Victorian Christmas(es)

One of my favorite Christmas stories is A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens. For me, it’s a story that cements a connection between Victorian England and the holiday forever in my mind. So, for this Christmas Eve, I thought I would write about a couple of Victorian England and Christmas related things that I’ve seen or read recently.

I Decorated a Sushi Roll Cake!

Due to traveling out of town for a few days (which I will probably talk about in my next post), I have neither the time nor the energy to write about comics this week. Well, more like I lack the energy to pull together the images for any comics-related posts. Fortunately, this isn’t a comics blog, it’s a “things that make me happy” blog. And my wife and I had an experience recently that was a lot of fun that I want to tell you about: we took a cake decorating class at Freed’s Bakery, where we decorated a sushi roll cake.

Ely, NV Part Two: Dinner at the Cell Block Steakhouse

While in Ely, NV, celebrating my 50th birthday by driving a steam locomotive at the Nevada Northern Railway Museum (more information about that in this post), I also went out with my wife for a birthday dinner. Having done our research, the only restaurant Ely seems to have approaching fine dining is the Cell Block Steakhouse, located in the Jailhouse Casino. I like steak, and it looked like this was going to be our best—perhaps only—option for a celebratory meal at a nicer restaurant.

Cherry Smoked Rib Roast

Having written about enjoying prime rib at Lawry’s and elsewhere, I thought this week, I would share my adventures in smoking my own rib roast. I’ve made one before, but this is the first time I took photos to document the process.

I Make Some Hot Wings

I’ve written about the foods that make me happy before. While I love trying new and different things, my comfort foods are pretty basic: hot dogs, steak and prime rib, and fried chicken sandwiches. I also love chicken wings. However, unlike all those other foods, I had never made my own wings, instead getting ready-made ones from restaurants or grocery stores, or frozen ones. Part of the reason is that my wife doesn’t share my taste when it comes to wings. She doesn’t like spicy foods, nor does she enjoy food with bones in it. However, that all changed just a few short months ago.

October Treats at Disneyland

Obviously, it’s been more than a week since my last post. And this post isn’t going to be about our late cat, Penelope, as promised a month ago. It’s been a busy, frustrating month for me, and when I didn’t have other obligations getting in the way of blogging, I just didn’t have the energy for it. 

One thing we recently did that wasn’t so frustrating was spending a few days at Disneyland. We had planned on our trip last January being our last trip to Disneyland for at least a year, but circumstances conspired to bring us to the LA area a couple more times, making this latest visit our third one this year. And I’m going back in a few weeks for a fourth, but that really will be the last one until 2020. Unless it isn’t. This time, we set a specific goal of trying as many of the Halloween special snacks the parks are currently serving, so this week, I’ll be talking about which ones we ate and what we thought of them.

Back to Lawry's The Prime Rib

It’s been another rough week in terms of staying positive. At work, some recent stresses finally came to a climax. Hopefully, things will go more smoothly from here on, but it was a struggle getting to and through this point. At home, things are getting a little better, in that for the first time since January, we don’t have any pending repairs at this time (knock wood). On the other hand, the repairs this year took a financial toll, and that necessitated cutting back on some travel plans. On top of that, my wife discovered some sort of repetitive motion injury to her wrist. Considering that she needs to use a computer mouse for work, this is of some concern to us. Fortunately, she consulted with a doctor, and we have a plan to manage that problem.

It hasn’t all been bleak, however. This month marked the 80th anniversary of Lawry’s The Prime Rib, and they were celebrating with a special $80-for-two meal, and we decided to take advantage of that offer. I wrote about Lawry’s on this blog just a couple of months ago, but we tried a couple of new items this time, so I thought I would share this most recent visit with you all.

My Birthday Meals: May 2018

So yesterday was my birthday. We had some pretty cool plans in mind, but for a number of reasons, none of them came to fruition. For the first time in years, instead of taking a birthday trip, we stayed home. However, we did go out to eat a lot, and most of it was pretty good. So I thought I would share it with you.

My Valentine's Day Dinner

Recently, I’ve been writing about restaurant and theme park food. We enjoy going out to eat, but we also enjoy staying in and eating. And the more confident I become with my cooking skills, the less interested I am in going out to eat. Too often, that involves driving down to the Strip, walking through a smelly casino, and paying tourist prices for good food and mediocre service. So, for the last couple of Valentine’s Days, instead of going out for disappointing meals, we’ve been staying in. The last two years, we had the exact same meal, and both times, it turned out great.

Winner, Winner, Chicken... Sandwich: Jack in the Box's Asian Fried Chicken Food Truck Series Sandwich

While we had a great time on our recent Disneyland trip, things have been a bit stressful since we returned. In addition to dealing with some health issues, we also learned that the wiring in our house was done pretty cheaply and shoddily. The repair guys we hired said we were lucky that a fire hadn’t been started in our house… and then they found evidence of a fire in the attic. So, having dealt with all that, I don’t have the energy for a big entry this week. Fortunately, Jack in the Box has come to my rescue, with a brand-new, limited-time chicken sandwich: the Asian Fried Chicken sandwich, part of their Food Truck series. 

Dining at Disneyland: Table Service Restaurants

Welcome back to my series of posts about Disneyland food! In the first of three parts, I wrote about Eat Like Walt, a book about food at Disneyland while Walt Disney was still alive. Last week, I wrote about the quick service meals we ate on our recent trip. This week, I’ll talk about the table service meals we had this time around. How do those experiences compare to our quick service meals? The answer may surprise you!

Dining at Disneyland: Quick Service restaurants

Posting pictures of food and meals online has become a bit of a cliche slam against social media. “I don’t want to know what people are eating,” whine the snobs. Yeah? Well, maybe I don’t want to see a zillion photos of your kids, or of your vacation, or your memes. There are only a few experiences that everyone shares with everyone else: eating, pooping, and dying. Of those three, I know which I’d rather see photos of. So, following on from last week’s blog about Eat Like Walt, this week and (probably) next, I’m going to talk about the foods we enjoyed on our recent trip to Disneyland.

Eat Like Walt: The Wonderful World of Disney Food

While my wife and I love visiting the Disney Parks, we haven’t been to Disneyland for about a year and a half. We’ll be correcting that shortly, and to prepare for the trip, I read a great book that my brother gave me for Christmas: Eat Like Walt: The Wonderful World of Disney Food by Marcy Carriker Smothers.

Winner, Winner, Chicken... Sandwich: McDonald's Classic Chicken Sandwich

(Just a quick blog this week while I get back into the swing of things.)

I love fried chicken sandwiches. It’s a go-to comfort food for me. The first one I ever ate would have been a McDonald’s chicken sandwich from back in the 80s, when they were introduced. So when I heard McDonald’s had introduced a new item called the Classic Chicken Sandwich, I had to try it.

Bob Taylor's Original Ranch House

As I’ve said before, I love prime rib. One of the best places in town I’ve had it is Lawry’s, but that’s all the way down near the Strip. Another of our favorite houses of beef is a great deal closer to home: Bob Taylor’s Original Ranch House. They’ve been around since 1955, and I’ve read that they are the oldest steak house in Las Vegas.

My Birthday Dinner(s)

My birthday was a couple of weeks ago. Traditionally, we celebrate it at home, and my wife makes the best Beef Wellington in the entire world just for us. However, this year, we were going to be traveling on my birthday, and ended up with two birthday dinners at restaurants: one here at home in Las Vegas, one in Monterey, CA. 

Dinner at Victoria & Albert's: A Photo Gallery

Last fall, my wife and I went to Walt Disney World for our sixth anniversary. As we always do, we made a point of dining at Victoria & Albert’s, the highest of high-end restaurants at the resort, located in Disney’s Grand Floridian Hotel.

Adventures in Smoking: Makin' Bacon

As my next step in learning how to smoke meat, I decided to make my own bacon. I had read on Grillgirl.com that she made bacon using Bill Gillespie’s Smoking Bacon and Hog Cookbook. The book sounded like it would be a good resource as I learn how to smoke, so I purchased a copy for myself.

Unlike Grillgirl, I didn’t want to use expensive Kurobuta pork belly for my first attempt. So we purchased about three pounds of regular pork belly at the Butcher Block. (My wife loved watching them use the band saw to cut our portion off.) As a side note, one of our initial concerns about making our own bacon was being able to slice it, since we don’t have a meat slicer. I had the idea to ask the guys at the Butcher Block if they could slice it for us if we brought it in. They said they could, and that was the final obstacle in our way cleared.

Club 33

My wife and I have done a lot of things at Disneyland. We’ve ridden in the Lilly Belle railcar. We’ve ridden in the wheelhouse of the Mark Twain river boat. We’ve ridden in the tender of one of the train locomotives. We always make a point of listening to the Dapper Dans. However, one exclusive experience we never thought we’d have a chance to do is eat dinner at Club 33.

If you don't take time to listen to the Dapper Dans, you have no soul.

Club 33 is a very exclusive club for Disney fans. It costs something like $25,000 to join, and then $10,000 a year after that. (Possibly even more now.) Even at those rates, the waiting list is years long, so even if we had the cash to join, we still wouldn’t be able to. Among their other perks, Club 33 members can eat and drink in the exclusive members-and-guests-only restaurant and lounge located above New Orleans Square in Disneyland. We had heard the meal was fantastic, but an even greater part of the appeal was that it was something that we would only ever hear about. Until a few years ago, when we ended up learning that we literally knew a guy who knew a guy. Someone we know knows a Club 33 member, and for the past couple of years, we’ve been trying to work it out to get a reservation for Club 33. On our last trip to Disneyland, it finally worked out.

Ghost Post Follow-Up and Tea at Disneyland Hotel's Steakhouse 55

This week is a bit of a follow-up to a couple of earlier blogs. Not only will you hear more about our recent dining-focused trip to the Disneyland Resort, but I’ve also got some more information about the Haunted Mansion Ghost Relations Department Ghost Post.

In my post about the Ghost Post, I noted that there was apparently content that could be unlocked in the Disneyland park. So, on a recent trip, we fired up the Phantom Radio app, which led us to Esmerelda, the fortune-telling machine on Main Street. (The app both told us to visit Esmerelda, and showed us her location on the GPS locator map part of the app.)