I don’t know whose big idea it was to put an egg on a cheeseburger first. However, if they didn’t get a Nobel Prize for it, then what the hell, man. What the hell. Red Robin probably wasn’t the first place to do this, but they were the first place I knew of who did it.

Red Robin has been one of my go-to cheeseburger joints for the last eight years or so. Once you get above the fast food joints, burgers are chain-proof, or at least they seem like it. I’m not gonna say that you’ll get a better burger at Red Robin than you will at the local gastropub with the perfectly seasoned-griddle top, but it’ll be closer than the, say, fish or roasted chicken dish.

That being said, I was never really all-in on the Royal Burger until recently. I was always more of a fan of their teriyaki or guac-n-bacon burgers. But there’s something about the protein overload, especially now that I’m trying to eat less in a single sitting. There’s a richness, even though the egg was fried through. I know a lot of people prefer the egg to be runny.

I would like to try a burger with the runny yolk, but at that point, I’d probably have to skip the cheese, and at least with the Royal Burger, the cheese is the best part. They use an American cheese, but it’s not the mild, weaksauce version you get at the corner deli. It’s actually got tang. I love how it interplays with the egg and the tomato. And of course, bacon makes nearly everything better.

Like I wrote above, I’ve gone to Red Robin for eight years. Not a whole lot has changed, mainly because it’s a formula that works. There have been specials, and today, I found out they replaced their basket plating options with something a little fancier; the steak fries (still awesome after all these years) come in a neat little cannister set-up. It’s comfortable because it is safe, admittedly. But sometimes, all you want is safe. Burgers are comfort food at heart, right?

(pardon the stock photo, I didn’t think to take a pic of my meal)

My first experience with Five Guys was less than optimal. It was a Saturday night, and my wife and I both got stomach aches. The food was especially greasy, especially the fries. I wanted to try it again, hoping that it wasn’t necessarily indicative of the restaurant and that it was more them having a bad night. But with a bad food experience, especially with so many options out there? Yeah, a sample size of one is all that might be needed.

I was away for work last night, and I found myself right in Five Guys’ breadbasket, Northern Virginia. There were two different franchise locations within 4 miles of each other in unincorporated Alexandria along US 1. I guess I had my opportunity to try them again.

I was far more impressed by the fries this time around. I guess I can chalk my prior distaste for their french fried potatoes before because I hadn’t really been a fan of the fresh-cut style until recently. But I dug in and found that they were fried perfectly and well-seasoned. I couldn’t get enough of them.

The burger was a different story. I liked it a lot better than the last time I had it, but there were still a lot of problems. The burger was put together pretty haphazardly. Yeah, I probably shouldn’t have gotten all the toppings that I got on it, and there was probably an entropy factor that was unavoidable. But the bun, man, the bun was doughy and felt undercooked. That’s pretty bad.

The burger meat and cheese were both good though, and I dug the toppings. There’s a reason why people go crazy for them, and I see it. But that bun, holy shit, man.

They do get major points for the Coke Freestyle machine, though. Those things are rad as hell.

Think of this as TH Cooks: Quickie Edition. That’s a New York strip steak, cheesy home fries, Brussels sprouts, and of course, capped off with a 21st Amendment Hell or High Watermelon. Nothing fancy. Home fries were done in butter with American cheese melted on top. Steak done on the grill with salt and pepper. Sprouts steamed and tossed with butter, garlic powder, and salt. Simple, but delicious. Excellent cheat night dinner.

Roasting is awesome. Roasting on the grill is better than awesome because a grill makes everything better. It’s scientific fact. Okay, maybe it isn’t, but it should be. So, I had this idea to make a savory spread/condiment to accompany lunch sandwiches, among other things.

Two ingredients that I think lend themselves perfectly to roasting are peppers and garlic. So I decided to make a spread out of, you guessed it, roasted peppers, in this case, poblano, and garlic. First, I prepared the garlic. I took 50 cloves, spread them on some aluminum foil, coated them in 2 tablespoons of olive oil, and seasoned with salt, cracked black pepper, and a bit of parsley flake. I wrapped the foil up, fired up the grill, and put the pack on the top rack for some indirect cooking.

Then, I took 10 poblano peppers and put them right on the bottom grill until the skin was good and scorched. After sweating them in a paper bag for about a half-hour or so, I removed the skin and chopped them up.

The garlic takes a bit longer than the peppers to roast; you’ll have to poke the foil, or even open it up and feel individual cloves. Be careful, because it’ll be really hot. Use tongs, duh. Once the garlic is good and soft, take the foil off the grill. Get a food processor and combine the garlic and peppers. Depending on the size of your processor, you may have to do it piecemeal. Once the mixture is uniform and smooth, scoop it out into a bowl big enough where you can mix it up. Why? Because you’re going to finish it with a few shakes more of salt for flavor and a teaspoon or so of ground cumin. Mix it all up and bam, your spread is ready.

Now, poblanos are spicy peppers. I like heat, so I kept the seeds. If you want it to be a bit more mild, remove the seeds before roasting. Heat or not though, the flavors really work well together. It tastes rich and earthy, and the olive oil is the only fat in it, and those fats are good fats. So it’s fairly guilt free, delicious, and pretty much anyone can eat it.

Farm to table with a retro flair

What I Ordered: Peanut Butter Heath Bar Milkshake, Crab Corn Chowder, Local Flat Iron Steak with Bleu Cheese Butter, Crispy Onion Straws, Mashed Potatoes, Garlic Sauteed Spinach

I’m back on the weight-loss bandwagon, so I’ve been strict with myself and my diet for the last two weeks so far. However, with any diet, there needs to be a built in release valve, a cheat meal if you will, or else the pressures of always eating healthy will make you explode. At least that’s how I’ve found it. I happened to be in NoVA for work for my designated cheat meal, so I tried to seek out the best combination of “things I actually want to eat” and “stuff that isn’t depressingly a chain restaurant.”

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Okay, so food trucks are cool, even if they’re just standard grease trucks with griddles that make sandwiches and hot dogs. When a whole bunch of gourmet or specialty trucks get together in one area though? You know I’m there. The Swarthmore Food Co-op sponsored the Food Truck-a-Thon II, and they invited a whole bunch of trucks to line up and offer wares for a hungry crowd. There were 12-15 trucks thereabouts. I didn’t sample all of them, because I’m not made of money here. But I did get to hit up a good sampling of them. Here’s what the Mrs. and I ate.

Cheese Curds with Chipotle Ranch Dressing - The Cow and the Curd - Amanda and I were mutually looking forward to this truck the most. I don’t know what that says about us, but hey, people who love fried cheese love fried cheese. We weren’t disappointed. The curds were a mix of white and yellow cheddar in a beer batter. The cheese itself was sharp to the taste, always the sign of a good cheddar. The curds were delicious without or with the dipping sauce. Definite thumbs up here.

Bacon Passion and “The Swarthmore Special” - Sum Pig - Sum Pig is a truck that specializes in, well, pig. If you’re a pork-friendly truck, you’re going to have to have bacon in this meme-centric society we have landed in, for better or worse. I admit I’m part of the problem, but it’s a delicious problem to have. Bacon itself is not a meat that needs a whole lot of elevation, but by God, they tried and succeeded with their Bacon Passion, thick cubes of bacon fried and then drizzled in a passion fruit-ghost chili glaze. I know what you’re thinking, and yes, they probably only used like one chili to every 100 passion fruit they put in the glaze. It had a kick, but it wasn’t oppressively spicy. Overally, I thought it complemented the salty richness of the bacon well.

Amanda got the “Swarthmore Special,” which was a pulled pork taco with slaw and a creamy chipotle dressing. She didn’t finish it, so she let me have the rest of it. The pork had a very slight “piggy” taste, but other than that, it was very delicious. Sum Pig deserves to have Charlotte the Spider lavish compliments at them via silken spun web.

Margherita Pizza - Nomad Pizza - We needed to find something that the baby would eat, and luckily, there was a pizza truck with their own wood-fired brick oven. A portable wood-fired brick oven. WE ARE LIVING IN THE FUTURE, PEOPLE. Anyway, I’m a firm believer in the fact that it’s hard to fuck up pizza, and that even bad pizza is good pizza. However, when pizza is really good? It’s goddamn orgasmic. I can say without any shadow of any doubt that Nomad Pizza’s Margherita is goddamn orgasmic, stacking up to Tacconnelli’s and Celebre’s as best in the area.   The sauce was tangy and flavorful, but it was the cheese that was the star of the dish. It was actually sharp and salty, which is odd for a good mozzarella, but not unwelcome. I would seek these guys out again and again and again and well you get the drift.

Bulgogi Taco and Kimchi Rice Balls - Ka’Chi - This was the truck I personally was most looking forward to, because basically, I’ve heard nothing but good things about Korean food. It was by far the most popular truck I went to. I waited a half-hour just to place an order, and by the time I got there, they were sold out of half their menu items. That was fine, since the two items I wanted were there - the bulgogi taco and the rice balls.

The only thing during the entire trip that I was disappointed in were the rice balls though. They were shockingly bland. Like, I bit into the first one, and it barely had any flavor to it. The texture was nice, I liked the smell, but it had no goddamn flavor.

That being said, the bulgogi taco? That was sublime. Bulgogi is Korean steak, and the beef was super tender. It was glazed in a sweet sauce, which I thought complemented the beef well, and the taco was finished off with a wonderfully acidic red cabbage. I wasn’t ready to pan them completely, so I was glad the taco saved the visit to that particular truck.

Chocolate Chipotle Ice Cream and Coffee Toffee Ice Cream - Little Baby’s - What perfect way to end the night than with ice cream. I’ve been wanting to try a chocolate and chili dessert for a long time, and what better way than through my sweet obsession, ice cream? I have to say, the flavors complemented each other well on first bite, but I was taken slightly aback with the amount of spice that built up. Mainly, I wasn’t used to chipotles having more spice than smoke. However, as a man who likes his capsacin, it didn’t take long for me to get used to it. The coffee toffee ice cream was a delicious counterweight to the spicy chocolate, but then again, it was no big shock. Coffee and toffee are two of my favorite flavors.

Overall - I expected big things from this truck crawl, and for the most part, they delivered. It’s amazing how far food trucks have come from a single griddle and maybe a deep fryer if you were lucky. People getting creative in their rolling kitchens only makes for happy customers. I would visit every one of the trucks that I patronized again, and I would definitely do up the trucks that we missed out on as well. All in all, it was a different but delicious dining experience.

It’s early in the morning. You shouldn’t have to be thinking about manhunts or suspect chases. You should be thinking about breakfast. Breakfast is the most important meal of the day, and it can be the most delicious. Here’s my definitive ranking of breakfast foods. Note, not going to rank individual meats because bacon would win, and it wouldn’t be fair.

10. Leftover Pizza - Think this isn’t breakfast food? Think again. I can’t count how many times I had leftover pizza for breakfast, whether cold or heated up in the toaster oven. Something about pizza that’s inviting for any meal. People have actually experimented by making actual breakfast pizza. It’s an intriguing concept, although I’ve never tried it before. Maybe I should.

9. Raisin Bran Crunch - Regular raisin bran is good because raisins are the perfect sweetener for boring old bran flakes. Raisin Bran Crunch adds on that with all those funky granola things, and it’s divine. It’s the perfect addition of sweetness and texture to an already great cereal.

8. Krispy Kreme Glazed Donuts - Preferably, you want these right off the conveyor belt. Donuts are a quintessential on-the-go breakfast food, but Dunkin’ Donuts are too cakey and greasy. Really, you don’t wanna be bogged down by something too heavy. The hot glazed numbers are light, portable, sweet, and satisfying. Grab two and a cup of coffee (preferably NOT from KK, since their coffee is ass) and you’re good to go.

7. Cracker Barrel Hash Brown Casserole - Potatoes? Cheese? Bacon? All baked together in one convenient dish? I could eat this as a main course and be satisfied. It may shorten your lifespan by a few months per serving, but you’ll at least be happy when you eat it.

6. Bacon, Eggs, and Toast - Simple, tasty, all-American. This is what most people think of when their minds wander towards classic breakfast, and it’s for good reason. It’s hearty, fatty, and keeps your motor running all day long.

5. Creamed Chipped Beef - I honestly don’t know where this dish is local to outside of Philadelphia, but I’m glad we have it here. For those who don’t know, it’s dried beef cooked in a cream sauce and served over whatever kind of starchy thing you want to serve it over - toast, biscuits, bagels, home fries, even waffles. So good.

4. Pancakes - Look, I know people love their waffles and French toast, but neither stand up to the almighty glory that is the pancake. It’s lighter and fluffier than the waffle, and really, there’s something texturally off about French toast. In addition to being great on its own, you can put all kinds of stuff in pancakes too. Chocolate chips, fruit, peanut butter… it’s so versatile.

3. Grease Truck Breakfast Sandwiches - Breakfast sandwiches are nothing new, really. Everywhere has their own, but the kind you get from food trucks in the city are the superior article. Basically, they’re some  variant of egg, cheese, and a meat on a long roll (hoagie/sub roll). It’s the next evolution of #6, mainly because cheese is involved and the bread is better. White toast is fine, but why have that when you can have a sandwich on a crusty Italian roll?

2. Breakfast Burritos - There has been backlash against burritos, and I blame shitty fast food outlets for that. However, when you can combine one of the best ethnic foods (Mexican or Tex-Mex) with breakfast ingredients, you have to do it. Besides, everyone knows that peppers and onions go well with eggs.

1. Latkes - I had the latkes at Blue Moon Cafe in Baltimore, and they changed my life. Obviously, they were at the peak of what the latke could be, but at the same time, potatoes are an essential breakfast food. I’ve already noted how regular pancakes can be so versatile, and with potato as the canvas, the palette of ingredients expands a thousandfold. If you can have latkes for breakfast, have latkes for breakfast.

Honorable Mentions: Cocoa Puffs, Eggs Neptune, S’mores Pop-Tarts, Cinnamon Buns, Quiche Lorraine

Drink of choice: Coffee. Leave your OJ in the fridge.

My wife joined this Facebook group that acted as a giant yard sale, so to speak. People post items they want to sell, and other people bid on those items. It’s like Craigslist, only without the perverts, missed connections, and claimants of having perfected time travel. Anyway, she was going to go purchase an umbrella stroller for the baby at a shopping center parking lot. Rather than leave me at home with a rambunctious toddler and a hump-happy dog, she suggested my son and I come with, since the parking lot was right across the street from Cocco’s Gelateria.

My wife knows me well.

Gelato is probably my favorite of the desserts. I’m an ice cream junkie, but there’s something that’s more luxurious, unctuous, silky about its smooth-textured Italian counterpart that turns me into a quivering mess of satisfaction. Cocco’s feels like it’s the only place in Delaware County that specializes in the frozen treat. Then again, there may be a bunch of other places, but I’m not entirely sure that I’m not being lazy here. If you’re local, and the name sounds familiar, well, the Cocco name is also emblazoned on a disturbing number of pizza joints located throughout Delco and Chester County as well. Cocco’s pizza is the definition of mediocre, but damn, at least their gelato joint brings it.

They don’t just sell gelato. They have sorbet and ice cream too. We got a banana ice cream for the baby, because TJ loves his ice cream and he loves his nanners, and well, why not combine the two? That kid loved his dessert so much he was yelling between bites for my wife to feed him more. As for Amanda, she got a scoop of panna cotta gelato and one of dark chocolate sorbet, which I have to say, is the most dark chocolatey thing I’ve ever eaten.

However, I didn’t come for ice cream or sorbet. I wanted three scoops of gelato and a cup of coffee. I got three different flavors in my dessert. At the bottom was a scoop of chocolate hazelnut gelato, which yes, tasted just like frozen, dairified Nutella. Which is to say good Lord, it was incredible. The middle layer was roasted almond. It had a flavor akin to marzipan. The top layer? Tiramisu, because yes, my goal with this dessert was to be a wardrobe change and a combover from being a stereotype from a Martin Scorsese mob movie.

I had coffee with my dessert, because EVERYONE knows I like to drink coffee with my dessert, don’t I?

“OF COURSE WE DO, SIR!” 

It was a French roast, dark, slightly bitter, and strong. I would have preferred their regular roast, but they were out. Darn. Nothing’s perfect. But then again, how can anyone complain while eating gelato? Unless you’re lactose intolerant or vegan, I can’t see why.

Honestly, there isn’t much I wouldn’t do if bribed with gelato. I might even take on a contract hit if my only payment was the rich, creamy dream of an Italian dessert. However, all I had to do this time was accompany my wife to make sure she didn’t end up in a Mexican standoff over a stroller. I’d say that’s a small price to pay.

Cocco’s Gelateria is located at the corner of Oak and Providence Road in Primos, PA. You won’t be able to miss it. It’s on the same block as Cocco’s Pizzeria, Cocco’s Catering, and even Cocco’s Laundromat.

For some Peruvian flavor…

What I Ordered: Half pollo a la brasa (rotisserie chicken) and french fries

Over at Progressive Boink, Jon Bois used to do a weekly Lunch Judgment that has only now made appearances when he damn well feels like it. We’d all put our lunch submissions in the comments, and he’d rate them as only he could. There were perennial favorites. I often did well in them. Others didn’t, whether in disappointing fashion or whether in intentional, spectacular, entertaining failure.

Among the most enterprising and varied eaters who’d pop in to be adjudged for his midday culinary feats was one Bobby Big Wheel, the semi-anonymous lawyer/part-time SB Nation and KSK Gruden parodier, who would turn in some pretty impressive and highly rated lunch choices. Among the most intriguing of these was a thing called Peruvian rotisserie. I had always equated Peruvian food with ceviche and leche de tigre, because I saw Jose Garces make Peruvian food on Iron Chef America once, and well, small sample sizes leave way too big an imprint on my psyche sometimes.

So yeah, I like rotisserie chicken, so this intrigued me. I had to go seek out a place that had it on the menu. Luckily for me, Northeast Philadelphia has become a haven for several different ethnicities to set up their eateries. There are Vietnamese, Korean, Brazilian, Portuguese, and yes, Peruvian rotisserie joints. I found my target at El Balconcito II.

The storefront was settled within a standard Philadelphia rowhome block, with the windows tinted. I’m not sure what that says about the place. I walked in, and I was greeted by the sounds of infomercials in Spanish and a table setup that looked like it was a VFW Hall for a beef ‘n beer. I was seated and found they had pollo a la brasa in their Peruvian section (it’s a Peruvian/Portuguese restaurant) in three different sizes, whole, half, and quarter. I was hungry, but I wasn’t trying to take a nap. I did have to get back to work. So, I ordered the half, with french fries. I like french fries.

I was greeted first with a toasted Portuguese bun and some butter. I love Portuguese rolls. They’re so light and airy, and the bread was crispy on the outside and warm and soft on the inside. It was a suitable appetizer for what was to come out.

The chicken came out with a generous side of fries. The fries were bag ‘n dump, standard foodservice fries, but they were cooked perfectly. I had no complaints about them. But this isn’t about french fries.

First thing’s first, the skin wasn’t crispy, which was probably my biggest complaint. I don’t know if that was a function of the spices or cooking methods, or because they didn’t cook it right, but I like crispy skin. That’s my Achilles heel. Well, one of my heels. You don’t get to 336 lbs. without having a score of go-to food vices. However, it was delicious skin. It was herbaceous and bold. If only it were crispy.

The white meat was fairly juicy, which was a pleasant surprise since that part of the chicken is the easiest to dry out. The dark meat was just as moist with the exception of the wing, which was abnormally small. Because of that, it got super dried out, almost to the point of it being chicken jerky, but that was not only delicious, but it was texturally pleasing as well. What can I say, I like jerky.

The real star of the plate was brought to me in a plastic squirt bottle though. I couldn’t get enough of the aji sauce. For those who don’t know, it’s an herby, spicy, acidic sauce, green in color at this establishment (apparently, recipes can vary wildly). I dipped my fries in it like I needed it to live. I mopped the chicken up in it. I stopped just short of squirting it in my mouth from the bottle. I would buy a 30-gallon drum of it and bathe in it if I could.

All in all, it was a satisfying meal. The chicken was both familiar and new to me at the same time, and the fries (and especially the sauce) were the perfect complements to it. I would definitely go back, and I would also definitely take more culinary cues from Mr. Wheel, as he seems to know what’s up.

El Balconcito II is located at 7326 Castor Avenue in Philadelphia, PA. The flagship location is found at 658 E. Godfrey Avenue, also in Philly.

No, this isn’t a Spilly meal. You won’t want to vomit after reading this, I hope. This is an idea I had develop over the day today through many a stimulus. First, I watched an episode of Diners, Drive-ins, and Dives where the chef was doing this outrageous take on duck fat fries that included duck skin chicharrones. I love crispy skin of any kind, because duh, it’s the best part on any fowl. Then, on our way home from dinner, we passed a local ice cream parlor that had “Try our ice cream and waffles!” on the marquee. My wife turned to me and said, “I want waffles and ice cream.”

My response? “I’d rather have chicken, waffles, and ice cream.”

Then the idea hit me. It wasn’t just an offhand idea to be gross, it was an actual, legit idea.

Of course, no one in their right mind would combine ice cream and actual chicken meat. Maybe there’s a good application that combines the two ingredients. I don’t know, I try to be adventurous, but I’m not all the way there yet. However, sweet and savory have been laying in the same bed for the last decade at least. People put bacon in sundaes, for crying out loud. What’s the bacon of the chicken?

The skin, duh.

So my idea is this. You have a waffle, a nice, fluffy Belgian waffle. You put two scoops of ice cream on top. Vanilla’s the go-to choice, but the adventurous might pick something like butter pecan or something of a maple variety.

Now, how to incorporate the chicken into this? Well, regardless of either application I’m about to put forth, one would make the skin into a play on chicharrones. Fry the skin til it’s nice and crisp, and then chop it up until it’s a crumble. Then, you do one of two things.

One, you sprinkle it on top of the ice cream and waffles directly. You get texture, a crunch to go with the light, airy waffle and the creamy, rich ice cream. Plus you get the counterbalance of the salty, unctuousness of chicken skin.The other option is to make a play on a salted caramel. Whip up a caramel sauce, and instead of putting in sea salt, you replace with the chicharrones.

I haven’t made this yet. I may try to at some point, but I think this is too good an idea not to share with the world. Tinker with this recipe/idea, and if you do make it, get back to me with the results. Chicken and waffles are a great marriage. Waffles and ice cream are a great marriage too. That culinary menage a trois though? I think there’s something there.