Original Joes - November 13th

Original Joe's - November 13th

In case you've been living under a rock, or just haven't been privy to all the new and exciting happenings in Fort McMurray, we have a new Restaurant & Bar in Fort McMurray.. Original Joe's! The newest dining location is located at  8406 Franklin Avenue in the Save-On parking lot.

If you haven't been to an Original Joe's before, I highly recommend you do. They feature a lot of different beer on tap, as well as a lot of great pub food.

Original Joe's had their official opening on November 11th, from what I read on that day, the service was great, the food was great and the beer was cold and delicious. One of the hardest things to do on an opening day is stay consistent with all of these things.

I decided to check out the newest place for food and drink today during lunch. Finding a spot to park in a parking lot that is home to a grocery store, liquor store, a soon to open coffee franchise and now a restaurant and bar can be a bit tricky and I would say this is going to cause more headaches than previously thought.

Walking in, the deep brown decor was warm and comforting. Nothing was over the top or flashy. Tasteful would be a great word to describe it. There was a lot of seating and plenty of TVs along the walls.

For a starter I went with the Greek garlic wings. Now just a heads up, I did not take pictures of my meal so I am "borrowing" these photos from the originaljoes.ca website.

This photo isn't of the Greek style wings but you get the idea.. Wings! The flavor was pretty great and the wings were cooked perfectly. They offer the usual suspects as well but next time, I will certainly be back to try Dill Pickle flavour.

For my main I got the Double Dog.

I do have a tendency of making a mess while eating food, so thankfully this hotdog was wrapped for my eating safety. When you order this, or any other burgers or sandwiches, you get two sides; I went with the honey slaw (cole slaw with a dash of honey) as well as the potato salad (which had real bacon in it). Everything about this meal was phenomenal.

I would like to point out that our service was fantastic, especially seeing how busy the place seemed, it looked like it was running perfectly smoothly. Kudos to the well trained staff. Everyone appeared to be seasoned pros and it was quite refreshing to say the least.

Original Joe's is a great place to go for a good meal and a hearty drink. They have about a bajillion (okay less than that.. but a lot!) of different beer on tap including their own line of beer. Check out some of the beer they have on tap here: http://www.originaljoes.ca/meetourgirls

Hopefully you all enjoyed the same experience I had. Let me know what you think!

@ymmfoodcritic
Eric

The Fish Place - The Other Side of the Table

A new feature we are rolling out here on the YMM food critic is quite simply someone elses' take on the restaurant. I normally do not dine alone and I'm welcoming anyone who does dine with me to blog the same restaurant and add in their impression. For the First one we have Fiona (@fimango) with her impression on the Fish Place. Enjoy!

Like Eric (@ymmfoodcritic), I too have lived in Fort McMurray for over a decade and haven’t had the pleasure of stopping in at The Fish Place for a meal. Unlike Eric, I love seafood, so I was quite excited to give it a try! In a typical foodie manner, I googled the restaurant before heading there to check out the menu. To my surprise, they don’t have a website, and urban spoon’s website only had three reviews on the restaurant, none of which were detailed or helpful. Their rating, based on 51 people’s votes, was an overall 72% of people “liking it.”

So walking into the clearly East coast-inspired restaurant, I had no idea what to expect. The walls were a cheerful sunshine yellow color and the tables a blue and sandy yellow décor with wooden floors. We were greeted with a cheerful smile and a Newfoundland dialect that, living in Fort McMurray for so long, I’ve become familiar with and have come to love. After being seated in the lively restaurant and getting our drinks, we ordered the alligator appetizer and the Cajun shrimp and mahi-mahi for our entrees.

The Louisiana Gator, at $10.99, was sautéed in a creamed whisky sauce and came with about six pieces of meat, a lemon slice, two pieces of garlic toast and the parsley garnish. Gator meat is extremely low in fat compared to other meats which makes the texture a little tougher and harder to chew than the beef that we’re all too familiar with in Alberta. Because of this, I appreciated the fact that the gator was pre-cut into small, bite-sized pieces. I found the sauce was a bit too salty for my taste, and while quite delicious otherwise, it seemed to overpower the very subtle, natural taste of the gator.This wasn’t my first time trying alligator and for those who haven’t tried it, it doesn’t “taste like chicken” despite what you might have been told.  For a few bites, I ended up just scraping away the sauce so I could taste the actual essence of gator meat.

The shrimp Eric ordered was off the lunch menu and, at $15.99, was described as a New Orleans-style Cajun Shrimp and came with either rice or pasta; Eric opted for the short-grained rice . Cajun cuisine is indigenous to the Acadian region of the USA, namely Louisiana, and is typically seasoned with black or cayenne pepper, neither of which was prominent in this dish. , There was no heat or complexity to the dish at all, and I don’t think either Eric or I were too impressed with the plate. A couple notable redeeming qualities to mention though: The sauce appeared to be house-made (so it wasn’t just an opened jar of Ragu tomato pasta sauce, although it tasted suspiciously similar), and the number of shrimp in the dish was impressive. There was a lot! Portion size was definitely impressive for both main dishes.

The Cajun mahi mahi topped with pineapple salsa that I ordered was off the specials menu for $20.99. The presentation included slices of carrot and parsnip, a baked potato, slice of orange, sprig of parsley and the fish. The main part of the dish was awesome; I don’t have a single negative thing to say about the mahi mahi--the heat from the Cajun spices gently lingered in my mouth, wasn’t overpowering, and I was able to appreciate the complexity of the spices and still taste the fish. The meat itself was perfectly cooked – nicely browned on the outside, and the flesh inside was flaky and extremely moist. Moving away from the fish, I was pleasantly surprised to see the parsnip on my plate! I feel it’s an extremely unappreciated, underused vegetable that tastes great! The pineapple salsa was made of pineapples, red peppers, red onion and tiny bits of green pepper or jalapeño (cut too small for me to differentiate). It had the perfect amount of sour zing with a dash of salt and a bit of sweetness.

While we were there, Eric tweeted that we were at the fish place, and a fellow tweeter suggested we try the cheesecake. We had two choices: either Key lime or French vanilla. We went with the French vanilla, and the no-bake cheesecake came with whipped cream and strawberries on top. The vanilla flavor wasn’t pronounced, but I did appreciate that the cheese cake had a whipped texture and was actually more of a cheesecake flavored mousse than the American New York style cheesecake I’ve come to expect. Nevertheless, it was quite tasty! Thanks for the tip Melissa! (@BellyDancinGeek)

As for the service, throughout our meal, we were very well taken care of. It was a fairly busy Saturday afternoon, but the service was extremely prompt. Our server came by multiple times, always with a smile on her face, to ask us how we were doing, to refill our drinks and to take away empty dishes. All in all, while I didn’t absolutely love the food, the service was awesome! I've always been an avid supporter of independently-owned restaurants like The Fish Place so I wouldn’t mind visiting again and seeing what else their menu has to offer!

 
Thanks for stopping by and I hope you enjoyed reading my take on The Fish Place.

Fiona (@fimango) 

p.s. Special mention to James who was kind enough to quickly do the blog edit. Thank you!

The Fish Place - May 12 2012

I've more or less been a resident of Fort McMurray for the past 12 years and I will have to admit this was my first time going to The Fish Place. I'm not one for fish, nor am I one for places that fish is what the place is all about. I decided to bite the bullet and see for myself why this part of Fort McMurray's food culture has been thriving and see what I've been missing.

I didn't end up taking pictures of the interior but I will admit I found it very fitting, in a good way. The name of the restaurant resonates throughout the whole restaurant. Lobster traps, nautical upholstery on the bench seats and the tables too. I really enjoyed this aspect of it.

The servers were friendly and despite how busy this place was on a Saturday afternoon we were well looked after.

For starters we went with the Alligator. Now I've never had alligator before so I wasn't too sure what to expect. the meat itself isn't bad and the sauce it was served in was good but for a guy who's all about pub food it was certainly a change of taste. Paired with the garlic bread and it turned into a great way to start off lunch.

For my meal I ordered off the lunch menu and got the New Orleans style Cajun Shrimp on Rice. What I was anticipating was something that was spicy, a little bit of heat and what I got was this:

Now if they said it was Italian, then yeah I wouldn't have ordered it but I would have at least understood what this was trying to be. This looked and tasted like it came out of a spaghetti sauce bottle. There was no hint of cajun spice that I was anticipating . Fiona (@fimango) on the other hand got the Mahi Mahi with pineapple salsa:

And for a guy that doesn't like fish, I absolutely loved this. I would recommend this meal in a heart beat. The fish was done perfectly and was moist, full of flavour and extremely appealing.
While dining, I mentioned on twitter that I was here for lunch and Melissa (@BellydancinGeek) recommended the cheese cake for dessert, let me just say this was awesome.

 While my main course wasn't what I was expecting nor was it all that appealing, everything else that we had made up for it. I recommend the Mahi Mahi and I recommend the cheese cake. If you're feeling adventurous try the alligator but unless you're a fan of italian cajun shrimp I would stay clear of the New Orleans Cajun shrimp. I would most certainly come back and try more items off of the menu. It was a pleasant experience and I can really see why this place has been a main stay in Fort McMurray.


Side Note: I'm going to try to do more blogging in the future. Make sure to follow me on twitter: http://www.twitter.com/ymmfoodcritic or on my personal account http://www.twitter.com/twentynineyears

Atmosfere Feb 9 2012

Today for lunch @daveenwood and I were going to go to Ms. B's. We even had a discussion about how much it makes no sense for a "Newfie" restaurant wouldn't sell toutants. it's not rocket sciene m'son. ANYWAYS, the place has the worst parking ever. Actually, all of Fort McMurray has the worst parking ever. We couldn't find a spot so we drove around and parked on the side of the road, right in front of Atmosfere. This place is located by the bingo hall, longshots, Ms. B's and Tavern on Main. We've heard things about this place, mostly about the 3 course dinner and how expensive the place was. We had to check it out for ourselves:

I must admit, it looks pretty classy going in. Dave and I were by far the most under dressed patrons. Most of the people here were in suits and dressy clothes. Dave was rocking his Nightmare before Christmas shirt and I was in my typical get up; vest toque and a beard.

This place looks great inside, the seating is elegant the decor matches the mood. It all works. I was checking out the menu though and saw something that threw me for a loop. I actually laughed out loud about this:

The biggest couple in the world of teen fluff vampire series at the top. When we were paying I asked what was up with that and I was told that the person who designed the menu had no idea who they were and thought that it was just a couple of models. 

For starters we got the vegetable samosas and the bruschetta. I must say that not only did these taste extremely delightful but the presentation was perfect too:

For our meals Dave went with the blackened chicken panino with fries and I went with the  Capocollo ham panino. I'm not a fan of Capocollo but I wanted to try it again. I'm not happy I went with it. I can't say I won't recommend it because I'm generally not a fan of the meat so anyone who likes the meat I'm sure would love it. It was a beautiful looking panino though:

The Caesar salad was great they used actual back and it complimented the salad quite nicely. 

With desert the bill came to about 70 dollars. that's 2 3 course meals. That's not bad at all and the dinner menu offers some great options for the 3 course meals but they also offer separate things on their menu if you don't want to go with the 3 course meal. I highly recommend Atmosfere and I am certain that I will be going there sometime in the near future. 

Also it's nice to see another restaurant catering to a more sophisticated envirnoment. It's not just the keg folks.

Gino's

It's my brother's birthday today so I decided to be the greatest guy in the world and let him take me out for dinner tonight. Since BP's was closed for their staff party we decided on Gino's. Gino's is a pub connected to McRays. It's close to Westwood High School and the Black Horse pub up in Thickwood.

I ordered Steak and bacon wrapped scallops for the price of 23 big ones. I requested a bowl of cream of broccoli soup for a starter and I was informed later that they were all out. So I went with a caeser salad.

For pub food this turned out to be really good. But then I remember that this is attached to a restaurant and if I was on the other side of the building I wouldn't have been too impressed. I did sit on the pub side so I was content with what I was eating though. The steak was cooked as I asked, the seasoning was light but it was enough. The scallops and bacon were great, how could they not be great? The caeser salad was passable and wasn't too bad. The dressing wasn't heavy. The garlic toast wasn't that flavoured and a tad dry. The real issue I had on the plate was the vegetables. Now don't get me wrong, I'm not anti vegetable but when what I am being offered is frozen vegetables from a bag that's thrown in a microwave and added to my dish I am not down for that. I think I have that exact medley of frozen vegetables in my freezer and I haven't taken them out because it's gross. 

I was sitting at the table thinking about how I was going to recommend this place. Our server was great, it was casual and I had a really good time. The wait for food wasn't too long and everyone at my table seemed to enjoy their meal. I was ready to cross the t's and dot the i's on a positive review and then I came across this:

That my friends is a hair in my drink. 

I'm not a big debbie downer when there is food in my hair, but I am a debbie downer when there is hair in my food. I drank the majority of this before I realized there was hair in my drink. I'm not repulsed by it or anything I just feel it's completely avoidable. 

For the most part the meal I had was good for pub food. Not great, but when you are at a pub you're not expecting high end food. I wouldn't have ordered this on the other side and enjoyed it as much though. Besides the mishap with the hair in my drink I had good service. I've had poor service before here and it's spotty in that regards but tonight, she was awesome.

Side note: We've had 2 tweetups at Gino's. I've been loaded for both of them.

Hearthstone Grille (Sawridge)

I just want to point something out. I started this blog because I made a comment about the food I ate one day on twitter. I was complaining about the buffet I had at the Hearthstone Grille and I had someone people say it was good and others not so much but mostly I heard people telling me to write a blog about my food experiences. I hummed and hawed for about 20 minutes and then made one. So because of my poor experience at the Hearthstone Grille this blog now exists.. So thank you?

The Hearthstone Grille is located in the Sawridge hotel up in Gregoire. The setting is a really opened area for dining which is really nice. The decor is subtle and not overwhelming. One thing I must say though is it takes away from an intimate feeling you might be looking for when you go out for a meal. I flew solo today so that wasn't that big of a deal.

I was greeted as soon as I walked in and was seated right away. As I was sitting down my drink order was placed. I was handed my drink but no menu. 1 minute passes, 2 minutes, 5 minutes.. It wasn't until 10 minutes of me sitting there did someone come up to me and ask if I was getting the buffet or would I like a menu. You would think that if I wanted the buffet I would have already helped myself.. but I guess they should ask just in case I was too shy to go out without being asked what I wanted to do first.

Going through their lunch menu I decided to go with the Grilled Chicken and Brie Panini Sandwich:

You can already tell that the bread used in the sandwich is dry. It's cracked. It seemed like it was old bread or that it was over cooked in the panini press. Not only that but the only flavour from the sandwich came from the amazing brie. You can't go wrong with brie. The portabella mushrooms were good too. The chicken wasn't seasoned and it was extremely dry. With the combination of dry bread and dry chicken this wasn't the easiest sandwich I've ever eaten. The sweet potato fries were decent but didn't save the meal.

While they were slow to give me the menu, they were quick with the bill. That sandwich was $15.00 and with my drink and taxes it was like 18 something. I didn't have any change so I gave her a 6 dollar tip. I regret this. I'm all about tipping for good food and good service but when it's bad on both ends of the dining experience how does one tip? I'm too kind hearted in nature to not tip.

So in conclusion, this is the 2nd time in 3 months I've eaten at the Hearthstone Grille and it's the 2nd time I was not enthused about what was presented to me and what I ate. Do not go to the Sawridge, it's not worth all you can eat cupcakes.

Best and Worst of 2011

So I've only been doing this blog for less than 2 months.. but it's the end of the year so I decided to give the best and worst of what I experienced while blogging the dining experiences of Fort McMurray.

                                                                        The Best thing I ate:
                                                          Clubhouse with Poutine at Table 63

I don't know if it was the overwhelming positive changes the restaurant made with it's renovations but when I dined at Table 63 I was impressed with not only the new decor but also this Clubhouse with Beer Battered Fries Poutine. The sandwich was one of the best clubhouses I have ever eaten in my 29 years of living.  The poutine was amazing. I do have to say this though, I went back and had the clubhouse since I did the blog and it wasn't nearly as good as the first time I had it there. I don't know if it was a different cook or maybe I wasn't as hungry as I was then but it was lacking.. something. I would still recommend trying your luck on it. I'm probably going to try one more time to ensure if it's the real deal or I just lucked out one time.

                                               What I ate 10-20 times in the past 2 months:
                                                         Wor Won Ton at Frontier Dining

I know this probably isn't the greatest bowl of wor won ton soup known to man. But it certainly is the best bowl of wor won ton known to me. And since I am famous (Fort McMurray Today did a profile on me.. yes I will be doing an autograph session at the next restaurant I am attending) that counts for something. Remember, add hot sauce to it to make this great dish even more amazing.

                                                                      Worst thing I ate:

                                                        Firecracker Stirfry from Wok Box

This was a horrible horrible dish. If you can't continue eating and then go to a Mcdonald's to get something thats BETTER than what you just ate, then there's your review right there. Wok Box tries to give you something unique and always comes up short and bland. Avoid at all costs

Best Service in Fort McMurray:

LONGSHOTS

I've drank and dined at this bar on numerous occasions and not only has the food been great (best thing I've had so far would be the Longshots Burger) but the service has always been amazing here. Friendly staff, very fun atmosphere, and just the ideal place to go out, have great pub food and have a few cold ones with your friends. I always know I'm going to have a good time if I know I am going to Longshots. My only recommendation is this: If you're going to try Poutine Wings or the Hot Chocolate Wings just remember just because you like them all separate, combined isn't always going to equal the same response. 

I think that's going to wrap up my Best and Worst of 2011. Check back into 2012 where I will be experiencing other locales in Fort McMurray. Please leave a comment and suggest on places I should try out. 

Remember, Be well, and eat even better.

Mucho Burrito

I decided to check out Mucho Burrito today for lunch.
It's located down in the same area as Wok Box and Source Adult.

This is the newest restaurant/fast food in town. This is a franchise that has locations in Canada, the United States and other countries over the world.

As you can tell by the name of the franchise this is based around Mexican cuisine. Now I know we have a taco bell (which is the worst) and we also have a taco time (which is almost as bad as taco bell) so it's nice to see a place that boasts fresh daily salsas and other fresh ingredients.

At 1pm this place was pretty busy, there was a line up of about 8 people ahead of us. I'm trying to figure out if it's busy because it's new of if it's busy because of the food. The people working the counter were polite, quick and friendly. This is something I haven't seen in a fast food place in a long time. With the 8 people ahead of us it didn't take too long for me to place my order. I got a Burrito. Yeah I know.. real original. I had rice and vegetables and I could have had beans, and then for your protein your options are sausage, steak, chicken, some sort of fish. I went with the chicken. Now for salsa (WHICH IS FRESH!) I had a corn based salsa with some hot salsa thrown in. Add some cheese, sour cream, fresh cilantro, jalapenos and BOOM you got yourself lunch baby.

For 12 dollars I had this burrito and a bottle of Diet Dr. Pepper. Now I need to say Guacamole is an extra dollar but it's worth it. So much flavour, heat, and freshness in this meal.

The service was quick, the place was clean, the food is great. It's worth more than you'd pay at McDonald's and is there any other fast food place in town boasting fresh?

Check this place out I highly recommend it. I only hope that this place continues to stay busy and doesn't lose customers as it becomes part of the Fort McMurray foodsphere.

The Islander - December 14th

I decided to check out the Islander today for lunch.

The Islander is located up in Gregoire in the same group of buildings that The Experts (formerly Pizza Experts) and Frontier Dining are located in.

And as you can see they have a lunch buffet. Now I had a hard time deciding if I should do a blog on chinese buffet food. I asked several of my coworkers who more or less pointed out that buffet food isn't the best food that a place would offer. This is very true. You can't argue buffet food would be on the same page as their regular menu, the food is out under heat lamps, being mauled by every hungry customer who wants just a little bit more, just a little bit more.  It was actually my brother @daveenwood who said that the point of the blog is to suggest food, so in this case, would I suggest the buffet from The Islander? It was with this sense of understanding what this blog is capable of that I decided that yes, I will try the buffet.

Now if you've never been to the Islander, you'll be almost confused by the decor as the decor in Frontier Dining.. I totally get it's Christmas, and there are lights and what not for being festive, but they also have a huge TV on the end of the bar area with sports on it. Today was Tennis. Now I don't know about you or your Aunt June, but whenever I go to a Chinese restaurant I'm not going to catch up on the latest tennis match. Also green? Is it needed? No. I don't ever envision the person who was moving into this location to pick this decor as the best way to exemplify their vision.

This place was much busier than I anticipated but I am assuming with a buffet most places are busier than they deserve to be. The service was surprisingly not bad considering it was one person manning the whole front end. Some places (frontier dining) could really learn from this. I am not saying tending to patrons is an easy task but it seems like this guy actually puts in an effort and I commend him for it.

Okay anyways, to the food!

It was a fairly typical Chinese layout for a buffet. There was a few soups, about 12 hot dishes and a small selection of desserts. The food was pretty good considering it was a buffet, and the only real complaint I had was the rice was crunchy at times. I don't know if it was because it was over cooked or under cooked. I am not a rice wizard who can magically make rice so I don't know how it's made I can only assume it wasn't cooked to the right level of awesomeness. Can you honestly go wrong with deep fried food? Well in a healthy eating situation yeah but.. still..  One thing that was curiously not on the buffet spread was Chicken balls. I'm not a fan of chicken balls so it wasn't something I was going to frown about but it's still kinda odd. They push chicken balls in every other Chinese place.. but not here I guess.

The highlights on the buffet was the sweet and sour chicken stuff. I would also like to note that the desserts were more or less store bought. This is understandable as well seeing that I've never heard of a Chinese Restaurant specializing in desserts. But guess what, Seriously guess! I'll wait.. Nope you were wrong. They had lime jello! I rocked out on that stuff. Speaking of rocking out. They had quite the eclectic mix playing. Chinese music, and Billy Joel? Don't mind if I do.

When it comes down to it, the food wasn't bad, the place looks pretty messed up they were missing some  classic western Chinese staples and they ruined the rice.. I would recommend this place regardless of these mishaps. The price wasn't bad either.

So check it out or don't. I'm on the fence with this experience. I wish I was more decisive. Would I go back again? Yeah probably but it'll be a long long time until I do that again.

Aurora Bar & Grill - Dec 6

Today I was meeting up with an old co worker for lunch, he suggested to go to the Aurora Bar & Grill and since I haven't reviewed there yet it made sense to go check it out.

The restaurant is located at the  Radisson hotel up in Gregoire. It's across the street from the Mcdonald's and beside the United Furniture. Like most places in this great great city of Fort McMurray, parking isn't always the best but there is plenty of parking along the sides or in the back.

The place isn't the most well lit and while the decor is tasteful it's also fairly bland. There isn't anything that really draws your eyes except for maybe the stained glass but even that seems a little drab.
Mind you from the picture that they use on their website it looks a lot better than how I took it.

Taken from http://www.radisson.com/fort-mcmurray-hotel-ab-t9h4k7/abftmcmu/dinings

Mind you I don't think they had this much lighting on the go or that they were trying to make the place look elegant today when I walked in.

The service wasn't bad, but that could have depended on the fact that we were one of the only two tables that had people there at 1pm. I'm going to assume that this place doesn't get too busy at all, but that's an assumption. I've been there once on a friday and I think they have a fish special and there was more people there but that was also about 5 months ago so what do I know? I suppose I could have asked how busy they got but I am shy goddamnit. 

I decided on copying Josh and got the Angus Burger with fries and gravy. 

Now I wouldn't expect a restaurant in a hotel to make their own patties and obviously I was correct in this assumption. I'm always iffy on ordering a burger. When it's freshly made juicy is awesome. When it's frozen, juicy doesn't really work. The texture doesn't really come together and it becomes fairly unappealing if you're paying attention to what you're eating. The fries were okay, but honestly it's pretty much impossible to screw up fries. The gravy is run of the mill. Nothing in this meal was over all appealing, although it wasn't horrible either. Just like the decor, it works but nothing really stands out.

To sum up the experience I had at Aurora Bar & Grill, the place isn't memorable. I seriously had to google to get the actual name right and I had to text Josh to find out what we ordered. I know I can be forgetful but I think if anything really stood out I would have remembered something.

Sidenote: This place used to be Fog and Suds, which was one of the first places in town that offered the Tower of beer. They also had beer from all over the world, it was kinda a neat idea. Obviously it didn't work out though and now we are left with a very bland restaurant in it's place. And I wondered if this place ever got busy? I think I figured out my own question.

Longshots November 30th

I've heard rumblings on twitter and from word of mouth that there was a place in town that served Poutine Wings.. Yes, gravy, cheese, and fried chicken wings. This place is Longshots. This is the reason behind my adventure. I must try these wings.

If you haven't been to Longshots before it's across the street from the Bridgeport Inn down town, close to Mrs. B's (I'll do a review of that place sometime I'm sure). This place is a sports bar, and it's a Rough Rider fan's place to be come game time..

I've been to this pub many times, and every single time I have had great service. The staff is friendly, sociable and make you feel like this is a place where your business is wanted and appreciated. A few weeks back we had a tweetup at this pub, they reserved a section for us and we had a great time. Well, I had a great time. I got extremely intoxicated and danced. There's video somewhere online of this.

But this post is not about me tapping my toes while intoxicated. It's about food!
So I ordered the Poutine Wings and since I didn't feel right rating just wings I also ordered a clubhouse with a Potato and Bacon cream soup.

Okay, the waitress wouldn't say that these taste good, only that they were different. This is the best way to describe it. Gravy? Good! Cheese? Yes Please!! Wings? Yep! Gravy, cheese and wings? NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO. It doesn't work. I applaud the attempt of thinking outside the box but it should be put back in the box, sealed, and stored away in a terrible memory. I talked to Nolan afterwards (we are all on a first name basis or nickname on this blog now keep up) and he said the Salt and Pepper is the way to go or their Rough Riders wings which are concocted with some sort of hot sauce I am going to assume is green.

The clubhouse was good.. I talked to Alex and David about this. It's rare you'll find an amazing clubhouse (I DID AT TABLE 63!!) It's either good or processed. This was good. It filled the right spot and I would order it again for the sake of knowing I'm getting something that isn't terrible. Now the highlight of the night was the soup. Cream of Potato and Bacon. This was the best thing I ate tonight. It filled the void I had from working in the cold today and it really warmed me up. There's something nostalgic about a cream based soup, especially in winter time.

Longshots is a great pub, I would honestly say for the atmosphere, food, and general good times this is one of the better spots to go for a bite to eat and a pint of your favourite Ale (bud light here, so if you see me you already know what I like to drink and yes I'll have one. Thanks for offering.)

I like the idea of going outside of the standard presentations of chicken wings but Poutine Wings fell flat, the clubhouse wasn't processed so it was good but not amazing and the potato and bacon soup was the highlight.

Sidenote: While most places in town celebrate wing Wednesday Longshots doesn't. They use Sunday as that special day of fried goodness. Also before Longshots came to be the location housed a steak house that was named Cedars.

Table 63 - November 24

For lunch today I went to Table 63 which is located at the Quality Hotel. Now I've been in Fort McMurray for a while now and I've been to this restaurant when it was a different name, and when it was a changed name. It always looked the same, but had the same poor food. I was hoping to see some sort of improvement and I was blown away. They have transformed the restaurant with a whole new renovation. It looks classy, it's open, sophisticated and a real attempt to bring some class to the hotel. I must say that an issue I had when I first went is I wasn't sure if I was to wait to be seated or to just seat myself. What I did after waiting at the front was I stood at a table until she said I could sit there.

They have a lunch buffet on I think every week day but I decided against it. I would also like to mention that the buffet they do have there is much smaller than the saw ridge's but I cannot tell you what was served or how it tasted. What I can tell you is they removed the bathrooms and opened up that area and the whole restaurant looks amazing.

I decided for something simple. Clubhouse on whole wheat with a poutine.

The fries are dipped in beer batter and are absolutely amazing. The clubhouse has to be one of the best I've ever had in my lifetime of clubhouses. I cannot explain to you in every precise detail how much I loved this sandwich fry combination. I was in food heaven. I've had clubhouses that have been horrible and fries that you need to drown in ketchup to get through but this here, this was enjoyable from the beginning to the end. My bill was over 20 dollars. I know that the sandwich with fries was supposed to be about 13 dollars but I think they charged me for a poutine and then a pop which seems kinda odd.. it should have been an extra dollar or two at the most on the sandwich but it wasn't.

It was still worth it though. This is the first meal I've had since I started this blog that I can sit here and fully say I loved it. I loved the restaurant, the food, the atmosphere, everything.  Go check out Table 63, try the fries and eat the clubhouse, I promise you that you'll love it. If you don't you're no friend of mine mister.

Side note: I used to work at the Quality when it was called the Mackenzie Park Inn. I was a front desk supervisor and I was totally awesome. 

Wok Box - November 23rd and delivery from Boston Pizza Timberlea

Today for lunch I went down to the Wok Box. In case you're not aware of the location it is down in the business corner like across the street from Keyano. It's also right beside Adult Source Video (where I worked for a couple of days a long long time ago). When I walked in I saw a poster they have pushing some new food to try. The poster was colorful, and eye catching so I decided to try the Firecracker Stirfry.

(picture taken from http://www.wokbox.ca)

I have to tell you, I've had okay food from Wok Box (butter chicken), I've had great food at Wok Box (mongolian beef) and now I can say I've had horrible food (firecracker stirfry).

The sauce is very spicy, hence the term firecracker and it's something I did enjoy out of it. It has pieces of bacon (poorly cooked and not really appealing) and chinese sausage (quite tasteless). The issue I have with this meal was the green stuff in it. I don't know if that's kim chee. Is it? If that's not Kim Chee then  I am going to classify as seaweed (it tasted salt watery and disgusting). There was something else in my meal that Sean said was Kim Chee and it was cold and horrible to have in a mouthful of hot spicy noodles.

I ate less than half my meal and when we were driving up to work we went to the McDonald's drive through and I had a quarter pounder with cheese and bacon and nothing else on it and I want to tell you I don't know if it was because of my previous poor food choice but that hamburger was simply amazing. AMAZING!

I am on the fence with the wok box. I appreciate what they are trying to do with their menu, it's broad in it's options which can be a good thing but I've found it more often than not missing the ideal mark. If the food you are looking for is authentic then you came to the wrong place. If you want something that's a knock off, then this is up your ally. If you've only experienced butter chicken from wok box you honestly have no idea how amazing it is and what you really are missing.

Now tonight we ordered Boston Pizza for supper.

I'm not going to get into what the food tasted like (it was okay, never amazing, but serviceable). What I want to talk about is how they have a hard time getting the order right. After Megan read back the order to me and I confirmed it with her she still punched it in as 1 chicken fingers when 2 orders was placed, also I ordered a salad to go with my hamburger and it came with just the burger. No fries, salad, no note telling me to go fuck myself. NOTHING. Also, the delivery was about an hour. I've had worst times but it seems the bare minimum for delivery is an hour.

Unfortunately when it comes to delivery there aren't as many options as there is to eat out. I didn't want to dedicate a full blog to delivery food but I mean it's not always bad to get food delivered. While waiting I watched hockey, ran on the treadmill, and talked about sports and music with my good friend Steve. 

If you want to try the Wok Box, I'm not saying don't try it, just please avoid the Firecracker Stirfry and the butter chicken and if you're doing the delivery route with Boston Pizza read back the order, ensure it's right and be prepared to be waiting for at least an hour.

Side note: The location that is the Wok Box used to be 2 different bars, one of which hosted open mic nights about 10 years ago. Does anyone remember the names of those bars? 

Frontier Dining - November 16th

I get an hour long lunch break. Now I know some of you are dying to have an hour long lunch break, or some already have them and like them. Me personally? I hate them. If I bring a lunch, I am done eating within 20 minutes and then I have 40 minutes to kill. My work place doesn't have a lunch room or anywhere to really go and relax. So I have to go out for lunches.

Today I went to: Frontier Dining!

Yes, this is the place that is a "steakhouse with Chinese cuisine" They seriously need a different name, different place mats, different decor. If one restaurant was able to get a restaurant makeover I would submit Frontier Dining.

I ordered a small Wor Won ton. Now even though it the title has small in it, it's a meal:

Besides the typical won tons, you get pork, chicken, shrimp bokchoy, some noodle things and a whole lot of flavor. Heres a great idea: Get some hot sauce to go with it. It will blow your mind. I absolutely LOVE this wonton. I will admit I am not a connoisseur when it comes to won tons, but I know what I like and I like this.

The soup and a glass of pop was like $16.00 which isn't on the cheap end of lunch but I mean you go get a sandwich somewhere else it'll cost you like 10 bucks. This soup really hits the spot on a cold day. I cannot recommend it enough.

The service was good, they don't seem to be pushy but they also never come by to check if everything's okay with the food or if you need another drink. Which could be a good thing seeing how so it's not free refills on the pop.

So while the decor is to be desired, the name of the place should be changed, and the service while adequate could be more conscientious of the patrons, the wor won ton soup is worth it all.

Sidenote: Frontier Dining was one of the very last restaurants to give into the no smoking policy. Want to know other ones? OJ's and Dairy Queen. Yeah, Dairy Queen.

Moxies - November 10th

I got off of work and it was decided my friends and I wanted to go out, have a meal, and get drunk.
This is what we did.
The place that we went to was Moxies. In case you haven't gone down to Moxies since they have done their renovations I recommend you do. The atmosphere in the lounge area is great, the lighting is great, the seating makes sense, it just works.
Our server was Jasmine, and she was super nice, pretty quick with our drinks and just someone who looked after us fairly well.
David went with his usual chicken tenders and beef vindaloo, Al went with chicken fingers and fries, Bill did fish and chips, Spank had the beef dip, and Rojo had dry ribs. Now before I get into my meal I just want to say that spank gave his beef dip a 4 spanks out of 10. And Rojo said that the dry ribs while had a lot of meat on them weren't salted enough for him.
Moxies has a holiday feature menu that ends in late December so I decided to try a starter from that. I got the Lettuce Wraps:

As Spank pointed out, it looked like I was given a head of lettuce. Now I've never had a lettuce wrap before but I was really looking forward to trying something new. The chicken and noodles were spicy and had a lot of flavour which was great to see. The only issue I have with this starter is that it's extremely messy. I ended up having the sauce spill out of my wrap, over my hands and the table. I know, classy right? I asked for some moist towelettes and Jasmine was great and hooked me up with 4! 

For my starter I went with something I normally wouldn't order. I got the Citrus Chicken Salad:

the salad had a lot of flavour to it, but it could have used more avocado. The avocado that was in the salad was extremely mushy and it didn't look too appealing. So to sum up the avocado situation: I wanted more but it was mushy and unappealing. The greens seemed fresh, I didn't see any bad pieces that I seem to have a tendency of finding, and the tomato was a nice touch. I did have a problem with the chicken though. It lacked flavour. They nailed it with the chicken in the lettuce wraps and then came up short with the salad.

Would I recommend Moxies? Absolutely. Great renovation makes it feel more updated, casual, and an excellent atmosphere. Mix that in with good service and why wouldn't you want to come here? Would I recommend the food I had? I recommend the lettuce wraps, I do not recommend the salad. I've had great food from Moxies in the past but while doing this blog I'm trying to step out of my comfort zone and try new food and perhaps come across something great (lettuce wraps). To find something new and exciting it is certainly worth trying something different.

A note about Moxies: They are one of the few restaurants that do not post their food content (calories, sodium, etc) If you search around on the internet there are people who have tried to get nutritional information about their food and they refused to do it. This is one of the reasons why I try to stay clear of Moxies, it's great food but sometimes I like to know what I'm eating.

Be well, and eat even better.

November 09 2011 - Alexander's

With news that there was an accident on the NB bridge after I got off work I decided it'd be best to hit up my friend Sean to see if he wanted to meet downtown for supper and to wait out the traffic. Not only was he game but he even offered to pay. What a guy! He suggested Alexander's and I decided that since he was paying he should have the say.

Now if you've never been to Alexander's let me give you a heads up as to the location of the pub. It's at the Merrit hotel kitty corner from Keyano College. The parking isn't that great, but honestly, it's Fort McMurray, tell me where there's great parking. Please. The decor seems to be a toss up between a sports bar (various tv's hanging everywhere) and a lounge, low lighting, an area for open mic night. I honestly think the idea behind Alexander's is trying to get anybody in, doesn't matter what kind of crowd, as long as they come in.

Our waitress was great, we got our beer and we ordered soup for starters. I must say, the Clam Chowder was pretty great. I don't have a whole lot to compare it too because I've never tried it before but I really did enjoy this bowl of chowder. I ordered the blackened chicken melt as my meal and it seemed like it was an attempt at chicken in a grilled cheese situation. The toast was soggy from the butter and it wasn't appealing to eat. The flavors were fine, you can't screw up chicken and melted cheese too badly. I just think that the sandwich presented to me could have been executed in a better fashion. No one likes soggy toast, unless you're putting it in tea.

Also worth noting, we had no silverwear and when our food was brought to us the guy asked, "Oh is there something wrong?" and I said, "Could I get silverware please?" His response as he went to go get me my silverware: "Silverware, now that's a novel idea" What do I do to respond to this?

To sum it up, Alexander's wasn't horrible, it wasn't great. Service was good to great, food was poor to great. Would I recommend it? Not really. Would I ever go back? Yeah I would there are only so many options in town and there are certainly worse places out there.

Side note: I'm trying to figure out how to add my sarcasm, humor, and attitude into a blog. It'll get better. I promise.