Potato Chips: Good Vs Evil

I like potato chips. I think they're almost like the perfect snack, especially on road trips or while watching a movie. I like to try new flavors, and new brands. When i travel outside of Canada you'll often find me perusing the potato chip aisle along with the cereal aisle in a grocery or convenience store.

Sometimes i don't use good judgment when it comes to what i choose to buy. Here is 1 good example;


I was on a road trip to Seattle (to see Black Breath and Walls) with Mike and Elizabeth H. and we stopped at some grocery store along the way. I saw these new Cheeseburger Doritos, and my first thought was "I bet those taste disgusting!". But as I was thinking that thought i found myself reaching out to grab a bag. One thing i hate is when i find a new flavor of chips but it's only available in large bags. I stood there holding a giant bag of cheeseburger Doritos and contemplated how bad they would be, and then went and bought them. And let me tell you, they taste even worse than i imagined! They taste like crunchy vomit. I put the first chip in my mouth and instantly regretted it. I quickly swallowed the vile chip and recoiled in horror at the taste in my mouth. After a minute i tried another one.... nope this shit still tasted like puke. Erin thought they were ok.... she said they tasted exactly like a McDonalds cheeseburger, pickles and all. But neither of us ate more than 2 or 3 chips. Avoid these foul tasting Doritos.

You wanna know what potato chip i like; T.G.I. Friday's Potato Skins Cheddar & Bacon flavor.

This is my go-to , no fail, potato chip when i'm in America. I may pick up random brands and flavors, but I always return home with a few bags of these tasty treats. The chip itself is thicker than a normal chip, and the flavoring is plenty. And while there is alot of flavor on each chip, it's not an overpowering flavor. The bacon flavoring is subtle, with more emphasis on the cheddar. I can not recommend this chip enough!!

Anyone have some chip recommendations for me? I'll try pretty much any flavor. And i love trying old staples like Salt & Vinegar made by companies i haven't heard of.

My Mom's Chocolate Cake

Everyone loves chocolate cake, right? If you don't love, or at least like chocolate cake than i have to ask... "what is wrong with you?"
Let's cut to the chase here; My mom makes the best chocolate cake in the world. That's right, the whole freakin' world! I'll fight you to prove my point. She's got a recipe that everyone should use. but chances are if you used this recipe it still wouldn't taste the same as my mom's. I can't explain why that would happen, maybe the little bit of love that my mom puts in each cake changes the taste.
Let's break it down as to why my mom's cake is the best;

-- The cake itself is moist, but yet dense. But not too dense, nor is it too moist. It's science, i don't get it. But trust me, as you put it in your mouth your eyes roll into the back of you head and you can't help but mutter "god damn!"

-- the icing. Chocolate icing. It's not one of those whipped icings, but it's also not one of those super thick dense ones. It's somewhere in between. Once again, it's a science i can't comprehend. The chocolate isn't too overpowering, or rich. And it's not too sweet. It's just perfect!!

When we were younger one of the highlights of our birthday's was Mom would make a cake and put money inside. When you're 10 years old, the feeling of finding a quarter in your piece was about the equivalent of some old prospector finding gold in the Yukon back in the 1800's. The funny part.... well, maybe not everyone will find it funny but me and my parents had a good laugh about it on the phone the other night.... the funny part is that they didn't wrap the coins in anything when they put them in the cake!! And even funnier... or grosser... is that they didn't wash them either! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA...... We'd get our piece of cake on the plate in front of us, spin the plate around checking it out to see if any coins were sticking out slightly, and then attack the cake with our forks. When we'd find a coin we'd suck all the cake & icing off it.... making sure that our new found wealth was nice and clean. Oh, the glory days when everyone didn't live their lives in fear. Those were the days when kids could run around the neighborhood until the sun went down, you didn't have to wash your hands after touching a door handle at the grocery store, and it was still proper etiquette, and perfectly safe, to shake someones hand when you met them.

Here's some pictures of my Mom's cake... and a bonus picture of my Mom making some red beans & rice when i last saw her in the fall.

Birthday Dinner

Here's the 3rd post on this blog, haven't been able to write as much as I want, but yeah... 3rd post and this is one involves BBQ'd food as well.

Yesterday, Feb 12th, was my birthday. My fiance erin took me out for dinner, and much to my surprise invited some friends (Lana, Adam, Mike, and Elizabeth). We went to Memphis Blues BBQ on Commercial Drive. The days leading up i had been checking out their menu online, getting pretty excited because i haven't had any BBQ food since i was at the Palomino in Calgary.
The service here was quick, and our table was soon filled with meaty eats. Me and erin split a order of Poutine with pulled pork, and then i had a combo plate with ribs, pulled pork and on the side was potato salad, beans, coleslaw and corn bread. Yes i know it's alot of food, but i ate about 95% of it.

Here's the poutine.....


The pulled pork poutine was ok, not great. I don't know if i would order it again. It basically was a giant plate of pulled pork covered in BBQ sauce, with a small pile of fries underneath it. And there was barely any cheese. It was tasty, but i would've liked more cheese.

Next up we have my main course;



This is where things got tasty!! The ribs were amazing... the meat was falling off the bone. Moist and succulent, filled with flavor. The pulled pork was good, not as good as the Palomino, but still tasty. I kind of wished that i had picked a different meat instead of the pork simply because of how much i had on the poutine. The choices of meats were plenty... Adam had Brisket and it looked super yummy, as did the sausage on Mike's plate and the chicken on erin's.

All in all everyone at our table enjoyed their meals. I plan on going back, maybe i can convince some people to go there on a Monday when they have all you can eat Ribs & Fries for $20. I think i could eat a mountain of ribs, get more than $20's worth.

After filling our guts with meaty treats some of us returned to our apartment where erin had an ice cream cake from Dairy Queen waiting for us!! Sadly i could only eat 1 piece as i was so full. But today's a new day and i plan on eating more of the cake.