Fun With Carbs

If I had my way, I’d try out new restaurants for breakfast, lunch and dinner every single day. But budgetary, dietary and geographical restrictions prevent me from channeling my inner Guy Fieri. With that in mind, I’ll be having guest bloggers share their far-flung dining experiences here from time to time.

My former colleague Sandy Csizmar, a web producer at the Hartford Courant, received a delicious surprise this weekend when her husband, John, took her on an impromptu road trip to Sonic Drive-In in upstate New York. As New Englanders are pretty obsessed with Sonic, Sandy was stoked to finally try it out. She was nice enough to share her experience with us all…

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After two full turkey dinners, I don’t even want to look at the pile of leftovers in my fridge. But each meal was delicious.

At my parents’ house Thursday, we had cheese and crackers and amazing shrimp cocktail before heading into the main event of turkey; stuffing made with sausage, apples, onion and celery; sweet squash with brown sugar and butter; luxurious homemade mashed potatoes; my grandfather’s decadent Morton’s Steakhouse creamed spinach recipe and flaky rolls. Oh, and Ocean Spray cranberry log, as we call it, sliced up into manageable pieces. Dessert was our choice of Junior’s caramel apple cheesecake, a Milky Way mousse cake, pumpkin pie and gourmet cupcakes created by my aunt’s friend, a baker in Worcester.

Dinner at the in-laws was decidedly more healthy, but the turkey was perfect. My mother-in-law said she stuffed the turkey’s cavity with fresh oranges and bell peppers. While I couldn’t taste those flavors in the meat, I wonder if it added to its moistness. The white meat was fabulous. Wine selections: Beaujolais for the Griffin meal, Hobnob Pinot Noir at the Zielonkas.

Your turn: what did you eat on Thanksgiving? Did any dish particularly stand out to you? Any turkey techniques you want to share?

Honestly, we don’t do the late-night food thing often. I’m well-aware that we’re six to 10 years too old for that. But sometimes it’s 1:30 am in Northampton and you’ve had two Blue Moons at the Toasted Owl and a tiramisu martini at the Tunnel Bar and you smell delicious burgers cooking. And that’s when Local Burger looms in front of you like a munchie oasis.

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Working on a piece about Thanksgiving wines for later today/early tomorrow, but here’s a few tidbits of utter food absurdity for you in the meantime:

Coolio launches cookbook, dubs himself ‘Ghetto Gourmet’

Rapper Coolio has entered the ‘celebrity chef’ fray, releasing a cookbook “Cooking with Coolio” that features such recipes as Chicken Lettuce Blunts and Cold Shrimpin’.  (Thank you, THANK YOU, Boston.com, for posting the extended interview on your blog.) Among the best quotes:

“I am the Ghetto Gourmet, and my style of cooking is ghetto fusion. Instead of saying African-American and Asian, I say Blasian. Instead of saying urban and Italian, I say Ghettalian.”

“Salt was more expensive back in the day. We used to use salt to trade. You could trade for [darn] gold, for silk, you could trade spices for women.”

“You can cook some Kobe beef and I can cook some beef straight out of Compton, and you’d be hard pressed to make your [stuff] taste better than mine. My [stuff] is going to fall off the bone.”

Chicago Sun-Times publishes White Castle stuffing recipe

Somewhere in New Jersey, Harold and Kumar rejoice. and get REALLY high.

Bacon-flavored envelopes

From the brilliant minds of J&D’s, who also created Bacon Salt, Baconnaise, Bacon Pop (popcorn) and Bacon Ranch dressing. We were big fans of bacon-product hilarity in the Courant newsroom.  I just want to know why I didn’t discover these envelopes before I sent out all my wedding thank-you notes Tuesday…

Bobby Flay’s second Mohegan Sun restaurant, Bar Americain, opens today.

The menu looks similar to the original Bar Americain, with the addition of this appetizer: ”crispy Connecticut oysters with creme fraiche chowder and bacon relish.” LOCAL YUM.

Flay opened Bobby’s Burger Palace at the casino in July. More here.