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March 20, 2018

13 awesome ice cream sundaes

We hate to say it, but it’s become harder and harder to impress guests in recent years due to the huge surge of DIY and hosting tips available through sites like Pinterest. Entertaining has become a trend and, don't get us wrong, we’re all about it, but this summer we’re going to make an entertaining statement and it all starts with ice cream. Yes, you read right — we’re going to wow you with some gorgeous, drool-worthy, going-to-create-a-mess-but-its-so-worth-it sundaes from some stellar parlors and shops across the country. Whether they’re signature sundaes or creations built with a little help from customers, these sundaes are definitely more than OK in our mouths — er — books. Our list features everything from triple-chocolate-scoop concoctions of decadence to creations inspired by a certain former Knicks power player, but we’re keeping our lips sealed so you can take a look at them firsthand! For more on summer's favorite treat, ice cream, check out our go-to guide!

March 20, 2018

How to eat healthy at 16 fast-food chains

When you’re trying to eat healthy, a fast-food restaurant doesn’t exactly seem like a great dining option. Burgers, fries, and milkshakes probably aren’t your best bet if you’re on a diet. But over the past several years, fast-food chains have taken major strides to offer menu selections that are decidedly healthy. So when we’re hungry and have nowhere else to turn, a quick study of the menu board at these fast-food destinations can show that it’s not all so terrible after all. Right off the bat, it would seem that the burger joints would have the least healthy options, but there are some items that, surprisingly, aren't filled with bad ingredients and tons of calories. You're never going to mistake these spots for a wheatgrass bar, but in a pinch you can get out of there with minimal grease. Salads may seem the obvious choice, but aren't very healthy if loaded with breaded, fried chicken chunks, and creamy dressings. And keep in mind that while some sandwiches and entrées are healthier, that's often without the add-ons that boost flavor appeal. But the healthy choices don't have to be completely bland: When possible, ask for dressings, sauces, and condiments on the side so you can control the amount put on. And don't rule out combos completely — a combo of two items can be good, as long as the total intake doesn't end up being more than one unhealthy item. Lean toward items with vegetables, and though they're often hard to find at these places, vegetarian items when possible. These dishes are usually more health-friendly, they're nutritionally adequate, and they're usually not (as) steeped in grease. And if items are offered grilled or steamed, those are obviously a better option than their fried counterparts. Aside from meals, beverage and dessert choices can also be made healthier. Of course soda is the mainstay beverage of fast-food counters, but it's easy enough to get water or unsweetened iced tea; add lemon to them if available. If you're watching your weight, you may be skipping dessert, but it's nice to have options if you've got a sweet craving. And even the fastest of fast-food places offer a fruit option; we won't pretend that it'll be as fun as a giant shake or sundae, but at least we have more choices now. Nearly every fast-food chain posts nutritional information on their websites and makes it available at their restaurants, so be sure to take a quick look if you want to get the inside scoop on what you're eating. We checked out the nutrition information for just about all of the leading fast-food brands in search of the healthiest items on their menus. Read on to learn what we discovered.

March 20, 2018

10 epic doughnuts to celebrate national doughnut day

It’s not like Americans needed an excuse to celebrate the joy of eating doughnuts, but just to be sure, there is a National Doughnut Day. This year it falls on Friday, June 7. The holiday began in 1938 when the Salvation Army decided to honor volunteers who passed out doughnuts to soldiers fighting in the front lines of WWI. In patriotic celebration, we’ve put together a list of some of the most unusual and delicious doughnuts across the nation. If you can't try these works of fried greatness, grab your free Krispy Kreme or Dunkin’ Donut and just bask in the glory of these epic pastries.

March 20, 2018

World’s largest pizzas commercially available

While many pizza restaurants max out with 20-inch pizzas, with a few outliers straying into the 30-inch territory, there are few in the world bold enough to make pizzas that rival the size of the people eating them. But even then, most of those pizzerias will only make them a few times a month for special food challenges. Only a select, crazy few pizza joints in the world will make humongous pizzas at the whims of their customers – although they may require 48 hours notice. Here are the top five biggest, commercially available pizzas in the world.

March 20, 2018

10 best ribs in America

There are few things in life more delicious and satisfying than a plate of barbecue. And more often than not, the centerpiece of that plate is a rack of ribs. A glistening, smoky, slow-cooked rib, whether pork or beef, has the potential to be one of the most groan-inducingly good foods in existence, especially when enjoyed with a cold, easy-drinking beer. But who makes the best ribs in America? And what exactly makes a perfect rib? We reached out to some of the country’s most renowned food writers and critics, and assembled a list not only of their favorites, but of ribs that are renowned far and wide for their smoky perfection. The only criterion that we provided these panelists was that their picks needed to be bone-in ribs best eaten with your hands and a pile of napkins.  So while we’re certainly fans of Italian-style braised short ribs (famed critic Gael Greene told us that her favorite ribs are the ones at New York City’s Il Buco Alimentari), those didn’t meet our criteria for this list. Renowned food writer and director of the Southern Foodways Alliance John T. Edge, The Washington Post’s Tim Carman, GQ’s Alan Richman, the Los Angeles Times’ Jonathan Gold, and Esquire’s John Mariani all submitted some of their favorites. A couple of panelists also gave us their answer to the question, "What makes the perfect rib?" So what does make for a perfect rib, according to some of the country’s leading experts? Tenderness, sauce-to-meat ratio, smokiness, and good charring. Tim Carman told us, "For me, barbecue spareribs should not fall off the bone like those ubiquitous braised short ribs you find on every chef-driven menu. Your teeth should be engaged in the eating process with spareribs, forced to lock onto the smoky flesh and gently pull it from the bone. The spareribs should also not arrive at your table smothered in tangy/sweet/spicy sauce. I want to taste the meat and smoke and whatever layer of seasonings the pitmaster has applied to the ribs. Sauces can hide defects in seasoning and smoking." And John Mariani said, "For me a great rib is never oversmoked, pink under the skin, with good charring on the outside. The sauce is down my list of virtues, preferring a dry rub to do most of the work. The meat may come off the bone easily but not 'fall off,' and there should be some definite chewiness to the meat." We wholeheartedly agree, so with those parameters in mind, we set off to find the country’s 20 best ribs, building on 2011's list and ranking them according to local renown, critical appraisal, and adherence to the criteria set forth by our panel of experts. A word of warning before reading on: You’ll be hungry by the time you make your way to number one. And if your favorite place isn’t on the list, we also agree with what Alan Richman told us: "In fact, they’re all great."

March 20, 2018

Surprising origins of the 10 biggest chain restaurants

It’s not easy to run a restaurant. It’s even more difficult to run a chain restaurant. For one, you need to serve food that people will want to eat, all across the region, country, or world. Then you need to keep the menu fresh and up-to-date, all while making sure that every single dish in every single location looks and tastes exactly the same. And after all of that’s been done, you need to launch marketing and advertising campaigns to fill the seats, and figure out what’s going wrong if they’re not getting filled. To repeat, it’s not easy to run a successful chain restaurant. Chain restaurants as we know them today only came about within the past 30 or so years, largely because that genre of restaurant, called fast casual, is only about that old. There were plenty of hamburger chains and diner chains dating back to the 1950s, but the whole concept of going to a casual restaurant with your family, having a beer and ordering inexpensive food that makes everyone happy, and leaving with a doggie bag is still remarkably new. In fact, when Larry Lavine opened the first Chili’s in 1975 in Dallas, people lined up around the block on a daily basis just to eat a bowl of chili and drink a margarita. In many cases, the origins of today’s most popular chain restaurants aren’t exactly what you might expect. Many of them had different names when they were founded, as well as different menus and concepts. With the exception of Olive Garden, which was invented by General Mills as opposed to a single lucky entrepreneur, most of the big chains got their start when someone opened up a restaurant that just happened to do really, really well. And if it happened to fall into that new style of fast casual dining, wealthy investors were waiting around every corner during the '70s and '80s to take advantage of this newest dining trend. Once a chain restaurant is well-funded and its concept and menu are fully in place, it’s amazing how quickly it can spread. Panera Bread, one of the youngest major chains, only got its start 20 years ago, but today there are more than 1,600 units and it’s rapidly growing. Whether it’s an Australian-themed steakhouse, an inexpensive wing joint, or a New England-style seafood restaurant, these chains are known and patronized by millions and millions of Americans, and they all have really interesting backstories.  

March 20, 2018

Best ice cream parlors worldwide

Ice cream is a universal obsession, even more so now that the days when plain vanilla cones were the sole option are long gone. 

March 20, 2018

America's most expensive diner food

When we’re feeling a little flush, we’ll maybe bypass really crappy local takeout in favor of a slightly less crappy local takeout. Anyway, it turns out, some people are more than willing to splash a little cash around, not just on fancy dinners, but on diner food. We guess that eating huge piles of gold just isn’t as tasty as a slice. Here are 5 of the country’s most ludicrously overpriced (and not very good for you) meals.

March 20, 2018

Where to drink like Jay Gatsby

Alcohol may be legal, but that hasn’t stopped a proliferation of hard-to-find drinkeries that recall the 18th amendment. As The Great Gatsby hits theaters, we uncover ten speakeasies where you can party like it’s 1922.

March 20, 2018

Ridiculous restaurant commercials from the 1980s

Unless you’re a chain restaurant with a big marketing budget, odds are you’re not going to be doing too much in the way of television advertising these days. Commercials for non-chain restaurants, for one reason or another, always come across as dated and a bit tacky, because — honestly — how many ways can you say, "Come eat at my restaurant, it looks nice and the steak is good!"? From red sauce joints all the way up to high-end steakhouses, modern restaurant commercials tend to be a staid, low-res affair, with upbeat jazz, a voice-over, maybe some smiling patrons, close-ups of the food, and a snappy motto. But once upon a time — in the 1980s, to be exact — restaurant commercials were an art form. Back in those halcyon, pre-Internet days, when airtime was cheap and people actually tuned into public access channels, the airwaves were flooded with restaurants strutting their stuff, trying to attract as many customers as possible in any way possible. And in the flashy 1980s, nothing succeeded quite like a big, flashy commercial (or a big, flashy anything, for that matter). While independent restaurants are certainly guilty of going a bit over the top (for example, a commercial for Brooklyn’s Roll-N-Roaster is so outrageous that it’s entered into the New York pop culture lexicon and is still airing more than 30 years later), chains weren’t exempt from getting in on the ridiculousness either. There’s one from Bob’s Big Boy that hits all the essential notes of the '80s: close-ups of questionably appealing-looking food, children smiling perhaps a bit too broadly, and a vaguely creepy mascot. But one from A&W takes things in a slightly more unintentionally menacing direction, with a giant bear conducting an invisible band, someone tearing a whole head of lettuce in half, and nonexistent adjectives like "LOTSY," "NUMMY," and "TREATY" flashing across the screen, all against a black background. The bear makes a brief reappearance at the end of the commercial, playing a tuba. It's safe to say a lot of weird and awkward things happened during the 1980s, these commercials included.