Fast Food

Cherrywood, in Soho, was a breath of fresh air, both from the overwhelming crowds of Mercer Street and the stifling afternoon heat last Wednesday. A new addition to a quieter part of town, Cherrywood offers a gilded interpretation of classic Asian and American flavors.The décor is understated, almost a little generic with its blood-red curtains and eponymous wood accents strewn about the restaurant, high-ceilinged and classic like a more minimal boudoir. It is sprawling in all aspects and ends up feeling a little less intimate than the name Cherrywood Kitchen would suggest, but Cherrywood Study or Cherrywood Living Room ends up making more of a mouthful than the food. The upper catwalk of the main room had bookshelves and oddities along the shelves, which I craved more of than the small peek I received in gazing around.The drink menu offers six cocktails, perfect for two to sample throughout an evening, and a reliable, if basic wine selection. The cocktails were what piqued my curiosity, utilizing an array of fresh fruits and ingredients, from the simple, but vibrant Botanical Gimlet, with Hendrick’s, tonic, lime, and cucumber, to the clever in the Cherrywood margarita, whose flavors were reminiscent of a craft cherry limeade. The vodka cider was my personal favorite – simple, clean flavors that perfectly complemented the ribs, with a punch of Cointreau to withstand the strong flavors of the meat. The Bedfellow was partial to her Manhattan, made with smoked orange peel. A serviceable sangria and delicate blood orange prosecco finished out the meal, before coffee and dessert wine. (Clockwise: Cherrywood margarita, vodka cider, blood orange prosecco, Manhattan, and Taylor Fladgate)Our meal began with a selection of small appetizers and bread, the latter of which put other bread baskets to shame. Freshly baked ciabatta with whipped bleu cheese butter was en point, crispy and ethereally light on the inside, with a tender, flaky crunch. Tearing into it with our hands increased the satisfaction. Smeared with the earthy, equally light butter, we unabashedly ate two loaves in the blink of an eye. We shared three small plates in lieu of larger appetizers – the miniature lobster ‘tacos’ with Old Bay hollandaise, short rib spring rolls, and housemade pickles. Syntactically, my eyes always gravitate toward interpretive dishes that riff off other dishes, it appeals to my meta aesthetics and inability to let go of my childhood whimsy. Luckily, this trend is rampant in modern cuisine, and even luckier, the lobster ‘tacos’ actually were tacos, served in petite hard taco shells made of spring roll dough, brimming with large, tender chunks of lobster. The egginess of the hollandaise disappeared amidst the bolder spices, the Old Bay reigned supreme. Three was an unwieldy number, and a contentious battle followed between the Bedfellow and I for the last bite. The bite-sized spring rolls were devils in disguise, the crispy outer shells yielding to savory, succulent pieces of short rib, but they were elevated to a new level of appetizer elation with the au jus on the side, silky and deep with a slow-roasted flavor that we dipped the rolls, bread, tacos, and sneakily, our fingers in before we’d had enough. Our final plate, the housemade pickles, were surprisingly varied in color and variety. I was expecting something of the bread and butter variety and received a Crayola-colored selection of snackable vegetables with a pungent, sweet set of flavors. Paired with crisp butter-roasted peanuts, it brought to mind a deconstructed Pad Thai.The entrée selection sways from tastefully flashy to wriggling, almost uncomfortable levels of excitement – the tuna belly, caviar, heirloom tomato, and foie gras stuffed ribeye had an air of attention-seeking decadence whose description alone could have filled and killed us. It is easier to find satisfaction on the quirkier side of Cherrywood’s menu – the freshly killed, smoked chicken stuffed with eel, though technica

People need to be more excited about sandwiches. Like the old Jake Gyllenhaal snack and sandwich memes, they need to grin from ear to ear and hold their sammies up as if they were the iPhones 20, 30 and 40 all wrapped up into one. Well, leave it to Reddit to make it happen. A new meme showcasing stock actors smiling blissfully at sandwiches has made its way around the internet these past couple of days. Everyone from concert-goers to ethnically-balanced friend groups to tech-savvy grandparents – no one is safe from the mesmerizing, uplifting powers of a well-made BLT. So the next time you decide to take a #selfie of your #OOTD, stop for sec and think about how you must look to other people. Primed, perky, smiling stupidly at a nigh-invisible little black box. Yep, to most people walking by, you probably look pretty damn ridiculous right now. But if you replaced that b*tch with a sandwich? Nah, you still look pretty stupid. H/T + PicThx Reddit The post Here, Have Some Pics of Smartphones Replaced with Sandwiches appeared first on Foodbeast.

I’m sometimes guilty of gravitating towards fast food just because of the name of the product.  Yeah I’m a rube with my drive-thru tendencies and here’s some evidence for you.  This burger is called the Big Daddy Double and I couldn’t care less what was in it when I placed my order, I just liked the name.  Checkers usually fails to disappoint me with their burgers too so I guess I’ll say this lunch choice wasn’t the most difficult decision for me.I’m assuming that Checkers locations in Maryland are a test market of sorts because I normally see grub that isn’t advertised on the Checkers website.  The Big Daddy Double is a burger that I haven’t been able to dig up any details for online, so I don’t have all the specifics on the exact ingredients.  From what I could tell, the Big Daddy Double consisted of two seasoned burger patties with a mix of crispy onion tanglers, grilled onions, pickles, American cheese and a Thousand Island style sauce on toasted sourdough.  I’m pretty certain on all the ingredients except for the sauce, but Russian dressing/Thousand Island/Mac Sauce/Fry Sauce… whatever you want to call it, it’s some sort of ketchupy mayo based sauce. Priced at $2.99, the Big Daddy Double is a really solid value.  Combine that with the fact that there was a 2 for $5 promo going on, this burger is a borderline great value.  Those two hearty seasoned beef patties sandwiching that slice of cheese did everything to remind me how of much I appreciate Checkers staying true to what good fast food stands for.  The core ingredients of the Big Daddy Double are that salty mix of beef and cheese which just scream guilty pleasure.  When it comes to the rest of the burger, I don’t think that all of the ingredients worked particularly well together and my bread wasn’t completely toasted, but it wasn’t enough to detract from enjoying the burger overall.  Come to think of it, the half-toasted sourdough looks a lot worse than it really was.  With burgers, I like the “less is more” approach and feel sometimes places try too hard to fit in more unnecessary ingredients.  This could’ve been a masterpiece without the distraction of pickles. Continuing the discussion of distracting ingredients, I don’t understand the point of the including both crispy fried onions and grilled onions.  I’m partial to crispy, but either or would’ve worked just fine here.  Surprisingly, there wasn’t an overwhelming onion taste to the Big Daddy Double by having the mix of crispy and grilled.  The extra onions provided more heft to the sandwich and a little bit of a disconcerting feeling of not digging the soft and crunchy textures.  I’d rather have a lot of crunch if you’re including crispy onion tanglers and adding in the grilled onions cut down on that.  Rounding out the ingredients, the dressing was tangy familiarity.  A Russian dressing style sauce is usually an easy way to bring a burger together.It’s hard to not appreciate a filling fast food burger at the three dollar mark.   A big reason why Checkers stays true to great fast food is its understanding that $3 and under is where it belongs.  The Big Daddy Double doesn’t reach the high praise I’ve given previous Checkers creations, but it’s by no means a bad burger.  This sandwich is just stuck somewhere in between average and pretty good.

Let me sum up this article in five words: There will be Duff Beer. Other than that, yes, Universal Orlando will be building a real-life Springfield — the hometown of America’s most endearing animated family (Full House? Get outta here). The new outdoor attraction will include the actual restaurants, stores, characters and food featured in The Simpsons. Visitors will be able to feast upon a “Krusty-certified” meat sandwich at Krusty Burger, pizza at Luigi’s Pizza, donuts at Lard Lad, fish at the Frying Dutchman, a “Taco Fresho” with Bumblebee Man and Duff Beer at Moe’s Tavern. “This will be a must-see experience for Simpsons fans all over the world,” raved Mark Woodbury, President of Universal Creative, in a press release. “For the first time ever, they’re going to be able to enter a world that they’ve only seen on television – and we’re really excited to bring that world to life.” I’m not gonna front, I’m way more excited for this than I was for Harry Potter’s Diagon Alley. Mostly because I felt cheated when I found out the Butterbeer was a cream soda sham. H/T + PicThx Eater The post Simpsons Theme Park Will Feature Krusty Burger & Serve Duff Beer appeared first on Foodbeast.

The Beefy Crunch Burrito is back at Taco Bell as of May 23rd!  No more strange looks from people in the cars next to you as you try to stuff chips into your fast food, because Taco Bell has answered your cries for help. Yes, it’s back baby. The Beefy Crunch Burrito has five layers of goodness for just 99 cents.  Ground beef, rice, warm nacho cheese sauce, reduced-fat sour cream (oooo, “healthy”!), and Flamin’ Hot Fritos. Plus, Taco Bell and the NBA have come together to create Big Boxes, which include the Beefy Crunch Burrito Box and the Doritos Locos Tacos Box for $5.00 each. It’s like a childhood dream-come-true.  Burritos filled with chips, stuffed in a big box.  What more could you want in life? H/T + PicThx GrubGrade The post Taco Bell Brings Back the Beefy Crunch Burrito in ‘NBA Big Box’ appeared first on Foodbeast.

For all you food-porn-loving Instagrammers out there, here’s something new for you to gawk at.  Talking Food (@talkingfood) doesn’t mess around with #selfiesunday or #womancrushwednesday or #throwbackthursday or any other themed day you can think of.  They keep it clean with slick photos of food paired with a cheeky phrase that we guarantee will garner a snicker or two. Having only been up and running for a month, @talkingfood has about 150 followers. Although, let’s be honest, “Shit’s about to get eel. . .” Check out our favorites below: Oh hey, since it’s Memorial Day Weekend, “Happy Hollandaise!” H/T + PicThx FirstWeFeast The post ‘Talking Food’ Porn Takes Instagram to the Next Level appeared first on Foodbeast.

Arby’s recently impressed us with its use of King’s Hawaiian buns and now Wendy’s has plans on going with the pretzel bun to catch our interest.  2013 looks to be the year of a fast food trend to add some interesting variety to sandwich buns.  Back in December I received an email from a reader in regards to a Pretzel Bacon Cheeseburger being offered at Wendy’s in Garfield Heights. Ohio.   The test market burger was being sold for $4.49 and $6.49 for the combo meal.  Today Darren Rovell tweets a picture of the bacon cheeseburger with the pretzel bun… “Analyst: Wendy’s will roll out its Pretzel Bacon Cheeseburger nationally this year.”  Take a look:

7-Eleven’s Summer Slurpee Days starts today and you can get medium Slurpee drinks for 49 cents all weekend long.  Also… Slurpee Lite is introducing Slurpee Lite Sugar Free Sprite Flavor.  The Splenda-sweetened Slurpee Lite Sugar Free Sprite has no sugar and 20 calories for per 8 oz. serving.

Let’s be honest — pregnancy is pretty much a constellation of things that suck. There’s the nausea, the weight gain, the swelling that makes your feet look like overstuffed sausage casings, and to top it all off you can’t even have a drink or your baby will be born with flippers instead of eyeballs. Or something. However, a new study is claiming otherwise. The study published in BJOG: An International Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology and tracked 10,000 children born in the U.K. between 2000 and 2001 for the first seven years of their lives. The children were tested for math, reading, and spatial skills while their parents answered questionnaires on their emotional and social development. Turns out that the kids whose mothers drank a little alcohol during pregnancy were doing just as well as those whose mothers abstained completely, and some of the alcohol-exposed kids scored higher. Of course, this doesn’t mean that pregnant women should start tapping kegs any time soon. The government still recommends that women “not have more than one to two units of alcohol once or twice a week, and not to get drunk” during pregnancy (to put that in perspective: a  four-ounce glass of wine is roughly one and a half units). Keep in mind, it’s difficult to judge one’s individual limit when it comes to booze, as “one to two units of alcohol” will affect certain people differently. Bottom line: Imbibing any form of alcohol during pregnancy is potentially dangerous. H/T + PicThx NPR The post Pregnancy Just Got Awesome: Study Okays Drinking ‘A Little’ During Pregnancy appeared first on Foodbeast.

Oreo’s latest ad campaign, Wonderfilled, features a song by a man who literally goes by the name Owl City! That’s the most absurd thing I’ve found out all week, outside of the realization that I am going to have to obtain internet via exposure therapy. Seriously, Starbucks is my ninth level of hell. I hope that’s how he’s billed at Jiffy Lube and how the servers shout his order at Five Guys. Owl City. On the plus side, the hipster swooning that elicits must be insane. In any case, I received the press package for the campaign this week, which contained an Oreo book, and a set of three things to play, learn, and share: an iPod loaded up with the new Owl City song, an Oreo-shaped thumbdrive, and Oreos. I sense a theme!Having already forced my latest bedfellow (henceforth known as Bedfellow) to read the book with me, which made for an entirely awkward evening, I decided to focus on the song bright and early in the morning, while my ears were at their keenest. The campaign is pretty cute and centers around aggressively tying the abstract concept of ‘wonder’ to America’s favorite cookie. “Wonder can be twisted, licked, dunked, stacked, rolled, crunched, nibbled, and savored,” which makes me wonder (see what I did there?) if I ought to change my name to Wonder. Wonder Watsky has a swell ring to it. I’m a food critic, but I decided, then and there, that I could also be a music critic. The song is obviously called ‘Wonderfilled,’ not to be confused with ‘Wonderwall,’ or ‘Wonderful’ from Wicked, and starts off ominously, as the only file on the iPod is called ‘OREO WONDERFILLED ANTHEM’ which makes me wonder if I’ve stumbled onto a top-secret plot to take over the world with Oreo cookies. If so, it would totally work. Bitches love Oreos.But not with this song. Oreo City lays down a thick beat that I immediately want to snort a line of cookie crumbs to, then quickly transitions into some straight-up autotuned jams. There is a story, and the ending leads to roads paved of cookies and cream and triangle-accented syllables. It’s precious. Too precious. I mean, it’s literally the most twee thing I’ve ever set eyes to, and I willingly read Kristin Chenoweth’s entire memoir. I’m not sure that Oreo should have something more saccharine than its cookies advertising them. Owl Cookie puts a friendly flair on some dour dope fairy tales. I was definitely not aware of the fact that the three little pigs were killed in any non-Oreo related versions of the story, but now that I do, I’m damned glad I have some Oreos to eat away the post-traumatic stress with. Wonderfill my belly! Vampires turn vegetarian, sharks share things and ‘cuddle up with giant squids for a friendly meal’ that apparently consists of nothing but cookies, and I end up dying from diabetic shock from the sheer campiness of the song alone. It’s cute, catchy, and dreadfully unsubstantial. Now that I’ve wholly established that I’m not going to be the next Ben Brantley, let’s move to an Oreo product I picked up at the grocery store, Oreo Cookies ‘n’ Cream Jell-O Pudding! Full FCC/blogger disclosure: I ate this out of a Tupperware container and I have no regrets, because it’s one of the best Oreo-flavored products on the market. So many of these lose that iconic flavor, even, in some cases, the Oreos themselves when they’re flavored with berries or sorbet, so it was a real pleasure to dig into this and find that the flavor of the cookies was as bold as ever. The pudding is extremely thick, at least it was when I made it, and features huge chunks of cookies that vary in size, so some are soft and cake-like when you eat the pudding, and others are still crispy.The flavor is great- the pudding itself doesn’t overshadow the salty, sweet cookies with too much sugar or flavor, despite the huge imbalance in between the ‘crème’ and the cookie component. What I liked best was that it appeared that Kraft only used the wafer part instead of crushing up Oreos with crème inside, which would have certa