wow. I like 3,000 calorie items at my fast food place. F you, Tanya Steel

There's no reason to consume an entire day's calories in one breakfast burrito from Hardee's.

An "entire day's" calories differs from person to person. Hell, an "entire day's" calories differs from day to day depending on what a person does in a given day. IE, if I spend the day doing lawn work, I'm gonna eat more calories to compensate than a day when I sit on my ass playing halo 3.

Hot Spots You Can't Find

Up until the last sentence, I thought she was talking about wi-fi. I also noticed the words "tunnel" and "password". I think she did that shiat on purpose.

Hell, yes, I'm tired of seeing truffles in everything. Last week, was offered a lovely meal with 'truffled' mashed potato.

I don't like the mustiness of truffles, and call me a plebeian, but some fads just don't work when I believe the establishment offering them is just trying to justify high prices.

$40 entrees exist because line chefs would like to be able to pay their rent, and a perfect rack of lamb is easily worth $40. Go live on bacon cheeseburgers if you can't stand to pay market price for quality food.

/cousins own/run a restaurant in Pilsen

FTFA commenter: I wonder/hope that in 2008 we'll see a focus on simplicity and moderation.

I don't even want to THINK about what they're gonna charge for that.

It's only the pumpkin-sized truffles that bother me. Stupid things are invading my yard.

Vanity Vodkas: The minute Donald Trump got his own vodka, the clear spirit had jumped the shark.

Seriously. Fancy specialty alcohol is making social drinking too trendy for its own good. What's next, Hannah Montana bourbon?

soze: $40 entrees exist because line chefs would like to be able to pay their rent, and a perfect rack of lamb is easily worth $40. Go live on bacon cheeseburgers if you can't stand to pay market price for quality food.

/cousins own/run a restaurant in Pilsen

But if I want the lamb, I can't afford to pay my rent. Can't the line chefs just find a smaller and cheaper place in a bad neighborhood to live?

Bring on the vodak! That I can live with.

And WTF is with the Tower O' Food silliness? Red Robin called-- it wants its tower of onion rings back.

I declare a corollary to Godwin's Law: The longer the Food Snob thread, the more likely would someone mentions SYSCO.

The Grinch: Vanity Vodkas: The minute Donald Trump got his own vodka, the clear spirit had jumped the shark.

Seriously. Fancy specialty alcohol is making social drinking too trendy for its own good. What's next, Hannah Montana bourbon?

What about the vodka commercial that makes no sense and you can't even tell which brand it is.

/I suppose they think everybody's got large screen high def TVs.

Something that would never get old to eat.

I am going to throw the rise of "New York style" (specializing in expensive small portions) restaurants that aren't in New York onto the pile. I have a few clients in the restaurant business and they have been tracking the success of the outside-the-city "New York Style" eateries in the suburbs and it's been universally unsuccessful. How you can you expect suburbanites to want to pay for ambience over Bucca de Beppo or Olive Garden?

soze: $40 entrees exist because line chefs would like to be able to pay their rent, and a perfect rack of lamb is easily worth $40. Go live on bacon cheeseburgers if you can't stand to pay market price for quality food.

I see your point, but I am also glad that I am conversant enough in my local restaurants to know where to go for best food to money ratio.

Kevin5280: soze: $40 entrees exist because line chefs would like to be able to pay their rent, and a perfect rack of lamb is easily worth $40. Go live on bacon cheeseburgers if you can't stand to pay market price for quality food.

/cousins own/run a restaurant in Pilsen

But if I want the lamb, I can't afford to pay my rent. Can't the line chefs just find a smaller and cheaper place in a bad neighborhood to live?

This. Tony Bourdain sez the real pros are all sleazebags anyway.

Kevin5280:

But if I want the lamb, I can't afford to pay my rent. Can't the line chefs just find a smaller and cheaper place in a bad neighborhood to live?

Happy chefs make tastier food. While pain makes for great art, great food is really more of a craft. After all, there are no great beermakers who were horribly depressed.

I missed the days where the waiter would bring out the fish/meat they are preparing for you to inspect and see if it was satisfactory.

The Grinch: What's next, Hannah Montana bourbon WINECOOLERS?

FIFY. I always picture these ditzy teenybopper stars with an alcopop.

Sandra. Farking. Lee.

"Today we're making Tiramisu out of twinkies, vanilla pudding, and astroglide!"

/trailer trash entertaining ftw!

Quincy8Boy: /I suppose they think everybody's got large screen high def TVs.

If you don't, you're not the kind of person they want drinking their vodka.

Here's by far the worst food trend of 2007: the rise of prices in the global food market.

Think of the starving masses, even if you're not one of them.

SockMonkeyHolocaust:

$40 entrees exist because line chefs would like to be able to pay their rent, and a perfect rack of lamb is easily worth $40. Go live on bacon cheeseburgers if you can't stand to pay market price for quality food.

I see your point, but I am also glad that I am conversant enough in my local restaurants to know where to go for best food to money ratio.

Forgive me, I did not mean to apply the $40/entree rule to the 1" cube of meat with some stuff drizzled on the plate concoctions. I was speaking more to the idea that $40 should get you Claim Jumper levels of food.

For Christmas Day dinner I had a plate of five large scallops in this really amazing orange-shroom glaize with mashed potatoes and green beans on the side for $27. It wasn't a mammoth amount of food but the quality of the food along with the work that went into cooking it made it a screamin' deal.

Also, people who think because they can cook half decently that they are the next untrained chef making good with a cookbook and bland TV show.

Truffles the Size of a Softball

I dunno, I kind of like 'em

Yawn, screw this, I'm gonna just go eat a huge plate of White Castles.

Poutine. It needs to go dig a hole and die in it. Just pictures of it are enough to invoke a gag reflex in me.

MadTheologian: I always picture these ditzy teenybopper stars with an alcopop.

Good call. I sort of had Billy Ray in mind when I said bourbon. Give those tweener concert-goers five years, and they'll be sorority sluts who'll chug cheap beer and knock back Everclear-laced punch, but will never know any of the good stuff.

/single malt FTW

I completely agree with the majority of the list. Why must people spend $40+ on an entree that provides only a nosh-sized amount of food?

Good places can be found locally with prices in the 10-20 dollar range which provide ample portions. And none of this bull "big portions are bad too" stuff - if it's too big I'll man up, or bring it home for lunch tomorrow.

soze: Forgive me, I did not mean to apply the $40/entree rule to the 1" cube of meat with some stuff drizzled on the plate concoctions. I was speaking more to the idea that $40 should get you Claim Jumper levels of food.

I was thinking along the lines that if I want salmon, I know enough about my local restaurants to know to go to X andY and stay away from Z because I'll get a decent amount of well-prepared food but that's not discounting, say, Z because they do good pasta.

I live in an area where you can pay more for the right to say you ate there and sussing through the hype can be a chore but well worth it.

/Wait, she wasn't on the list?

Rising prices make great food inaccessible to the masses.

So the only places where one can find "great food" are those with fine china and half a dozen forks per person? Some of the best restaurants in any city are hole-in-the-wall or one-of-a-kind mom and pop type places.

$15+ cheeseburgers

SockMonkeyHolocaust:

I live in an area where you can pay more for the right to say you ate there and sussing through the hype can be a chore but well worth it.

We're very fortunate to have a free newspaper with a no bullshiat bunch of food reviewers here. Every review has been spot on; they tend to love reviewing mom-and-pop restaurants, too, not just the $$$ trendy spots that'll be closed in fifteen months after the hype has died down.

web250: And none of this bull "big portions are bad too" stuff - if it's too big I'll man up, or bring it home for lunch tomorrow.

Exactly. If I get more food than I can handle at once...I got something for lunch the next day. It's quite simple - you just ask for a to-go box.

However...that said....

Recently, I had dinner at the top of the John Hancock building in Chicago....my bill was 108 dollars. The portions served to me were small, some might say even tiny. Still....I've never tasted fish like I tasted that night. I learned that food like that should be enjoyed one small bite at a time - not in the typical American shovel-it-down-your-throat manner.

I would pay $40+ for a Kraft Dinner main entree, but only if it came with the bonus Red Hots wiener bits. And a cup of Baby Duck.

/Canadian fine-diner.

gimmedaloot: wow. I like 3,000 calorie items at my fast food place. F you, Tanya Steel

this

Bit'O'Gristle: Something that would never get old to eat.

um are those rubber panties for bedwetters?

what's wrong with ruffles? i like them better than the flat ones.

Lemme tell you something: if you're a guy and you ask for the doggie bag on a date, you might as well have them just wrap up your genitals too. You're not going to be needing those for awhile, either.

Scifientologist: Poutine. It needs to go dig a hole and die in it. Just pictures of it are enough to invoke a gag reflex in me.



/obligatory

gimmedaloot: wow. I like 3,000 calorie items at my fast food place. F you, Tanya Steel

They say you are what you eat. Some people eat quantity over quality.

web250: I completely agree with the majority of the list. Why must people spend $40+ on an entree that provides only a nosh-sized amount of food?

Maybe it's geography, but I've never been to a restaurant that just serves a nosh-sized entrée for a large price. I've never walked away hungry from an expensive meal.

The only small portions I've ever seen are just one part of a series of courses which in total provide enough to satisfy just about any appetite.

Do people really go to restaurants that offer a two-course menu where your entrée is just a few bites?

LordJiro: Scifientologist: Poutine. It needs to go dig a hole and die in it. Just pictures of it are enough to invoke a gag reflex in me.



/obligatory

Dammit, where'd my picture go? Fark it, it was a picture of poutine. It's not worth it.

Bit'O'Gristle: Something that would never get old to eat.

When she gets past 80, you may re-think that.

soze: We're very fortunate to have a free newspaper with a no bullshiat bunch of food reviewers here. Every review has been spot on; they tend to love reviewing mom-and-pop restaurants, too, not just the $$$ trendy spots that'll be closed in fifteen months after the hype has died down.

That is 100% awesome. I had a restaurateur explain to me one night while we were both in our cups that the secret to keeping your eatery popular was to change the name every two years. I was like, "ok, can you tell me what your place is called so that I never go and encourage you."

I have found that I can cook American food better than most of the restraunts that I have visited. I usually go out for ethnic when I rarely dine out for dinner. Why waste you money dining out when you can make better at home. And yes, I do dine out. Drop $200 at Morimoto's in Philly and you will crave crave oh toro and waygo for the rest of your life!

moreover, a daily calorie intake for a hard ass working man or athlete under heavy work can be 7-8000 calories. fark scientists with their 2000 calorie diets and 2 gallons of water a day.

web250:
Good places can be found locally with prices in the 10-20 dollar range which provide ample portions.

Very true. I had a real gourmet meal a while ago, my date and I ate like freaking royalty for about $60 total. Granted this was in Kitchener Ontario but still, amazing food and good service for an occasionally-affordable price.

And none of this bull "big portions are bad too" stuff - if it's too big I'll man up, or bring it home for lunch tomorrow.

Some places though... I once ate at a place in Delaware where you got a POUND of pasta - that was just the pasta, not the sauce etc. It was just farking excessive. And not very tasty the next day.

"Macho Fast Food: There's no reason to consume an entire day's calories in one breakfast burrito from Hardee's."

I love those burritos, but I keep choking on the gold necklace wrapped around it.

/YMCA

Lemme tell you something: if you're a guy and you ask for the doggie bag on a date, you might as well have them just wrap up your genitals too. You're not going to be needing those for awhile, either.

Yeah, because picturing your clogged arteries is such a turn on for us women.

Let me give you a tip: Male fascination with consuming massive amounts of meat isn't about impressing the ladies.

Scifientologist: Poutine


Sorry, I just had to. Are you gagging? Personally, I like the stuff. But to each their own. On just about everything.

soze: Happy chefs make tastier food.

Especially free-range chefs. Not as stringy.