Spent a few hours yesterday running some errands, including a few stops at thrift shops looking for a typewriter (long story for another time).  In the course of entering/exiting and walking through  a selection of Columbus’ thrift shops encountered a variety of individuals from cross sections of Columbus I don’t always see.  For the most part nothing too interesting to report on and in general the shops were pretty nice and clean and had pretty decent stuff for sell (not just bric-a-brac despite the sign above from the Salvation Army store on South High St.). Two things that kind ofstuck in my head was how much crap (and I don’t mean crap to mean its junk – plenty of good pots, pans, glasses, clothes, electronics or whatever) our country must go through that we can donate this stuff in such volumes.  Some of the stuff is clearly headed to new homes where it will have a good 2nd, 3rd or 4th life.  Some of the electronics though are destined for doom (no chance in being sold) – one example: old Ameritch DSL modems that originally come free when you sign up for service.  I don’t know maybe somebody breaks theirs and needs one but these things don’t seem like anyone will be coming to buy one.  But actually some of the stuff really sells – VHS tapes?  Actually yes – there sure seemed to be a lot of folks combing through the pretty expansive offerings that are out there – so if your looking to get into a nice collection it seems like just the time.

My over analytical view of the world after visiting all these shops:  Partly sad to see all the extra junk we have put out there and how the exciting new electronic which once was the latest and greatest and was the center of our universe is sitting on a  shelf with a grease pencil $1.99 on it, but partly happy seeing how affordable living in America is if you go pick up a electric hand mixer for $1.99 and another buck for the metal beaters and how we do reuse a lot of the stuff and second homes are found (there were even dumpster divers going through the rejected donations).

The other constant on the trip around thrift shops was seeing Columbus’ immigrant population out in force and then running into someone thinking I wanted to chat w/ them about the need for these people to ‘speak American’ (as a side note the person he was upset about was speaking English and the guy had just been nice about holding the door for the non-American speaking man, so not the worst person ever to be fair), but still the comment sickened me and I wish I had retorted with some witty comment about this ‘American’ language he was talking about or something about his ancestors – presumably non-English speaking bringing a copy of Rosetta Stone w/ them on the boat ride over to be so well prepared.  But I didn’t sadly, and I say sadly as I am not sure these people get the fact that our country has never been such a purely English speaking nation as they think and that to thrive Columbus needs to be reaching out to immigrants and growing these populations.

picture from Cooks Country

Saw this recipe the other day on WOSU our local PBS station on an episode of Cooks Country. The recipe is for Apple Cider Chicken, which uses bone in chicken pieces, seared in a pan, where a braising sauce is then made, with the chicken then going back into the pan to finish in the oven in a kinda shallow braise allows the skin to stay super crispy and for an amazing sauce that braises the bottom half of the chicken into deliciousness. The recipe is quick to which is nice on a weeknight and was on the table in no time leaving us a nice lunch of leftovers for the next day. (I used a whole chicken the I cut into a fairly standard 10 pieces – legs, thighs, wings, and cutting each half breast in half again to give four quarters of the breast meat – all left on the bone of course).

The technique in the recipe is one that is really useful and could be used in countless other ways, using the pan to sear, sauce and bake makes for easy cleanup (something I am not very good at).  The other reason the recipe sounded  so good to me was to achieve the apple flavor the recipe uses apple cider, apple brandy and apple cider vinegar and we already had some Ohio cider already sitting the in fridge as well as a bottle of Ohio’s own Tom’s Foolery Apple-Jack (recently made available here in Columbus at Weiland’s - where and enthusiastic clerk pointed it out to us and didn’t take any convincing on his part to take it home).

Tom’s Foolery Apple-Jack is an apple brandy made right here in Northeastern Ohio and the stuff is small batch (they say micro batch actually as they say it would take four years to maker the amount that small batch folks make).  Either way the stuff is fantastic (more fruity I would say than a calvados, but with the complexity and warmth you’d expect from a brandy) and finding out that there is another great local distiller is very exciting stuff and I am really pleased that Weiland’s down here in Columbus carries it (there aren’t too many places in Ohio to buy it – I think Weiland’s is the only place in Columbus).  Hopefully the trend of creating artisan spirits continues and people will continue to support the fantastic local liquor scene.

Ok so back to the chicken.  After about fifteen minutes cooking the chicken in the skillet, made the sauce by cooking the onions and scrapping up the fond from the chicken.  Next in goes some garlic, thyme, cider, the brandy and some diced apples, bring it to a quick boil and the chicken goes back in and into the hot 450 degree oven that crisps the chicken even more.  After the oven you finish the sauce with a bit more brandy and a teaspoon of apple cider vinegar.  The sauce is reminiscent of a good french onion soup (but applely) and was fantastic and worthy of eating on its own with a spoon.  Served it with some potatoes from the oven and some green beans that are easily prepared while the chicken is in the oven.  Forgot to take a picture of the results as we started to devour it so quickly, so the top picture is courtesy of Cooks Country.

So back to the ballpark in Cincy, in one of the fun interstate rivalary elements they cooked up for the weekend the ballpark was conducting a mustard taste off, Cincinnati Reds stadium’s Uncle Phil’s (more on that later) versus Bertman’s Ballpark Mustard. I am biased towards the Bertmans so I voted for that, but Uncle Phil’s was pretty good too. Neither were yellow mustard so I was happy to grab a dog before we sat down and I put some Uncle Phil’s on it and enjoyed the Indians win and the hot dog. Not sure who won the voting or if they even counted up the slips.

Interestingly enough I got home and looked up Uncle Phil’s and learned it doesn’t have much to do with Cincy and that it hasn’t been around for a long time as the Red’s mustard and it seems like for a year or two they stopped using it as the mustard – but it seems to be back.  According to this article the Red’s featured Uncle Phil’s for 6 and 1/2 seasons (see here).  And is made in Wisconsin.  Funny enough that Bertman’s is the one that is made nearby Cincy – kinda wonder why they don’t get into using that one.

Foodie Cart can be found at @freshstreet on Twitter or atFacebook.com/Foodie.Cart.

Anyway that’s not the point. I think I’ve mentioned but may not have that I love Plant Money an NPR podcast. They had a real interesting show on the economics of Lebron, including the conclusion that Lebron should not have gone to Miami (gasp).  Why?  Well Miami isn’t exactly a big city (compared to NY or Chicago) and to maximize happiness he should have gone to New York, in fact since they were so bad that he wouldn’t have to win for a while to make them happy – just being there would bring a lot of happiness for a large number of people.  Additionally putting all those stars together reduces the supply of stars and how much happiness they can provide (there is a limited amount of how much happiness the Heat can provide, presumably getting Wade and Bosh provides almost as much happiness as adding Lebron.

Anyway, check it out, a lot more interesting things about it (including the enjoyment rooting against someone may bring), check out some of their other pod casts (especially all the great episodes on Haiti – maybe you should check those out first actually.)

Lebronomics here and see planet moneys front page here

While I appreciate just a bit more crew stadium now and am glad the crew isn’t playing in front of 90,000 empty seats in Ohio Stadium, I do think in my fantasy world that the crew should move to a downtown stadium the spot I propose is next to Abbot Labs just east of North Fourth St. south of 670 – I don’t even know if that is feasible for any number of reasons, land owner, if the lot is big enough, etc, but from my window it looks to be and would replace a pretty empty field, but would set it close enough to share the arena district resources, court casual soccer fans and add a vibe to the game of having pre and post game options in bars/restaurants that are not really a factor at the State Fairgrounds location.

So I guess it sounds pretty ungrateful saying all this after being named #1 and having a stadium and a team in the first place, but don’t forget that #1 was for being first and  now despite being not so old I think some people might be able to realize some improvements, aside from the location, building an urban, small and compressed stadium would allow our loud fans to have more impact and create an environoment where I think casual fans could learn the game and grow the sport.

Anyway, I got a bit off topic, but I did think the Stadia magazine top 10 was interesting and you can read the whole issue online which is kinda longer and more indepth then I was expecting, ended up reading some articles on plenty of strange topics I hadn’t thought about.  See the latest issue here: Stadia latest

The Black & Gold Standard (crew blog) has the quick list of the top 10 here:

The Black & Gold Standard » Blog Archive » Stadia Magazine names Crew Stadium #1 stadium of the decade

“The Jewish Community Federation of Cleveland, the chief planning and fundraising agency for the region’s 80,000 Jews, is committing resources to a center designed to attract international talent and investment. It’s offering expertise, start-up funding and the prospect of an enticing location — its headquarters building on Playhouse Square.

When federation leaders decided in fall 2008 to move their staff and operations to Beachwood, they vowed to make a visible re-commitment to the city. That may be by saying “Welcome” to the world.” “

via Cleveland’s Jewish community wants to welcome the world | Metro – cleveland.com – cleveland.com.

Thought this was an interesting idea that the Jewish Community Federation of Cleveland is working towards in the wake of moving their headquarters out to the suburbs.  While these days immigration is a touchy subject, but in my mind it is mostly a good things and one of the reasons our country has thrived.  Cities like Ohio that have struggled could use very well new people with drive and ambition – this is both the highly qualified visa applicants for highly skilled positions but also others who are just looking for a better life.  Read about the plan to create a welcome center in the article above.

Bar Symon sits in a strip wall west of Cleveland in Avon Lake, honestly I can’t say I have a great sense where it is since I wasn’t driving and wasn’t paying too close attention to it, but its definitely a ways out there for a former east sider who when visiting Cleveland stays on the east side, so that said I don’t think I will be regularly getting out to this place but I was still excited to try it.

First impression, wow this isn’t the location I would have picked, but they do a nice job of taking the strip mall setting and making the rectangular shaped room have some vibe, including hanging some tin ceiling tiles dropped down from the tall industrial ceiling way up high. No reservations for less than 6 people so spent about 40 minutes grabbing a beer at the bar up front, nice selection of beers on tap, didn’t look at their drinks or wine.

To eat:
mint & lamb spicy sausage
duck confit slider
double cooked chicken wings
symon fried chicken
polenta (side dish)

the lamb & mint sausage was good, not phenomenal, probably would have chosen a different sausage myself, my friends choice and I think the reason I would have gone w another was the accompaniments were 3 mustards (including stadium mustard I think) and pickled veggies & toast rounds. I think this sausage would have worked well w/ some more greek or turkish type accompaniments, some yogurt sauce or something, it was fine but didn’t stand out to me. Nice presentation similar to the way they handle cured meats at his other places.

the duck confit slider was a favorite, small, good simple flavors, a bit of spiced mayo, cilantro and shredded carrot gave a nice asian angle, still nice duck flavor. I probably wouldn’t want more than one so its nice to order by the each as its rich.

the chicken wings sounded nice, but the top portion didn’t have the citrus & peppers on them as it seems to have settled, and overall these didn’t live up to my possibly unreasonably high expectations. I wish I hadn’t done two chicken dishes, I knew what I was getting into and did it anyway.

I ordered the fried chicken that comes with a honey drizzle of some sort was recommended by the waitress over some other things, since it was cheaper than the other options I suggested I was impressed she wasn’t up selling, it was without a doubt very good fried chicken, I could have gone for more of the honey drizzle or whatever it was, perfect texture, but still its fried chicken and I probably would go for other things in the future.
The side of polenta was good, maybe it stood out as the only non-meat dish, was simple, rich and had a nice flavor and texture.

Way too much food, the chicken serving is half a chicken. Overall the place is really affordable which is nice, and I may be the first to complain that they could use smaller servings (I know I could use some restraint) and that the place is trying to have homestyle food for what its worth.

I really like Lolita probably the most of Symon’s restaurants and visiting Bar Symon didn’t change that, still it was good, I just worry if Symon will follow Wolfgang Puck type expansion and lose control of his operations, that said if he can continue to do good places its good for Cleveland and Ohio to have him creating high quality options, even in strip malls.

Ohio Gov. Ted Strickland says the state could restore passenger rail service with $250 million in federal stimulus money.

Strickland’s administration released the estimate Friday. Trains would run along existing freight tracks connecting Cincinnati, Dayton, Columbus and Cleveland, with the eventual goal of making the service high speed.

The governor also estimates it would cost $10 million a year to operate the service, less than 1 percent of Ohio’s $7.6 billion, two-year transportation budget.

via WTTE FOX 28 – Ohio News.

As you may know I strongly support rail travel and I am hoping that the Governors plan to restart Ohio rail travel works.  One thing that people don’t seem to think about but that I read recently was the amount of state employee travel by car and how we could get some of them using rail.  I can attest that I would love to be able to travel this way, fire up my computer (hopefully with wifi) and get work done instead of billing the state for 5 hours of driving, doing some actual work.  Not sure how easy it would be to quantify this kind of information, but companies may also see a benefit here if they travel in state.  Of course we have problems as a lot of our cities sprawl and you would need easy public transport connections, but for a lot of us going downtown to downtown for meetings it would work great.