New Era Fine Fermentations in Tulsa

Okay so the name of this joint is pretty silly.  But I guess when you open something as specific as an all gluten-free brewery and restaurant you can call it whatever you want.   NEFF is located in downtown Tulsa and I was shocked/excited to see that it was pretty empty the night we strolled by on accounta everywhere else was jam-packed.

All the beers and food are gluten free which they accomplish by using quinoa*.    They have all the required flavors.

The place is standard warehouse turned brewery.

The chef/co-owner of the place was getting ready to shut down the kitchen but he was really nice and made us some fries.  He also gave us some soup on the house that was really good.  I should start a soup blog.  And why did I choose such a dirty menu to take a picture of?

Anyway for $4 this behemoth was delivered to us.  Soup bowl/hand for scale.

Holy cow!  That's enough fries for a naked pyramid of rugby players!  The pile was like 4 inches tall!

And they were really good.  They had sage (whatever that is) and garlic on them and oh my there were SO MANY.

I gotta tell ya every once in a while a place really stands out and not only were the people at NEFF super-friendly (even with us dragging a little kid in there) but the beer and fries were super.

This is what went back to the hotel with us.  Unbelievable.  DO IT.

*quinoa beers make you fart.  A lot.

The Gathering Place TULSA

A while back I went with the fam to this joint we Amy found online called The Gathering Place that was supposed to be amazing and FREE.  I didn't actually think they were also gonna have fries but they did so it was on!  This place is right on the riverfront and we managed to pick a weekend when Tulsa was basically getting flooded by the river.  Oops.

Amy was super smart by suggesting that we go on a Friday morning on accounta there probably would be less people.  She was right.  We had the place pretty much to ourselves for the first few hours.  It's kind of a hard joint to explain.  Imagine an amusement park/playground with no electricity.  All the fun stuff is done with action by humans.  Like paddle boats, water features that are operated by cranking and moving levers, hedge mazes, big pieces of interactive artwork, zip lines, stuff like that.  The playground climby stuff is all crazy too.  There's a platypus.

And cranes.

An elephant.

And castles (Grunion up at top right).

The Gathering Place is awesome.  And free.  You should do it.  There's a ton more stuff there too like a fancy restaurant and a museum but this is a fry blog yo.

Fries targeted.  Sorry the pic is blurry I was excited.  Did I mention the place also HAS BEER?  Noice.

$2.99 for this at a free amusement park?  Totally worth it.

They were those lightly battered frozen jobs.  Not too bad.

I liked them.  Especially with the Goose Island IPA.  DO IT.

P.S. I scared the crap out of the Grunion when he was coming down one of the slides.  Heh.

Sassy's Revisited

Ten years ago I checked out the fry offerings of this joint in Fayetteville.  Went back recently to check for any changes.  The patio is pretty sweet when the weather is nice.  I recommend it as the interior can seem claustrophobical.  Irish nachos with waffle fries as the base and pulled pork?  Yes please.  I should note that on Sundays you can get a $10 bottle of champagne with a carafe of OJ or cranberry juice (yuck) and pour your own mimosas.  Much better deal than the $2.50 single mimosas IMO.

Boom!

Solid execution of the American doctrine of excess!

The pulled pork is awesome and the waffle fries are perfect.

I got to this point and said to myself "I should stop eating now.  I can take these home for later."

So much good.  10 out of 10.  DO IT ON A SUNDAY.

P.S. I ate the whole damn thing.  I was so embarrassed. 

The Holler

Bentonville AR has kinda finally become like a real place you can hang out (see here).  It's only taken 146 years for that to happen, but whatever.  And what happens when a town finally becomes "cool"?  Exactly.  You need to have a dedicated indoor shuffleboard court joint that is part of a much larger farmer's market/deli/shared workspace/brewery/coffee shop/clothing store/juice bar/restaurant...oh let's cut the crap it's a hipster mall called 8th Street Market.

The place is what a hipster designed casino would look like.  Visually noisy and confusing.  I guess that's what young people like.

There was a group having a party there with some snackies.  Think they'll mind if I snag a few?

I was there for a bachelor party kinda thing but it was on a Thursday night so I couldn't get crazy but they had REALLY good beers on tap.  I had a Pseudo Sue by Toppling Goliath -good!
There's the shuffleboards.  Meh.

About 10 minutes in I noticed they had fries so here we go.  Obviously jumping on the retail trend of self checkouts, this joint makes you order your own stuff on a computer touchscreen.  I got the "Holler Style Fries" and an order of regular ones.

And here's what we got.  Oh I see.  Large orders come on a "larger" pan and regular/small orders come on a pan made for a baby.

I chose no onions on the Holler Style ones so I guess they got nervous and put the scallions on the side.  Heh.

The Holler Style ones were okay.  Not amazing.

The regular ones were much stronger.  Funny how some places never seem to get that just throwing a bunch of crap on your fries won't necessarily make them better.

I say no to the Holler Style Fries.

And yes to the regular ones.

And if you are a professional shuffleboard player I guess I can suggest this place.

For the Love of Pete JUST STOP!

I feel like the fast food corporate idea monsters are seeing my posts and creating more of these terrible things just to torture me at this point.  The latest abomination comes once again courtesy of the BK Lounge-Bacon Cheesy Tots.  This is what BK says they look like:

These boxes give me nightmares now.

Oh I see.  Little chunks of the stuff you use to batter the chicken nuggets.

Except you put a microscopic amount of the shredded cheese and bacon bits that fell off the prep counter onto the floor that have been swept up.

Even if these were made better, I can't see a fair amount of anything inside these.  You would be better off eating the two dollar bills that these cost.

Tastes like depression.

DO NOT DO.

Daytona Beach Revisited II

I've pretty much eaten fries at every place in Daytona Beach at this point, but I was able to create some newish experiences on this last trip.   I have been to Hidden Treasure Rum Bar & Grill several times and I have no idea why I have never done the fries there.  I was sure that I had but apparently not.  I was so sure I had done a review there that I didn't take that many pictures so all you get is this:

Good fries, okay amount, and the prices was decent considering you are sitting on the water.  I got kinda bored and decided to the leftover appetizers to create a unique new menu item for the joint.  I used the bread bowl from the buffalo chicken dip, some boneless wings, and the leftover fries to create what I call THE TODDLER'S DREAM.  I am a genius.  The waitress was not impressed.

Next we revisited the Daytona Taproom.  Still amazing.  This place is a must go if you are ever in DYB.  Sorry the picture is blurry.  I was shaking with excitement.

The burger I got was DEEP FRIED.  Unbelievable.

Still DO IT.

My parents wanted to take us to a fancy schmancy joint one night so off we went to the Chart House.  Heh.  Sounds like Shart House.  It's a chain, but fancy.

This place is part of a big marina with lotsa boats so the decor is nautical.  Kinda looks like a cruise ship dining room.

The place reeked of rope.  The manager told me that indeed they had just replaced all the rope the week before.  Lucky us.

Whoa...fancy!

My folks like this place on accounta its got a huge salad bar which also has caviar.  I tried it.  It was ok.  Got me thinkin there are probably caviar fries somewhere (probably Russia).  Gross.

Chachie ate A CRAPLOAD of caviar while drinking a pina colada like a boss.  He said the pina coladas there were good and I think he drank three.

I got fish and chips, cause I didn't want to seem unfancy and order a side order.  They gave me a ton of fries though.  The picture doesn't really do the amount justice.

Frozen, but cooked perfectly and attended to nicely with garlic, parsley, and a smidgen of clarified butter.  Nice.

$22 for the salad bar and the fish and chips.  I'd say worth it overall.  Plus it was only 900 calories so I probably lost 2 or 3 pounds while we were there!