Double Cheeseburger from McDonald's - $1.00

1401 Governor's Place, Bear, DE - (302)836-1308

This has to be one of the best deals out there. It's two beef patties, onions, pickles, and American cheese. You can get full off of these for only $4!!

Sesame Chicken from Taste Of China - $6.75

1228 Capitol Trail, Newark, DE - (302)368-2100

This ranks as one of my favorite Americanized Chinese dishes, right up there along with General Tso's chicken and Mongolian beef. From what I can gather, it's just fried chicken smothered with some sauce and sprinkled with sesame seeds and then mixed in with some broccoli. The aforementioned sauce is saturated with sweetness so make sure to have a drink handy.

Although I don't mind eating most food as leftovers, this is a dish that's much better fresh. If you wait too long, the crispy breading will get mushy and the chicken will begin clumping with each other. Still, you get a large amount of food for a reasonable price, so don't fret if you can't finish it in a single sitting.

Create Your Own Feast from Red Lobster - $20.50

1249 New Churchman's Road, Newark, DE - (302)456-1792

The Create Your Own Feast meal is a meal where you get to choose three items from a select list for $20.50. You can opt to pick only two for $16.50, but come on! As if I would ever opt to eat less. The choices available are:

- Garlic-Grilled Jumbo Shrimp
- Seafood-Stuffed Flounder
- Parrot Bay Jumbo Coconut Shrimp
- Walt's Favorite Shrimp
- Grilled Salmon
- Shrimp Linguini Alfredo
- Crab Linguini Alfredo
- Garlic Shrimp Scampi
- Steamed Snow Crab Legs
- Grilled Sirloin Steak* (3.75 additional)

It also comes with an unlimited supply of their famous cheddar biscuits, a garden or Caesar salad, and a side. The Caesar salad was captured in an earlier post found here.


The first picture illustrates the cheddar biscuits. These things are addictive. My advice is to stuff yourself with as many of these as you can and eat the main course as a leftover.


This picture shows the shrimp linguini alfredo (left), seafood-stuffed flounder (top-center), grilled salmon (right), and mashed potatoes for my side (bottom-center). The linguini is good, but a bit too oily. The flounder was a bland disappointment, and the salmon and mashed potatoes are both good, but nothing spectular or special.


My sister ordered the crab linguini alfredo (left), steamed snow crab legs (top-center), Parrot Bay jumbo coconut shrimp (bottom-center), and a baked potato (middle-center) for her side. I've eaten these all before and here's what I have to say: the crab linguini is identical to the shrimp linguini save for the crab/shrimp substitution; the coconut shrimp is tasty is small doses; and the crab legs and baked potato are once again, good, but nothing outstanding.

All in all, it's a very satisfying feast with lots of variety to keep your appetite interested.

Gang Ped Yang (Duck Curry) from Tasty Thai - $11.95

287 Christiana Road, New Castle, DE - (302)322-1306

The duck curry is described on the menu as "boneless roasted duck, tomato, and pineapples in chef's special red curry."

This is another great selection from a mediocre Thai restaurant. The dish is supposed to be spicy, but it's not so much the burns-my-tongue kind of spicy. It's more like the tickles-my-throat-and-makes-me-want-to-cough spicy. As with all curry dishes that I know of, this comes with a little cardboard box of white rice to mix with the curry.

The angle of the picture doesn't show the size, but it comes in one of those one quart plastic tubs that most Chinese restaurants tend to use, but they probably only fill it up about 75% total. The price is a bit high in my opinion, but then I justify it by reminding myself that Thai food is more of a novelty in these parts.

Steak Phở Tái from Phở Như Vũ - $7.95

1146 Pulaski Highway, Bear, DE - (302)595-2530

First off, I spent FOREVER trying to look for the correct characters for the restaurant name, so I hope you appreciate it.

For those of you who are unfamiliar, phở tái is basically the signature dish of Vietnamese cuisine. I think it's pronounced fuh. I took my order to go, as usual, and was surprised to see that assembly was required.


The first picture is the beef broth. Simple enough.


This next picture is a baggy of Thai basil, a lime wedge, bean sprouts, and fresh jalapeños. On the side of that same picture, you have a mixture of hoisin sauce, fish sauce, and the Thai hot sauce Sriracha.


In this third picture, you get a box full of rice noodles, raw thinly sliced strips of steak, green onions, white onions, coriander leaves (cilantro), and perhaps a couple things I'm overlooking.


Finally, the fourth and fifth picture are after everything was put together. Being the great chef that I am, I spilled a lot of the broth because I tried dumping everything into the original plastic bucket of broth, but there wasn't enough room for it. Then I tried to transfer it all to my bowl, but there STILL wasn't enough room for it.

Despite all the spillage, the meal was very satisfying considering it was only $7.95 for the large. Also, this is one of the few places that actually served a dish that I considered spicy, so that's another bonus. The restaurant is very new (open about two months now) so I will have to revisit this place again to check out some of their other dishes.

Junior Bacon Cheeseburger from Wendy's - $1.09

90 University Plaza, Newark, DE - (302)366-8225

If you're looking for some cheap food, then this is a good place to start.

For only $1.09, you get a beef patty topped with lettuce, tomato, bacon, American cheese, ketchup and mayo. That's pretty much a textbook burger right there. I'm not a huge fan of Wendy's, but when I do go, this is probably the standard order.

Crispy Honey Roasted Duck from Tasty Thai - $11.95

287 Christiana Road, New Castle, DE - (302)322-1306

This is deep-fried boneless duck tossed in the "chef's special three flavor sauce topped with crispy basil leaves."

Although it may look spicy, it's actually a very sweet dish, and although the name says otherwise, the breading is more soggy than crispy. But even with these "setbacks" the dish holds a good flavor and I revisit this meal often.

Chicken Nuggets from Wendy's - $1.00

90 University Plaza, Newark, DE - (302)366-8225

Since I posted the chicken nuggets from McDonald's a couple days ago, I decided to get the Wendy's version for comparison.

The Wendy's version has more peppery zest in their breading but the McDonald's has the crispier texture. All things considered, I prefer the McDonald's version - and that doesn't even take into account that they also have a greater/better selection of sauces.

Oh, also, the four piece is the one that sells for $1.

Chicken McNuggets from McDonald's - $5.30

1401 Governor's Place, Bear, DE - (302)836-1308

These are simply all white chicken meat deep-fried for crispy goodness. MmmMmm. My dog goes CRAZY when I bring these things home. For $5.30, you get 20 pieces.

Capastrami from Capriotti's - $6.75

430 Eden Square Shopping Center, Bear, DE - (302)832-8132

This sandwich is comprised of pastrami, Swiss cheese, coleslaw, and Russian dressing. I only ordered the 9" sandwich because any more than that tastes too... saturated? heavy? I don't know, but the sandwich is good in smaller doses.

Steak McSkillet Burrito from McDonald's - $2.95

1401 Governor's Place, Bear, DE - (302)836-1308

Here is another bit of proof that McDonald's breakfast is top tier. You've got your steak, scrambled eggs, potato vegetable blend, American cheese, shredded cheddar & Jack cheese, onions and salsa all wrapped inside a flour tortilla.

The picture may look messy, but it's neatly wrapped when you receive it so it's nothing to worry about. What you MAY have to worry about are digestion woes. I think the salsa gave me some minor stomach pains later that day, but I have sensitive stomach, so it could just be me.

Mien Kam

Ingredients.

While the name bears strong similarity to Adolf Hitler's book (just a character flip and 2 letters short), this here is not a German dish. It's a Thai appetizer.



The ingredients, clockwise from the top, spiraling into the center, are: dried shrimp, mint leaves, diced lime, cili padi (a very very spicy chili), chopped lemongrass, diced onion, toasted dried coconut and finally, roasted peanuts. The 2 missing ingredients from the photo is the sauce and the leaves that you use to wrap all this with, both of which I do not know the name.

Before the fold.

What you do is grab one of the heart-shaped leaves, fold it into a cone (if you cannot imagine how then you suck at origami) and drop a bit of each of these ingredients in, along with a dollop of the unknown sauce. For the purpose of this shot I did not roll the leaf into a cone (this is now sounding like a drug blog), but what happens after that is you just roll the cone up and eat it whole.

Apparently the original dish does not include mint leaves. That's something my mom added in, and it works well too, considering that this is a very raw and uhm... "sharp" tasting appetizer. It's difficult to explain the taste, it's a combination of... zesty, sour, sweet, nutty and very green. You try finding one word to sum all that up.

Caesar Salad from Red Lobster - $???

1249 New Churchman's Road, Newark, DE - (302)456-1792

Me? Eat something healthy? Who knew? Well, in my defense, it had a lot of fatty dressing and it came with my even fattier entrée.

Anyway, according to wiki, "a typical Caesar salad comprises romaine lettuce and croutons dressed with Parmesan cheese, lemon juice, olive oil, egg, Worcestershire sauce, and black pepper originally prepared tableside." I don't really see the egg or Worcestershire sauce in the picture, but it was a well-made salad, nonetheless. It's just what I needed to prime my stomach for my massive entrée.

Fiery Chicken Popper Sandwich from Friday's - $8.39

650 South College Avenue, Newark, DE - (302)737-3700

Unlike most foods that are deemed spicy, this sandwich actually had enough zing on it to make my tongue tingle. Here's the description from tgifridays.com:

"A crispy chicken breast, smothered with cream cheese & jalapeño habanero jelly then topped with jalapeños and mayo. Served on toasted ciabatta bread with fries and a Jalapeño Popper™."

The sandwich was a bit messy because the cream cheese and jelly ooze out when you take a bite. If you're okay with spicy food and having sticky hands, then this one deserves a try. I even think this good enough for a repeat order.

Grilled Italian from Capriotti's - $6.75

430 Eden Square Shopping Center, Bear, DE - (302)832-8132

I'm not exactly sure of all the meats that went into this sandwich, but the Italian is typically capicola, prosciutto, and Genoa salami, with provolone cheese, lettuce, tomato, oil, and vinegar. This one also appears to have grilled onions.

The sandwich is good enough for me to revisit often, but if I really wanted to nitpick, there are a couple of downsides. For one thing, it's REALLY oily as you can tell from shininess of the sandwich and the see-through paper. The other thing is that the sandwich is fairly salty from all the various meats, but if you're like me, you won't be health-conscious enough to care.

The sandwich in the picture is the small size (9"). Normally, I would get the large (20") for $13, but I like to go for variety and get two smalls instead.

Spicy Sauceless Wings from KFC - $9.95

220 Fox Hunt Drive, Bear, DE - (302)836-0714

KFC's commercial brainwashed me into getting these and thinking it was a great deal. But if you think about it, it's about 50 cents per wing which isn't very good. I'll try to get pictures of the wings from Buffalo Wild Wings to show you what I can get for that price instead.

Anyway, the flavoring of the wings are pretty good, but they aren't spicy in the least and there isn't very much meat to them. Still, there's a special feeling about finishing off a bucket of KFC by yourself which makes it worthwhile on occasion. But be warned, there's ANOTHER special feeling waiting for you in your stomach the next day.

Roasted Red Pepper Sausage & Chicken Penne from TGIFriday's - $6.99

650 South College Avenue, Newark, DE - (302)737-3700

I'm feeling a bit lazy today since I'll be fairly busy for about the next month. Therefore, I'm stealing the description of the dish from tgifridays.com:

"Hot Italian sausage and chicken served over penne pasta and tossed with creamy roasted red pepper sauce and sautéed red onions. Finished with shavings of Parmesan cheese."

The best thing about this dish is the price. I can't remember it exactly, but I think it was $6.99, whereas all the other pastas were about $12. Of course, cheap food doesn't mean anything if it tastes like garbage, but this was actually a tasty dish. I'm considering making it a standard add-on to another entrée whenever I go.