Yay, we found it!

To celebrate the fact that we found our camera today, we decided to top off our daily errands with a stop at Flavor Cupcakery.

Flavor Cupcakery is a newly opened--they opened their doors to the public this past Summer--cupcakery located in the same strip that houses Burlane Cat & Dog where we get our little devils groomed, and Fiesta Grill, a surprisingly authentic and delicious Mexican joint. I'd first heard about Flavor Cupcakery... Frankly, I don't remember where. Anyway, despite my love/hate relationship with cupcakes, I was intrigued at the possibility of another local food venue in Bel Air that actually had some soul (Fiesta Grill being the first). So we pulled up the car and luckily they had just opened so we walked right on in.

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Top 10 Most Memorable Bites Eating Out 2010

Every food blogger loves to do top 10 lists at this time of year, so here's mine! Now, realize that these aren't necessarily the BEST bites of 2010, I ate so many damned awesome places this year that actually ranking them would be an impossible task. These are the nummy bites that stick out in my memory for one reason or another.

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Two Dorks, One Apple Day 2

The beginning of our second day in NYC landed us at Loncada Verde for brunch. I tossed around a few other brunch options (Shopsin’s and Public) but in the end I chose LV because I wanted to treat my brother to something a bit more elegant.

After braving the face-numbingly glacial blasts of TriBeCa we put our name in with the hostess and nabbed two spots at the bar just as another couple was paying their check. We pondered dining at the bar, but in the end we waited it out for a table of our own.

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1st Anniversary Road-trip Day 9: Homeward Bound

Shadow is a cooler name than Chance, but I don't want to be the old dude. I guess the wife is Sassy. Anyway, whilst still in the midst of an ice cream coma we packed up our things and said goodbye to Boston. We had one more stop before leaving the city proper--Flour Bakery.

I'd had my mind set on trying their sticky buns after they slaughtered Bobby Flay on his show Throwdown! which he then went on to rave about on Best Thing I Ever Ate.  We were doubly interested after realizing she covers them in self-proclaimed GOOOOO. We had to have these things in our belly. Even after showing up balls early on a Saturday there was still a line to the door. I guess that's the result of positive publicity from Food Network (among many other publications).

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1st Anniversary Road-trip Day 7

I want to start this post with a quote from Homer Simpson’s high school year book: “I can’t believe I ate the whole thing.” Yes, that was the primary theme for Day 7 of our road-trip--our first full day in Portland.

I’d reserved a 2-hour Schooner Tour of Casco Bay for a nice start to our day so I was thrilled to find that Standard Baking Company was a short walk from the pier. Unfortunately, I was a tad skeptical after our so-so dinner at Fore Street (they’re owned by the same restaurant group) the night before, but nevertheless I had a hankerin’ for baked goodies.

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Gaps vs. City

My father is turning the ripe age of 55 today so for his birthday I offered to take him to NYC for the day. He hasn't been to NYC since before I was born so I felt like it was my duty to show him the best the city had to offer. Alright, that's not entirely true. He said no majorly touristy stuff (Empire State, Statue of Liberty, etc.) and that he wanted pizza. That was great because as you all know I don't care about seeing NYC, I care about eating NYC. And that's exactly what we did.

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1st Anniversary Road-Trip Day 1

Holy hell where do I start? 9 days, 2 countries, and 4 cities eating all the way. Yes, my wife and I have just returned from our road-trip to celebrate our first anniversary and I am eager to tell you all about it. We spent 2 days in Montreal, 3 days in Quebec City, 2 days in Portland, ME, and one day in Boston. There were some fabulous surprises and some pretty disheartening disappointments, but overall I think this was the best food trip I've ever embarked on. We ate everything from fried whole-belly clams to blood sausage to lobster ceviche to tofu ice cream. And I'm going to tell you all about every single bite. Aren't you excited? I sure am. This is quite a daunting task, no doubt, but I think I'm up for the challenge. So let's begin, shall we?

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Tortas, falafel, and concretes, oh my!

I'm switching back to the old editor while I still can. The new one is so GD BUGGY I want to paint the walls with my brains. You'll see just how buggy it is in my next post. The spacing just won't cooperate so I gave up. What a P.O.S. So sorry, no more nifty photo captions.

Do you ever wonder just how mental I am about planning my food adventures? Here's a good example. Take a guess at how many places I planned to go for breakfast that Sunday. Let's see if I can remember them all. First it was Buttermilk Channel. Then it was Tom's Restaurant. No, make that Joyce Bakeshop. On second thought let's go to Bark Hot Dogs. Where did we finally end up going? None of the above. I need therapy.

After seeing NYC Food Guy's 200th post about a Mexican food tour in Sunset Park and seeing the post on Serious Eats about the Hawaiian Torta de Salchicha I marked Sunset Park down as a worthy food destination.

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Mo'betta, mo'pain, mo'pork

This trip was planned, re-planned, evaluated, re-evalutated and ultimately just tossed up into the air.  I research my food trips entirely too much.  It's a fact.  I seriously enjoy doing it, telling myself that it's always good to have options.  Well, it is.  But not this many options.  I guess in the end it's not really hurting anything, I do feel like it is time well spent.  It usually results in my consumption of some damn good grub too.  Now about that grub...

Our bus arrived in NYC at 8:30am on Saturday.  Our first stop was another trip to Shopsin's to see if it could blow me away for a second time.  We got there at about 9:10 and it was empty so we walked across the street to use the restroom at McD's and by the time we got back all but one table was full with regular's and we had to wait in line.  I didn't mind, luckily our itinerary for the day was pretty loose.  Last time we were given a table out in the open dining area, this time we were fortunate enough to be seated in the cozy cubby right by the kitchen.

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Et Cetera Eats in NYC

Now you may think all we ate while we were in NYC was BBQ. You'd be wrong. Come on, you know me better than that. Here's a rundown of the other goodies we sampled throughout the weekend.

After a stroll through High Line Park the Mrs. was determined to try Stand's Toasted Marshmallow Milkshake I'd raved so much about.


While I felt it lacked a little bit of the toastiness of the last trip, it was still ridiculously good. Mrs. Micro gave it her I-sucked-it-down-faster-than-anything-else-I've-ever-drank approval.


That's my favorite pic from the entire trip.

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Raging the Windy City à la Wind God Gau Pt. 3

After putzing around the city for a while we finally worked up the stomach room to sip a few beers at The Map Room. The sign out front was easy to spot from far off and looked like... Well, it looks like something, doesn't it?

It's not my imagination right? You see it too? Good, we're on the same page then.

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Raging the Windy City à la Wind God Gau Pt. 2

After seeing Taste of Peru featured on DD&D and finding out that it was mere walking distance from M's place, I immediately added it to our itinerary. So we skipped breakfast and walked over to ToP on Saturday.

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NYC April 2010: Tapas Dinner and Bottomless Brunch

After our round of milkshakes at Stand we headed over to Union Square to get in line for rush tickets for the 8pm show of Fuerza Bruta. Yes, after hearing me rave about it so much my friends were very interested in checking it out for themselves. Well G was anyway, A proclaimed he wasn't much a fan of the performing arts. Little did he know that would change after the show.

After obtaining our tickets A suggested we see if there was a wait at one of his favorite restaurants in the city which just happened to be a few short blocks away: Pipa Tapas y Mas. Luck was with us that day as we were seated immediately. A had talked this place up quite a bit so I had some pretty high expectations, even more so since my favorite restaurant in Baltimore is also a tapas joint. I was very curious to see if Pipa would top Pazo. Unfortunately, in most cases, it didn't.

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