On The Road Again...

Where I guest on Internet Boyfriends

So Joey and Ryan have this wonderful podcast called Internet Boyfriend s.  They decided to have me on as a guest, still unsure why as I am not as awesome as them, but I did it.  We discussed car trouble, killer snow plows, mustaches, Taco Bell, Canadian award shows (and how I almost screwed one up), and other nonsense I am sure.

Give it a listen here , or subscribe to their podcast on itunes here .

The Great Burger Hunt – Red Boot

Another St James burger joint!

Well I think I have exhausted all of the true burger joints in the St. James area now.  But this one is highly recommended if you are ever in the area.  Since I moved back home I heard that Red Boot changed ownership and that the burgers, and more importantly the Karvy’s, were not as good.  Growing up in St. James I enjoyed Karvy’s and a burger on numerous occasions and I did not want my memory changed from how delicious they were growing up so I never made it down to Red Boot once I returned, until now.

If people had not told me of the change of ownership I honestly would not have noticed.  The building, inside and out, had not changed in the slightest.  It still had the 60’s menu from way back in the day hanging on the wall!

My buddy James and I placed our orders and sat on the little stools taking in the tasty smells coming from the kitchen.  About 10 minutes later we had our big bag of food.

As we returned home to eat and catch the March Madness unfolding my brother Brett was enamored with the smell of our food.  “The smell was amazing”, according to James too, and I agree with him.

I ordered the Big Boot, which is 2 patties each about an inch thick with tomatoes, pickles, lettuce, onions, cheese, and a little bit of chili, and an order of Karvy’s.

Although more expensive then I remember the Karvy’s were just as scrumptious as I remember.  I am curious if I could get the secret recipe from the new owner as the previous owner would not give it up but I would not expect it.  Karvy’s are crinkle cut fries with some secret spices.  They are absolutely delicious, maybe a little expensive at $4.65 for only a small container but worth the treat.  Because Red Boot is known for the tasty creation of Karvy’s, created by original owner Jim Karvelas , I figured these should be ordered over the normal french fries.

Karvy's

The Big Boot was a very juicy burger.  Aside from the bun, which was kind of stale, and very soggy from the juicy burger, this was a very balanced burger with all the toppings spread evenly around the burger, probably better than any of the burgers I have eaten so far on The Great Burger Hunt.  This also was a very messy burger due to all the juices flowing out of the burger; so make sure you have some napkins ready!

If you did not want a normal burger Red Boot also has chicken burgers and hot dogs on the menu.  Plus they have a slush machine for those hot summer days.  Red Boot is strictly a burger joint and their menu, which is a little on the pricy side, is only geared towards burgers and hot dogs.

What I got - Big Boot and Karvy’s $12.40 (after taxes)

Burger Taste : 4/5

Fries Taste : 5/5 (actually Karvy’s)

Price Value : 2/5

Menu Selection : 2/5

Overall : 3.25/5

Red Boot
1866 Ness Ave
Winnipeg, MB
204-888-1506

Plzensky Prazdroj Pilsner Urquell

Could a cheap pilsner be a great buy?

Beer : Pilsner Urquell

Brewery : Plzensky Prazdroj

Brewed In : Czech Republic

Style : Czech Pilsner

ABV : 4.4%

Price : Just under $2, super cheap!

Notes : available year round

Story : I do not drink many Pilsners but figured I should give my palette a taste of one since I have not had one in a while.

Appearance : Poured a light clear gold with a solid two finger head that is very fluffy and the head sticks around on the edges of the beer.

Smell : Has a bit of skunkyness to it, which got more apparent as the beer got warm, but overall it is strictly a mild floral hop nose.

Taste : I was surprised with the slight malt flavour after the hops in the nose but the main flavour seems to be an earthy grain and hops.  It is a little sweet and finishes with a slight bitterness.  The beer is very well balanced though.

Mouthfeel : Very thin bodied beer.  The carbonation is fairly heavy on it as well.

Drinkability : This is an average pilsner.  Initially the taste was actually pretty good but as I was finishing the glass it became more and more evident the skunky smell was in the taste as well and was pretty prominent near the end of the glass.  Not sure if it was a great buy but it was not a bad purchase.

A Contest?

Why yes it is!

So it is that time of year again, possibly my favourite time of year.  I will be decked out in burnt orange gear, more than usual, until the Texas Longhorns win it all.

Yes March Madness returns on Tuesday and I cannot wait!  Figured I would try and get some more people to fill out brackets with me this year and get rid of some books at the same time. So I am going to have a Stacks of Words contest to do that!!!! So sign up, t hat is, if you want the chance to win some free stuff, or like basketball.

Signing up is simple, go here , click "Join Group", if you don't have a Yahoo ID you'll need to create one to go further.  Enter the group ID# ( 50979) and password (at the end of post) and fill out a bracket for a chance to win a handful of books. I’ll send the stack, a stack of variety, in the top left to the winner.

I'll be using the standard yahoo scoring setup for points and tiebreakers.  Nothing fancy or complicated.  Just pick the winners and you win!

Of course I have a big stack of books to give away.  This will be the first of a few give-aways.  These are all used books from me, nothing brand new, as I'm not that fancy here to give-away new books.

I will also give away these to books on the right to the person who picks the biggest underdog to go the farthest.  Because we all love underdogs, especially if they go far during March Madness.

If there is a tie on this I will send one book to each person.  If there is a three-way tie, or more, I will just draw 2 names from a hat and ship the books to those people.

I should also clarify what seed the underdog is so we all know who's got a team left.  I think a 6 seed or lower COULD be considered an underdog in the tournament BUT I am going to label an underdog for this contest as a 8 or lower seed .

The password for the contest, of course, is: Hookem !!!! (not the exclamation marks)

Pray for Japan

Please pray for Japan....

I checked twitter before bed and I see #prayforjapan trending on the side bar.  Naturally I got curious.

Now I cannot sleep.  Of course me not sleeping is not a problem.  The earthquake and tsunami damage is the problem.  I cannot look away from the BBC, CNN and Al Jazeera news feed with my twitter feed open in a fourth window.  #prayforjapan indeed.

The footage of the tsunami rolling across the countryside is absolutely insane.  There are no words to describe that devastation.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21134540/vp/42024122#42024122

People are stuck at the Disneyland and the Sendai Airport is under a lot of water.

As of now only 8 have been confirmed dead but I am sure the number will rise by the end of the day.  #prayforjapan (UPDATE : 19 confirmed dead)

Aftershocks have not stopped and this could get worse as more tsunami waves are on their way, currently 19 countries are under tsunami warnings. (UPDATE : The entire pacific basin is under tsunami warnings)

#prayforjapan

Cannery Brewing Maple Stout

Where beer meets maple!

Brett should teach me how to take a photo

Beer : Maple Stout

Brewery : Cannery Brewing Company Ltd

Brewed In : British Colombia, Canada

Style : English Stout

ABV : 5.5%

Price : $6 for 650ml

Notes : Available year round.

Story : I love maple.  I love beer.  Seemed like a solid purchase.

Appearance : Pitch black with a big, feathery dark tan head but it faded quickly for how thick it was.

Smell : I really did not enjoy the smell of this beer.  My initial reaction was that it had an odd smell of maple and peat but as the head faded the maple became a more dominant smell making it more bearable.

Taste : Sweet maple goodness.  It tastes very good.  Like drinking maple syrup in beer form.  This beer also has hints of molasses and chocolate in the background.

Mouthfeel : A very smooth medium to full body.

Drinkability : I will drink this again!  So tasty, even with a not very good aroma this beer is worth checking out.  Thinking this would be a good breakfast beer with waffles or possibly a good beer to make donuts with!!

Website Redesign

No not mine!!!

It was Friday night (when I wrote this at least) but I was not sure what to write about.  I knew I needed a blog post or two.  The ideas were not coming to me as I typed up a short story about the guy on my beer bottle.  (I may post that later, probably with the review)  So off to FaceBook I went and started chatting with some people.  I asked a few friends if they wanted me to do a write up about something specific.  Nothing really stood out in their ideas.  Not that they were bad but I just did not feel like writing about them at that specific moment!  Until my friend Lauren said I should do a “blog about what website I should build for my assignment”.

I did not hesitate with this idea.  So I cranked up The Long Blondes , drank my beer, possibly ate some ice cream and began searching for a few sites that she could redesign.  This is what I came up with, and of course a brief why!

IMDB

www.imdb.com

Let’s face it.  The new redesign they launched a while back is flashy but it is not very friendly to a web surfer.  I will give them credit I do like the homepage better but when looking at a specific movie the new design is terrible!  I feel a 8 year old could redesign this much better, but I will leave that to Lauren.

Gizmodo

www.gizmodo.com

Ah the Gadget Guide.  Such a great website.  A simple design too.  Top stories at the top and the rest just scroll down.  Yet the fact that some articles have big photos while others have tiny photos, or none at all, and it has always bothered me.  They really need to change that shit!  Maybe a bar on the left side that has categories for articles to be grouped could benefit a surfer looking for news about some specific category.

The New York Times

www.nytimes.com

For the record, I dislike the slide show news feeds, like yahoo.com, and that is why I like the NY Times site overall but aside from not having that it is very basic and not really structured well.  Sure the sidebar on the left can direct me to the category of news I am looking for but if I want to see what all the top news is for that day I think a slight redesign could improve their homepage.  Honestly they could just use the same template from their specific category pages and I would be happy.  But until they do I will never be sure at what is the most important news on the homepage.

Hopefully I helped Lauren!  Probably not though…. I also think I was asked this question, or I asked it, to Ryan and Joey when we recorded Internet Boyfriends (their podcast) last week.  For some reason I don’t think I could think of an answer then.  Well here is your answer now!!!

Hopefully we can get Lauren to show us how she redesigned the website, if she ended up choosing one of these!!!  If you have a better suggestion leave it in the comments!

Grilled Cheese Pita?

Yes Please!!!!!

Ingredients

So I decided to make a grilled cheese sandwich.  It turned out I had pita bread only.  Thought I would give it a shot.

Here is what I did.

Split the pita open; try not to rip it like I did.  FAIL ME (*sobs*)!

Cut cheese, I used both mozzarella and cheddar.  I also cut big and small pieces to make it easier to fit around the entire pita.

Sizzling

Buttered both sides, I placed ripped side down first so the cheese wouldn’t melt too much out of the holes in the bread.  I started it on high, not really sure why since I normally start everything on low heat.  I turned the temperature down after a minute or two.

Flipped when I felt it was done on the one side.

And viola.  Grilled cheese Pita!!!!!!  I now want to try this with bacon inside, I mean who doesn’t love bacon!!!!

Thoughts on grilled cheese pita: very greasy, very tasty, and very cheesy.  Did I say it was greasy?  Because it sure as hell was a greasy grilled cheese pita.  I think next time I will try and make it with less, much less butter, if any at all.  The pita bread doesn’t absorb the butter like normal bread does, leaving tons of greasiness.  I still devoured the tastiness of it though rather quickly.