The Big Biscuit, Springfield, MO

Well, it's been a while. I really should post more often regardless of if anybody reads my blog or not. This is the only bit of creative writing (or creative anything really) I have in my life. Alrighty, let's see if I can remember how to do this.

So I went to Springfield, MO last weekend to see my bro and sis for my brother's birthday (ha ha, you're old!). Before I left on Monday, my brother and I decided to try out a new place in Springfield called The Big Biscuit. This is the first location in Springfield, and it has only been open a few weeks; the other locations are in the Kansas City area.

This location is at 2920 S. Glenstone Avenue in the Brentwood South shopping center (across from the Battlefield Mall near Vintage Stock).

Hello, map, my old friend
I only took a few pictures of food, so I'll just have to describe the location. The Big Biscuit is a breakfast/lunch place that is only open in the morning and early afternoon: 6:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. It was busy when we got there at lunch time, but we only had to wait about 10 minutes or so. There is an outdoor patio where you can wait and also probably eat if you so desire. There is quite a bit of seating inside, and while you aren't in your neighbor's lap, they are close together. The decor is reminiscent of most American restaurants: local memorabilia, historic pictures of the restaurant/location, random items.

So, food. the menu is pretty robust: omelets, pancakes, biscuits and gravy, burgers, chicken...I decided on a breakfast bowl (scram-bowl) called the "Midwest." It's scrambled eggs with bacon, sausage, cheddar cheese, and country-fried potatoes.

That's a big bowl of food...

It was really good. I also got a side of sausage gravy to go along with it to mix in. When I have scrambled eggs, I like them a little brown, which is how these eggs are done. The bacon was also crispy enough for me. There can always be more cheese, but it was sufficient. :-) The bowl is really quite large. I only ate maybe a third of mine and took the rest to go. The bowls also come with a biscuit.

Now THAT'S a biscuit

The biscuits are HUGE. I'm not quite sure how to describe it other than really good even just by itself. The consistency is just right and it has a good flavor. The sausage gravy goes really well with it, too. The gravy is really good, too: just the right amount of pepper. A side of gravy will run you about $2.49. 

Mmmm...gravy...

My brother got the "Ranch Hand" scram-bowl, which is grilled steak, scrambled eggs, jalapenos, tomatoes, onions, and jack & cheddar cheese. He said the steak was really tender and the jalapenos  had some kick to them.

Howdy, pardner

So, both of us enjoyed our food quite a bit and want to try other menu items, so we'll definitely be back. The Haymaker looks particularly intriguing (chicken strips on a bed of fries, topped with cheddar cheese and covered with gravy plus it comes with a biscuit) and the pancakes sound good and are massive. The prices are comparable to other restaurants with similar food: it's about an average of $10 for each entree. However, it is a lot of food considering that I got lunch and dinner out of mine. I don't know if my brother ate anything else for the rest of the day, but he was pretty full afterwards, too. You could probably order an entree and a side and split it with someone if you're both wanting the same thing. I think this restaurant will do really well in the area, and they seem to think so, too, since they're opening a second location on Campbell in the Kickapoo Corners shopping center.

So, if you're in the Springfield area and want a filling, yummy breakfast or lunch, check out The Big Biscuit: you won't be disappointed.

Treasure Island Hotel & Casino; Canter's Delicatessen - Las Vegas, Nevada

So, when I go to Las Vegas, I like to stay at the Treasure Island Hotel & Casino. It's not very expensive and I like the location - towards one end of The Strip. You can get some great deals on Expedia including this hotel, or you can sign up on their website for some great specials.

Probably the biggest reason that I stay here is the beds. Oh my god. Best sleep ever. The beds are apparently so popular here that they even mention them on their web site. The casino itself has a nice variety of games and is a good place to pass time. I'm partial to PengWins since I won on that game quite a bit. I liked the cows.

The resident shows at Treasure Island are Mystere by Cirque du Soleil and Sirens of TI. Mystere is absolutely amazing and a definite must see if you're in Vegas. I've never seen the Sirens of TI show, but it seems to get good reviews.

There are also a nice variety of restaurants inside Treasure Island, too. I'm a big fan of The Coffee Shop. The name can be misleading - it's a full restaurant open 24 hours. I think I've eaten the majority of my meals in Vegas here. The servings are huge, so bring your appetite. The morning of the day that I was going to pick up Dougie at the airport, I decided to get a light breakfast of oatmeal and toast.

Ha! "Light". Foolish mortal.
Yeah. I don't think "small portions" is in their vocabulary. The bowl of oatmeal was huge. I chose bananas as my topping, so it came with a whole banana sliced up in a bowl along with some brown sugar and milk. The wheat toast was two slices of buttered toast. I don't know what it is, but buttered toast at a diner always taste better than at home...

There is also a deli called Canter's Delicatessen. I ate here twice and wasn't disappointed at all. The prices are a bit steep, but everything in Vegas is.

This is half of my pastrami sandwich

My takeout for dinner one night: patty melt
The Buffet is the buffet inside TI. The name isn't very creative, but eh. I ate here twice since I received some coupons for free buffets when I checked in. There's a decent variety of food for lunch and dinner - I don't feel I ate enough really to make it worth paying for a buffet, so I'm glad they were free. The food was good, though, but I recommend sitting at a table instead of a booth. The tables in the booths are really high and really close to the seats - I asked to move to a standalone table so my food wouldn't be at armpit level while I was trying to eat.

Also inside TI are The Seafood Shack, Senor Frog's and Gilley's. I haven't been to any of these, but they seemed to always be packed when I would wander by them.

This is one of my favorite places to stay and I definitely recommend checking it out at least for the food in the restaurants.

Aces & Ales, Las Vegas, NV

So, I haven't found a lot of my pics from last year, but I do have my pics from this year's trip. I'm finally going to write a post about Aces & Ales. This is a bar located a few miles off the strip. It's known more as a craft beer bar and people go there to try lesser-known beers. You can get the address and see their full food and beer menu on their website that I've linked to above. It takes about 15 - 20 minutes to get to the place from the strip, but it's worth it. The prices seem fairly reasonable to me, but then again it's Vegas and I've been living overseas for 5 years, so what the hell do I know.

Aces & Ales
Now, I'm not a big beer fan, but I had been watching Brew Masters on Discovery Channel and was intrigued by the different flavors that Dogfish Head brewery uses (we're a bit behind on TV shows in Korea). So I did a search for what places in Vegas sell their beers and found Aces & Ales. It didn't hurt that they also have a full menu so we could have dinner there as well.

As at any bar, you'll see the regulars there sitting at the bar playing the video poker machines embedded in the counter. The people working are friendly, though, and try to be attentive. We were there fairly earlyish on a Saturday evening and it was pretty busy.

My Dougie and I tried the Black & Blue from Dogfish Head first.

Big bottle o' beer

Nice looking beer
It wasn't bad, but I sadly am just not meant to be a beer drinker - guess I'll stick to my mixed drinks and my hard ciders.

For dinner, I ordered the buffalo chicken macaroni & cheese. It was, really, really good. It also came with some toast. It was very cheesy and the buffalo chicken wasn't overly spicy, but added just the right amount of kick.

Mac & cheesey goodness
I think Doug ordered the chicken cheese steak sandwich with sweet potato fries. If I remember correctly, he said it was really good. Both of us were super stuffed after grub.

Doug and his sammich
To finish up our dinner at Aces & Ales, Doug had a glass of 120 Minutes from Dogfish Head (I think) and I had an appletini :D

He wasn't drunk - he just looks it

Don't judge me - it was delicious
So that wrapped up our evening at Aces & Ales before we headed back to The Strip. I definitely recommend checking this place out if you want to get off The Strip for a bit for something different.

BBQ Chicken

Well friends, I’ve had to find a new chicken place to get my chicken fix since DD Chicken closed. And I’m slightly ashamed to admit that I had been cheating on DD with BBQ before DD brought our long-standing relationship to an end. Yes…I am a dirty chicken ho’: I don’t care where it comes from, as long as it’s fried and delicious.

And BBQ Chicken is indeed delicious. I'm pretty sure that they mix a little bit of crack in with the flour. I swear to insert-your-favorite-deity that for several days after I first took some BBQ Chicken home, I was jonesing for more chicken…breaking out in cold sweats…stomach growling….hallucinating about chicken…Ok, maybe not that extreme, but it is some damn good chicken and I was craving it for a few days until I got some more. It’s also one of the more expensive, if not the most, fried chicken places around. The prices will range from 15000 won to 20000 won.
(I’ll scan in a menu later)

I usually get chicken from the branch inside the complex at work when I leave work at night and have a chicken craving – it’s very convenient. Unfortunately, unless you work for Samsung, you can’t access this one. However, fear not my fellow Yeongtongites, Yeongtongians waegookins!! There is a BBQ Chicken branch located between the Yeongtong Homeplus and Kyunghee-de. I, unfortunately, can’t give you an exact location, but if you wander around between the two places, you’ll spot it :D I’ve only ordered delivery from here since I live down in the 4 danji area and don’t feel like walking forever for my chicken fix. Ordering delivery from them is pretty simple if you know you’re address…just say hello and then tell them what kind of chicken you want. They’ll ask something about if you want a small or large soda, and then for your address. The people there speak just enough English to prompt you. And, if you’re lucky, once you order a few times, they’ll repeat your address back to you before you even give it because they have stalkercaller ID.

I’ve tried a few different kinds of chicken from here because sometimes my team orders it, but when I order it myself, I keep it pretty simple with either the BB Wings or the Olive-whatever Chicken Strips – honestly, when I order from work, I just point at the picture, and I order “BB Wings” for delivery because it’s easy. I don’t eat a lot of whole chicken (just white meat) so that’s why I don’t order a lot of the “soon sal” chicken (순살), which is a whole chicken cut up and fried.

Mmm....wings...

Now, I’ve had a Korean friend warn me before that if you order a saucy chicken (no, it doesn’t have an attitude), they will fry the chicken in older oil since the sauce will cover up the darker batter color. I don’t know if it’s true, but eh, who cares: it’s fried chicken. I used to work at KFC when I was in high school, so I know how often the oil needs to be changed before it starts affecting the color.

There isn’t anything here that I’ve tried that I don’t like. The breading on the fried chicken is just, really, really good. I can’t really describe the flavor, but it’s yummy. The chicken is also juicy and not overcooked or undercooked.
So, for those that aren’t too hot with Korean, here’s a list of some of the words on the menu and what they are in English:

후라이드 (hu-ride) = fried
닭 (kind of like dawk) or 치킨 (chee-keen) = chicken
다리 (da-ri) = leg
웡스 (wings) = wings
칼슘양념 (cal-shum yeong-nyeom) = fried chicken dipped in a “calcium sauce” (not sure what it is, though)
매운맛양념 (mei-un-mat yeong-nyeom)= fried chicken dipped in a hot sauce
매운맛 닭 다리 (mei-un-mat dawk da-ri) = hot chicken legs
순살크래커 (soon-sal c-rak-ah) = I don’t know. I think this is the hacked up whole chicken fried in pieces
비비웡스 (bee bee wing-suh) ^^ - fried wings
스모크 치킨 (s-mo-kuh chee-keen) – smoked chicken
퉁다리비배큐 (tong da-ri bee-beh-que) = some kind of barbequed legs
골드휭거 (golduh hwing-gah) = chicken fingers (strips)

So, hope that helps! Good luck ordering chicken ^^

Izakaya (Maetan-dong and Yeongtong)

And….back to South Korea. Let’s start back up with one of my favorite Japanese ramen places: Izakaya. The location that I typically go to is located in Maetan-dong in front of Samsung (this location is now closed or has moved elsewhere and I haven't found it again yet). There is a location in Yeongtong, but the exact location escapes me – I think it’s on the street that runs along the side of KFC, but I’ll have to double-check that. I’ve never been to the one in Yeongtong because I’m more familiar with places in front of work.

It's to the right of Freshburger (which I DO NOT recommend).

They serve a few other things besides ramen here, like some donkasu and random other dishes that I have no clue what they are. Izakaya is nice for a quick, cheap lunch or dinner: the bowls of ramen average about 6500 won and the sets, which come with a smaller bowl of ramen and variety of choices for cutlet on rice, for an average of 10500 won. The rice and donkasu bowls on their own aren’t very filling, so I’d recommend getting a set. I’m not sure what kind of ramen comes with the set and I’m too sure on getting it replaced with a different type. I know that one time I went with a Korean friend and he was able to get them to substitute the miso ramen for me. I should probably note that the only ramen I’ve eaten at Izakaya is the miso: they have two different kinds of miso ramen. The one I get most often is on the first page of the menu and has the spicy symbol next to it. I prefer the miso ramen because the soup base is miso instead of a fish base, which is what the other ramen soup bases taste like to me (I don’t like fish). The other miso ramen is on the third page of the menu and has half of a boiled egg on top and comes with mushrooms and 3 pieces of pork as opposed to 1 with the ramen that I always get.

As you can see, the ramen is topped with a copious amount of bean sprouts, corn, green onions, a piece of seaweed, and a piece of pork. This is the one I typically get because I always pick the pork out and feel better about taking out 1 piece instead of 3 :). Now, I love seaweed, but the seaweed they use in the ramen taste a little off to me, so I usually try to pick its sogginess out of my noodles, too. The ramen also comes with a little side of kimchi and pickled radishes. The kimchi here is hit and miss – sometimes it’s good, sometimes it just taste like old, nasty, spicy cabbage. The radishes, however, I love: I think they’re marinated in soy sauce or crack (much like the jjangjorim at Bon Juk).

I haven’t tried many things here since a lot of the ramen has seafood in it, but my Korean friends enjoy those ramens quite well. They also have dumplings on the menu as a side item that are baked instead of fried. I think they’re “gyozo” on the menu instead of “mandu,” but they’re the first item under Side Orders on the menu.

So yeah, I can’t really read the menu very well at Izakaya and can’t tell you much about most of the food, but I know the one thing that I always order is enjoyable and I probably look something like Naruto while I’m eating my ramen.

*image copyright VIZ Media

Lambert's Cafe II

So, I was back in the U.S. for a couple of months for family reasons, so I haven’t tried any places in Yeongtong for a while. However, there is a restaurant in Ozark, Missouri that is a great place to visit for good, down-home, Southern cooking: Lambert’s. There are 3 Lambert’s located in the U.S. with the 1st one being in Sikeston, Missouri (in the southeastern part of the state – a.k.a. the bootheel), and the 3rd one is in Alabama. This one in Ozark is Lambert’s Café II and is located between Springfield, MO and Branson, MO on highway 65. If you’re passing through Missouri on I-44 or US-60, it’s not much off your path to pay this place a visit – it’s well worth it!

Their website (http://www.throwedrolls.com) gives directions and offers a view of their menu. They don’t take debit/credit cards or reservations, so make sure you have cash on hand and time to wait (usually no less than half an hour).

The best thing, in my opinion, is the “pass arounds.” Servers walk around the restaurant with bowls of fried okra, fried potatoes, macaroni and tomatoes, black-eyed peas, and rolls and sorghum. One of most distinguishing features about Lambert’s, though, is the rolls aren’t just “passed around” but chucked at you across the restaurant by a server. Do people ever miss? Sure. Do people ever get whomped upside the head with a hot roll? You betcha. It just adds to
the experience.


This is the fried okra:

And this is the fried potatoes:

The other interesting thing is that the whole menu is pretty much all-you-can-eat. If you’ve finished your plate and want more, you just ask – that is if you’re able to squeeze anything else in after stuffing yourself full of delicious rolls with butter melted over the warm, yummy goodness…mmmm… warm, buttered rolls…

Ahem, anyway, the food is quite good and you definitely get your money’s worth: most all of the meals are only $11.99, plus all the “pass arounds.” At this outing, I had the meatloaf for some reason despite not being a big meatloaf fan – it just sounded good, and meatloaf is always a good comfort food. And it was. Just the right amount of seasoning and ketchup crust (top).

My meatloaf dinner:

My brother had the charbroiled chicken breast and seemed to like it despite thinking it was a little bit dry.

Ken had the chicken fried round steak (hen’s portion) and demolished it pretty well.

On the way out of the store there’s a gift shop if you feel the need to have a reminder of your visit other than the stretched waistband of your pants. You can also purchase rolls by the dozen for take out…mmm…rolls…

DD Chicken

I might as well start the blog off with one of my favorite chicken places in Yeongtong - DD Chicken. I've only tried the chicken fingers and wings, but they are both quite good and well priced. You even get a 1000 won discount if it's a carry-out order. They also deliver in the area if you're so inclined to try to order. The couple that run the place (the new couple - I guess the previous ones are no longer there) speak limited English, so you may be able to place an order as long as you know what you want and your address.

This box of chicken fingers, along with a small can of Pepsi, a pack of radishes, and a couple of sauces is just 12000 won for carry-out.





Update: August 4, 2011
*sigh* Well, while walking home from Homeplus tonight, I noticed that my dear DD Chicken is gone. It will be sorely missed since it was so conveniently located near my apartment. However, fret not! There are some other chicken places in the area, I'll introduce one tomorrow.