Where to Eat in Peoria Illinois

I played bass this weekend in Illinois with the soon to be famous Mitch Houston Band. I learned a valuable lesson. Its actually something I've been learning over and over for the last several months. Lately I have been asking the server at the restaurants I go to what they recommend for me to eat. I have realized, however, that waitresses have particularly very bad taste in cuisine. So far, the last 4 eating experiences where I have asked for a recommendation have been particularly bad.

We ate at a place called Sully's which was a little pub in downtown Peoria with a pretty cool feel. It was smoky, dark, and had a dart machine. All good qualities in a pub. Mitch ordered a burger, Michael ordered ribs, Krista ordered fettuccine, and I ordered the pork tenderloin sandwich after a raving revue and extensive recommendation from our server. She has no taste buds apparently. This thing was 8 or 9 inches in diameter, pounded out wafer thin, and deep fried. It was served on a plain bun. No sauce. No lettuce. No tomato. No nothing. A plain, dry, bigger than my head, fried piece of tenderloin. Weird. Flavor wasn't that bad. In fact, had I had a small pan, a handful of porcini mushrooms and some port wine I could have made an out of this world Jager Schnitzel. Unfortunately I wasn't the cook. But how do you eat a big dry fried pork tenderloin with no sauce? Everyone else raved about how tasty their food was. They all nearly choked on their food laughing at my plight too.

Hoops is a good place to eat though. It was a little smoky pub that served Chicago style pizza. It was very good. It was smoky though. I'm not a smoker, but it almost feels better to walk into a little pub like this and be enveloped in smoke. OKC has a no smoking rule in its restaurants which is nice and all, but the little pubs should be smoky. It just doesn't feel right without the smoke.

Maybe I should open a restaurant. I would make sure my wait staff knew how to make recommendations. I would serve a variety of wine sauces with several types of mushrooms. I would cook the pasta al dente, and my waiters would never recommend the worst thing on the menu. There actually wouldn't be a worst thing on the menu.

Hurts So Good

I've been pondering a lot lately. Normally this can be very dangerous and lead to disaster, but this time I've been pondering food. OK, I often ponder food. I love food. What I have been thinking about lately is why "good food", meaning tasty food, is often not good FOR you. Lets take my favorite food products for example:

Heavy Cream

Butter

Whole Milk

Fried Bologna

Steak

Pork Fat

Duck Fat

Dr. Pepper

These are all natural occurring foods, with the exception of the bologna which is a processed meat product, that contrary to popular belief is NOT made of cow lips and pig nipples, rather it is a type of smoked sausage that becomes extra delicious when fried on a griddle. Cream, butter, Steak, all come from the cow which was clean even to ancient Israel.....well, maybe not the way I eat my steaks. And then Dr. Pepper which is obviously blessed. If you haven't heard my story about when I was in college and trusted God to supply me a missing nickel and then found it laying at my feet in front of the drink machine I went to a nickel short, in faith, then you just did.

Anyway, why does cream and butter have to slowly collect in your arteries? I typically have at least a couple cloves of garlic and some onion or shallot which is supposed to help clean them out so I think I wash out the bad effects. But not just cream and butter, everything dairy is full of cholesterol, cow meat is terrible for you, sugar causes all kinds of problems, and drinking pork fat is never advisable in any situation.

Of course the easy answer is moderation. Americans are notoriously bad at moderation. We rarely teach moderation in anything. We typically have knee jerk reactions in life. Ex. "Twinkies are yummy, so I will eat 40 of them". The church (in the South) puts bans on alcohol because people can't practice moderation, but we don't ban sugar and butter and the same ones who imposed the ban on alcohol are double fisting chili dogs after their victory at the convention. Heart disease is the leading cause of death in America.

I guess if we would practice moderation then a little butter or cream is fine for everyone. I wish it wasn't bad for me. I really like cream sauces and butter. I really like frying things in butter, pork fat, or duck fat. I really like Dr. Pepper. But I can't afford to have heart disease so I have to eat things that won't kill me.

A new review site

I have been asked to begin contributing to a local Oklahoma Food Review site that is soon to be a staple for the locals, eataroundokc.com

I will still post things here for myself to read and to amuse myself.