last meal

marisa, arbo, and i went to in and out for last meal, well, one of my last meals in cali.

How did I do? Cheeseburger with grilled onions, chopped chilies, animal style fries, and a chocolate shake. 

 

Holy crap. It was so good. And I was so full after. 

Maybe it's a good thing I don't live near one.

xoxo

second stop

Once back in the promised land (aka LA),

my first stop is always my favorite mexican restaurant, la Cabanita. 

But my second stop is in-and-out for a delicious hamburger with grilled onions and a chocolate shake

If you have yet to experience this, get on it. It will change your life.

xoxo

Too much of a good thing?

So yes, PT's is RIP. and we cry. 

But we move on and appreciate the other fine offerings in CH, like Buns.

Buns is delicious. I'm not going to lie, I eat there often. Probably too often given how much food they give you.  It's pretty ridiculous. Their burgers are huge and you can put just about anything on them (including a fried egg!) and then there are the fries. The sweet potato fries that is. So good and so many! One meal from Buns is really like 2 or 3 in proper proportion but it doesn't always pan out that way...

What do we have here? Oh yes.  Turkey burger with andouille sausage, avocado, caramelized onions, lettuce, and tomato. I think there was some cheese on that thing too, maybe pepper jack? Whoa. I'm full just remembering how good it was.

xoxo

bean town

I haven't been in my new apt that long, and given that school is very much in session, I haven't had a lot of time to cook or even plan to cook.  Well one night I found myself with a bit of time (shocking I know) and wanted to whip something up, but of course had limited fresh supplies.

Not to fear, I always have a well stocked freezer and pantry. And after some digging I decided to make black bean burgers.  I had never made black bean burgers before, and didn't have a recipe, but I figured, how hard can it be to make a patty, right? Right, actually, here is what I came up with and it's pretty friggin tasty.

What do you need: 
From the pantry:
Can of black beans
Shallot
Garlic

From the freezer:
Corn
Cornbread

From the fridge:
Chipotle pepper
Pickled Jalapenos
Lime Juice
Tabasco

Coffee
Egg
From the spice rack:
Salt, Pepper, Garlic and Onion Powder, Red Pepper Flakes, Cayenne Pepper, Cumin, Chili Powder

 What to do:
1. Pull out that handy dandy food processor and get ready to fill it up:
2. Drain the can of black beans but don't rinse, add to the processor along with a scant cup of corn, 1 shallot roughly chopped, and two cloves of garlic, also roughly chopped.

3. To that add: one chipotle pepper, 1/4 cup (or to taste) of pickled jalapenos, and a hearty seasoning of each of the aforementioned spices.

4. Top it off with an egg, a dash of lime juice, 1/8 cup of coffee, a few dashes of Tabasco, and about two cups of cornbread in pieces.

5. Put that mixer to work; stopping to scrape the sides and bottoms. It should look, well kind of gross, like processed beans do, or baby food...but trust me its tasty.

6. Meanwhile you should have been preheating your oven to 350, sorry about that. Pull out a sheet pan and give it a good spray with some canola oil or something.  Then take a handy disher and dish away.  I like all things mini (as you know) so I went with the slider size patties, if you want to make a proper burger sized patty go for it!

7. Bake them off for 15 minutes then pull out and top with cheese if desired. Pop back in the oven for another 2 minutes and then you are ready to eat. I went ahead and froze half of them and stuck the rest in the fridge for easy lunches throughout the week. 

*To reheat from fridge microwave two for 1 minute. From the freezer microwave for 1 minute then add the cheese and mircrowave for another minute. 

 

delicious, veggie, easy, boom.

 xoxo

Oh Arkansassy!

I recently got to spend a few days in Little Rock with my Arkansas team and it was of course a wonderful time filled with my wonderful people and delicious food.
I of course had to go to my favorite brunch spot, b-side.  Seriously people, it may be my favorite place to get brunch in the country.  I force myself to get something different every time I go and I'm never disappointed.  I went basic this time with the traditional breakfast - eggs, bacon, toast, gouda grits. Yes gouda grits, they are so friggin' good it should be illegal.  Did I mention the $3 mimosas? Yeah, I love this place.

I also got to enjoy some items that really you can only justify while on vacation...in the south. Items like, buffalo chicken dip and a bacon cheeseburger topped with a fried egg...

During these fine few days I also had a take on my summer fancy.  Any gin cocktail that combines cucumber, mint, and lime will do.  It is an amazingly refreshing combo that never disappoints.  This one was called the effin good martini, and it was.

Finally there was the absolute ridiculousness that was dessert.  We ordered key lime pie and a flourless chocolate cake topped with ganache, blue bell, and whipped cream.  Now the piece of pie in the picture was a standard slice of pie to help show how absolutely massive the chocolate cake was.  And it was every bit as delicious as it looks.  Now Arkansas holds a good piece of my heart, but I worry I can't ever live there again or else I'll blow up like a hot air balloon...

Buns vs PTs

There was/is a great debate between some of my friends over the superior burger in Chapel Hill.  There were two contenders in this battle: Buns and PTs.  Each has there own set of pros and cons:

Buns
The good:

*Variety, you can top your burger with practically anything, including a fried egg, as seen here on the delicious brunch burger.

*Options for non-meat eaters, this is a big one as many of my friends don’t like to eat the cow. AND they have sweet-potato fries, my fav.
The not-so good:

THE BUN?! Okay, so this is my huge problem with Buns, if you are going to call yourself buns, I expect the best bun.  The bun you get isn’t bad, but its not really that good and that just leads to disappointment. 

The burger, is a little dry, I like a medium burger but you can’t get that many places in NC due to some ridiculous law blah blah, so I can’t fault them too much for this but still, lame.

PTs

The good:

The burger, that’s right people, the most important part of this equation, the burger at PTs was delicious.  It was a thin patty with a good char, not overcooked, absolutely delicious.  And it was surrounded by a wonderful fluffy bun that had just a shake of salt on it, oh soo good. 

The bar, boom! Full bar at PTs, need I say more?

The bad:

*Options: the menu at PTs didn’t mess around, they served a good burger and fries and that was almost it, so if you had other wants in your party, PTs would not be such a good choice.

*Biggest problem: its not PTs anymore! Due to an altercation PTs closed and reopened as the Lodge.  The Lodge sucks.  It still has a full bar which is awesome but the burger  (and bun) has gone down the Chapel Hill.  Finally, the biggest sin of all: on my last attempt to eat at the Lodge I noticed they had expanded their menu and now had cheese fries, I friggin love cheese fries so of course I ordered them.  What did I get? Not cheese fries but burned yet soggy fries covered in that weird nacho cheese/velveta kind of sauce.  Not a happy camper.

So in conclusion in the battle over the best burger in CH, the order is such:

The Lodge …… < Buns < PTs (RIP)