Serious Eats - seriouseats.com

One problem with Friendly's is that they refuse to make burgers rarer than medium well done. After a fight with a Friendly's manager about that, I swore never to patronize them again.

Harvey

I believe that The Kitchen Sink sundae originated with Jahn's Ice Cream Parlor in Richmond Hill, New York, long before Jaxson's ever existed.

Harvey

When I was young (1940s) there were two types of bagels, water bagels and egg bagels. The water bagels were all made by members of Bagel Bakers Local 338 who traveled around from bakery to bakery making the bagels for that days baking and sales. These water bagels were about three inches in diameter and weighed almost as much as today's bloated monsters. But if you bought them in the morning, they were rock-hard by lunch. But God, they tasted GOOD. As far as I know you can't get anything like that anymore.

Egg bagels were made from an almost challah-like soft dough which was sort of like a roll-with-a-hole rather than a REAL bagel. I am not sure if they were also made by Local 338, but I doubt it. These bagels you have here sound and look very much like those egg bagels of my youth.

My mother would never let me eat water bagels as she said that they were too heavy on my stomach and she insisted that I eat only egg bagels. But occasionally my father would slip me a water bagel with a schmear. Mmmm, mmmm, good!!!

Harvey

Real simple - baguette with ham and lots of butter in Mont de Marsan.

Harvey

Lox (NOT smoked salmon) with cream cheese on a bagel.

Bananas aren't ripe until they are brown. The brown banana is the sweet banana. When I buy bananas I put them aside until they turn brown. Yellow bananas are bland and blah.

Harvey

I canceled my subscription to _Gourmet_ several years ago when they were unable to send me magazines without the perfume ads that make me sick. Most other magazines (including many Conde Nast publications) can and do do this, but _Gourmet_ refused. Goodbye, _Gourmet_. And their advertising of a year's subscription for $12.00 and then tacking on an additional $3.00 for postage always made me see red. I am not at all sorry that they are going out of business. To my mind they earned it.

Harvey

Pearl Meat Packing uses natural casings for their hot dogs. Natural casings come from a pig; NOT KOSHER!!!

The hot dogs may be all beef with garlic, but they are not kosher.

Eating out alone is time to read _The New York Times_. It is still big enough that it needs a restaurant table to spread out on.

Harvey

But if you go look at their menu, it says that the hamburger is served ALWAYS well done!! That's not for me; I want my burgers rare or medium rare at worst.

Harvey

Check their latest on-line menu; the cheeseburger is $11.95!! Not cheap.

Harvey

I love bacon just cooked enough to prevent possible trichinosis. The flavor is in the fat, and I consider it criminal to cook the fat and taste away.

Harvey