House of Sweets — the nostalgic cupcake bakery attached to Delray’s House of Vintage — opened its new Cupcake Cafe this Saturday with a host of free giveaways and a cupcake-eating contest that saw one dude devour a dozen of the personal-sized pastries in under six minutes. House proprietors Amanda…
The server was explaining this and that about the dessert tray at Truluck’s in Fort Lauderdale when I made some comment about how perfect they all looked. “They’re not real,” he said. Then he slapped the chocolate cake. It made a sound like smacking a basketball. I swear, I had…
Although Clean Plate Charlie is the only food blog you really need to read daily, some people just can’t get enough. Here are some highlights of other food blogs, this time with a local focus.Dinner Reviews focuses on Broward, Palm Beach, and Dade counties and… well reviews restaurants. The best…
No self-respecting foodie should let Bastille Day go by without some kind of celebration. Say what you want about French culture (normally a bunch of overblown cliques anyway); there is simply no denying French influence on cuisine. Some of the finest breads, cheeses, and desserts in the world are distinctly…
It begins before I even cut into my burger at Grease Burger Bar in West Palm Beach: A nervous swelling fills my stomach, the same mixture of fear and anxiousness I get every time I order a hamburger at a restaurant I’ve never been to before, knowing it’s probably going…
It’s getting so the best gauge of a new restaurant’s success is how many years the proprietors have already been in the business. The team that opened Wild Ginger in CityPlace a couple of months ago certainly has the creds: Lirim Jacobi owns Taverna Opa and City Pizza; his partner…
There’s no sugar-coating this one. I knew from the moment I saw it on my desk it was going to be bad. I feared eating this so much, in fact, that I “accidentally” forgot to bring a can opener into the office for three straight weeks. The boss stopped putting…
I stopped by the Lake Worth farmers’ market recently and ran into Jodi Swank, whose (with husband Darrin) Swank Specialty Produce is to the trash at your local supermarket what a Bugatti Veyron is to skateboarding with square wheels. She’ll be at the market on J Street at Lucerne Avenue…
The world’s most omnivorous, omnipresent purveyor of junk food is now crashing the rather more upscale salons of junque cuisine. That would be McDonald’s, which last week spat up a trio of 100 percent Angus beef burgers. Launched to compete with the tonier patties of eateries like Five Guys, Fuddruckers,…
This week’s column had me trekking alongside local pizza blogger Lapp of Worstpizza.com as we took on three pie-slinging joints in one night. You can check out the article for my conclusions on La Fontana Pizzeria in Coral Springs, Nino’s Restaurant & Pizzeria in Boca Raton, and Tucci’s Fire N…
Although Clean Plate Charlie is the only food blog you really need to read daily, some people just can’t get enough. Here are some highlights of other food blogs, this time with a focus on July 4 themed posts:Taste of Home has a list of their top ten Patriotic Dessert…
Tired of the rubber-ball tomatoes, wilted corporate greens and vegetables older than Michael Jackson’s last hit at your local giant-mega-supermarket? It’s not like you have many options, because most farmers’ markets close during South Florida summers, when the only thing that grows is mold. Well, on July 4 the Oceanside…
Several Northwood Village restaurants are offering to pack up your favorites to add some extra sparkle to your 4th festivities. Head to Café Centro/Allora (2409 N. Dixie Hwy, 561.514-4070) to pick up sandwiches, salads, pastas and pizzas off its lunch menu before you venture over to the park on Dixie to…
Honestly, you should be all caught up on this by now. It’s been a whole month, plenty of time to read the single greatest food blog in South Florida. But just in case you haven’t been a super-faithful reader, here’s some of the best blogging of June on Clean Plate…
Pizza expert Craig “Lapp” Agranoff sits across from me at La Fontana Pizzeria in Coral Springs, inspecting a warm cheese-only slice. He lifts the thin triangle by its crunchy lip with one hand and pokes at the underside of the crust with the other. It sags in the middle like…
It was 6 p.m. the night before a long weekend, and so far my getaway trip was going smoothly. I’d made it through the Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport security screening line with half an hour to spare before boarding time. Now, I was starving. But where the hell could I…
Although Clean Plate Charlie is the only food blog you really need to read daily, some people just can’t get enough. Here are some highlights of other food blogs, this time with a focus on food disaster blogs:Cake Wrecks has countless pictures of cakes with the best of intentions gone…
There’s a certain kind of man who never fails to impress me, a guy who does things (apart from the obvious) that I could never do. Vacationing in Cape Cod last week, I met one of them: the contractor who was renovating the upstairs loft in my sister’s new house…
Obama is speaking in Cairo, even quoting verses from the Qur’an, glad-handing Arab leaders, and no doubt settling down for intimate talks with King Abdullah II over a pot of Turkish coffee and some sticky pastries loaded with pistachios. And here’s Hillary Clinton, touring the Middle East wearing a headscarf…
The well-heeled boomers who live in the swank Mizner mansions behind the new Joy Noodles & Rice are already steering their Benzes and Beemers into Joy’s cramped parking lot for carry-out cartons of Thai noodle soups and Philippine egg rolls; and they probably don’t demand a whole lot in the…
When I was a kid, I remember my mother packing lunches in a brown paper bag and throwing in a little note on my napkin throughout grade school. As I complained of embarrassment, the notes disappeared, as did the carefully prepared cream cheese and sliced green olive sandwiches. They were…
Slow Foods Glades to Coast, our local chapter of the global organization dedicated to spreading the word and supporting food grown in our own backyards, is planning yet another of its scrumptious dinners at Lola’s in Hollywood. If you haven’t attended these events, foodies, you are really missing the slow…
