It's an age-old question: How come Japan gets all the good stuff? Like, I'm sorry, in Japan there are ramen burgers and we're still eating our ramen out of bowls like it's the Middle Ages or something? UNFAIR. Anyway, thanks to Food Republic for pointing us toward this total smartypants who had the vision to order his Lotteria ramen burger with ten supplemental orders of ramen, then stacked them all together.
Meal Ticket's favorite off-the-beaten-path pizzeria, DiMeo (8500 Henry Ave.) in leafy Andorra, just added lunch. Pino and Antimo DiMeo are doing sandwiches like the B&B (burrata and beet!!) on house-baked bread, antipasti, pizza, salads and a hybrid of the two they're billing as Neapolitan Pizza Salads, tangles of greens and goodies (arugula and heirloom tomatoes, asparagus and fennel with La Quercia salumi) stacked on pizza crusts. Sounds like the best kind of salad we've heard of.
We haven't had a chance to make it up to New York to check out Hybird, Questlove's new fried chicken joint in Chelsea Market but the intrepid eaters at Serious Eats sure did. They made their way through the all over the place menu of drumsticks (tasty but pricey), ironically delicious take on crab rangoon and various other dumplings, Thai-inspired cupcakes and Loveslushes. Head on over to Serious Eats for a wow-worthy slideshow and review of Quest's New York debut.
If you're planning on forgoing the shore and staying in town this weekend rest assured that there are plenty of edible happenings on the agenda. Here's a look at a few to get the long weekend started:
If you're already out of the office for the day head over to Red Owl Tavern (433 Chestnut St.) at 5th and Chestnut for the debut of chef Guillermo Tellez's brand spankin' new mobile sausage operation, Sausage Hombre. He'll be outside of the restaurant grilling up five different house made links for $6 a piece including a bottle of water.
In other incased meat news Shake Shack (2000 Sansom St.) is rolling out two Memorial Day weekend specials, their Vienna Beef corn dog topped with Rick's Picks sweet corn relish and the Pecan Pie Oh My concrete made with vanilla custard and a slice of Nook Bakery's pecan pie.
Passyunk Avenue cupcakerie Ms. Goodie Cupcake (1838 East Passyunk Ave.) is previewing her new truck, The Pink Lady, this weekend. She'll be parked out side of Sealed with a Kiss (1942 S.10th St,) on Saturday doling out dark chocolate stout cupcakes.
Fresh of a ringing three-beller from Craig Laban (following similar praise from yours truly), "FDR," (2201 Spruce St.) as it's known by chef Rob Marzinsky and owners Ed Hackett and Dan Clark, starts brunch service this Sunday from 11 in the morning till 3 in the afternoon. The sun-washed corner salon is a hard to beat location to while away a couple leisurely weekend hours, preferably with Marzinsky's "Fairhill," a fried soft-shell crab, breakfast sausage, fava ragout, coddled egg and grits, or strawberry-rhubarb brioche French toast.
One of the best things about other people is that some of them are willing to do things like watch the Rachael Ray Show and blog about it so that I don't have to watch it myself. So a big thanks to the Braiser for sharing a truly dismal clip of Guy Fieri and Rachael Ray engaging in some sort of incomprehensible "improv" bit that involves Wayne Brady and a lot of gushing about Anchorman. Click through to watch it because whatever, it's Tuesday.
Bacon-flavored hot dogs and a bunch of booze, after the break. »
File this under big, giant bummer. New York Magazine, parent company behind the national stable of Grub Street blogs is shutting down operations in L.A., Chicago, San Francisco, Boston and Philly.
And while we're certainly going to miss hearing from GS editor Collin Keefe, we're certain that he'll be continuing his awesome coverage of the Philly food scene post haste.
We love the fact that Julia Child's kitchen has a permanent home at The Smithsonian and James Beard's West Village digs serve as a home for chefs from all over the world. But we're kind of on the fence about this breaking news from the Albany Herald out of Georgia.
It appears as though Paula Deen, the crowned queen of butter is going to be getting her own museum in her hometown. The plan, formulated by a local businesswoman as well as Deen's ex husband is to transform her childhood home into a shrine to all things Paula-related. No word yet on whether or not the museum restaurant is going to be serving Cheesy Ham and Banana Casserole, y'all.
Okay, well, these 10 food-centric flicks aren't exactly going to make the same box office billions as The Wolverine or Fast & Furious 6 but we're pretty stoked about this list compiled by the fine folks at First We Feast.
First up we've got two movies sharing the title Chef, one starring Bradley Cooper and the other with Robert Downey Jr. Then there are a trio of good looking booze docs, one following Michael Jackson i.e. The Beer Hunter and the second, Somm, that tracks four aspiring Master Sommeliers and another focusing on bar culture in the U.S., from up-market cocktail makers to flair-factor cocktail competitors.
Head on over to First We Feast for a bunch of good old fashioned time wasting trailers and lots more food flicks.

Notes from the Weekend is a feature that sees the members of Team Meal Ticket compiling all the food/drink highlights uncovered during prime eatin' time, Friday to Sunday. We'd love to hear all about YOUR weekend eating adventures in the comments. Go for it! (View past NFTW installments at citypaper.net/notes.)
Adam Erace: AE
Caroline Russock: CR

Friday night was a high-low affair that kicked off with killer happy hour cocktails at Vedge. I went with a Strawberry Southside (gin, lime, mint and muddle strawberries) and gingery Whisky Buck. I made my way back home and debated dinner plans. At the risk of losing all food writing credentials I ended up going with a few slices of frozen pizza (I know, terrible) before hitting Ray's Happy Birthday Bar and The Dolphin.—CR
More New York eats and Adam's home cooking right this way! »
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