Here’s an article in the NY Times about Miracle Fruit that was a cover story in the dining section today. Miracle fruit is a berry that, once eaten, changes your tastebuds for about an hour. Say you eat a lemon, it will taste like lemonade.

The article features one of my friends, Franz (who has blogged here before), who introduced me to miracle fruit through one of his miracle fruit tasting parties. It was like a food orgy. Franz rules and you should check out his project StreetWars (which I used to be apart of), the OG IRL watergun assassination game. It’s coming back to NYC this Summer.

According to Waiter from Waiter Rant, today is National Waiters Day. He urges you to tip 30% day if you go out to eat.

In other news, restaurant cooks still bitter about shitty hourly wages and resentful towards waitrons.

John-Phillipe is worth the 20+%.

PS: The waitrons at The Restaurant celebrated National Waiters Day (which should really be the gender neutral “waitron”, you sexist c-suckers) by going to a midnight showing of the new India Jones movie at the local indie theatre. I celebrated by cutting my finger and watching Top Chef.  Go FOH!

I bet that this dude, who wrote what he thought was an exposé about Iron Chef America, goes up to children and tells them that there’s no Santa Claus. And then I bet he walks home feeling all smug like he’s done something important and righted some injustice. What a cock.

Apparently there’s a short clip of me cooking at The Restaurant on NY1 (local NYC tv channel). It’s part of a segment about the new Zagat Best of Brooklyn book . I haven’t seen it yet and the NY1 OnDemand is janky.

If I had my own cooking show, it would pretty much look like this.

Gordon Ramsay recently burned his cock and/or balls while cooking with an unfurnished basement.

You fucking donkey! 

My problem with Starbucks is that they do not have simple syrup out on their little fixin’s bar. I see people order ice coffees and put white or raw sugar in it. I cringe at the thought of getting a mouthful of grainy, sweet sugar while trying to chillax and enjoy a refreshing iced coffee on a hot day. Especially since you just paid $4 for it. You have to ask for their “classic flavored” syrup when ordering, I’m pretty sure they charge you for it, and you don’t even get to control the amount they put in. Big mistake, Starbucks. You’ve made The List.

The place around the corner from me, The Coffee Den, is where I get my iced coffees from. They are kinda expensive ($3 for a large) and the coffee isn’t the best. However, they have simple syrup out which I greatly appreciate.

Simple syrup is so named because it’s really effing simple. Sugar + water + heat = deliciousness. You can make it during a commercial break of Hell’s Kitchen and it’s extremely hard to eff up. And because of this newfangled thing called “science”, the syrup is actually about 20% sweeter than the OG sugar.

Take equal parts sugar and water and heat in a sauce pan over medium heat, stirring occasionally until the sugar dissolves. You can add more sugar if you want it thicker. Store at room temperature or in the fridge for several months. (I use raw sugar, which I just found out isn’t actually better for you.)

Make flavored simple syrup by throwing in a cinnamon stick, a vanilla pod, some lemongrass or a few citrus rinds. Put it in iced beverages, adult beverages, over fruit or whatever else Google tells you you can do with it.

R. Kelly is currently working on a song about sex and simple syrup.

Anyone who doesn’t like the Bohiemian Hall & Beer Garden in Astoria is a communist. You can drink cheap pitchers of Hoegaarden outside with your friends and not have to deal with annoying douchebags hitting on you.

Soon Williamsburg kids won’t have to make the treck into Queens for very long as Williamsburg is getting their own. One with a retractable roof. Ooh-la-la!
+ =

Do you think the new beer garden will serve up PBR, tofu dogs and irony?

Bread-n- Brie, which is an online gourmet supermaket, just launched. They sell organic and kosher foods, too.

20% off your first order.

Their website is still a little janky.

Right now they only deliver to the Upper East Side and NYU area (because, you know, those kids need even more grocery outlets besides the greenmarket, Trader Joe’s and Whole Foods), but you can go pick-up your orders.

I heard on the radio that Gordon Ramsay is trying to get people to eat horse. He claims it’s half the fat of beef and ten times the omega-3.

Here’s an article about it.

I’ll try any food once.
And I mean ANY food.
Even zombie meat, as long as I wouldn’t catch zombitis.
I mean, it’s dry aged.

Rachael Ray is unstoppable - like Mecha Streisand. Or Oprah if you don’t know what Mecha Streisand is.

Personally, I don’t like her: I find her annoying, insipid and unctuous. Her cooking looks gross to me. Though, I do get the concept of her and why she’s popular. I understand why some people like her personality and her cooking. I get why Mid-western moms love her. And I do think it’s a good thing that she’s getting more people in the kitchen and trying new things. Though, I do not get why weird dudes have crushes on her and I think that is a telltale sign of some kind of personality disorder. I do not hold it against her that she will do anything for money.

Here’s my problem:

Two days ago the New York Times reported that Ray Ray recently started a non-profit organization called Yum-o Organization. It aims to, as the official website states, “Cook. Feed. Fund.” and that “The Yum-o! Organization empowers kids and their families to develop healthy relationships with food and cooking.”

Nice! So she doesn’t produce the healthiest recipes on her show (”Healthy” being a totally relative word - yes, her meals are healthier than a Big Mac, but terribly unhealthy compared to this kind of home cooking). But Rachael Ray does inspire and influence thousands, if not millions, of people. And going around, promoting healthy (it should really say “healthier”) eating habits for Americans is admirable, right?

No. Because it’s a fucking sham.

I call extreme shenanigans because Rachael Ray is also a spokeswoman for Dunkin’ Donuts. What’s a kid supposed to think when they hear Rachael Ray telling them eating fruits and veg can be totally yum-o and then they see her on peddling French crullers on TV? Maybe it’s good for them to learn early on to not trust anyone and that people are liars and will pretend to do nice things as a tax write-off.