My Favorite New Food Blogs of 2008

20081231-blogz

The interregnum between Christmas and New Year’s is a slow one for most daily and weekly news outlets. So’s the case on Serious Eats. We planned an onslaught of year-in-review posts, but readers grew tired of it before I could post about my favorite new (or new-to-me) food blogs of 2008. So I’ll just do it on Kublog.

Grocery Eats: Serious Eats New York editor Zach Brooks discovered DJ Grocery’s General Tso’s Philly cheesesteak on a message board, posted about it, and not long after, the good DJ was inspired to start a blog documenting his (and, later, his contributors’) insane experiments with extreme food mashups. His first post was titled “Fuck, Yes,” and pretty much set the tone for the site. With plenty of cursing and craziness, it’s a great antidote to all the too-precious food blogs out there.

So Good: Though D.C.-based Jon Eick started his blog in August 2007, it really seemed to blow up in 2008, with his coverage of the Papa John’s/LeBron James/”Crybaby” T-shirt controversy. He was totally one top of crazy food-related current events. Thank you, Jon, for highlighting the Shawn Johnson “Makes My Taco Pop” commercial.

Fast Food Critic: Timothy appeared out of nowhere in March with a concept that seemed easily dismissable—reviews of fast food meals. Who is not familiar with the stuff the major chains put out? I thought. But FFC manages to take a seeingly common subject and find great nuggets of wisdom and humor in it. He’s tempermental and has threatened to quit blogging at least once, but we’re glad he’s back. I’m looking forward to more in 2009, Timothy.

Eat Me Daily: This blog popped on the scene in in October, with a smart, funny, wry take on food culture. Lots of great posts about cookbooks, food-related art, food media, and video snippets from popular TV shows. Too often food sites tend to all go echo-chamber on you, covering the same stories in the same way, but the anonymous staff of Eat Me Daily often finds a great new angle on the stories everyone is talking about.

Posted at 7:25 pm on 01/02/09 | no comments | Filed Under: Serious Eats, Technology, blogging, food read on

Lazer Dancer Guy on the NYC R Train Subway Last Night



Saw This on the R Train Last Night, originally uploaded by Adam "Slice" Kuban.

I heard this guy before I saw him last night as I boarded the R train at Pacific Street. He marched down the car, stiffly, robotically, with an old-school boombox, which he put on the floor near the front of the train. He then started to do warm-up exercises before doing a weird dance.

He was wearing a T-shirt that said “Lazer 1″ on the back (yes, misspelled, if memory serves), along with animal-print tights and, I think, sweatbands.

At one point, the music segued into Kenny Loggins’s “Highway to the Danger Zone” just as the train made a stop, and then he did a funny move—running comically out of the train and then back in before the doors closed. A dangerous move, as he ran the risk of getting shut out and losing his boombox.

Passenger reaction went from perplexed to amused pretty quickly, and the girl who got up went down there to take some cameraphone pictures of him, which you’ll see her doing at the end of the video just before the doors close on the show.

Posted at 9:57 am on 12/30/08 | no comments | Filed Under: Videos read on

‘Last Christmas’

Posted at 12:25 am on 12/25/08 | no comments | Filed Under: Videos, music read on

California Academy of Sciences ‘Living Roof’



California Academy of Sciences ‘Living Roof’, originally uploaded by Adam "Slice" Kuban.

Posted at 1:55 am on 12/24/08 | no comments | Filed Under: Uncategorized read on

My Burrito



My Burrito, originally uploaded by Adam "Slice" Kuban.

Yum. I liked my burrito.

There were some burritos on the menu: Regular (rice, bean, meat), Especial (rice, bean, meat, cheese), and Super (rice, bean, meat, cheese, sour cream, guac).

The GF gets the regular saying that’s how real San Franciscans get theirs, but I wanted cheese, so I went for the Especial.

Of course, I wanted to be down with the people, so I asked for “an ess-pess-cee-ahl burrito.”

The woman was like, “WHA?”

Me, sheepishly: “Um, ess-special burrito?”

That worked, and the lady and the customers behind me laughed.

Whatever. That’s how you pronounce it in Spanish.

Posted at 10:42 pm on 12/21/08 | 2 comments | Filed Under: Uncategorized read on

‘Walking on a Dream’ Video

The video is about as insane as the album art. Completely over the top and ridiculous. I saw one MP3 blog describe them as “what music will look and sound like in 2012.”

Posted at 3:56 pm on 12/18/08 | no comments | Filed Under: Videos, music read on

DAILY-ISH LINKS

Links from Monday, December 15, 2008 to Saturday, January 3, 2009

  • Matt Smith is 11th Doctor Who
    I haven't been following the Doctor Who news recently, but I started to hear about the search for the 11th doctor a couple months ago. They just announced it's some guy named Matt Smith. Bill Nighy was in the running, and I think he would have been awesome. David Tennant was a brilliant Doctor Who, and I don't know how anyone could top him. Smith will have a tough act to follow. I hope he proves me wrong and surprises me, but I don't know if anyone will be as good as Tennant, who handily replaced Tom Baker as my favorite.
  • Victoria Burger Blog
  • Fine Art Spotted On Fellini’s Pizza Boxes
    For Pizza Box Museum. From Green Olive Media. Some rather nice pizza boxes.

Links for Monday, December 15, 2008

Links from Tuesday, November 25, 2008 to Friday, December 12, 2008

  • ‘After 96 Years, a Press Closes in Brooklyn’
    Video from WYNC: "Before Xeroxing and digital images, businesses would take their orders for menus, posters and receipt booklets to a local printer to be set in type and pressed to paper. Henington Press in Park Slope, Brooklyn was just that kind of place. It’s a family business that started in 1912 and is going to close this winter. Before the presses stop, WNYC’s Kathleen Horan dropped by and talked with the press’s owner, David Harris."
    (tags: none)
  • Pizza Slayer
    A pizza blog based in Columbus, Ohio. Looks like the folks behind it are in a band called Pizza Slayer.
    (tags: pizza blogs BTSlice Ohio )
  • Kisai Denshoku Aluminum LED Watch
    I don't even wear a watch anymore—and I typically don't like gimmick watches—but this one is awesome. "Inspired by the neon skylines of Shinjuku." Parallel LCD bars stack up in sequence to tell the time. Add the bars together—hours, 10-minute periods, and single minutes—to get the time.
    (tags: none)

Links from Saturday, November 15, 2008 to Tuesday, November 25, 2008

Links for Friday, November 14, 2008

  • Jessi Klein Hates Foodies
    "Let me be clear: I really love eating and I love food. I think anyone who knows how to cook anything is a genius, and I always appreciate the time and love that goes into a home-made meal. And I love going to restaurants. I love menus and forks and appetizers and the anticipation of desserts. But I hate that foodies feel like every meal has to have the same wow-factor as their birthday blowjob. I once tried to make dining plans with a foodie friend and it took over ninety minutes to agree on a place that met all of her qualifications for ambiance, cuisine, and service. You would have thought we were negotiating Israeli borders."
    (tags: none)
  • God Bless America Pizza Box
    A candidate for the "Pizza Box Museum" I'd like to start on Slice. From Kathryn Yu's Flickr photostream.
    (tags: none)
  • Alcapurria - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
    Alcapurria is a dish from Puerto Rico made from a mixture of ground plantains and yautía or green banana and yautía or yuca, filled with ground beef or crab meat and deep fried in oil. Many Puerto Ricans enjoy this dish and are often found eating it at the beach with friends. "Alcapurrias" are also one of the many dishes served on the kiosko stands.
    (tags: none)

Links from Monday, November 10, 2008 to Thursday, November 13, 2008

Links from Wednesday, November 5, 2008 to Thursday, November 6, 2008


RECENTLY LISTENED TO


Elsewhere

Founder Of

Pages