Blame Gordon Ramsay

Yes, I'm still here. Yes, I still check this website daily. A couple points I want to bring up:

*There were two reasons I got burned out on maintaining this blog. The first was the daily recaps of Hell's Kitchen and MasterChef in 2012 and 2013. Specifically with Hell's Bitchin', the episodes just got so bad that it was almost unbearable to watch. Pair that with the fact that I had to watch each episode twice in order to get a recap out, it just became more of an annoyance than a fun side hobby. The second reason is that when it came to food pictures, I found myself being really repetitive with what I was posting, so, yeah...

*I've been quietly watching Hell's Bitchin' this season and it is an improvement over the last two seasons. There's been only one To Be Continued episode whereas at this time last season there had been about five. And believe me, the one TBC episode thus far was probably one of the worst Hell's Bitchin' episodes ever. And seriously, To Be Continued? It's a damn reality show, new episodes every week. Of course it's gonna be continued. The concept of a TBC for a reality show is so damn dumb that only Gordon Ramsay would be so blind as to its idiocy.

*Graham Norton has lost a crapload of weight.

*The Purge is a horrible movie - I still get comments about this.

*If you're gonna send me an e-mail pitching your online marketing services to me, it's probably best not to start said e-mail with "Dear gregsgourmet.blogspot.com Team".

As always, thanks for reading!

Buffalo Burgers

Buffalo is one of those entities that serves as a one-up for whatever is considered the standard. For example, why blow your money on whatever stupid phone Samsung is trying to push out when you could just save yourself a lot of aggravation and buy an iPhone? Likewise, whenever you see the option to upgrade your generic beef burger to a buffalo burger, you're naturally gonna jump at the chance, unless you're an asshole, of course.

So this is the upgraded buffalo burger at Watson Drugs and Soda Fountain in Orange, CA:

I had ordered curly fries, but it would have taken too long to send these back - sometimes you just have to pick your battles

This was a pretty good burger. Buffalo just has a little more a flavor to it than beef, which is probably why they nearly went extinct in the lower 48 during frontier times. 

I haven't food blogged in a while so work with me here. Watsons is a good place to eat, check it out.

Oh Hi

Just a quick update.

I'm still here and I actually do have some new food pictures that I'll get to posting.

As always, thanks for reading.

Holes in My Hostess Part II

So I received a response from Hostess regarding the 20 pinholes in the package of my Hostess fruit pie. The response kinda freaks me out, I gotta say:

"Recently we began perforating the product film with pin holes to reduce moisture in the package.  We feel this enhancement will provide a flakier crust and is not considered damaged packaging.  Your concerns have been forwarded to our Quality Managers and you should receive follow up correspondence via U. S. mail."

Dude...what??? Okay, I don't know much about food packaging but I have to assume that if they've got the balls to poke holes in their pie wrappers then there must be a "logical" reason. But I'm sorry, I wouldn't buy a candy wrapper with holes poked in it, I wouldn't buy a box of cereal with holes poked in it, and I certainly wouldn't buy a pie that has holes poked in it. Whoever's working in their brand management is a moron for thinking this is actually a good idea. If you know me then you know how much I love sweets, but I will absolutely not be purchasing this product any longer and I told them as much.

This is almost as annoying as when Poking on Facebook was mainstream

Seriously, with all the germs and other crap that supermarket shelves inevitably pick up, and you're gonna basically carve a way for them to get onto your products? Disgusting. "Sweetest comeback in the history of ever"?  I could think of a few different adjectives to describe it.

Holes in My Hostess

I haven't posted any sort of food-centered blog in a while, but today's incident got me so angry that I simply couldn't resist.  I'm not going to say that this is my triumphant return to food blogging, but...it's something.

So, Hostess.  A little over a year ago they went bankrupt, then they were bought over, then Twinkies and other like products returned to the shelves.  I like Twinkies.  I like pies.  I like Chocodiles, Ho Hos, Ding Dongs, Sno Balls, Zingers, Donuts, Donettes, etc.  Some of those I don't think they've brought back yet but I digress.  A couple weeks ago at Albertsons I reached for one of the Hostess pies when I noticed something really frickin' creepy: all of the packages had little pinholes pricked all around them like a kid with zits all over his face.  Every.  Single.  One.  I took one of the packages to customer service with the theory that someone had deliberately poked holes the pie packages with a needle or something.  They were then promptly removed from the shelves.

Fast forward to today.  I again reach for one of the pies only to find that the packages are littered with pinholes.  Every.  Single.  One.  And the holes are all in the same spots, so this wasn't deliberate.  No, this is on Hostess.  So I purchased one to take home, take pictures of, and write directly to Hostess.  Here, my friends, is the specimen:

The specimen

Look closely

If this pie were a camera it would be a pinhole

Seriously, what the hell is this?  I counted TWENTY of these tiny little holes around the package.  Now, unless some butthole is coming into Albertsons and meticulously poking the same pattern of holes in every single Hostess fruit pie, then clearly something is going wrong during the manufacturing process.

I'll update you on my correspondence.

Just an FYI

Just an FYI to people coming to this blog (and according to my numbers apparently a good few still do), no, this blog is not very active at the moment but no, I have not abandoned it.  I actually come here everyday and I still read all the comments from old posts.  I'm just not posting as much.  Blogging is hard.  Blogs will return at some point.

As always, thanks for reading!

Merry Christmas!

I know I don't update this site as much as I used to but naturally I have to show off the important meals:

Turkey drumstick, mashed potatoes, stuffing, dinner roll, and cranberry sauce - the meal of champions

Gnarly brownies and chocolate chip cookies - all homemade

All American Dessert - Christmas Version

Okay, so last year I made this same dish but forgot to put the grapes in.  Honestly though, this version doesn't really do it for me.  The grapes just aren't sweet enough, and the canned cherries to match the red Jello aren't exciting enough.  You may ask "well, Greg, why don't you just put strawberries to match the red Jello?  Are you stupid or something?"  Yeah, strawberries aren't in season this time of year, jerk.  I'm not putting sub-par fruit in my dessert, thank you very much.  Anyway, in addition to the fruit and Jello (lime and cherry) you've also got the layers of pound cake and whipped cream. 

Aerial View

The top layer consists of more whipped cream, the rest of the Jello, candy cane shavings, maraschino cherries, and kiwi.  

Christmas Sandwiches!

Hope everyone had a great holiday season.  And ate lots of good food.  Happy Holidays, Happy New Year, thanks for reading!