Just Plain Chips

One of my coworker’s sisters just came by with a delivery. Their mom made a little Easter basket with “flowers” growing in it. They were cookies on sticks. Keeping in mind with my last post I had to take the one that looked most like a Peep. And thus I give you, cookie Peep on a stick:

It was dee-lish!

Some of you may know me as a slightly picky eater. I mean, my blog’s name is “Just Plain Chips”. I like to eat the same kinds of things and not branch out too often. But I’ve had an adventuresome bug in me lately. I’ve tried some things I wouldn’t have even thought about not too long ago.

When I was in Austin, Allison took me to one of her favorite Mexican restaurants on my first night there. I’m not the biggest Mexican fan in the world, but I was definitely willing to go where she wanted to bring me and at least try it. I poured over the menu for a while, not knowing what to get. For some reason I chose the mole (moe-lay) enchiladas. Mole is a Mexican sauce that I am unable to describe. But it was pretty good. And so were the enchiladas. And so was the avocado margarita I drank! How many of you have had one of those? How many of you can believe that I actually enjoyed it? Allison admitted that she was a little worried about my eating habits while there. But after the fact she said that she was very happy and relieved that I didn’t act as picky as I make myself out to be. (Of course, I’ve been known to act a little out of the ordinary to impress cute girls before. Shhhh.)

While in Los Angeles, Brian, Natalie, and I headed down to Kincaids in Redondo Beach. I had a gift card to use and I felt that a nice fancy dinner would be fun. It did turn out to be a little more expensive than I thought, but it was well worth it. I was probably one the few best meals I’ve ever had.

We started off with a glass of wine and the teriyaki tenderloin appetizer. I love chicken fingers and mozzarella sticks as appetizers. But what happened when I put that first marinated piece of filet mignon in my mouth I won’t soon forget. (I know it’s cliche, but…) The flavors exploded in my mouth and my eyes bulged in surprise. I couldn’t believe what I was tasting. It was so delicious and so tender. Not many meals start out this good. And just like the immortal Eric Cartman said, appetizers are “what we eat before we eat, to get more hungry.” This appetizer just left me wanting more.

Next came the main course, which I branched *way* out of the norm for. I had the grilled mahi-mahi encrusted with macadamia nuts and stuffed with crab with scalloped potatoes. Is your mouth watering? Mine was as soon as I heard it, and I don’t like seafood or fish! I had to try it though. I was out at a fancy restuarant and if it had been light out I would have been able to see the ocean (the restaurant was on the pier), time to try something new and see why people are willing to pay $20 for a plate of food. I was not let down. I enjoyed every bite. What a surprise to be eating fish (and crab) and really liking it. After dinner we all three shared a piece of cheesecake. Mmmm, I love cheesecake. I didn’t love it as a kid. I think I probably refused to eat it because of the name. The only complaint that I have with the night is how our server kept ignoring my need for a full glass of water. It was as though he was more concerned with getting his other tables more glasses of $10 wine (not to be confused with boxes of $10 wine) or bottles of $100 wine. Funny, that.

Then tonight after work my dad decided that he, my mom, and I would go out to dinner. We went to this really nice local restaurant called Woody’s. For some reason I felt like branching out again. I didn’t go for the steak, or the chicken parmesan, or the meat loaf. I had ahi tuna. Served seered rare with teriyaki sauce, wasabi, szechuan vegetables, and sticky rice. The huge slab of fish came way more pink than I expected, but I was undaunted. I took my first bite with a bit of rice and a dip in the teriyaki. Delicious! I had a few more bites before deciding to tempt fate by going for my old nemesis: spicy. I spread a little wasabi on a piece, dipped it in the sauce, and popped it in my mouth. It definitely had some spice, but it wasn’t like a hot salsa kick. It was much more subtle. Subtle enough to make me wonder why my nose was running not five minutes later. I didn’t have wasabi on every bite, but I went back for more on a number of them.

I’ve been very proud of my branching out lately. Especially considering how much I enjoyed each new meal. I can’t wait to see what I feel like trying next time.

Thanksgiving weekend was great. I really didn’t do that much. I ate a lot of food. I talked to relatives and friends. I sat around and watched football. And I sat around and played video games. I’m sure there are a few other things, but not much.

My parents had a big dinner at their house this year. The first Thanksgiving in the new place. We had 22 people there. People from my dad’s side. People from my mom’s side. And friends of the family.

Following are a few pictures from Thanksgiving Day.

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For those of you who didn’t know, I can be a little weird about stuff. For example, I usually have a certain way I eat certain things. Like Cheetos, I always eat them from the smallest to the largest. Or how I pretty much try to save the “best” thing on my plate to eat last in every meal. Oh, and how I cut up my Eggo waffles nearly the same exact way every time I eat them. I mean, I could eat them in a different way. But why would I when my way is the best? Hehe.

With my recent candy purchase I’ve been afforded the chance to think about M&Ms too much. I remember someone asking a week or two ago about what M&M colors people eat last. And that very question has entered my mind ever time I open up a little snack sized bag of peanut M&Ms.

I have decided that my favorite individual colors are blue and green. And my least favorite are yellow and brown. With red right under the top two and orange right above the bottom two. So I usually eat them in order from least favorite to most favorite. But I always eat green ones last. Why would I do that, you ask? Because of a television commercial. Let it never be said that I am not a slave to the marketing. (Yes, I am aware that this is more of a character flaw than a positive attribute to brag about.)

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I sometimes use the phrase “Bad News Bears” about anything that just isn’t quite right or if something might be bad news. I find it softens the blow a little bit. It was a saying from an old girlfriend and it just kind of stuck.

Anyway, over lunch with my dad yesterday I was reminded of something bad that happened last week.

First, one day a couple of weeks ago I hadn’t brought anything to work for lunch. I had to run some errands so I just stopped in at the closest McDonald’s to get some food on my way back to the office. I had a two cheeseburger meal. Unfortunately I forgot to ask for “ketchup only”. I do that not only because I don’t like onions, pickles, or mustard, but I think it ensures that my burger hasn’t been sitting under the warming lights. I don’t mind the extra few seconds it takes for them to throw a “new” burger into the microwave.

So what does this have to do with last week? It was another day that I didn’t bring a lunch. What was I going to do? Go to Subway for a tasty toasted chicken parmesan sub? Go to the little sandwich shop for a tasty but slightly over priced freshly made sandwich? Go to the Vietnamese place for the surprisingly good and ample portions of ginger chicken? Nope. Not that day. I had a Bad News Bears feeling. I was craving McDonald’s!

I don’t care who you are, that is never a good sign.

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Crunch bars are just so good. I’m a big fan of chocolate in general, but there’s something about Crunch bars. In a moment of weakness at the grocery store last week I indulged myself and spent a whole $5 on four bags of discounted Halloween candy. One bag of 3 Musketeers. One bag of Peanut M&Ms. One bag of Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups. And One bag of Crunch bars.

I started liking Peanut M&Ms more a number of years ago after finding out my mom really liked them and if I ever had M&Ms around her they were probably Peanut ones. (I think I like the Crispy and the Peanut Butter ones better though) I still like plain M&Ms, but if I am going to eat chocolate I usually like something better.

I like 3 Musketeers as well. That filling is super tasty. I think my brother Brian likes them more than I do (but he doesn’t like them as much as Snickers) but they are still up there on my list. We both like to eat most of the chocolate coating off of the whole thing and leave ourselves with just the yummy filling with the bottom layer of chocolate.

And Reese’s. Well, I am a fan of nearly everything they make. I like peanut butter a lot (I still eat PB&J sandwiches) and sweet peanut butter mixed with chocolate is a pretty darn good combination if you ask me.

But those Crunch bars. I don’t know. There’s something about the Nestle’s chocolate and the crispy rice puffs. I could eat the whole bag in one sitting, I know that. Thank goodness I have a modicum of restraint or I would have any left right now.

Of course that restraint was my downfall in my youth. Whenever I’d come home from trick-or-treating with a huge haul of candy I showed restraint. I didn’t want to eat it all at once. First, I knew it wasn’t good for me. And second, if I ate it all now I wouldn’t have any later. Well, I usually ended up just being stupid about it and not eating almost anything and arriving at Christmas with a two month old bag of candy that wasn’t as appealing any more. IDIOT!

While some people don’t like meatloaf, I love it. At least I love my mom’s meatloaf. It’s good stuff. I hadn’t had it in a number of years before having it a couple times in the last month or two. It’s as good as I remember. But I’ve found something odd. It just doesn’t seem to fill me up. I had two huge pieces, along with some carrots and mashed potatoes, for lunch today, and my stomach feels empty. It’s so weird. Does anyone else experience this?

It probably wouldn’t be a good idea to keep eating meatloaf until I filled up, though, would it?

Alright, I’ll try to run through some things quick here.

Last weekend was quite a weekend for Minnesota football fans. The Gophers pulled out a huge win against #11 Purdue in two overtimes to go 4-0. The Vikings finally played like a pro football team and won their first game of the year against the homeless New Orleans Saints. And as an added bonus the Green Bay Packers lost by one point to Tampa Bay to go 0-3.

My trip up to St. Cloud went very well. It was very informative and very enlighting to see and hear what we saw and heard. It was definitely a sales trip, and a very effective one for the sales team that put it on. But the major part of the trip was meeting with other cabinet shop owners that had bought the same equipment previously. And all of them were honestly excited about the machines they had bought and all of them said that they don’t know how they survived before.

Anyway, one fun part of the trip was the food. The first evening we were there we had a meeting in the Golliday Inn we stayed in. Before the presentation part of the evening we had dinner served to us and it was surprisingly good. I had a stuffed chicken breast. I don’t know exactly what the stuffing was but it was super tasty along with the chicken. And they had garlic mashed potatoes and vegetables. It definitely helped put me in a good mood for the long presentation.

The next day while driving between two cabinet shops we stopped at a hole-in-the-wall restaurant called the Ole Creamery. The lunch special was the buffet. But it was unlike any buffet I had ever been at. The first thing on the buffet was a salad bar–that’s normal. And there were some lunch meats, which was different but expected. They also had potato salad, baked beans, and I think a couple other things. But then, the piece de resistance, they had hamburgers and corn dogs! Unlimited hamburgers and/or corn dogs? That’s pretty much as good as it gets. In total I had a salad, two helpings of baked beans, a corn dog, and two hamburgers. Mmmm. Oh and for after dinner, they had an ice cream machine. So I had two bowls of ice cream with caramel, butterscotch, and crushed Heath bars. They were so tasty.

Okay, that wraps up all the food related stuff.

I am flying out to State College, Pennsylvania tomorrow night and meeting my friend Eric. He is originally from Pennsylvania and I met him out in Bozeman. He is a big Penn State football fan and I am a huge Gophers football fan. Last year he and I drove from Bozeman to Minneapolis to see the Gophers play the Lions at the Metrodome. So this year we’re flying out and meeting in Pennsylvania to watch the game there. I am really excited about it. Beaver Stadium seats over 107,000 people. I can hardly imagine seeing a game with that many people.

It was tasty but maybe my McDonald’s lunch followed by a Cookie Batter ice cream and cookie dough bowl from Cold Stone Creamery wasn’t the best idea for lunch.

So tasty. So full.

What a slow weekend. I did way too little. But it was relaxing.

I watched a couple of movies I had already seen on Friday night and enjoyed them again. Then on Saturday I settled in to watch some college football. During the half time of the Bowling Green/Wisconsin game I ran out to do some errands. From the moment I left the driveway it started raining and didn’t stop for most of the rest of the day. I felt that vindicated my desire to watch football.

Then yesterday I did some reading. I finished Ringworld and started the latest Harry Potter. Last night I went to see “The Constant Gardener” with Chey. It was quite good, if slightly depressing. The only problem was that I whined about going all the way across town to the theater she usually goes to. So we met at the Southdale theater, which was completely packed. I got there uncharacteristically late and we sat way in front and to the side. It wasn’t like we couldn’t watch the movie in relative comfort, it just wasn’t idea.

Then today I met my friend Kari and her husband Steve (who were in town from Madison) for lunch. First they were out at the house and showed us pictures from the crazy 6 week trip around the world they took this summer. We went to lunch at Pizzaria Unos. It was quite good. Then after I went swimming over at Matt’s, it was a perfect day for that.

Now I’m just chilling out. Hazzah!

If I die or develop some cow related disease I just want everyone to know that it is from the undercooked meat I had at Chino Latino. I met some friends for dinner there tonight. It was a really neat atmosphere and all of the food was pretty good. But one of the things we ordered were these little strips of beef that you were supposed to cook on a little heated stone at your table. Supposedly you’re just supposed to sear the meat for a few seconds and it would be fine. Well, whatever we did don’t think we really got the hang of it. I like my steaks on the rarer side of medium but tonight I basically had a few strips of raw beef dipped in some sauce. It was tasty with the sauce you dipped it in, but I am just hoping that there was nothing wrong with the meat. The vegetarian Tina was encouraging me to not eat it, but I did anyway.

On kind of a side note, the other things I enjoyed tonight was some funky, yummy corn; a couple barbequed ribs; enchiladas; and some salmon sushi. A well rounded night for Just Plain Chips!

So, just as a reminder: if I die or get mad cow disease, I just wanted everyone to know what happened.

I had a good lunch fairly late for me. It was at Culvers, chicken tenders and a concrete vanilla (just plain chips) malt. So I’m not hungry. Why am I tempted to go and grab a big chocolate chip cookie from the break room every time I walk by? Oh, they’re chewy and tasty…they were at the party yesterday and I had a couple at break this morning. But I’m full. I find myself wandering towards the door and then forcing myself to turn away.

Well, at least I’m finding myself able to force myself to turn away. Mmmm, cookies.

I like eating. I’ve enjoyed it for most of my life. I’m picky about what I eat, but when I like something, I like to eat it. I also like to eat too much. I’m a bit more husky these days than I was a few years ago while surveying or in my youth when I was in sports all of the time.

Anyway, I hadn’t been to a Chinese buffet in quite some time. Maybe even since I lived in Montana. There was a place up in Havre, MT that Margaret and I used to go to all of the time when we surveyed there. Back in the day I could sometimes do three whole plates. There was a place in Bozeman that I’d go to every once in a while as well. So today for lunch my dad and I headed out to a buffet place called Lucky Inn Chinese Cuisine. I hadn’t been there before and there’s always a bit of nervousness when trying out a new place. Those fears were unfounded. First of all, they may have the best egg rolls I’ve ever eaten. Yowza! Plus, the sweet and sour chicken was excellent, which is pretty much all I need at a Chinese buffet. And then, they had these barbequed pieces of beef on a stick. I don’t know what kind of spices they used, but boy were they tasty. All in all a good lunch. And I only had two plates of food; I just can’t eat as much as I used to.

Now, I know I’m going to sound callous and cold here, but I have to say my piece. If you weigh upwards of 300 pounds, do you really need to be going to a Chinese (or any other kind) buffet for lunch? I’m not saying that a 300 pounder can’t enjoy some tasty Chinese food every once in a while. I’m just saying that maybe it’s not such a great idea to tempt yourself with the never ending buffet of food. When you are at a buffet there is always the thought in your mind: “I better get my money’s worth.” That thought just makes you want to go get one more place or put one more pile of stuff on your current plate. I’m not at what I would consider my ideal weight, but I try not to put myself in a situation where I feel like I have to eat more.

While eating our lunch a group of three ladies walked in. One with an average build and her two very large friends. Then not 10 minutes later another lady walked in with a large companion of her own. I just didn’t think it was the best idea for these ladies. But, for all I know, this one lunch was a reward for a month of being faithful to a difficult diet. So I try not to judge too much.

So that’s that.

I didn’t mention that for dinner last night I had Sir Winston’s Toasty Cheese or some such thing. Basically it was a grilled cheese sandwich and cream of tomato soup–one of my favorite meals ever. It was very good and I was glad I ordered it.

Anyway, I came across a tip today on how to make sure the cheese melts completely when making grilled cheese. I’m going to have to try it next time.

I went along with Chey to a movie she wanted to see at the Lagoon Cinema. The movie was Yes. It is an independent, artsy type film. It is the story of a woman in a cold marriage having an affair with an exiled Lebanese man in England. Chey was thinking that the movie would be a little steamier than your normal fare and interesting. She was way, way, way off on both accounts.

First, it was pouring out. Luckily I had changed my head light since the last time we had seen a movie on a rainy night and I could see alright. We pulled into the parking lot at pretty much the exact same time, I parked right next to her, and we ran over to the theater. Being the gentleman that I am I had no umbrella for her to use. The partially transparent, white top she was wearing was not what one would normally consider “ideal” for the situation. There was a huge line outside the theater, which we got into. After only a couple of minutes of standing around we figured out that it was a line for another movie. We skipped by it, got our tickets, and headed to the theater. Phew!

And then we sat down to watch. Yikes. Chey will readily admit that she missed the ball on this one. She said that she usually picks out good ones, but not this time. It was pretty painful at times. At the beginning we were trying to figure out what was strange about the way everyone was speaking. It just all seemed so high-brow and unnatural. I started to notice a few rhymes every once in a while and a certain rhythm to the way they were speaking. After a while, it had become clear; they were all speaking in rhyming iambic pentameter.

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So I drove over to 7601 Penn Ave S for lunch today. Google Maps has Best Buy listed on the map! (here’s an aerial picture) I checked in with security and then passed through the metal detector. I went and talked to the receptionist who called Laura. I then sat down on the entirely too modern furniture in the waiting area (which was very spacious) until Laura came down.

We waited about 30 seconds for Paul and then headed to the cafeteria, which already at about 11:20 was pretty stocked with people. The variety was pretty impressive. They of course had a grill with burgers and dogs, but they had a mexican section, a “comfort food” section (which all looked really good: hot dish, mac and cheese, soft pretzels, etc), a big salad bar, tons of snacks, even more drinks, and pizza. I couldn’t pass up trying the pizza, but I also had a salad, and the little loaves of corn bread started calling my name. As did the glass bottles of Orange Crush. So, I went through the line and paid too much money for my over loaded tray of food and we say down in the very spacious eating area. (Everything in the building seemed to be quite spacious)

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I almost forgot. When I was at CONvergence I had some pocky. They were little chocolate sticks and they were yummy.

I don’t remember where I first heard about pocky, but I remember wondering what it was. I finally found out a couple of weeks ago. I found out it was tasty.

If you’re a fan of The Legend of Zelda series of video games and you like sushi, then this might be the greatest thing you’ve ever seen. If not, it might be one of the scariest things you’ve ever seen.

Edit (4:51pm): The site I got this link from, kotaku.com, posted a correction about the picture saying that someone who could read Japanese said that the dish is supposed to look like Peter Pan and Wendy, which I will admit it does. But I think it still kind of looks like Link and Zelda as well.

Picture from Ricoco Blog (in Japanese)

Unexpected treats are one of the best kinds of treats. On the way back from a delivery my co-worker said he was in the mood for a Caribou Cooler. So he directed me (I was driving) to the closest Caribou Coffee and ran in and bought himself a Cooler and me a Wild Berry Smoothy. It’s quite tasty and I certainly wasn’t expecting to be having one this afternoon. What a nice surprise.

My dad and I headed to the mall after work tonight to see Batman Begins. In short, it was awesome. We both loved it. Nearly everything worked and all of the actors were really good. I especially liked Liam Neeson, it was fun to see him in a different sort of role than the last couple of things I’ve seen him in: The Phantom Menace and Love Actually. If you haven’t seen it, you really need to get going.

Another fun part of the evening was my choice of fare tonight. I made the kind of culinary choices that harkened back to my days living with Steve. He can tell you of a special night when I made myself some waffles (whether they were Eggos or Bisquik, I cannot remember, maybe he does) for the main course. Slathered in peanut butter and maple syrup. Yes, that’s right, peanut butter and maple syrup. Don’t knock it if you haven’t tried it. And then after having my fill of delicious waffles I finished off with a huge bowl of ice cream for desert. It was a very sweet night.

Tonight was not much better. What else are you going to have for “dinner” when going to a 6:15pm movie? Why, a large popcorn of course. And that’s what I had, along with a large Sprite. And then when I got home, I decided that to balance out the salty, butteriness of my dinner I needed some ice cream. And that’s what I had.