And..............I'm back

A lot has happened in this past month so far and attempting to find time to even get on here and type things up, is becoming difficult.  I have good news and bad news.  The good news, is that my other hobby, which is playing around with making jewelry, has apparently gotten some people to like it enough that I have items for sale at the Club Tattoo location in Las Vegas.  I did sell things in the St. Louis Curio Shoppe in downtown St. Louis, but the store in Las Vegas means that my items can be sold for more and I will get a lot more people to view my work.  I do know, that this site doesn't pay me at all, so at least the jewelry helps.

Now, as if designing and choosing 30 items, packing them up and shipping them to Las Vegas from the St. Louis area in 3 days wasn't close enough, try keeping the food writing going on while doing that.  So, I think the first thing that I have to spring back is a new energy drink flavor.  I am slightly addicted to energy drinks so when I see a new one, that isn't full of High Fructose Corn Syrup, I'll buy it and try it.  This is one such instance.  Also, since I have had a mojito in my life and have a friend from Cuba, I thought it would be fitting.

So what does it taste like?  Is it good?  No.  It tastes like the regular Monster fruity flavor with a strong fake lime flavor and it has something else.  I know what they were trying for, making a refreshing lime flavored Monster drink, but in the end, don't make new flavors if they are not good.

Now, while wandering the streets of St. Louis, particularly around the Hospital area, I saw a food truck.  It was one called Sarah's Cake Stop and the truck sold pre-made cupcakes, cakes and cookies.  You know, having a truck drive around, selling sweet sugary things from the side of it sounds like a really good idea. This company makes everything in their main location and then packs it up for moving and selling.  I felt hungry so I got a quick cupcake, of each kind they had.

So, the one in the upper right corner was a gluten free one, a flourless chocolate cake, which tasted fine to me.  What I liked about each and every one of these, is that the icing was more of a whipped cream icing.  It was light, fluffy and wasn't laden with this heavy-ness like regular powdered sugar and water can provide.  They were very moist as well.  The flavors were very spot on as there was a carrot cake one and a red devil cake and vanilla/maple flavored and so forth.   Even though I do make cupcakes at home from time to time, I wasn't filled with this feeling of "oh I can do that", which sometimes permeates my mind when looking at other people's versions of baked goods, but I can say that everything tasted really good for what it was supposed to be.  This isn't like another cupcake company in the area whose cupcakes are just not that tasty, because Sarah's Cake Stop isn't all about hype but instead about the flavor.  A lot of some of the best of St. Louis didn't make it to a television show or didn't pay to run giant ads and articles in periodicals.  A lot of the best of this city, is hidden and you have to brush aside the hype and the junk to see it.  This truck, and more importantly the people of the company, make very good cupcakes and for their price, I am happy.  I would give their cupcakes a 4 out of 5 stars, for being very good and if you see them on the street, you should take a stop and try them out.

Just because you won, doesn't mean you are the best

I don't really want to talk trash or spread vile rumors.  The fact is that while an institution or restaurant or chef may have won something at some point in time, doesn't mean that they forever have that power and prestige'; such as any episode of Restaurant Impossible, Mystery Diners or Restaurant Stakeout may prove. There are many episodes which had famous or world record holding chefs and restaurants whom have since then become relaxed in their work, lost their passion and thought that just because they were famous at one time, people will come back and spend money.

Along Delmar, near 170, is an Indian restaurant named House of India.  House of India was a staple for my wife and our family and whenever someone wanted great Indian food, we would go there.  It is our favorite Indian restaurant: to date.  It is just perfect.  Now, next to it, where a fabric store used to be, is a new shop. The new shop, is a Jilly's cupcake bar and cafe.  Jilly's is well known because they won on the show Cupcake Wars, in Season 3.  Now I know that they went back again in February and won another round of cupcake wars, but their food doesn't really show it.  When we went there, we picked up 3 cupcakes.  We picked up a 24 carrot gold which was a carrot cake flavored one with some dusted gold sugar on top, there was a Twisted Pink Velvet which was like a red velvet cake, there was one called the Bee Sting which has flavors of lemon and honey and finally we ordered a plain one: Simply Iced.

First off, there were some things that just didn't seem too comfortable about the cafe and experience.  First of all, it was very crowded and while that is great for places, when people left a table and no one came to clean them off and bus them, it made it look dirty inside.  Now, that we finally had gotten a table, there was 6 of us and I had to sit at a dirty and messed table and wait for someone to come by and clean it, we sat with our cupcakes and began eating and tasting.

The 24 Karot carrot cake cupcake was okay.  I'd give it a 2 out of 5, but it didn't taste anything like a carrot cake.  It had such a heavy and pronounced spice-ness to it that it tasted like a spice cake, heavy with nutmeg or allspice and cinnamon and walnuts.  If you didn't tell me it had carrot in it, I would have thought it was a banana spice cake.  It was just okay for $5, actually it wasn't worth $5.

Then there was a Twisted Pink Velvet and it tasted like the red velvet cakes that are made with cocoa powder.  It had a chocolate hint to them and was moist and good.  I'd give this one a 3 out of 5.  It was good and I'd order it again; it was also $5.

The Bee Sting was interesting because as much as I thought it would taste like honey, it tasted more like strong fake lemon flavor than anything else.  The little piped icing bee was cute and the little lemon candy shaped honey comb piece was tart and the cake seemed pretty normal and subtle.  I'd give it a 2 out of 5 and it was also $5.

The last one was the Simply Iced and was their regular iced cupcake and was $3.75.  This one was better priced and for its flavor, which was a regular vanilla flavoring, I'd say that it was still over-priced.  It had a vanilla cake and the icing was pretty normal for a Jilly cupcake.  I was expecting something grand but maybe my taste buds are not as refined because their Tahitian vanilla icing tasted just like the fresh vanilla bean icing I can make at home using the beans I buy at Costco.  The ones at Costco are from New Guinea or somewhere like that, so they taste the same to me.  Still, I'd give this regular tasting cupcake a 2 out of 5.

Here is the thing: the cupcakes all seemed normal.  There wasn't anything strange like a beer flavored cupcake with bacon or something strange that should be in a cupcake.  Furthermore, while these cupcakes are large, they are not as large as the huge cupcakes you can find at places like Sams or Costco.  I dunno.  Maybe I'm just not a cupcake snob, but I will not get there anytime soon.  This is like the trouble wine.  You need to get wine tasting experience by learning about wines and tasting wines.  But if you don't have the funds to buy wine all of the time, how can you tell which wines taste the best?  Here, at places that charge as much as a full meal, for cupcakes, makes it difficult to taste as many as I can.

If you are hungry for a cupcake and you have $5 and some change in your pocket, then go there and have one.  If you are hungry for a cupcake and you want more than 1, then go some place else.

A secret food truck feast

There was a food truck feast this past Saturday, but you would never have known it.  First off, it was announced in a small ad in the RFT magazine.  Secondly, it could have been a better arranged event.  Here is the thing: it was held partially be the Four Hands Brewery, which was on 8th street downtown.  The brewery has parking places in back of the building; about 8.  So, this event, was to have about 10 food trucks, live music and food and beer and all sorts of goodies, as well as the first fashion truck.  This is a good idea, but could have been a billion times better, had there been parking.  The closest parking, was on 8th street, but after those two blocks of parking filled up, the only answer left was more street parking.  Parking was done on the streets as far West as near St. Raymond's church.  Parking doesn't seem like an issue at first, but there was something gnawing at me: the vacant "event parking" lots nearby.  There was three, large empty lots within a shotput's throw of the event.

This meant that just a quick forethought on the event organizers, could have had those spots not only available, but for rent for just a few bucks.  Even if they charged a single $1, per car, they would have cleaned up with their 50-60 spots, versus not having them open at all.  Now, besides the parking and the tables setup for 50 people when there was over 200 people there at any one time, I'd say everything else was good.

My family and I tried as much as we could.  It was also important to see that some of the foods we ordered, were not only child friendly, but were inhaled by those same children.  We ordered a grilled cheese sandwich from Sarah's Meltdown: https://www.facebook.com/sarahsmeltdown .  We had ordered a grilled cheese in which my boys inhaled.  I think my wife was able to get a single bite of it before each boy grabbed half of it, and ate all they could.  It was definitely cheesy and I'd say as far as child friendly things, that was an easy 3 and 1/2 out of 5.

Next, my son ordered a dish from the Completely Sauced truck.  They say that they serve Creole Cuisine.  So, my son orders their nachos, which I wasn't happy about because I was expecting chips and cheese which sound great to a 6 year old, but isn't really note-worthy from a food truck.  These nachos were not nachos. They were $7.50 and it was this huge paper basket of sweet potato chips with what seemed like beef, green onions, and this amazing sauce.  So, I sat there, after having a sample and watched my 6 year old, take a fork and eat and eat and eat.  My skinny little 6 year old, ate the whole thing, which was probably 2 pounds of food!  The flavor of the sauce, reminded me a lot of the flavor of a sauce that Guerrilla Street food had on one of their dishes.  It was fantastic at an easy 4 out of 5 stars.

There was a Greek truck there called "My Big Fat Greek Food Truck" and I had to ask and order from them.  First off, I found out that they do everything there and even the woman, whom I spoke with, makes the yogurt fresh and then the woman makes the Tzatziki sauce from scratch, using that home-made yogurt.  They cook the meats, they spice and make the herb mix for pita bread.  I ordered the gyro and some baklava.  The baklava was made from scratch and made extra sweet with what tasted like honey.  It was so good and so moist and the woman said that everything, but the phyllo dough, was done by them. The baklava was a 4 out of 5 as in, you have to order it.  The gyro was huge and was great with the raw onions and tomatoes.  The sauce was great and the beef/lamb was delicious.  The woman there actually told me that at one time, they offered a pork gyro, but  no one liked it.  Weird.  So, the gyro was huge and was enough that I had to save it a few hours later and eat it again for dinner.  The meat was perfectly spiced and the first half of the sandwich was perfect and making me happy.  I think it wasn't until I got to the second half that I thought that the meat was getting salty and spicy.  I think there was actually a chili rub or spicy paprika or something that lent some heat, on the pita bread.  All in all, it was very good and I'd give both of these items a 4 out of 5 as you have to order them.

There was a truck that was called "The Sweet Divine".  The side of the truck mentioned that they had won Cupcake Wars.

What they specialized in, was cupcakes and they had this clever stand out front with what each cupcake looked like along with a description.  They had some interesting flavors and out of the 6 available, we had chosen 4.  Our four flavors were a Salted Caramel, which had an overly salty cake and a smooth and rich caramel sauce.  The Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough one had a very rich chocolate cake with a small spot in the bottom with some cake that tasted like cookie dough.  There was a simple icing on top and some small chocolate chips also.  The Neapolitan had flavors of chocolate and vanilla and strawberry that tasted just like a scoop of the ice cream.  It was right every-way. The best they had was one called "The Drunken Pig".  It was a beer flavored cake with a simple vanilla icing and pieces of crumbled cooked bacon on top.  The thing was awesome.  The cake part tasted like a really, really yeast-y, like a good beer and then the bacon on top worked with everything.  Now, there were four cupcakes, but every one was worth getting.  It was an easy 4 out of 5 and each was awesome.

Now we also picked up a Nutella crepe' from Rooster:

It was as good as a Nutella crepe' can get at a 3 and 1/2 out of 5.

We also got a large sushi burrito wrapped type thing that my wife got and thought was delicious.  It was from Chop Shop and I forget which one it was, but it was huge and perfectly done.  It also came with some Wasabi spiced popcorn.  I'd say that it was a 4 out of 5.

There you have it.  This was a quick run through of about 6 food places and what I thought of them.  If you see any of these driving around, I suggest that you flag them down and give them your money,.

my little hostess...

Okay, I love sugary, rich snack cakes and love Hostess cupcakes.  However, since I do try to make everything a bit healthier than it normally is : ie, take out the HFCS, I found a copycat recipe and decided to play around. So, I made the cupcake parts:

Then I made the creamy white filling:

Then I made the chocolate frosting for the top:

The way this worked, was that you took the filling and piped it into the insides of the cupcakes, from the bottom.  This gave the insides, like a hostess cupcake.  Then placing the frosting on top made something that looked okay but tasted okay as well.

My problem was that the filling did not fill up the cupcakes, it only went as far as the piping bag fit in, so it didn't make a spot of filling at all.  I ended up cutting the cupcakes in half and placing a pat of filling on a side and then closing them back up.  Doing this recipe does need work to make them taste as good and work as the originals, so more work is needed in the future.