Mystery Meat -

by 80 Proof

Fishing for a Good Title

Just a taste of what was available at the Tsukiji Fish Market in Tokyo. Gansie and I actually missed a lot of the good stuff, as they were shutting down when we arrived at 10:30 am. Gansie blamed us for being late, but they don’t let tourists in for the good stuff anymore until after 9 am…so I blame other annoying tourists. After the market, we ate at one of Tokyo’s hard to find, yes, hard to find sushi joints. Best sushi (fine, nagiri) ever. No pics of that however, sorry.

by gansie

A Second Round of Heart

So Im in Osaka and I cant find the apostrophe on the keyboard so just go with it. I will tell you a quick story before we start our day here.

It was our first night in Japan. Tokyo. Fourteen fucking hour plane ride. We find the hotel, which is of course a story itself, quickly pull ourselves together and walk around our tiny section of Shinjuko. Its a maze of restaurants and bars with very little English signage.

We circle the area about six times, too scared to walk in anywhere. There are no other tourists in this area. We have not heard a lick of English. But we smell deliciousness all around and are ready to wash away the processed plane food.

We walk into a long narrow place with about 15 tables. The 20-something-year-old cooks greet us with wide smiles and something in Japanese. We smile. Show two fingers (as in there are two of us) and we are brought to a high-top.

When the waitress arrives the best we can do is bring our hands, in a cup shape to our mouth, and pretend we are drinking. We say beer. It works. We are brought out two drafts and are given menus. Everything is in Japanese. I look and laugh. 80 laughs.

We try to order and Im not even sure what we say. We just kinda giggle and our 20-something waitress with thick fake eyelashes and a scrounge in her hair giggles back. She walks away and 80 and I are like – what the fuck do we do. Fuck.

in Food Travel / Pig 9 comments

by 80 Proof

Mystery Photo Solved

So maybe that wasn’t the easiest contest of all time.

I guess it helped that I took the picture to begin with. Anyways, some great guesses in the comments, especially the chef’s coats. Unfortunately, that was not the correct answer. To find out what which one was, click on the link below:

in Contests 0 comments

by 80 Proof

Artsy Mystery Photo of the Day

While everyone is busy trying to decide where to cast their all important vote for Eater of the Year, how about a little game? First person to guess this (admittedly easy) mystery photo wins a surprise gift, shown after the jump…

in Contests / Photos 10 comments

by tvff

Cheflebrity Smörgåsbord: Supermodel Jerky

The latest and greatest news about celebrity chefs, served up buffet style.

– Liz Hurley’s farm may be producing jerky, but that dress ain’t no Green Acres get-up. ROWR!

– Last week, while at work in my office in Philly, I had an eerie feeling overcome me…chilling me to the bone. Yep, that explains it.

After the jump…picking on Ray-Ray gets a little bit harder, Jessie the Cowgirl from Toy Story 2 tries her hand at baking and all of your craptastic adventures in the kitchen could pay off in a TV appearance.

in Celebs / TV 1 comments

by tvff

Happy National Scrapple Day!

I think it’s hilarious that today is “National” Scrapple Day, considering: (1) you can only get the stuff in a relatively small portion of the country and (2) in places where it is available, a solid 85% of the people won’t touch the stuff. But maybe what this horrendously under-appreciated delight needs is a day of observance to boost its reputation.

For those of you who don’t live in the mid-Atlantic states, I suppose that scrapple deserves a little explanation. Essentially, it’s a meat product made using pig offal. After the butchers have taken the “desirable” cuts off the pig, the rest gets boiled, the meat is minced and grain (cornmeal, usually) and spices are added to thicken the mixture into a loaf.

Once it gets to your kitchen or diner, it’s either pan- or deep-fried and what you get is a wonderful slice that is crunchy on the outside, smooth and creamy on the inside. There is a rich, meaty flavor here that you’re never going to get from a lifeless cut of meat like a quick-fry pork chop. Do yourself a favor and stop in a diner during your next trip through South Jersey or Eastern Pennsylvania.

I understand that scrapple can be scary. Shit, just the word is creepy. There’s the vaguely Germanic sound and the unfortunate inclusion of “scrap” and/or “crap.” But what really gets me is when I tell someone how much I enjoy it and they come back with: “But don’t you know what’s in that?!?” Yes, I do, which makes me like it even more. Here’s why…

in Breakfast / Holiday / Pig / Rants & Raves 16 comments

by tvff

Bachelorhood is the Mother of Invention

Having been married for almost three years now, I forgot how much of a mess my cooking was when I was flying solo.

More than anything, it was a matter of laziness. Laziness when it came to picking out and shopping for ingredients, and laziness when dinner time rolled around and I balked at the notion of busting my hump on a meal for one. So there were plenty of simple pasta dishes and takeout, accompanied by by an occasional flash of inspiration that foreshadowed the foodie I would become once I was cooking for an audience.

One such bit of creativity was the “Hot Dog Sandwich.” Typically, I’d stop at the Wawa on the ride home from work, pick up an eight inch Italian roll and fill it with a couple of boiled hot dogs and the usual condiments. If this doesn’t strike you as particularly creative, then you understand how dire the whole situation really was.

This all came back to me last month as Mrs. TVFF headed off for a press junket in New Orleans and I quickly regressed to my old self, relying on leftovers from earlier in the week and whatever mismatched ingredients happened to be sitting around the house. Arriving home after work and not having a plan, I noticed a couple of hot dogs in the freezer — Trader Joe’s Uncured Hot Dogs…good stuff. I quickly began scouring the kitchen for an appropriate delivery device.

As you can tell from the photo, the only available option was a couple of orphaned hamburger buns. Although aesthetics aren’t everything to me, I realized I needed to do something to overcome the problem posed by the round bun and the long sausage. This is where a little flash of improvisation came in.

in Sandwich 6 comments