindy's a try. They're an old Tallahassee tradition for a reason.
Today I decided to revisit Lindy's for chicken wings, which is not their specialty, but it's nearby work and I pass it almost every day, and suddenly had the urge to get some this week. Let me tell you, while they have great fried chicken and even a great fried chicken filet sandwich - and right next to Chick-Fil-A on North Monroe, how gutsy is that? - their wings are not to be dismissed.
Why? What makes them so special? Especially for a place that doesn't specialize in wings? Well... nothing, really, but that's the beauty of it. Like everything at Lindy's, the recipe is straight forward, no nonsense. Quite honestly, Lindy's chicken wings are the quinetessential buffalo wing to me. The sauce is smooth, and gravy like, almost ketchup consistency, but not syrupy, and they use unbreaded fried chicken. They don't have any fancy flavors there, your options are mild, hot, or barbeque, and the hot wings taste kinda like your basic, generic hot wing. Except it's the perfect example of what a basic hot wing should be. It's a bold buffalo flavor, with just enough sting to open your nostrils, but won't give you a runny nose (unless you're really sensitive to that kinda thing). Best of all, if you get the special, 10 hot wings and either veggies or fries, it's only $6.45 plus tax. Honestly, most wing places charge about that much for 10 wings by themselves, no sides, and when they throw in "a side", it's 4 tiny celery sticks, and a dip if you're lucky. Not here. Lindy's hooks you up with a heaping handful of carrots and celery sticks, AND a ranch or bleu cheese dip for that $6.45. In all honesty, this is a very solid deal for a very solid wing. Nothing fancy, but a standard setting meal.
If you're out for hot wings and don't feel like getting fancy, and still want to watch your wallet, find your nearest Lindy's and give these a try. There are five locations around Tallahassee, and one in Crawfordville and one in Quincy. The Crawfordville location has their own website, http://crawfordvillelindys.com/ which features the full menu that you'll get at all locations. And even if you're not looking for wings and just want some no-nonsense, good old southern fried chicken, pass on KFC, and even Publix Deli chicken (which is also good!), and give Lindy's a try. They're an old Tallahassee tradition for a reason.
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