I gotta say, Philly, I’m not in love.

Philly cheesesteaks ARE good.  Don’t get me wrong.  There’s nothing like some shaved steak smothered in grilled onions and cheese, but I’ve gotta say I’ve had better.

Oh, and Cheez Whiz must be something you had to grow up eating on your cheese steak to like.  It’s far too salty for me.  But don’t think I’m bashing the cheese steak.  I like being in an area where culinary pride comes from a humble and tasty sandwich.

But the cheese steak (as I am led to believe) has Italian origins.  Well, let an Irish girl who grew up in an Italian town in West Virginia put her two cents in the well.

I grew up eating Steak Hoagies.  In Clarksburg WV, home of one of the better Italian Heritage Festivals you’re likely to encounter and the best fresh made Italian bread, we eat Steak Hoagies.

A Steak Hoagie is 18 inches long, has shaved steak, onions and cheese as well as Italian style peppers we all know simply as Oliverio Peppers.  It’s a lot like a cheese steak.

Steak Hoagie

My Recipe (but used and loved all over Clarksburg, WV)

Shaved beef steak (most grocery butchers have this, or you could use frozen steak umms, either will work)

Hoagie Buns (Here in PA, they only come in 12 inches.  In Clarksburg, get yourself an 18 incher!)

1 large onion, sliced

1 Tblsp. oil

salt and pepper

1 16-oz. jar Oliverio Peppers (You can get any jarred Italian style peppers, but Oliverio’s has a website!)

1/2 lb. Provolone cheese (yes, it has to be Provolone!)

Heat a cast iron skillet over medium high heat.  Add oil.  Add onions and cook until soft and starting to brown.

Next add the shaved steak.  I used about 5 lbs. and this will make 4 12-inch sandwiches.  Cook in the hot pan and add salt and pepper to taste.

When the meat is browned, it’s time to add the peppers.  Add the whole jar!

Just stir together until combined and hot.

Now, line a baking sheet with aluminum foil.  Stuff the buns with the meat mixture and place on the prepared sheet pan.  Place cheese over the sandwiches.

Put under a broiler until the cheese is melted and bubbly.

Now insert into face-hole and enjoy!

Another great thing about these is that it is a super fast meal to make.  15-20 minutes and you have dinner on the table.  You can serve it with french fries (drizzle Cheez Whiz on THOSE!  Now that’s good!) or just eat the sandwiches alone.  Either way, you will waddle away from the table feeling very satisfied.

Enjoy!

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I didn’t take my camera and thus, have no pictures.  I could kick myself…seriously.  I’m going to be a new regular of this place.  I.  Am.  In.  Love.

The place is tiny.  It’s got old floors.  There are peanut shells littering the floor (their claim to fame is that they were the first to serve peanuts on the house and let their patrons throw the shells on the floor).  The lighting was low, the bartender was CUTE (hey, it helped with the ambiance) there was a great beer list, it’s family friendly, and the food is fantastic.

We started with a dozen wings each as an appetizer.  After jonesing for wings for more than a week, I was more than satisfied.  They were delicious.  As a rule for me, I like for my wings to be spicy enough for my nose to be running, but not so hot that I’m crying for my mommy.  These wings were just right.

The way that they were served was genius, GENIUS I tell you.  They were served in a bowl and there was a puddle of hot-sauce-goo at the bottom.  They were swimming in their hot sauce.  They were cooked to perfection.  Crispy, not soggy and not overcooked either.  Even when swimming in their hot-sauce-goo they maintained a crispness.  I’m going back for more very soon!

As a main course, I had the N.Y Jewish Corned Beef on Rye sandwich.  Just right.  Just right.  Again, I’ll be having that again after I’ve run through the rest of the menu.

The staff was super nice and attentive, the atmosphere was comfortable even though they were quite busy.  The prices were a little high, yes, but I won’t begrudge them that.  It was worth it. I liked this place so much, that when I go back, I’ll take my camera and give them ANOTHER post on here.  I told you…IN LOVE.

I’m happy to see that my new city will offer me many strata of eating trials.  I look forward to exploring further.

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Eventually, though, we found those small places.  Those charming places owned by local joe’s who greet you as you walk in the door and wave to you as you leave.  Those charming places with menus sitting on the narrow but loving shoulders of only one or two people.  Those charming places that serve warmth and that one-of-a-kind spirit that makes them a million times more special than any pretentious restaurant that has the audacity to charge astronomical amounts of money for cocktails and even more for their cream-soaked mediocre food.

Today, I took my husband out to lunch and we visited a couple of our favorite places.  We went to the Santorini Greek Grill in downtown Kirkland (very close to the waterfront of Lake Washington).  This place is a teeny tiny little joint that stops you in the street as you walk by with the seductive scents of Greek meats.  Lamb for lunch?  Oh sure, why not!

The gyros, salads, Souvlaki, baklava, falafel, and service are all TERRIFIC.  I love this place.  The food is served up lightening fast and on real plates to boot!  Usually is itty bitty places like this, you get plastic forks and paper plates or baskets.  It helps to eat off of a plate with a metal fork.

In a small funky place like this, I was worried that the decor was going to be really kitschy and scary like off of My Big Fat Greek Wedding.  Luckily, it’s not like that at all.  All over the neutrally painted walls, framed photographs of different regions of Greece hang in a very cool and very West coast manner.  It’s lovely.

The one piece of kitsch was this hilarious tidbit right by the entrance/exit.

This restaurant is even featured in Zagat.  That means nothing to me, it’s just amusing that Zagat and I agree for once.

After our Greek lunch, we went a couple of doors down to the Seattle area’s best coffee shop.  No, it’s not Starbucks.  Out here, I’ve found that there are two very opinionated groups where Starbucks is concerned:  those who are proud of it and those who hate it for being a corporate crap shoot.  Now, I get Starbucks every once in a while simply because they are literally on every block in this area.  But if I had my choice, I would go to Cafe Ladro.  This place is what a Seattle coffee shop should be.  Small.  Friendly barista who doesn’t have a painted on fake smile.  Fair prices.  And in their goddamned iced chai lattes, there is more latte than ice…unlike how Starbucks serves them….assholes.

Sorry about that outburst.  But Cafe Ladro is a superior coffee shop.  It’s a small place, it’s mellow instead of that fake rushed sense that you get when in a Starbucks.  It’s a cool and industrial look that is oddly more soothing than that manufactured and fake look that Starbucks is trying to sell.  The coffee is BETTER.  The pastries are BETTER.  All of the drinks are BETTER.

Look at that understated logo.  It’s perfection.

The station was very simple.  In fact, I had a nice little conversation with the barista about the movie Zoolander as she filled our order.  Nice lady.

Some other East Side places that I loved while here:

Momoya Sushi and Sake House

Dick’s Hamburgers

L&L Hawaiian Barbecue (even though it’s a small chain)

Beth’s Cafe

I realize that we’ve barely chipped the iceberg and I have regrets about that, but our time here is up and I look forward to getting to know a new city.  But if you ever make your way out to this area, check these places out and have some great food without worrying about an offensively huge bill.

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I’m taking a chance by posting this.  It’s quite possible that a local will stomp my big toe after reading this.

This place was disappointing all around.  We didn’t go to the original Ivar’s on Seattle’s waterfront, we went to a little fish shack in downtown Bothell, a suburb of Seattle.  Actually, I’m giggling right now because I’m at their website and by the looks of it, it seems that the company would have you believe that it is a sit-down and elegant seafood restaurant.  Umm, no. It’s not.  We ate chowder from paper bowls, and ate our fried food from baskets lined with wax paper.  Our drinks came in paper cups just like what you would expect from a fast food chain.  That in and of itself would never bother me, but this place failed in the food department.

Their fries were ok.  They tasted like a million other French fries I have eaten.  Their regular fish was not so good.  The breading was coarse and bland.  The clam strips, the shrimp, were all covered in the same breading.  I’ve had better come from my freezer.

The chowders were gross.  I have nothing at all nice to say about those chowders.  The Manhattan Clam Chowder (the red one) tasted like it came from a can.  It had that cheap bouillon cube taste to it that was overwhelming and gross.  Clam Chowder, I understand can be tricky, but if you plaster your restaurants and webpage with gloats of awards your restaurant has won, own up and put quality ingredients in your food.  There’s just no excuse for cheap tasting soup.

The New England Clam Chowder (the white cream-based one) was weird.  It was better than the Manhattan, but it was still not very good.  The main taste in this soup was bacon.  I want to taste the sweet briney taste of clams and I’m eating bacon-cream soup.  That’s not right.  This place is famous for it’s chowder and I hated it.

They also provided little plastic tubs of tartar sauce and ketchup with our meals; little pre-sealed Ivar’s condiments.  The problem with these is that the tubs were only filled maybe 1/3 to 1/2 full.  That’s a lot of plastic waste coming from a native restaurant of a city that considers itself progressive in environmental consciousness.  And no, there was no recycling offered.  Between my toddler and I, we used 3 tubs of ketchup and 1 tub of tartar sauce (I was sharing with my son and couldn’t use malt vinegar like I wanted)….that’s a lot of plastic going to a landfill and that was just us.  I’m disappointed.

There were ants crawling around on the table top.  That, to me, was the straw that broke the camel’s back.  I expect ants when I am eating on the ground in a park, but not in a restaurant.

The prices were a little high considering what we were eating.  We were actually sitting in a booth in the back of a restaurant and the door to the kitchen was open and I could look right in.  It was a bunch of deep fryers and freezers.  It actually kind of reminded me of the kitchen in the back of the Krusty Krab on the show Spongebob Squarepants (I’ve got a toddler, people.  Nickelodeon is very familiar to me!).  Also, the “combo dinners” didn’t come with drinks.  That’s ridiculous!  And the drinks ended up being quite pricey!  I am just so annoyed with this place.  I could have gotten better tasting deep fried fish at a cheaper price from Captain D’s or Long John Silvers (that’s the comment that’s going to get me killed).

Maybe it’s the fact that I’ve had Fish N’ Chips made by a person from the UK.  Those people KNOW how to batter and fry cod, ladies and gentlemen.  I just really didn’t like this place, and that disappoints me because up until tonight I have absolutely loved all of the tiny food joints Seattle has to offer.  Sorry, Ivar’s and Seattlites.  It was NOT good.

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The place that we visited this weekend was Beth’s Cafe.  Perhaps you have heard of this place from the Travel Channel.  This place is most famous for it’s 12-egg omelettes.  My husband and I saw it on television and joked that we should find this place….then we sort of forgot about it and went on with our lives.  Well last summer we took a family trip to a nearby zoo and right across the street from the zoo was Beth’s Cafe.  I pointed this out to my husband who quickly got excited about it and proclaimed that we would go the very next weekend.  Fast forward to more than a year later and we still hadn’t gone.  I was planning a nice Father’s Day for my husband and decided that now would be a great time to finally go the Beth’s and get the low-down on the hizzy….err something like that.

Of course we ordered a 12-egg omelette!  I was certain that we wouldn’t eat it all and my husband (who loves the fact that I regularly eat waaaay more than him in a sitting) was certain that we (me) would eat it all.  But let’s hold off on the food for a moment and talk about the place itself.  Parking is in the back next to a run-down old building with a door that scared the heck out of me.  It looked like a rat the size of a gorilla was going to jump out and punch me at any moment!  The inside of the cafe is old and probably hasn’t changed since it was opened in 1954.  The walls were dingy and had little splatters of food on them, the floor was worn and slightly muddy, and the booths have definitely seen better days.  There are crayon drawings covering all of the walls.  All patrons are provided with a small stack of regular white paper and a cup of crayons and are encouraged to doodle so that the cafe will always have new “art” all over the walls.  It was funky and neat.  It was a cool distraction to look around at all of the drawings.  Since this place is open 24/7, I can imagine that more than one over-partied person has stumbled in there for a stack of pancakes and left behind a unique drawing.

The wait staff couldn’t have been more attentive or friendly.  It was refreshing, really, to find such nice people.  They were genuinely nice.  When you go to small places like this as opposed to those big chain restaurants, you are more likely to run into genuine personalities waiting on you rather than the plastered on fake smiles of the teenaged wait staff at Applebee’s.

Never once did either my husband or I see the bottoms of our coffee cups, and for my husband that says a LOT.  He’s a web developer; he’s practically immune to caffeine.  When we were seated, we were immediately greeted with ice water and coffee.  Almost as soon as we put our menus down, a happy face was there to take our order.  When we stopped eating, a happy face was there to ask if we were done and to compliment us on how cute our son is (always a plus).  I really enjoyed the wait staff at Beth’s.

Now for the food.  We went on a Friday morning, but remember that it’s summer vacation for public schools and colleges and universities so this place was actually quite busy.  When we ordered our 12-egg omelette, we expected that it would be a long wait before we got our food.  We were wrong!  The waitress brought us our food in no more than 5 minutes.  That’s crazy!  What was even crazier was the fact that this omelette was served to us on a huge pizza pan.  It’s THAT big.

Underneath that huge stuffed omelette (stuffed with sausage, onions, green peppers and cheddar cheese) was at least a lb. of hash browns, and you can obviously see the toast.  I wondered if a dish like this were pure novelty or if it was actually going to taste good.  It was DELICIOUS.  It was perfectly cooked.  It was a joy eating this monster.  The hash browns were also delicious even though the main flavor was of BUTTER.  These things were soaked in butter…but in a good way.

Alas, we were unable to clean our pizza pan.  We did pretty well though, huh?

Even with his enthusiastic help, we still didn’t eat the whole thing.  I was partly disappointed, but we were mostly stuffed to the gills.  That’s a lot or protein and carbs!

After the total experience:  the food, the service and the atmosphere I would have to say that I would recommend this place to anybody.  Yeah it’s a little dingy looking, but that lends to the personality of the place.  Yeah the building is old and the parking lot is a little scary, but the people there are so cool.  I absolutely loved it and would like to go again before we leave here.

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-McDonald’s:  The Big Mac is a great little sandwich.  I have a hard time really calling it a hamburger because I generally prefer that my hamburgers contain more meat than bread (and “secret” sauce), and the Big Mac has only two pathetic smooshed patties.  Ask me if I care.  Go ahead.  Ask.  NO I DON’T CARE!  I love that thing!  And I LOVE their French fries!  When I was in high school, I would eat basket upon basket upon basket of their French fries.  I don’t really care for much else on their menu, but I am a hardcore Big Mac fan.  Someone get me a t-shirt!

-Wendy’s:  I like those little itty bitty burgers on their $0.99 value menu.  Their fries stink, but those bitty burgers are great for a little snack.  They used to have a Bacon Burger that I loved but they replaced it with something called the Baconator and I’ve gotta say….I just can’t bring myself to eat that thing.  It looks way too gross.  Oh, and I don’t like Frosties.  LOVE their chili, however and I love their baked potatoes.

-KFC:  Original Recipe only please.  They have the best coleslaw in the world and their biscuits make me weep.  If either of my grandmother’s cooked, I imagine that it would have tasted like this.  In fact, my paternal grandmother seemed to always have buckets of KFC magically appearing on her table.  Anytime anyone even considered going to her house, a bucket of chicken appeared.

-Taco Bell:  Yes please.  I love their Mexican Pizzas and their Quesadillas.  And their Gorditas.  And almost everything else on their menu.  Except the Choco Taco.  Blech.

-Dairy Queen (Brazier):  It’s not the best out there, but something about it seems old-timey to me.  Is that weird?  My maternal grandmother used to take me there for chicken sandwiches and onion rings when I was little and eating those two things always remind me of her, and since I miss her so terribly it’s a nice way to remember her.

-Burger King:  If there isn’t a McDonald’s or a Wendy’s around, I will go get a Whopper.  I hate their fries and WILL NOT eat them.  However, they used to have a burger that they would bring out every summer called the Rodeo Burger.  It had barbecue sauce and onion rings on it and it was soooo good.  And huge.  Bring it back!

-Pizza:  I like making homemade pizza, but I also love just ordering a greasy home delivery pizza.  Why?  Because I can get chicken wings with it.  Extra cheese, pepperoni and red onion.  Nothing else!

-Hot Dogs:  I’m originally from West Virginia and I am told that the way that we eat our dogs is strange.  Ketchup, mustard, chili, and onions.  That’s weird?  Really?  Oh well, it’s delicious and it’s something that I miss terribly.  The best hot dogs in WV come from a place called T&L Hot Dog.  They also served fresh fries with cheese.

-Chinese Takeout:  This is something that can be either really good or simply terrible.  Really good is a rare find, but boy when you find it, is it ever a great indulgence!  Cheese wontons, egg drop soup, egg rolls, spring rolls, noodles, chicken, beef, pork….YUM!  I’ve been without a REALLY good Chinese takeout for 3 years now.  Philadelphia, damn it, you’d better offer it up!

-Sub Sandwiches:  I like both Quizno’s and Subway.  They offer two different kinds of sandwiches for the most part.  If I want a cold sandwich, I go to Subway.  If I want a beef dip or toasted sub, I go to Quizno’s.  Both are fine in my book.

-Arbie’s:  I love their roast beef sandwiches.  Smother them in some mayo and they’re golden.  Also, CURLY FRIES!  SQUEEE!

Wow, that’s a long list.  I’m almost ashamed of myself!  Almost.  Overall, I’d just like to say that I really enjoy “slumming it” when it comes to the partaking of food.  I cook better than what these places offer and I can emulate almost anything from these places, but sometimes that convenience is just too tempting!  It’s something that’s maybe a once a week thing.  I try to cook most of our meals but sometimes I just want a Big Mac or a Mexican Pizza.  Am I really so very different from you, mister hoity-toity foodie?  We all like to slum it!

Once again, I’m going to be shaking in my boots all night long wondering when the comments about me being a gross pig will come rolling in.  Name-call all you want, you will not shake my foundation of fast food love!  And yes, in case you’re wondering, I DID watch Super Size Me and didn’t eat McDonald’s for a month after.  And that was the hardest month of my life up to that point.

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My local restaurant is located in an old strip mall.  It’s actually funny that it’s located next to a Curves because their food isn’t exactly *ahem* figure friendly.  That’s ok because it’s really good and totally worth the splurge.

The decor in this place is beyond cheesy.  But, if you’ve ever been to Hawaii (Waikiki in particular) it’s not that far off base.  That whole town was cheese-tastic and this restaurant reflects that perfectly.  Every time I have been in this particular restaurant the floors have been very dirty and the red booths are so smooshy, you sink down so that you are nose-level with the table.  The food is so good that these things are easy to ignore.

The serving sizes of the meals are simply enormous.  I have a hard time eating a full serving, and that’s rare for me.  Listen, I’m not one of those tiny super skinny people that tries to brush off my super skinny-ness by saying I eat a lot.  I really do pound it back when I sit down to a meal.  I’ve actually frightened people by how much I can eat.  There’s a reason that I can’t fit into a size 2 pants, folks.  And yes, that’s my son trying to dig into the food.  He loves it so much that he couldn’t wait 2 seconds for me to snap a picture.

This place serves Spam Musubi.  As you may or may not know, Spam is a very big thing on the islands.  Under normal circumstances I don’t really care for this stuff.  Maybe it’s the novelty of having what is basically a Spam sushi, but I really like this stuff.  It’s salty, savory, and the dried seaweed goes perfectly with the Spam.  I like it, so shoot me.

This is what my meal looked like.  Smokey Kalua Pork, rice, and a delicious pasta salad.  Maybe it doesn’t look all that intimidating here, but all those carbs really can weigh a person down.  It’s a delicious meal, I adore every aspect of it.  They serve a Kalua Pork with or without cabbage but I just don’t care for the texture of the option that comes with cabbage (and with Irish and German ancestors, I’ve had cabbage many many ways).  I like my pork straight up.  I’d like to think that the afterlife is fully stocked with Kalua Pork.

The first time I came to L&L, I found the side of pasta salad a little odd, but I went with it.  I’m a sucker for any carb smothered in a mayonnaise sauce so the pasta salad and I made quick friends with each other.  It goes oddly well with the intense smokey flavor of the Kalua Pork.  It’s weird, but it works.

I urge you to please visit the website and see if there is a franchise near you.  It’s still a small restuarant chain so if you are left without one of these little gems close to you, my sympathies go to you and your families.  You’re missing great food in a total dive.

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See my original post here.

Behold the tiffin.  This is a marvelous little invention that is used in India and China as an everyday lunch box.  In the case of my tiffin, there are three bowls that fit together and are clamped together by a carrier.  I got this for $9.99 here.  It’s also dishwasher safe.  Yeah, now you’re out of excuses to NOT get one of these.  If you do some browsing and have no problem with paying a little more, these can come with a more “designer” feel to them with colors and patterns.  For me, the stainless steel is fine.

These are the three tiffin bowls and the top lid.

Here I have some Chinese takeout in the tiffin bowls.  These bowls actually hold quite a lot of food.  They hold just as much, if not more than those little takeout containers (which, depending on your takeout provider can be paper or styrofoam) usually provided.

Here I’m showing my hand next to the tiffin bowls to give a to-scale comparison.  These bowls are not tiny and they are great for takeout.  I warn you, you’ll have to argue with your provider to get them to use your own container instead of theirs.  They get confused.  Just try to explain to them why you are against using the styrofoam or paper and they usually cooperate.

I don’t know about you, but almost every time I go out to eat at a sit-down restaurant, I always have food leftover and the waitress/waiter is always offering me a box.  These “boxes” are styrofoam and completely wasteful.  Keep a tiffin on you and tell your server that you brought your own box.  You paid for it, it’s your food and I seriously doubt you’ll get any resistance.  If anything, you’re going to hear how cool that it is and how clever you are.  Who doesn’t love that?  Just remember who gave you the tip, huh kids?

TIFFIN.  You know you want one….or two.  Go on, save the world one tiffin at a time.

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I got a Tuna Roll and a Cucumber Roll.  I know that this is painfully tame to some of you, but I love these rolls and that they are so gorgeous in their simplicity.  I was a happy girl.

Of course this came with green tea (flavored with dark sesame oil for a smokey taste) and a salad and miso soup.  I love miso soup!

My husband got a gorgeous Bento box.  Of course I nibbled a little bit of everything from this meal and it was all delectable and perfect.  Seriously, this sushi man knows what the hell he’s doing.

Since we are leaving the Pacific Northwest in August, we thought it would be a good idea to try a local seafood called Geoduck (pronounced “gooey duck”).  It’s basically a clam that looks….uhhh….like a certain part of a man.  It’s a freak out, but they are supposedly sweet and great for sushi.  Unfortunately, Momoya did not have this native mollusk so we decided to try another fresh seafood.  We tried raw Sea Urchin.  Let me be straight with you.  This Sea Urchin was FRESH FRESH FRESH.  The taste was sublime.  It’s everything good about the ocean and seafood wrapped into one.  HOWEVER, it is the consistency of peanut butter.  Some people call it the Foie Gras of the sea, and I can see that.  Despite the taste being as heavenly as it was, the consistency just freaked me out a little bit and I couldn’t help but gag.  I did that the first time I tried raw oysters on the half shell too…but now I’ll suck down raw oysters with the best of them and slurp the liqueur like it’s mother’s milk.  (Sorry I didn’t get a picture of it.  I was too excited and my phone was in the hands of a phone-happy toddler.)

The best part about this last trip to Momoya’s was that our soup and salad were given to us on the house.  I don’t know why.  Maybe because we were the first dinner guests?  I would have happily paid!  And when we ordered the Sea Urchin, we were given a hand roll, also on the house.  I would have paid for that too!  This place is fantastic.  It’s tiny, family owned, friendly, and completely non-pretentious.  I wish I could take it back East with me.  I will miss it.

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