Well shoot, Deschutes

I’m going to get this right out of the way. Timothy O’Tooles is not a good food restaurant. It is a “get out of work and hang out with friends who don’t care about food” type of place. The food I had there was so mediocre and middle of the road I had to liberally apply salt and pepper to my “Michigan Avenue” salad to give it some modicum of flavor. The salad comprised of grilled chicken, goat cheese, avocado, craisins, corn, toasted almonds, tomato, croutons & citrus vinaigrette should have been a shoo-in, so somehow making that taste like nothing makes your restaurant extra special. The pretzel bites themselves were fine, but the dipping sauce was so runny, it barely clung to the pretzel. 

But people don’t go here for the food. It’s a sports bar plain and simple. Hell, their logo is a bald dude passed out on the bar. I don’t think people care their salad is flavorless as long as the drink specials are indeed special and hopefully cheap.

I wasn’t here for the food anyways. Oregon’s Deschutes Brewery was having a “We’re finally in Chicago!” party, and I’m always game for trying new beer. I called up my friend Jeremy and we headed down to Streeterville to try some beer and get our complimentary Dechutes pint glass (it’s pretty nice).

As I’ve mentioned previously, I’m not good at reviewing the fine points of beer. I just know if something tastes good to me. I was not equipped with the taste buds to appreciate the subtle oaky notes, or fruit forward direction of a beer. So, this is less a review of the beer and more a “I’d drink that again.”

The biggest surprise of the evening for me was their Black Butte Porter. Porters are usually beyond my comfort zone when it comes to beer. Decidedly strong, dark and bitter I tend to avoid them. Yet this porter was surprisingly smooth and while still strong and dark, the bitter bite was missing. Of the porters I’ve had, and that’s not many, this was probably my favorite, just because it wins by being the least like a porter. 

Sweetest two words in the human language, “Forfeit.”

I did enjoy their Mirror Pond Pale Ale quite a bit, a “hop-forward” beer according to the press release and website. It was probably the cleanest pour (LOOK I’M USING LINGO!) of the evening, as evidenced by the two pints I had.

I’m not a huge fan of IPA’s, but the Chainbreaker White IPA wasn’t cringeworthy. I’m guessing it’s because it tasted like a mix of a Belgian white and a regular IPA. It’s not something I would order, but the free sample was nice.

The street team member was hilarious, and I started referring to her as our new best friend. I don’t know if people weren’t biting on trying new and different beer, but she was INCREDIBLY excited that we were there purely to try their wares. We even got a sweet Deschutes bottle opener keychain out of the deal. You can’t go wrong with free. Plus now, if a party breaks out in the middle of the street or a CTA car I’m all set. I will be there to pop those bottles if popping bottles is something that needs to be done.

What did I learn from this experience? Not all porters are terrible. Street team members for breweries are incredibly friendly and probably drunk. Free stuff is fun.

Good Enough To Give You Diabetes: Nutella Swirl Pound Cake

I don’t have much to say about this recipe other than it’s delicious. Katie has a particular weakness for Nutella, so when I see an interesting recipe I bookmark it and eventually treat her to a bit of baking.

The recipe originally came from Food & Wine, but I found it on the Chicago Foodies website.

If you want to make it extra sugary to guarantee your own health downfall, and possible stomach ache, just do what I did and accidentally boost the 1 1/4 cups of sugar up to 1 1/2. It makes the crust extra crispy and your teeth extra tingly.

Nutella Swirl Pound Cake

• 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 4 large eggs, room temperature
• 2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
• 3/4 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 2 sticks unsalted butter, softened
• 1 1/4 cups granulated sugar
• One 13-ounce jar Nutella

1. Preheat the oven to 325 degrees F. Grease a 9″x5″ loaf pan. In a medium sized bowl, combine flour, baking powder and salt.

2. In a separate large bowl, beat together butter and sugar until light and fluffy using a mixer. Make sure your eggs are at room temperature to ensure your cake rises properly. Gradually add in each egg, and then the vanilla, until fully incorporated.
3. With your mixer on low, add in the dry ingredients to the wet little by little.
4. Spray or butter your pan. Pour in 1/3 of your batter. Spread with 1/2 of the jar of Nutella. Now, pour over 1/3 more of the batter. Top with the rest of the Nutella. Finish off with the rest of your batter.
5. Before baking, lightly swirl through the pan with a butter knife once or twice. Bake for about an hour and ten minutes, or until a toothpick comes out clean from the center.

Allow the cake to cool thoroughly before serving. I know it’s tempting to dig into warm Nutella, but you will have a runny mess if you cut into the cake immediately. Serve for dessert with ice cream or enjoy with a cup of coffee for breakfast. Nutella is a healthy breakfast food, right?

Cheeseburgers in Pasadena

Since we moved back to Illinois, people don’t ask me much how I feel about the whole thing. Burbank wasn’t the right place for us, but I’d be lying if I said I didn’t deeply miss the ocean and walking the beach, or being able to drive to a place like Disneyland or Universal Studios.

It’s hard to go through winter in Chicago but think what this time of the year would be like if we were still in Burbank (hopefully not 100 degrees). I still wistfully think we’ll make it back out there at least once under our own terms. We’ll find the right city to live. We’ll find the right place to call home. But for now, that’s not the case.

One of the biggest things I miss is our friends out there and the new places they took us. Whether it was Rocket Fizz, a shop dedicated to soda, or Yamashiro, being able to explore with friends was one of the biggest highlights.

So this morning when our friend Nikki messaged me with a plea to come back to California because next week was “Pasadena Burger Week,” I got a bit sad. I WANT to be back there, not just to see our friends, but to also take part in Pasadena’s Restaurant Week’s Cheeseburger Week.

It’s a week dedicated to the cheeseburger in the town where the cheeseburger was invented. I don’t even eat beef and I want to go to some of those restaurants. Of course, that would mean convincing Katie to try some of the stuff, but I think I could convince her to try Crepe Studio’s Estonian Burger, a crepe filled with beef and cheese.

It would probably be harder to convince her to try Slater’s 50/50′s FRITOS CRUNCH BURGER: A chili cheeseburger with a crunch! A Sterling Silver ground beef patty topped with melted cheddar cheese, signature chili, Fritos^® and 1000 island dressing on white brioche. I want to make a vegetarian version of that now. Stat. Now stat.

So, while I can’t visit Pasadena for what sounds like a great week of food, maybe those in California can eat a side of fries for me. Or maybe our friend Steve can try the Fritos Crunch Burger and get back to me on how awesome it is.

 

Drinking The Weekend Away

Katie and I planned to do the cute couple thing this weekend and take a trip to Long Grove, IL to see what all the old-person hub bub was about, but the weather cut that short. What we did see of Long Grove is exactly as one would think. Although based on how many times I’ve had to explain what Long Grove is to people, there doesn’t seem to be too many people thinking about it at all. It’s full of small stores (two Irish-based!), small boutiques and old-school ice cream stores. The sidewalks are cobblestone and horrible uneven, and under any other circumstances we would have stuck around, but the snow made the cobblestone nice and slippery. We decided that a guy with balance problems was not the target audience for Long Grove that day.

What we did get to try before we left was the Long Grove Confectionary, a chocolate lover’s wet dream. Free samples of their dark chocolate peppermint bark greeted us, and after some hemming and hawing we decided we couldn’t leave without trying the thing for which the city is known. We tried their jalapeño and sea salt chocolate, the peanut butter, and the fudge cup. Being a PB & Chocolate whore the cup won hands down as far as I’m concerned, but the salted caramel with a jalapeño kick was a close runner up. You didn’t get the heat until you swallowed and it hit the back of your throat.

Instead we had lunch at The Ram, which I wrote about the other day. The second trip was fairly similar to the first trip. The service was slightly slow, but the food was good. I tried their fish and chips for this second visit. You only get one piece of fish, but it’s a large piece. It was nice to not be disgustingly full as some fish and chips dishes can do to you. It’s a heavy, hearty meal and when a 

restaurant tosses three pieces of battered goodness at you, you don’t always walk away feeling good about yourself.

I tried their beer sampler as well. I didn’t feel as bad ordering my own, since the first trip I was sipping off my sister-in-law’s 3 oz pints. I think I’ve discussed my complete naivety when it comes to beer. I know nothing about hops and malts and wheats and ryes. I go in with a “if it tastes good, awesome” mentality. Through the very scientific process of “Try Everything” I’ve learned I like lighter, crisper beer, with stouts being the one exception. My favorite seems to be European drafts, especially something like an Italian Rye. So, I said bring on the sampler!

Turns out that my initial beer instincts stayed true. The Big Horn Blonde, Hefeweizen and the Buttface Amber Ale were the clear favorites, with Buttface probably being favorite. It went well with the fish and chips and never had a bitter taste to it. The blonde was a great before food drink, but didn’t necessarily pair up with the food very well. And the Hefeweizen was nice, if a bit too tangy (is that a beer term) for me.

The rest of the beers were sampled but just sat there. Sorry Big Red Ale and Total Disorder Porter.

Sunday we tried going to Little Goat since three of our friends got in with no wait. Of course we got there to find out there was over an hour wait. So we went to Haymarket Pub & Brewery instead. We weren’t disappointed.

The vegan burger was surprisingly good, especially since one of the main ingredients was beets. I do no like beets, so kudos to them making a delicious beet burger. The mac and cheese was awesomely smoky. And Katie loved her “Morning Riot” burger, which was italian sausage, mozzarella, BBQ pulled pork and an egg for good measure. She ate it as a personal dare to herself. She seldom eats the unhealthiest thing on the menu but the “Morning Riot” called to her. It didn’t last long.

We tried a couple of their beers, since you know, that’s what they’re about and stuff. I went with the White Chapel Wit, a Belgian white ale. It was exactly the kind of thing I like: light, crisp, and went well with my food. Katie tried the Nothing Rhymes With Purple Spiced Belgian Oatmeal Stout. Having just had a New Holland The Poet Oatmeal Stout a few days ago, I thought Haymarket’s was a much smoother stout, but still not something I’d order off the menu if I had a choice.

Readers of this blog will notice we actually avoided dessert at both of these restaurants. Sure, we replaced the calories with beer, but we almost felt like we were eating healthier, if you can count Italian sausage smothered in BBQ Pork and an egg healthier. But you have to start somewhere. Maybe next time we won’t order drinks, and be REALLY good.

But probably not.

Why cut out all the fun?

Rick’s Spicy Nuts

The last time I posted I mentioned a nutritionist enforced cleanse. It went about as well as one could expect when you tell someone they are only allowed to eat one vegetable a day. It turns out there’s eating healthy and there’s extremes. I chose pizza.

But that doesn’t mean I didn’t learn anything. I do actually want to be healthier and that means swapping out sugar filled granola bars with protein filled snacks like Rick Bayless’ spicy nuts.

Heh heh. I’m 12.

Chipotle-Roasted Almonds (4 cups)

• 2 canned chipotle chiles
• 2 Tbsp adobo sauce
• 2 Tbsp fresh lime juice
• 2 Tbsp ketchup
• 1/4 cup dark brown sugar
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 4 cups (1 1/4 lbs) toasted blanched almonds

Heat oven to 350 degrees. Scoop the chipotles, adobo, lime juice, ketchup, sugar and salt into a blender and process to a smooth puree. Pour into a large bowl along with the almonds and toss until the nuts are evenly coated. Line a rimmed baking sheet with parchment paper and evenly spread the nuts on it. Bake until they are a fragrant and no longer moist, about 30 minutes, stirring occasionally. Cool the almonds on the sheet pan, then school into a serving bowl.

Pumpkin Shakes At Jamba Juice

I guess calling them a shake isn’t fair. It’s technically a smoothie. But the seasonal smoothies at Jamba Juice may as well be milkshakes. Between an eggnog or a pumpkin option, they’re quickly trying to replace my eggnog shake addiction that for years belonged solely to McDonald’s. And now the pumpkin smoothie has only rekindled my love of the pumpkin pie Blizzard you could get seasonally from Dairy Queen.

But those aren’t healthy for anybody. Shoving an actual piece of pumpkin pie into a cup of already unhealthy ice cream is just a date with self loathing and disaster. DELICIOUS self loathing but self loathing nonetheless. It was like when I discovered the chocolate cake shakes at Portillos. Did the world NEED a chocolate milk shake blended with a piece of Duncan Hines chocolate cake? No! Did America make it anyways? Yes!

I would go to Portillos every other weekend with my best friend Chris and we’d order a large cake shake and just sit there happy as clams. I’d order a large cheese fries, because really when you’re on a lactose binge, go all out right? If I could have ordered mozzarella sticks covered in neon yellow cheese I probably would have. I’m not a healthy man.

But that’s why I’m actually happy Jamba Juice came out with these shakes. Sure, nothing beats the real deal of a pumpkin pie blizzard. I’m not an idiot. This shake doesn’t have piece of pie, or swirls of whip cream in it. BUT it does taste something like that original experience at half the calories (even less if you order up the light version). And they are pretty damn tasty. Granted, you don’t get a cool bracelet with one like you would with the Twilight branded Berry Midnight or whatever they’re calling it, but it’s good. And who needs Kristen Stewart sitting around looking listless while you’re trying to enjoy your drink anyhow?

The eggnog smoothie does indeed taste like eggnog, but it’s nowhere near as good as an eggnog shake. Eggnog by its very nature is gross, disgusting and REALLY unhealthy. Trying to healthify eggnog is a fruitless endeavor. You need whole cream and eggs and the feeling your heart may explode to truly enjoy it. And drinking an eggnog shake from McDonald’s gave you that experience. Of course it made it even unhealthier by adding nearly 2000 calories to it (if you got the large like I always did). So skip it. It’ll just make you sad you’re not drinking the real thing.

So long live the Jamba Juice Pumpkin Smash smoothie. I applaud it for getting me addicted to it. But I am a seasonal pumpkin drink whore. Except for you Pumpkin Latte at Starbucks. You taste like my spice cabinet full of nothing but all-spice and nutmeg exploded in my face.

Disneyland & California Adventure / Sept 2012

Disneyland & California Adventure / Sept 2012, a set on Flickr.

No food in these photos, but we went to Disneyland this weekend and had ourselves a good time.

Sadly I did not buy the amazing hats you see me wearing.

Disturbing Restaurants Abroad

I have to share this before I go to bed.

Crack.com’s 8 Most Terrifying Restaurants.

Too Cute To Eat

Tiger Sushi Goes RAWR!

This week may end up being a “Hey look at this link!” sorta week.  I’m typing from my mother’s laptop, my entire life currently in a 10×10 storage unit.  It’s truly a bizarre feeling to realize your entire life takes up the contents of so little space.  But, it’s promising to realize I just don’t have that much stuff!

This link comes from Cute Overload who had a great post on sushi art over in Japan.  The work going on over there is…well…insane.

Guttenberg’s Steak House

Forget Danny Bonaduce!  Steve Guttenberg wants you to come to his steak house!

Check out the commercial here.