After trailing at restaurant only twice, I had quickly come to realize the importance of knowing Spanish. Because, as you probably already know, almost all restaurants employ a high number of Spanish speaking immigrants to do the grunt work. And if you want them to do something for you, they will more likely get it done if you ask for it in their language. And those guys can get shit done. Only if they can understand what your gringo ass is saying, though. Unfortunately, I don’t know any Spanish. I took a few years in high school and what I knew was pushed out by being forced to take Italian in college and then attempting to relearn French recently. Pretty much what I remember is “no habla Español”, “gracias”, “chulo”, “pinga”, “burracho” and “Sabado Gigante”. Pretty much useless in a kitchen. Well, useless for now, anyway - some of those words may come in handy one day.

I want to learn French cooking. I know that a very large portion of New York’s high end restaurants are run by French executive chefs. And almost all culinary terms are French. So I was recently thinking that taking an intensive French class might be a smart move. Now I think I’m gonna scrap that idea and instead go download some Spanish lessons off of the information superhighway.

Kuma’s Corner is a Chicago restaurant with an interesting menu. The burger-heavy selection is notable for the titles of its dishes. All but two of the burgers along with the pulled pork and chicken sandwiches are named after metal bands. From the classic (Iron Maiden) to the questionable (Hate Beak), nearly the entire spectrum of metal is represented. Even stoned upstarts Mastodon get in on the act as a Cheddar-Bacon Burger smothered with BBQ sauce.

Now, I am having a difficult time deciding whether or not I like this idea. Now, I enjoy my metal (actually, I am listening to Obituary on my headphones) and I love burgers, so it’s not like I feel either of the two is sullying the other’s name. And in theory it should work and just be the raddest thing ever. But it isn’t. In fact, I don’t like the idea at all. I just feel like I should. I don’t really know why the names bother me, but they do. It’s as if I woke up one day and everything in my room was shifted 20 degrees to the left. On one hand, it might really open up the room and make it seem bigger, but on the other… well, it’s just plain weird. I want to sit and pound my fist on my table when i listen to Reign in Blood; I don’t want to eat a slayer. That would just be too bizarre for me.

I think that it also just reminds me too much of Planet Hollywood. And anything that reminds me of that place is gonna give me some bad vibes. Sorry, Kuma and your corner; no offense intended. I just had a rather bad experience at PH one time, involving a spilled fajita platter and my lap. I’m sure your burgers are extremely tasty—I just couldn’t order one by its name!

Am I crazy? Is this actually a marriage made in meatily metallic heaven? Quite possibly. But I am sticking to my guns, dammit!

Oh yeah, big ups to Grant for the link.