It was a fun weekend, but I'm excited about getting back to work on WacoFork business on this toasty Monday here in our fine town.
That was especially the case when I learned the guys from the internationally famous rock band Dutton would be in town for lunch. I don't think "internationally famous" is a hyperbolic description, but some would suggest that "internationally famous" would be a little bit off the mark for any praise-and-worship group, even if they are in the middle of a jam-packed summer tour. Still, these guys can scarcely go out in public without getting mobbed by fans in Oklahoma.
I joined them for lunch at Food For Thought and managed to talk Logan into a peanut butter pie for dessert. If you haven't had it, it's about as simply good as dessert gets.
Dutton, which bases out of Dallas these days, was headed for a week-long event just south of Austin. Seeing them was a good way to get rolling this week after an eventful weekend. It helped me shake off the emotional let down of a Monday, you know?
It's Friday morning and I'm still reveling in the little Mavs comeback win over the Miami Heat on Thursday night.
At about 10:15 last night I was practically crying in my beer as I sat at the bar at The Dancing Bear. The Mavs were down 15 point and I was alternating between mouthing off about why I don't like LeBron James and trying not to think about the fact that the Mavs ship was sinking fast.
Yesterday, I submitted the final spec to our lead developer for building WacoFork Mobile, a mobile app for accessing all of the restaurant listings, ratings and reviews on WacoFork.com. This has been in the works for a couple of months, and now we're really kicking development into high gear. The first version of the app will be for all iOS (iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch) and Android devices. This app will make it easier than ever to figure out "Where you wanne eat?"
Once upon a time, if you lived in Waco (or just about anywhere in the southern and southwestern regions of the United States) and you wanted to eat Chick-Fil-A, you had to go to the mall.
When I was growing up, the Chick-Fil-A was a mid-mall eatery. This was before there was a food court at the Richland Mall. The Chick-Fil-A served chicken sandwiches then as it does now, only it served them next door to the Waldenbooks.
Eventually, the Chick-Fil-A moved a hundred or so yards down the mall corridor in order to form the cornerstone of the food court. That's where it is now. But it is no longer the only Chick-Fil-A restaurant in town.
We don't need to have a reason to have a party — we'll haul off and throw one for things like basketball games or a television star leaving his program. But as it happens we have several good reasons to throw a party this month.
So we're having a party — the WacoFork 4x200 Celebration — on June 18 at Poppa Rollo's Pizza. Because we're so close to reaching our 4x200 goals and we're confident we'll get there by party time. Because we're giving away an iPad2. Because we recently ordered T-shirts. But mostly because we want to hang out with you, our friends.
In a few days, we will reach two full months of our WacoFork venture. In that time, we've begun to build a solid database of reviews submitted by an aggressive and witty bunch of registered users.
We've even been so impressed by some of our reviewers that we've asked them to guest blog. So note that there's opportunity for advancement here.
As we near 300 reviews, we wanted to take a look back at some of the best from the month of May. Last week, we rated the top 10. This time, we're going about it a little differently as the best of the best fit neatly into four subcategories.
Chad and I had the opportunity to talk about WacoFork today on Texas Today on KCEN with Teal Jennings and Kris Radcliffe. I'm pretty sure we're getting an Emmy for this one.
Guest blogger Monike Garabieta's many funny reviews have made us laugh. The lesson: make us laugh and we'll give you more space.
By Monike Garabieta
Like many fellow Waco, Texans, I have partaken of barbeque on a Sunday afternoon and felt somewhat sinful.
As a student who was once exposed to many new ideas and hot topic issues, I was a vegetarian for six months of my undergraduate career in response to my former lack of ecological responsiveness.
Food fads aside, one thing has always stuck with me, no matter what: my love for bread. As a child, I would eat the crusts off of pizza instead of the pizza itself (a practice that has led me to secretly judge anyone who does not eat their crust today). Now, as an “adult,” I look for places with superior bread-based appetizers. I will happily fill up on these items and save 80% of my dinner item for lunch tomorrow, and I don’t consider that cheating.
So, in case you're anything like me (cheap? love bread? like leftovers?), here's my list of the top 5 places for bready appetizers or sides in Waco:
I have to say my eyes were opened Wednesday afternoon.
Before Wednesday afternoon, I knew of the Gospel Cafe because it was a restaurant in our restaurant listings within the cafes and diners directory. It's located on the corner of South 10th Street and Cleveland Avenue. It has not been rated or reviewed yet, so I didn't know much more about it.
I figured the name Gospel Cafe was just a name, a positive association for a restaurant.
It turns out, it means what its name states. Like Gospel as in "Come follow me," Jesus said, "and I will send you out to fish for people (Matthew 4:19)."
Ideally, this blog will be about what's going on at Waco restaurants. So far it's mostly been successful in that goal.
Ideally, it won't be me writing about where I happened to pick up dinner.
But today, that's sort of what it's about. I picked up yellow curry at Bangkok Royal for dinner this evening. This was the first time I ever picked up food at Bangkok Royal as I had previously only dined in the dining room.
