8-9-12

On Thursday, the 9th, I went with a turkey and bacon wrap, an egg roll, and a cupcake for lunch:

The lady didn't offer to panini press it, so I just nuked it once I got it back to the office. It was ok, it needed something, maybe I'll see if they have some  honey mustard they can spread around the inside of it next time. The egg roll was pretty good, they're still not as good as they used to be. They're still making these evile cupcakes, and they're still stupidly tasty.

Didn't have dinner, but after the game, Jody, Grynner and I ventured to the old IHOP as we've not done in ages. I was fairly hungry, so I went with the country fried steak breakfast:

The pancakes were outstanding and finally quenched my pancake craving. I didn't even realize I was still having the pancake craving until I ate the first bite of them. The eggs were really good, and the hashbrowns were really good, for IHOP's. Still didn't hold a candle to Waffle House's. The country fried steak was the let down here, it was riddled with way too much connective tissue, so much so that I didn't eat much more than what you see in that pic. The flavor was good, but it was just a bad cut of meat, and I was so full off the other stuff on the plates (Jody got an appetizer sampler, so I had a chicken tender, a cheese stick and some onion rings off of it) I didn't finish it.

Chicken and Waffles

On the 1st of August, one of my coworkers decided to get a platter of chicken tenders from Chick-fil-a. Some of the other coworkers brought some chips and I brought some Sister Schuberts rolls and we did a mini-pot luck lunch:

The tenders were pretty good. They weren't too cooled off by the time they got here, and their flavor was pretty good. The first batch of rolls came out fine, but I overcooked the second batch. The wavy lays chips were good, but those bbq chips in there ... OUTSTANDING. They're Lays Barbecue chips, no special flavor other than that. But best bbq chips I've ever had.

For dinner, I had a sweet craving, so I hit up the old Waffle House and went with the All Star Special:

Ham, scrambled eggs, hashbrowns, a waffle and some toast. The ham was really tasty and tender, the hashbrowns were cooked just right, as were the eggs. The waffle was cooked just shy of crunchy-ness, which is how I like it. A good dinner (breakfast).

Cracker Barrel & Arby's

On the 27th of July, a Friday, I took the day off. I hit up Cracker Barrel for brunch:

I went with Grandpa's Country Fried Breakfast. I chose chicken fried chicken (big surprise), went with scrambled eggs, regular hash browns, biscuits and gravy and added a pancake (as I was still having a pancake craving).

The chicken was really good. It was cooked just right, still very juicy and hot. The eggs were nice and fully cooked, no runniness to them at all. The hashbrowns were just ok, they're never as good as Waffle House's. The pancake was good (for Cracker Barrel's, they're one of my least favorites). The gravy and biscuits were about as perfect as they can get.

For dinner, I had another Arby's craving, so I went with the usual #2 combo:

The potato cakes were good, and the roast beef was outstanding. Hot, juicy and flavorful, it was everything you'd want in a roast beef sandwich.

The Blue Plate Cafe

I had been having a pancake craving for a while. So, on Wedneday (7/18), I decided to indulge that craving by going to the Blue Plate Cafe. It had been a while since I've been there. We used to go fairly regularly at lunch, when we were just down the street from it, but since we moved to our new office last year, we've not been back.

I went with the 2 eggs and country ham platter. Their breakfast entrees come with biscuits and gravy and your choice of hashbrowns, grits or 3 pancakes.

The biscuits were just ok, and the gravy was VERY thin. But even though it was super thin, it did have a good flavor, which is really odd. This is the worst it's ever been in my many visits, and I attribute it to the odd time I hit.

As for my other side, I of course went with the pancakes:

The pancakes were good, flavor wise, but they were a little tough on the surface. Once you got them cut, they were fine. The ham had a really great flavor, but was fairly tough and dried out, more so than usual for country ham. The eggs were good.

This was easily the worst I've ever had at this restaurant, but I don't want it to sound like it was horrible. It was merely ok to fine. And if a bad experience is actually just an ok one, I'm fine with that.

The day after

For breakfast, we hit up the local Cracker Barrel. I went with the "Country Fried Breakfast" which in my case was the chicken fried chicken (big surprise), scrambled eggs, and biscuits and gravy. And I forgot to take a picture of it.

After that, the gang broke up and most headed back home. I hung out with Tab, Furey and their kids as I was heading back on Monday (12 hr drive wasn't happening after the day had started). So, we hung out in the pool for most of the afternoon.

For dinner, we had some hamburgers, corn, and finished off the crab that had been leftover from the party:

Yep, look at that, I tried to healthy up my usual fare. Went with corn for the side dish and tossed a couple of leaves of spinach on there. It was pretty tasty, and the spinach added a nice texture without being too bitter (last few times I've tried spinach on salads or such it had been really bitter).

And there were 3 blue crabs left over (yes, they really had a blue hue pre cooking) and a couple of clumps of snow crab legs, so we dealt with them. And they were tasty.

And for dessert? Key Lime Pie:

Very tasty, sweet with a little bite of tart.

The Old Switcheroo

For lunch, I hit up the old Crack House (Cracker Barrel), and went with my usual, the Chicken Fried Chicken, mashed potatoes with gravy (white on both), fried okra and dumplings.

The food was very good, I ate almost every bit of it. I only hate half of one of the biscuits though.

For dinner, I had the other half of that flat iron steak to get rid of, so I fried it up, and added some scrambled eggs, for the old breakfast of Steak and Eggs. First time I've ever actually gone with that meal:

It was outstanding. I put most of that praise on the steak. It had the same seasoning as the other half, only they'd been sitting in a ziplock bag for a few days. It was stupidly tender,so much so that I made steak and egg biscuits out of those and had no problem eating them. Flavor was top notch as was the tenderness.

Winner, Winner, Pizza Dinner!

Last night, on C's Plate:

PAPA JOHN's!

Nope, it wasn't really all that impressive, but it was tasty and it did get delivered to game night in a decent amount of time, unlike last week's over an hour time of Pizza Hut's order. We got a "Meats!" from Papa, and it was good. This pic doesn't really do it justice, but here it is anyway:

After the game night, 3 of us (Jody, Grynner and myself) made our way to the local IHOP. I had every intention of getting a short stack of pancakes, BUT, they had an addition to their menu. 7 combos for $7 bucks. One of these combos was "Hash Brown Crusted Chicken and Biscuit". This was one of their chicken breast fillets crusted in hashbrown like potatoes, deep fried and then served with 2 eggs (your choice) a biscuit cut in half and a bowl of gravy. How in the name of breakfast could I pass this up? I couldn't. So I ordered it, and a pancake (which the waitress forgot, probably saving my life).

I forgot to take a picture of the food.

BLOGGER FAIL.

So, I've done the next best thing, for you, my dear readers, no, friends. I asked the Google to find me a picture, and I now share with you the fruits of Google's love for us:

Imagine that, but with scrambled eggs, and then the eggs and the biscuits drowned in gravy, instead of a little dollop on the biscuits. The stuff not on the plate are some of the other combos and not relevant to this topic.

It was pretty good, the chicken was nice and salty, almost too salty actually. I salt McDonald's fries, so if I say something is salty, you can take my word for it. The eggs were REALLY well done and the gravy magnificently complimented them, and the biscuits were a little over buttered, but pretty good.

I should probably add that as tasty as this stuff was to eat, it's still sitting in my gut at the time of me typing this wondrous tale. And even though we were done eating around 1, and continued hanging out and talking to around 2, this stuff is still here. I'm hoping I'll be able to eat dinner tonight, so I can give you fine readers another post today.