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Weird Regional Foods
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How do they get the cheesesteak inside the pretzel? Did they borrow machinery from a Twinkie factory?
I'm not sure I want to know...
Looks like a hot pocket, wretch. Who is making it for them?
At first I thought, "yum!" A few seconds later I thought, "gross." Gross. Final answer.
So much for fighting childhood obesity with a sugar tax.
One of the Amish vendors in the Reading Terminal sells these, they are little tubes full of sex for your tastebuds.
where did they steal this idea from, like every other one.
Look at that sucker man. Everything depends on the cheese they use. The pretzel looks like it could stand to be somewhat thicker. I'd try one but I can't promise to get the whole thing down. Maybe we'll see 'em at Wing Bowl.
"It could stand to be somewhat thicker. I'd try one but I can't promise to get the whole thing down." That's what she said.
HEYOOOOOOOOO
Just got my free one. I'd say that the wayyy shorter line than what I heard about for the 500 degrees giveaway correlates with the hot-pocket-like quality. Don't think I'd pay $3.50 for this.
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| cocinatipo.com |
I'm looking for some Catalonian blood sausage. Do you know of any markets, butchers or grocers that might have this for sale anywhere in the area?One place that comes to mind off the top is Orlando's Quality Meats on Ninth between Christian and Carpenter, where they do blood sausage, or morcilla, in-house. (We failed to realize that Orlando no longer works out of the Italian Market. Our mistake — thank you to commenter Pucca.) But where else? Who's got the best? Drop your ideas and suggestions in the comments.
If you're talking Morcilla, head up North 5th. There is a butcher on the right hand side just north of Somerset that does great morcilla, along with an outstanding octopi salad.
Orlando left his store two years ago! He has been working for Giunta at RTM since he left the 9th street market. Talk to him, he may still make it for a special order.
Freddy and Tony's at 2nd and Allegheny, cheap take out prices and you can buy either by weight or dollar amount.
I am willing to bet that you will not find Catalan (style) blood sausage in Philadelphia. Though I do not recall seeing it in their case, you may want to talk to the people at Garces Trading Company to see if they will sell you some. Other then that, your best bet is ordering it online at latienda.com
DiBruno Bros. occasionally carries Morcillo Sausage.
Thank you for all your responses. I am actually looking for Botifarra Negra, a Catalan pork blood sausage. I did in fact order some Morcilla from latienda.com and am expecting it to arrive tomorrow. I was recently in Barcelona and there are several recipes I want to try out which call for this particular sausage.
Asked Xochitl chef Lucio Pazzo where he sources his excellent morcilla after tasting it for the first time last night -- he said D'Angelo Bros. in the Italian Market makes two types -- the Mexican style (pork sausage/beef blood) he uses, as well as a South American style with dried fruit and nuts! The pulpo y morcilla skewers in black garlic mole were sheer genius.
Swiaki's in Port Richmond sells Polish blood sausage - kishka
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| Photo | Drew Lazor |
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| Photo | Marc Steel |
My good friends Chris and Melissa came to visit me from Vermont last week. As per usual, they came bearing gifts. This time, they brought me a Vermatzah. A culinary delight for Semitic Vermonters, Vermatzah is a matzah made with ancient ingredients and baking techniques.
It's a lot tougher than typical Matzah, and definitely grainier, but I loved it. It has more of a cracker feel. I wouldn't recommend making Brei with it, but it would definitely make an interesting and tasty addition to any Seder.
I'll let Vermatzah.com take it from here:
Every piece of our Matzah is handmade with a blend of organic Vermont Wheat and Ancient Emmer, grown under the best sustainable agricultural practices from harvest through baking.
Following the journey of our ancestors from the desert to the Green Mountain hills of Vermont, we strive to re-connect the food we eat with the story of where it comes from. At Naga Bakehouse we follow the path of our Vermont grown grain from the field to the harvest to the baking meticulously guarding the entire process. We then infuse the 5,000-year-old tradition of baking matzah by the open fire in small, handmade batches ensuring the freshest quality.
Why Round? For the past 5,000 years, matzah was hand shaped, irregular. It wasn't until modern mechanization in the late 1800s that matzah became uniform and square with a recognizable pattern. Vermatzah is a return to the past. Our wood-fired ancient round unleavened bread is a symbol of simplicity — a metaphor for getting back to the basics. Vermatzah is eco-kosher, connecting modern ecology with ancient dietary laws and ethical standards about food production, preparation and eating. from the Green Mountain State.
More pics after the jump.
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| Note the dime for scale of thickness. |
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| Topped off with chopped liver. Perfection. |
Looks & sounds a lot like the matzah they made this year at Metropolitan Bakery. In other words, delicious!
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| Photos | Drew Lazor |
Can't recall a vegetable more hyped by the global media than the bhut jolokia, the spiciest pepper on the planet. You've probably heard about the Indian military's plans to weaponize them as non-lethal dispersion grenades — the bhut will be so used due to their insanely high Scoville count, which is the scientific unit used to measure a pepper's capsaicin levels. (The spiciest jalapenos have 8,000ish Scoville units. Bhuts have A MILLION.)
While bhut jolokia are often informally referred to as the "ghost pepper" due to their rarity, they've been showing up in the States with increased frequency in recent months. One connoisseur who's gotten his hands on a connect is Bobby Bolders (above), who owns and operates WMD Hot Sauce at 1212 South Street. Bolders had Meal Ticket in on Friday to sample a handful of ghost pepper sauces he's making by hand.
Bolders, who gets his bhut in dried from a source he declines to name (you're not going to find fresh ones Stateside unless you are a badass smuggler), thinks the pepper has captured the attention of so many people due to its extreme nature — people want to try the scariest, spiciest stuff and pin their survival to their vests as a merit badge of sorts. This mode of thought, however, detracts from the fact that, spice notwithstanding, they're pretty flavorful little buggers. Bhut jolokia have a smoky, woodsy quality that's similar, but not identical, to what you find in chipotle peppers. They've also got a round but aggressive heat that creeps into your cheeks and jaw, kicks its fiery feet up and stays for a spell.
At WMD, Bolders cuts the eye-dropper-full-of-lava punch of bhut with vegetable and fruit bases. Currently, the only housemade bhut sauce he's selling retail boasts a sneakily sweet carrot canvas. He does it on four increasingly scary spice levels — one and two will succeed in coaxing pleased giggles out of spicy fans, while 3 and 4 are pretty damn serious. (Last night we shook some 3-level onto a breakfast sandwich that already had sriracha on it and spent the better part of an hour going "Oooooooh CHILD!" and fanning ourselves with an old US Weekly.) Soon enough, WMD will begin offering bhut sauces with pineapple, tomato, mango and mango/Indian curry bases. Bottles range in price from $6.99 to $8.99.
Social comments and analytics for this post... This post was mentioned on Twitter by phillyinsider: RT @mealticket: Where to get handmade bhut jolokia (ghost pepper) hot sauces in Philly: http://bit.ly/aSZTha...
Bobby Bolders is a great guy! I was at his store a few days ago & he let me try a bunch of his hot sauces. I'm not even a big fan of hot sauce but his are very unique & tasty!
Thank you very much to all! BB
I love hot sauce, I can't wait to try!
Great review - spot on, looking forward to trying the sauce :-)
I ordered some from the following site: http://www.myspicesage.com/bhut-jolokia-peppers-worlds-hottest-chile-p-402.html They're (mostly) dried, but the site also has powder available. I was kinda nervous as I'd never bought anything from the site before, but I was not disappointed. All it took was a flake the size of a thumb tack and I was hooked. (and on fire). Habaneros just won't do it for me anymore. :D
Don't know what he's talking about in regards to smuggling. I bought seeds online, started them here in Texas in March and now have five ghost pepper plants growing at an awesome rate. The yield looks very promising.
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Here's Andrew Sabin, Dave Conn and Anthony Scuderi of Tinto rocking out with a bestial 35-pound octopus that the Jose Garces Basque tapas joint (116 S. 20th St.) just got in. Look at that thing! They're going to be hacking up the big boy for Pulpo Gallego, with the meat poached in red wine vinegar, lemon and spices before sautéeing, then hit with smoked paprika and served with sides of potato confit and fiddlehead ferns. Depending on whether or not there's any pulpo left after this weekend, they may introduce a cured octopus plate next week.
What a delicious thing of beauty!
[...] March, the crew at Jose Garces‘ Tinto (116 S. 20th St.) geeked out on a 35-pound octopus they sliced up for Pulpo Gallego. The Garces guys are at it again — this time the just-reviewed JG Domestic (Cira Centre, 2929 Arch [...]
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| April Saul/Inquirer staff photographer |
| The Krimpet gets a new home |
Today, Inquirer staff writer Harold Brubaker takes a look at the new Navy Yard home of the Tasty Baking Co., makers of iconic local favorites Krimpets and Kandy Kakes since 1914.
Facts of note:
- The new facility cost $78 million, including $31 million in publicly subsidized financing
- Plans for the 350,000-square-foot bakery and warehouse were announced in May 2007
- Tasty Baking Co.'s market value is $60 million.
- "Tasty has estimated that it will log annual pretax savings of $13 million to $15 million, which would amount to a cost reduction of about 11 percent, based on last year's results. A one-third reduction in the bakery workforce, from 500 to 315, made possible by automation, is the biggest factor in the cost savings."
Keeping this Philadelphia company in Philadelphia is a good thing, right? Bu should public money go to fund expansion by publicly-held companies, especially when no new jobs are created?
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