WDW Weekend Eats

We haven’t done a “Weekend Eats” in a while, so since Miss Bonnie and I spent our pre-Valentine’s weekend at Disney and had a nice variety of edibles while there, I figured it was time…

We were staying at the Wilderness Lodge and began our culinary adventures on Friday evening there at the Territory Lounge.

In this comfortable setting next to the  Artist Point restaurant they have a selection of appetizers available to go along with the featured wines of the the American Northwest (or the usual cocktail or beers of your choice if you prefer).

One of the appetizers is the same cheese plate as served next door at Artist Point, and that was our choice to start the weekend.

Smokey Blue Cheese, Reypenaer VSOP and Humboldt Fog

The aged Gouda and the Blue were pretty much tied as our favorite… cheese… yummm…

I’ve heard from semi-reliable sources that you can order from the complete restaurant menu in the bar, and we did see a couple of ladies enjoying the mushroom soup (which was not on the app menu for the lounge), so I imagine if you ask real nice…

We made our way to the Magic Kingdom for a while and enjoyed the “romance version” of the great castle show (if you haven’t seen the projection show on the castle that precedes the fireworks, you’re really missing something…) and the fireworks. Following Wishes we hightailed it to the resort monorail and got off at the Poly.

Next to Kona Cafe they set up a sushi bar starting at 5 PM (before this it’s a coffee/pastry venue) and here you can get some really great Polynesian-style sushi and/or order from the full Kona menu if you so desire.

We ordered a couple of items from the sushi menu as well as the potstickers from the Kona appetizer menu.

Pork and Vegetable Potstickers

I was a bit disappointment that the duck potstickers that had been on the menu had been replaced with a more mainstream pork and veggie version, but they were quite good nonetheless.

From the sushi side we tried the Citrus Hamachi Roll (which I think is a new addition to the selection there since my last visit) and one of my favorites, the Tuna Poke.

Citrus Hamachi Roll

The Hamachi roll featured marinated raw Yellow Tail with crunchy tempura bits and was quite good.

Tuna Poke... can you served me up a bucket of this stuff please???

Dedicated Readers may recall how much I enjoyed chopped-up-and-seasoned-raw-tuna dishes (and I’ve given you a couple of recipes for Tuna Poke in the posts “Let’s Cook! Tuna Poke” and “Let’s Cook! Tuna Poke, a la Aulani”), and the Tuna Poke served here is not only one of my favorite examples of this dish, but truly one of my favorite things served anywhere on Disney property. Very fresh seasoned tuna with a spicy mayoish topping on a crispy base… I could eat a huge amount of this stuff!

Miss Bonnie has been somewhat squeamish about raw fish before (but I give her lots of credit for at least trying most anything), but she bravely gave this a taste… and went back for more… it’s that flipping good…

The next day we again found ourselves in the Magic Kingdom, and around lunchtime we made our way to the Columbia Harbour House. This is probably my favorite quick service location in the Magic Kingdom – it’s menu is quite different from any other on property (believe it or not, you can’t get a burger there), and the seating areas, especially upstairs, are well themed and generally much less hectic than most other quick service eateries.

We had been meaning to get there for quite a while after a menu makeover a few months ago (making broccoli, of all things, a featured element), but this was the first time we’d actually made it there. Broccoli (which I actually quite like) is now offered as a side option to many of the menu items, and is featured in a salad, which we decided to try (along with and order of the fried fish so that Miss Bonnie could get here french-fry-fix for the day).

Broccoli Peppercorn Salad

The Broccoli Peppercorn Salad has “mixed greens (mostly iceberg), garden vegetables (corn and green peas), chicken, broccoli, parmesan cheese, tossed with a creamy peppercorn dressing”. This salad is huge with a very large amount of (I assume) poached chicken. The meat is tender and not dry at all, but fairly bland. The dressing is tasty and the ingredients really need the flavor boost. The peas and corn tend to wiggle there way down, so you see most of them at the bottom of the bowl as you finish. The salad is certainly big enough to share, and we both liked it and agreed we’d gladly have it again (even though my usual choice here is the hummus sandwich). Even though the ingredients are healthy, I can’t imagine the dressing is anywhere near a low (or even moderate) fat selection, so even though it’s a “salad”, it’s probably not really a great dietary choice, especially if you eat the whole thing… of course it’s probably still much better than a burger…

Later in the afternoon we found ourselves in Downtown Disney to take part in the the 5th Anniversary celebration for Lou Mongello’s WDW Radio podcast (congrats on five great years Lou!) being held outside of the Pollo Campero/Fresh A-Peel/babycakesNYC building with goodies being provided by the babycakesNYC bakery.

We were meeting up with Momma Ginny there, and she gave us the heads up on a tasty beverage to sample: Watermelon Sangria.

Watermelon Sangria

There is a small beverage area there with several Latin favorites (alcoholic and non… as if anyone should bother with the latter) and other usual beers and wine. On this day they had a very refreshing and yummy Watermelon Sangria, so we ordered one of those (primarily) for Miss Bonnie along with a Stella draft for myself. They do now offer discounts (20%) here for DVC members, Annual Passholders, etc., so our two drinks (before tip) were less than $10.00 – quite the adult beverage deal for being on Disney property!

Attendees were treated to small cupcakes with your choice of frosting (we selected a very assertive mint).

Cupcakes with Mint Frosting

And later a very moist and delicious Blondie cake with vanilla frosting was sliced and gladly devoured by the crowd.

babycakes manager Emily handing out slices of cake

Babycakes is known as the “healthy” dessert location – vegan, gluten-free, yadda, yadda, yadda… this equals taste-free to many… this cake converted any doubters…

Tasty, tasty vegan Blondie Cake with Vanilla Frosting... only thing that could have made it better would be some bacon!

That evening was our pre-Valentine’s dinner at Artist Point in the Wilderness Lodge resort.

We ordered a couple of glasses of Kung Fu Girl Riesling (a nice choice) and perused the menu. While we looked we nibbled on some nice Sourdough Bread served with soft butter sprinkled with Black Sea Salt.

Bread & Butter

We were tempted by several new appetizer offerings (including Roasted Oysters with Crab Ceviche and an Asian-inspired Beef Noodle Bowl), but settled on the Roasted Heirloom Beets.

Salt Roasted Heirloom Beets with Truffled Goat Cheese, Cider Poached Pink Lady Apples, Spiced Walnuts and Mulled Wine Vinaigrette

This was not only a beautiful dish, but an absolutely delicious one as well!  Of course it’s hard to go too wrong when you start with a base of truffled goat cheese… I would have gladly eaten a larger portion of this as a vegetarian entree.

For her main course Miss Bonnie chose the Sweet Potato Gnocchi (another new addition to the menu replacing another gnocchi dish) while I selected the Prawn and Crab “Hot Pot”.

House-made Sweet Potato Gnocchi with Wild Mushrooms, Spinach, Caper Butter and Drunken Goat Cheese

The gnocchi arrived on a slender plate along with mushrooms, spinach and (yet more) goat cheese. Bonnie was ecstatic about the dish and keep talking about it for days.

With the large number of people of Asian descent on the West Coast, it’s not surprising that Artist Point usually features several Asian-inspired dishes, and my entree was one of these…

Wild Caught Jumbo Prawn and Crab "Hot-Pot" with Mussels, Crispy Pork (yeah baby!, Jasmine Rice, and Spiced Thai Coconut Broth

the “Hot-Pot” is in quotes as you don’t actually cook the dish yourself as in a traditional hot pot, but this is an “inspired” dish from the flavors of a seafood hot pot… a flavorful broth was on the bottom of the dish, topped with the slightly sticky rice along with some mussels, a few cubes of pork belly, some pieces of crab and two large prawns. Overall the dish had very good flavor and was quite filling as well – the mussels were on the small side (which disappointed me as, like Janet Weiss, I’m a mussel fan…), but other than that I was quite satisfied.

We very both so stuffed that we passed on dessert, but just to be on the safe side we stopped in at the Wilderness Lodge quick-service venue, the Roaring Fork, to pick up a Magic Cookie Bar (which did make it unscathed until the next morning).

Magic Cookie Bar

On Sunday we went to Epcot (which will not shock Dedicated Readers in the least) and started wandering around World Showcase. After considering the new temporary Italian quick service (which is open while the Tutto Italia restaurant is closed for a refurbishment), we decided on my new/old favorite, the Katsura Grill for lunch.

Katsura Grill

The former Yakatori House, which was one of my favorite places in all the World, recently re-opened as the Katsura Grill (yes, we will give you more details on this venue sometime, soon I hope…), and I have been very pleased with the results. Most of the old menu is still intact, and several new items have been added. It was a very cool weekend, so on this visit Miss Bonnie was in the mood for soup and she went for the Miso Soup along with a California Roll.Both items hit the spot for her, especially the soup.

Miso Soup and California Roll

I picked one of the older dishes to see how it was now faring – the Shogun Combo of teriyaki chicken and beef served with steamed veggies and rice. The boneless chicken thighs were juicy and took well to the sauce. The thinly sliced beef was much better than the last time I’d had it, even though I still wish they’d bring back the sukiyaki beef. The vegetables and the rice were both cooked well. This was a very generous portion and a quality dish. Of course, a Kirin washed down a good lunch.

Shogun Teriyaki Combination

So there you have it, a culinary overview of our most recent weekend in the World – I hope you enjoyed it and were able to eat a bit vicariously…

We also came across several interesting things in the parks that weekend, so we’ll try and give you an “Odds & Ends” from the weekend soon…

Now, back to the kitchen! See you soon!

WDW Odds & Ends…

I’ve spent most of the last week in seclusion, contemplating the end of the Best Time of the Year… sobbing quietly… crying myself to sleep curled up in the fetal position…

Last weekend was, yes dear Dedicated Readers, the last weekend of the Epcot International Food & Wine Festival…

Now that I’ve had a bit of time to recover, I figured I’ve give you a (relatively) quick overview of last weekend, as it was not just the final weekend of the Food & Wine Festival, but much more was going on at the World (Disneyworld, that is) that weekend, so let’s take a look back…

Let’s start at Downtown Disney, where the 36th annual Festival of the Masters was going on.

This three-day event (Friday through Sunday) usually coincides with the last weekend of the Food & Wine Festival (or sometimes the weekend after), and features lots of exhibitors/sellers of artwork,

a display of sidewalk chalk artists at work,

various kids activities, a mini food & beverage festival,

live entertainment, and more…

Outside the Lego store, hobbyists show off their Lego creations, many of which are quite impressive.

The artist’s booths (over 150 this year) usually feature high-quality work in many categories such as photography, digital art, glass, painting and sculpture.

Down by the House of Blues is a section of booths featuring folk art.

And yes, there is food… and beverages…

Several of the Downtown Disney restaurants set up booths to show off their offerings….

The offerings aren’t extensive (only seven restaurants this year, and sadly Raglan Road didn’t participate this year – they have had some nice items the past couple of years), and the quality varies (usually good items from Fulton’s, Portabello, Bongo’s and House of Blues… Pucks has pretty much phoned it in the past few years, and T-Rex is well, T-Rex…), but it’s worth saving some stomach space if you’re heading down there.

Meatball Sliders

One of the offerings from Portabello was three Meatball Sliders from  for five bucks – tasty and a great deal!

Fulton’s Crab House had a couple of good deals – two big Stone Crab Claws for $6.00,

Stone Crab Claws

Lobster Bisque in a Sourdough Bread Bowl

and a big Sourdough Bread Bowl filled with a good Lobster Bisque for only $4.00.

The Festival of the Masters doesn’t seem to get a mass amount of publicity, and from the usual good crowds it probably doesn’t need too much. If you’re in the area while it’s going on, it’s well worth the visit.

Around Downtown Disney (as elsewhere on property) it’s obvious that the Christmas season was already in full swing, with decorations everywhere.

A sign at the House of Blue was touting an upcoming menu change, courtesy of Aaron Sanchez…

I’m actually quite looking forward to trying this new menu out, as Chef Sanchez is one of my favorite Food Network celebs.

Inside the World of Disney store, the Turkey Leg shirt still seems to be a big seller, and yes, it’s available in kid’s sizes.

If you haven’t been to Downtown Disney in a while, it’s worth a trip to check out the new Lego displays that were put in after the store was redone a few months ago, several are quite spectacular!

So now, let’s move on to the Studios…

Not surprisingly, the upcoming Muppet flick is being promoted at the Muppet store (technically known as the Stage 1 Company Store if you want to be picky…).

Sadly there’s not a ton of new Muppets merch to be had – let’s hope the movie is as great as we here hope it will be, and we’ll be given more opportunities to be parted with our hard-earned cash…

Earlier we were speaking of the holiday decorations around the World, and the big Christmas event at Disney’s Hollywood Studios has now opened…

The Osborne Family Spectacle of Dancing Lights has opened, and it’s perhaps more spectacular than ever.

Even though the lights weren’t “dancing” all the time we were there (the dreaded “technical difficulties”), it was still an amazing display.

Hidden Mickeys abound – fifty of them according to the announcer.

Do you see Mickey?

And the Hidden Purple Cat, whose location changes each year, of course is back… after much frustration and gnashing of teeth, Miss Bonnie & I spotted it almost at the same exact moment… scroll down a bit if you don’t want to see the next picture of it…

Hello kitty...

This is the first year of the lights since the passing of Jennings Osborne, who started the Christmas display at his home in Little Rock, Arkansas.

One thing I noticed this year is a “Hidden Arkansas Razorback”…

I’m sure someone will let me know if this has been there in prior years, but it’s new to me, and I’m assuming it’s an homage to the memory of Mr. Jennings.

And yes, there is food and beverage news at the Lights…

As usual, a Toy Soldier mans a grill.

Booths offered up a menu of (mostly) holiday-themed eats.

"Pour on some sprinkles, stick a glo-cube on me, and call me a "Holiday Cupcake"... hell yeah they'll pay $6.50 for me!"

Walking through the crowd was a ballpark-style beer vendor…

What? No Stella?

I would have actually been a bit excited if there had been more interesting choices beyond Bud & Bud Light.

All told, this display is pretty darn amazing, and a not-to-be-missed at Disney during the holiday season.

Okay, so now we move on to the weekend at Epcot…

Epcot Christmas Tree

I won’t go into a great amount of detail on the last weekend of the Food & Wine Festival right now as it for one, may make me cry that it’s over, and for another, the biggest parts of the weekend (for me at least), deserve much more attention (and will receive same in later posts…).

Needless to say, we did eat some food – we tried a few items that at least one of us (Miss Bonnie and/or myself) had yet to have – but mostly had some favorites for one last time at the festival.

The offerings from Germany

Jerk Chicken and Dragon Berry Colada

Kielbasa and Potato Pierogie

The Ocean Spray sponsored cranberry bog was a big hit at the festival this year, and the nearby booth was giving away packets of Crasins all through the festival, but at the final couple of days with many packages left, the offerings of the remaining Crasins were greatly expanded… Miss Bonnie’s backpack was filled to the brim with the tasty berries…

"Give me all your Crasins and no one will get hurt..."

And one night after dark, we saw something we’ve never seen…

the lights were on in the VIP lounge at Spaceship Earth…

wonder who was in there????

So now, the big part of the weekend… for me at least…

Pam Smith and Chef Suvir Saran

getting to see one of my true Culinary Icons, Suvir Saran (he has asked me not to refer to him as “Chef”, and I will try to resist…).

Dedicated Readers will know of my admiration for Suvir and his food (if you are new here, please go and read Let’s Cook! Grandma Hayes’s Corn Bread and Let’s Cook! Fried Chicken Masala before continuing…). And I’ve found that he his as great a person as he is a chef (I’ll used “chef” with a small “c”… maybe I can get away with that…).

For months I’ve looked forward to Suvir’s return to the Food and Wine Festival – his two events were the ones I signed up for on the first day they were available, and literally counted the days until I was able to attend them…

On Friday, his “Kitchen Memories” was was presented – a three-course, two-hour cooking demo highlighted by Suvir’s stories and culinary history. Hosted (as usual) by Pam Smith, the two had a great rapport.

David Munksgard of iron Horse Vineyards provided the accompanying beverages – Fairy Tale Cuvee at 10 AM – yeah baby!

David Munksgard

The food was great, but it was mostly the stories and personalty of Suvir that made the day.

I was fortunate to have some wonderful and engaging table-mates to share the experience. The two hours sped by, and I would have gladly spent all day listening to Suvir’s stories.

Miss Bonnie was able to observe the end of the program, and later joined me for the cookbook signing/meet-and-greet with Suvir.

He was very generous with his time with all attendees and gladly posed for photos. Afterwards I was as giddy as a little schoolgirl…

On Saturday Suvir gave another demonstration, this time one of the one-dish 45 minute demos.

Miss Bonnie attended as well, and we were joined at our table by Sarah, and her significant other Matt, from the Eating WDW blog.

Once again, Suvir was engaging, informative, and very, very funny… I horribly regret not having an audio of the presentation.

Afterwards was another book signing, and we gladly spent some more time with him.

There will be many more details, and of course recipes, from Chef Saran’s events (oops, sorry, I mean Suvir), and yes we’ll eventually have a recap of the Food & Wine Festival in general (just don’t hold your breath, we’ll get to it eventually… at least before next year’s festival for sure).

We hope you’ve enjoyed these ramblings from a weekend at the World, time to get back to the kitchen… see you soon!

Some things were just not meant to adorn a tee-shirt…

Came across this foodstuff-inspired bit of couture at Downtown Disney this week:

Now I know that there are folks that really do love those things, but to memorialize that humongous hunk of poultry on an item of clothing I think is a bit much….

A closer look (if you dare...).

What’s next in the line of Disney food (or drink) inspired outerwear? Dole Whip swim shorts? Carrot Cake Cookie Capri pants? A Tonga Toast tuxedo?

And why limit it to outerwear? I’m sure I know at least one Harem member who’d kill for a pair of Karamell-Küche edible undies (caramel flavor, of course)… okay, maybe she’d settle for a tee-shirt…

 

Mamma Mia, that’s a spicy meatball!

Yet more eating options added to the World… recently Portobello in Downtown Disney added a bar menu of meatball sliders, and of course, I had to check them them out (again, the sacrifices I make for you people…).

Sitting waterside near Fulton’s Crab House is Portobello, a traditional Italian eatery. A couple of weeks ago they unveiled the Meatball Bar featuring, what else, but handmade meatball sliders.

Now this is not really a “new” area inside the restaurant, the bar simply has some new signage added, and of course the addition of the slider menu in the bar area.

There are four types of meatballs: Beef & Veal with Parsley; Spicy Pork; Chicken with Sage; and Salmon with Tarragon. All of them are marinated in a tomato-based sauce and then formed and cooked to order. They are served simply on a slightly chewy roll and napped with the sauce. And even though the full bar offerings are there in front of you, they are specifically promoting and pairing these with a selection of organic beers from Orlando Brewing.

As I made my way into the restaurant at lunchtime, I was greeted by the hostess and told her I had heard rumor of this new meatball bar. She pointed me into the bar area and told me that Eric (who she kept insisting was a “nice guy”) would take good care of me.

As I asked Eric about the meatballs he gave me the quick history on the concept, how they had done a test run a few months back and due to the positive response had instituted the items a couple of weeks before my visit.

I ordered up one of the brews – the Olde Pelican E.P.A., which was excellent – and tried to make up my mind about which sliders to try… Considering their pretty low price (and my usual hunger), I figured I would wind up tasting all four, but decided to start with the 3 for $5.00 deal and ordered up the three meat-based balls.

As Eric put in my order, we were informed they didn’t have a beef ready yet – I jokingly inquired how, of any of the items, you could run out of beef? I could see maybe not having fresh salmon one day, but not having freaking hamburger around? This prompted much back-and-forth between Eric and the chef as to “Where’s the beef?” After this homage to Clara Peller eventually died down I selected the salmon instead as my third ball… keep the comments to yourself please, this is Disney after all…

The sliders were taking a while to arrive, and Eric good-naturedly kept harassing the chef to speed the order up, and considering I was the only patron there at the moment it did seem to take longer than really should have been required to cook my balls (my meatballs, that is)… I’ll cut them a bit of slack as I was there right as they opened, and it seemed a good bit of prep work was being done at the same time.

As I sipped on my beer I took the available time to query Eric about the regular menu. He was very, and seemingly honestly, enthusiastic about the food there. Noting that he was of Italian descent (and thusly I assume he meant he had to be good judge of Italian food), he ran through a few of his personal favorites and all sounded quite good. And since the two particular favorites noted among the entrees (the Rigatoni Calabrese he said was generally the staffs’ number one personal pick, and his own favorite was the Bucatini) were among the least expensive on the menu, I think he was honestly fond of the food and not just trying to do a good selling job.

When the sliders made their appearance, I ordered a second brew (I must have spilled part of the first one!) and dug in…

The good-size meatballs were all tender and flavorful – the pork had a moderate amount of spice, while the chicken tasted like, well, chicken…

Next was the salmon… now I was not too excited about this as I’m actually not too fond of salmon (but I will take the gastronomic bullet for you folks), but the mixture along with the tomato sauce was surprisingly good – I’d actually order it on purpose again… go figure…

Salmon with Tarragon Slider

The three meat sliders run $1.95 each, while the salmon will set you back $2.95. Not bad for food around Disney, but the real deal is that you can order any three for $5.00. The organic beers will cost you $5.95 per bottle (not at all out of line for a beer around the World, and well worth it in my opinion).

According to Eric, the sliders (and have I told you I have a rant coming on about “sliders”? We’ll save that for another time however…) are only served in the immediate bar area and not offered to patrons there for a “regular” meal. He explained that this was due to the “made-to-order” nature of the items and they might not be able to keep up if they were added as a regular appetizer type item.

One or two of these sliders would make a nice mid-day (or late night) snack – or go for three or more (along with a tasty adult beverage of course) for a more filling lunch or dinner. And I’d say this has to be among the better values to be had on property, especially when you consider the the restaurant itself is a bit on the more pricey side.

And yes, I’d say this was good enough to warrant another visit to Portobello’s Meatball Bar on an upcoming trip to Downtown Disney… I do still have to try the damn beef…

I haven’t eaten a “full” meal at this restaurant since it was the Portobello Yacht Club, but with my new buddy Eric’s enthusiastic dining recommendations I’m going to make a point of trying out their evening offering sooner rather than later.

I wouldn’t say the meatballs are worth a special “dining destination” trip, but next time you’re in DTD, they are certainly worth a try… if you’d had them, post your comments!

And yes dear readers, there were two references to old TV commercials in one post (and sadly I knew the name of the “Where’s the beef?” lady off the top of my head without aid from Google)… I’ll try not to inflict that upon you again…

More construction fun around the World!

Knowing how much at least one of my (now) three dedicated readers enjoy pictures of construction walls and the like, here’s some more from this past weekends visit to WDW for your viewing enjoyment.

This weekend was my first foray to Downtown Disney since the announcement that the famous Red-Headed Clown had been unceremoniously dumped to be replaced by a Cowboy Hat-Wearing Fowl (or is that a sombrero he’s sporting?).

The construction-destruction involved with the new Latin-flavor eatery that’s replacing the long-standing McDonald’s seems to be well on the way…

The semi-iconic clock tower in now just a shell of it's former self.

Great would be nice - I'll settle for pretty darn good...

For more construction news, we head back to Epcot and the World Showcase…

More of the sorta-new/sorta-refurbed Mexican restaurant is now exposed to the masses.

The dome is pretty... will the food match up? We can only hope...

Also in Mexico a new meet & greet area has been built for everyones favorite duck, the sometimes cranky Donald.

We now virtually venture  over to Germany… recently we saw some not-so-Disney goings on there (see Doings around the World Showcase) and wanted to be sure all was now right with the World…

There appears to still be some dancing going on in the gazebo of the German train layout, at least they’re now doing the vertical mambo instead of the horizontal version…

Back to the kitchen…

I gotta get out more….

The weekend after Thanksgiving I ran (okay, we know that means mostly walking very fast…) in the Jingle Bell Run 5K Run/Walk for Arthritis in Tampa. The “Plaza Run” race was held this year at the International Plaza Mall. Now I don’t get to this mall, and the adjacent Bay Street dining area, often… even though I do live in the “Tampa Bay Area”, International Mall is a good 45 minute to an hour drive from lovely Riverview, and especially since there is now an Apple Store much closer in Brandon…

But I did discover something new since the last time I had been to Bay Street… Early in the AM on that Sunday, fueled only by a good amount of coffee and a Clif bar I wandered through the darkened dining area to find the registration area for the race… some early morning workers were around – walkway being pressure washed – the clatter of dishes through the open back door of a restaurant – and the inside lighted up of, yes, the Holy Grail of Sandwiches – an Earl of Sandwich!

Disney fans are practically unanimous in their praise of the store located in Downtown Disney – some even make special trips there for one of the tasty, hot sandwiches… I had really never given much thought to this being a chain (it’s almost too good…), but it is, and if one is near you, be sure to give it a try… freshly made hot and unique sandwiches, usually all under six bucks… and of course salads, chips, and various other fresh sides… mmmm…

http://www.earlofsandwichusa.com/

Even though I don’t get to that mall often, I do have to make a pilgrimage every so often to a nearby location, so I now may have to make a short side trip for lunch… and that nearby location? I like to refer to it as the “Disneyland of Alcohol” (or the DOA for short), but most people know it as Total Wine… the best likker store in the whole wide world (or at the least the best I’ve been into…)

http://www.totalwine.com/

And for full disclosure, we here at Eating (and Drinking) around the World have no financial arrangement nor have we received any type of remuneration from either of the above businesses for our praise heaped upon them… not that we would be adverse to same… we will gladly whore ourselves for food and drink… call us…

An unusual race aside: as you probably know, most races have one or more places where they provide the participants with water and/or Powerade/Gatorade (or other sports drinks). Volunteers usually hand out the liquid in crushable Dixie cups which are then normally strewn wildly about by the participants and left for the poor volunteers to clean up… this race was basically two-plus loops around the mall, and there was one water station that was passed twice – the first pass by was the usual Dixie cup… but on the second round it appears they must have run out and had to use whatever they could find:

Ohhh… if only they had be really handing out Jager Bombs at 9 AM…