This makes me miss Wild Wings. I used to live in SC and had several locations to choose from but here in Tallahassee we are out of luck. I've never gotten a burger there but love the wings and buffalo chips.

I've got a Belgian Quad boiling right now. I'm pitching it on a yeast cake from a Belgian Stout that I'm transferring to secondary. The Belgian Stout is delicious (I used a kit from Northern Brewer).

Also, today was my first time using my new mash tun, instead of just using a grain bag. (I do partial mash since I can only boil up to 4 gallons inside) Yay for mash tuns!

potatoes

Most foods I didn't like as a kid I still don't like. Foods I never had as a kid, like okra, collard greens, and zucchini, I'll eat with no problem. My mom made me eat carrots about at about 50% of dinners growing up and I still don't like them. Cucumbers literally make me gag. I can only tolerate onions if they are cooked to death. Even onion rings/blossoms/straws I can't stand despite them smelling delicious. Mostly I can't stand raw veggies or anything with vinegar with the exception of hot pepper sauce. Some things I was scared of as a kid I've grown to appreciate but the most popular American veggies such as salad, carrots, peas, onions, cucumber, tomatoes, and a few others I never grew to do more than choke them down, if I can even manage that. I can't stand most condiments. Fortunately I'm usually the one cooking so I can control the food.

I love spicy food, and always have. I like a lot of ethnic foods that I never had growing up. I love trying new foods (as long as they don't contain on offending vegetable or condiment). I love cooking and trying new recipes. It is hard though when certain foods are so popular and try as I might, I can't stand them.

I've been a long time fan of the Sprecher root beer. We have family in WI and tasted it years ago and fell in love. We often bootlegged it back home in our luggage back when they didn't think you were trying to blow up the plane if you had liquids. I was sad to see it do poorly in the SE tasting test since I love it so much. It's largely because of it's smoothness that I like it so much. I also really like their Puma Cola. It's got a nice cinnamon flavor to it and the smoothness that all their sodas have. Fortunately we are able to get it in FL now although it cost about twice as much as it does in the Milwaukee area.

I've made something similar but it used graham cracker crumbs in place of corn flakes (also used powdered sugar as the only sugar). They were very good. For that recipe you melted a small amount of PB with chocolate chips to make the chocolate layer.

I use my dishwasher to sanitize (no need for a bottle tree or making up large volumes of sanitizer on bottling day).

Also, bottle over the open dishwasher door. I set a bottle upright on the dishwasher door, though an opening in the bottom rack. Any spills or over filled bottle messes are inside the dishwasher so you don't have to clean them up.

I usually soak my bottles in hot water w/oxyclean and then peel the labels off but I like the idea of soaking them after filling/capping.

I don't usually use those but I remember them being very very salty. I use "Better than Bouillon" which is a paste in a jar and I do think it is a bit better. I use it for about all of my stock needs.

I also like the Montreal Steak Seasoning...preferably the spicy one but the regular one is good too.

I'm having a Cinco de Derby party! (although we're a little heavy on the derby side). Beer cheese, pie, ham, guac, taco dip are on the menu. I also homebrewed a mint julep beer that turned out surprisingly well. Now I might have to try to incorporate some of these ideas too. Paper roses would be a nice addition to my party.

You can cook table sugar to make invert syrup which won't crystalize (which is the benefit of corn syrup in these recipes) I don't use corn syrup in my marshmallows but if you don't make invert syrup first you have to be really careful not to crystalize the syrup.

This website has some information on sugar and near the bottom has a recipe for invert syrup:
http://notsohumblepie.blogspot.com/2010/05/lollipops-sugar-science-ramblings.html

Fortunately the places I eat almost always give everyone their own check. I'm sure it's a pain for the server to run 8 different cards but it works out easiest for us and I do try to tip extra if in a large group b/c I know we can be difficult. The server almost always asks up front if we want separate checks and who is together. My "eating out" budget is $50 a month so I tend to order relatively cheap things and only eat out once a week. Maybe your budget allows you to eat out more and you want to order a steak and some wine. That's great fo you but I can't afford to eat out more than once a month if I ate like that so I order a hamburger and drink water. I order according to what I can afford. You can do the same thing. Splitting the bill evenly assumes everyone has a similar amount of disposable income. I don't mind ordering the cheapest meal on the menu usually, and spending time with friends is a big part of the value of eating out, but it sucks to miss out on socializing just because I can't afford to spend $15 bucks on dinner rather than eat food at home that cost me $3 to make.

I've seen it in the grocery stores here in Florida. I'll have to check it out.