September 8, 2008
From Serious Eats
Posted by Adam Kuban, September 7, 2008 at 10:00 AM
Barbecue chicken from The Pit in Raleigh, North Carolina. Photograph from Off the Broiler
Food blogger and tech journalist Jason Perlow blogs about five barbecue joints in the Carolinas that he visited while on several business trips there over the summer. Knowing Jason, I suspect that he visited more than these five. ;)
Jason's blog post is amazing, so do click through. Ed Levine here at SE points out that Jason repeatedly refers to overcooked green beans. "Southerners and Italians would beg to differ," Ed says. "That's the way they cook beans in the South and in Italy."
Jason also visits Maurice's BBQ in Columbia, South Carolina. Maurice Bessinger is an infamous segregationist, and Jason comes back with some scary photos of hoot-hollerin' South Will Rise Again type stuff that decorate the place. We're glad Perlow came out of Maurice's BBQ alive.
Be ready to replace your mouse's scroll wheel after you visit Jason's site. This post is loooooong—and long on goodness.
From Serious Eats
Posted by Allison Hemler, September 5, 2008 at 3:15 PM
Philly Phood: Serious Eats rolls out another edition of City Guides: first New York, now Philadelphia. Your favorite city might be next!
A Few Pieces of Chicken: Ed Levine visits soul food take-out joint Piece of Chicken in Manhattan's Hell's Kitchen, where the best eats on the menu are only a buck or two.
Pasadena Patties: At Pie 'N Burger in Pasadena, Nick Solares discovers his favorite burger in California, a classic griddle-cooked patty spiked with Thousand Island dressing.
Endless Fillings in Crunchy Bread: America's favorite sandwiches come in so many forms: hoagies, heroes, cheesesteaks, po'boys, and subs.
Veni, Vidi, Vito's: Two pizzerias in downtown Los Angeles fight for the attention of our Pizza Maven, with Vito's coming out on top as some of the best pizza in the city.
From Serious Eats
Posted by Joy Manning, September 4, 2008 at 8:00 PM
Editor's note: Our first Serious Eats City Guide brought you New York through the eyes (and stomach) of our own Ed Levine. For our second installation, we head down the Eastern Seaboard to Philadelphia with resident eater Joy Manning, the restaurant critic at Philadelphia Magazine. If her picks aren't enough, you can check out the magazine's Best of Philly food winners from 2004 to 2008 online. As always, chime in with agreement, or feel free to alert us to any Philly eats we've overlooked.
Best Pizza
A lot of visitors, especially New Yorkers, complain about pizza in Philly. But we do have a few terrific spots that bake world class pies. My two favorites both have super thin, super crispy crusts, but they are served up in settings that couldn’t be more different. Osteria, an upscale restaurant co-owned by Marc Vetri, does a full menu of rustic Italian fare but the pizzas—cooked to perfection in an 800-degree wood fired oven imported from Italy—steal the show. Try the Lombarda, which is topped with house-made sausage and a runny baked egg. Tacconelli’s, on the other hand, is a no frills neighborhood pizzeria with one big caveat. You have to call ahead and reserve the dough for the number of pies you want. A hassle? Definitely. But these perfectly charred pies are worth the effort.
Continue reading »
From Serious Eats: New York
Posted by Ed Levine, September 4, 2008 at 4:00 PM
I was amazed when I read the New York Times' Fall Dining Preview and discovered that even in these extremely iffy financial times, 45 new restaurants are set to open in New York in the next three months. How could that be? I think many of these newcomers, and quite a few of the old ones, will not survive a New York winter. In any case, I carefully read the entire section looking for excitement and came up with a surprisingly skimpy list of ten Serious Eats-anticipated openings.
Read my picks after the jump. And how about you, Serious Eaters? Which openings are making you salivate?
Continue reading »
From Slice
Posted by Daniel Zemans, September 4, 2008 at 2:45 PM
Daniel Zemans, our man in Chicago, checks in with another piece of intel on the Windy City pizza scene. Daniel also blogs about Chicagoland pizza with his friends on the Chicago Pizza Club blog. —The Mgmt.
Bacino's has been selling stuffed pizzas since 1978, making it one of the oldest purveyors of the Chicago delicacy. The founder, Dan Bacin, had a background in business, not cooking. No marketing dummy, Bacin used a variation of an old Chicago political trick in naming his restaurant. There is no truth to the rumor that Barack Obama's last name used to be Bama before he ran for office in Chicago, but many political candidates have changed their names to appeal to the significantly Irish electorate. While it would make no sense to name a pizzeria O'Bacin's, adding an o to the end of his name gave Bacin's pizzeria some faux Italian authenticity.
I don't know the full story behind the founding of Bacino's, but it involves Giordano's (reviewed for Slice here), Chicago's most popular stuffed pizza chain. Not long after Giordano's was formed in the mid '70s, the company was looking to grow. Dan Bacin got involved with them but ended up going out on his own and starting Bacino's. I'm unclear as to the time frame and whether Bacin ever actually opened a Giordano's, but a search of the relevant page on the State of Illinois website shows that on September 11, 1980, The Bacin Group was registered as Giordano's of Lincoln Park, Inc.
For this review, I went to the Bacino's location in the heart of Lincoln Park. There are three other locations, two downtown and one in the suburb of LaGrange. The building itself, both on the outside and the inside, is pretty nondescript. There is a bar on a different side of the restaurant that has a little more to look at. There is also a downstairs dining area that I've never seen used.
Continue reading »
From A Hamburger Today
Posted by Robyn Lee, September 4, 2008 at 2:00 PM
David Lebovitz may have been let down by the burger at Hippopotamus, but he should be able to fulfill his craving after looking through his readers' burger recommendations in Paris. With 19 restaurants to choose from, there may be some hope for homesick Americans and burger-loving Parisians.
Related
When In Paris, Do Not Get a Burger at Hippopotamus
'New York Times' on the Latest Culinary Fad in Paris: Burgers
From Serious Eats
Posted by Jenn Sit, September 4, 2008 at 8:30 AM
Hoagies, heroes, subs, wedges, po'boys, grinders, and the list goes on. No matter what you call your hometown hero, we're here to talk about America's best hot and cold versions—for now, we'll define it as a sandwich on a long individual bread or baguette. Whether the name refers to the people who eat them (Cubans, Italians) or the shape (submarine, torpedo, zeppelin), the long list of monikers should at the very least give you a hint of the importance and history of this most beloved and humble sandwich.
Submarines
Photograph from Benton on Flickr
Perhaps the most widespread term, a sub is a sandwich served on a long Italian roll, topped with a variety of meats and cheeses, lettuce, tomato, onion, oil and vinegar, salt and pepper, and maybe oregano. Some Philadelphians see subs as only a poor substitute for hoagies, which must be served on a roll that's crusty on the outside and soft on the inside. No matter if you're hailing from Philly or Boston, some argue that a sub can only be cold with no lettuce, while others see hot subs as part of the pack.
Continue reading »
From Serious Eats
Posted by Adam Kuban, September 3, 2008 at 5:55 PM
And some more housekeeping to take care of here, though this announcement is hardly a chore! Yesterday marks the 5,000th Talk topic started on Serious Eats by our community of awesome food lovers. And who broke the tape? Who set off the flashing lights and sirens? Who are the virtual balloons raining down on? None other than JerzeeTomato, with the topic Weird Parental Food Preparation.
Thanks, Jerz! And to mark the occasion, we're sending you The Complete Keller: The French Laundry Cookbook & Bouchon.
And, of course, JerzeeTomato didn't do it alone. We're immensely grateful to everyone who has ever created a Talk topic and to everyone who has ever responded to one. I wish we had Complete Kellers enough for all of you!
From Serious Eats: New York
Posted by Adam Kuban, September 3, 2008 at 3:30 PM
Mark at the blog Black Napkin goes behind the scenes at Per Se and comes back with a series of beautiful photos. He says:
It was eerily silent. Everything and everyone was moving in perfect unison, as if they were actors in a play rehearsed a thousand times. As a result, there was hardly any commotion at all.
From Slice
Posted by L.A. Pizza Maven, September 3, 2008 at 1:45 PM
Pizza wars, once confined to New York, now rage in Los Angeles. New York's dough-slinging gladiators, DeMarco, Grimaldi, and Mangieri, have their counterparts here in Joe and Vito, of their own respective eponymous pizzerias.
L.A. food bloggers, like their New York brethren, get rather emotional over pizza, which strikes me as odd since I've yet to taste pizza in L.A. (except for Mozza) worth getting especially excited about. Nevertheless, on the web locally, and on Slice, pizza freaks have slammed Joe's for uncharred crust, insipid sauce, and unhelpful and discourteous service. One gourmand opined that Vito's "is genius ... everything Joe's is not ... the best in L.A. (tied with Mozza)."
The claim that Vito's is tied with Mozza as the best pizza in Los Angeles, of course, is insanity. And I will admit that, though my first few pies at Joe's, made by Joe Vitale himself, brought joy and contentment to my gastrointestinal system, the quality definitely must now be considered, at best, inconsistent. So, given some of the raves about Vito's, an investigation was in order.
Continue reading »
From Serious Eats: New York
Posted by Joe DiStefano, September 3, 2008 at 1:30 PM
I’m not quite sure which I like better—tasty craft and imported beers or delicious bánh mì. All I know is that two days after reading Julia Moskin’s Times article on bars with noteworthy food, I was at the Blind Tiger Ale House for a Vietnamese sandwich and some suds. Though a card-carrying beer geek, I had never been to the new location of the acclaimed beer bar. The combination of delicious brews and savory bánh mì was enough to make me finally take the plunge.
Despite my long-held belief that only Vietnamese delis make good bánh mì, I was game to try Blind Tiger’s version.
At 5 p.m. before Labor Day weekend, the place was so crowded that ordering a beer—much less finding a perch at the bar—was nearly impossible. I considered giving up and trying Bánh Mì Số 1 in Chinatown instead, but I waited it out and persevered.
Continue reading »
