Photography: Jack O Lanterns by Jooliree

Food is apart of our life. We have a plethora of choices in our day to day lives. If we wake up hungry, with an empty refrigerator like myself, we think to ourselves “Hmm. I’m hungry, where can I go to get a bite to eat?”. If we want to have a fun time at a neat restaurant with some people that are close to us, this is a different decision. Cook at home? Meet at a Sushi restaurant? Today I throw down some options of gaining knowledge about food in general for everyone, this way you will know exactly why you have that pink shredded stuff called pickled ginger on your plate at that Sushi restaurant.

1. Food Blog Blog - A great site for discovering new food blogs and ideas
2. B Feed Me - Fun ideas and recipes, amusing injections by the author
3. Fast Food Facts - Cool site about fast food
4. Becks and Posh - Interesting and Intelligent posts, helpful for restaurant professionals
5. FX Cuisine - Some exciting angles on recipes with an Italian prospective
6. Everything Rachel Ray - Not an official site, which keeps it within interest
7. Coffee Works - Coffee and everything in between, good ideas to keep you away from the plain egg
8. The Old Foodie - Catch up on your food facts, history, and oddities
9. Smitten Kitchen - Yummy recipes, great pictures, and refreshing ideas
10. 101 Cookbooks - A great site for new recipes and new ideas
11. Dads Dish - Interesting quips from a mans trials and tribulations with food
12. Leftover Queen - Thoughtful ideas on food in general, not just that 3 day old Chinese takeout
13. Aphrodisiaka - Recipes, thoughts, and beautiful women cannot go wrong
14. Chocolate and Zucchini - Fun and intuitive recipes with a French accent
15. Food Pornographer - Rated XXX, that is if you are hungry with no food in house
16. Cooking with Amy - A great resource for chefs and wannabes
17. Cooking for Engineers - Simple layout with a ton of learning potential
18. Food Timeline - Get into the history of the food on that plate
19. Worlds Healthiest Foods - Letting you know what food is naughty and nice
20. Epicurious - Irresistible site dedicated to all things food
21. Copy Kat - In attempt to discover that secret recipe
22. Appellation America - Find wines from all over
23. Zagat - THE source for restaurant reviews and information
24. Delicious Days - A beautiful site about food and how to enjoy it
25. Curious Cook News - Keep yourself updated in the world of food
26. Fermentation - A great daily blog about a wonderful beverage called “Wine”
27. Law for Food - Very informative site about the lawful and controversial aspects of food
28. Obsession with Food - Quality content about food, ideas, and news topics
29. Knifes Edge - Insightful scriptings of a fellow foodie
30. Chez Pim - Beautifully written prose about one persons mission to discover food
31. Is My Blog Burning - Events, discussions, and cautionary tales of food

I have often heard the term "Soul Food" used to describe a certain type of cuisine. When I hear it, I immediately think of dishes such as fried chicken, braised greens, catfish, barbeque, and pork. I set out to answer a question. What does fried chicken have to do with my soul?

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Inflation looks like it will average about 2.5% this year. Which is within the norm. I understand that restaurant prices, someway or another, tend to increase along with inflation as does everything else. Because service people in the restaurant industry are customarily tipped on a percentage of sales, logic would state that if inflation goes up so does their tips.

This is not my point though. I believe that the old adage of tipping 15% if you get ok service should be thrown out the window. How much do you think college costs these days? So I am going to propose a whole new metrics system for tipping. Here it goes.

• 10% - You never got your food or beverage
• 15% - Your server smells of B.O. and he forgot to bring your main entree
• 18% - The customary tip percentage at a restaurant, service was “just there”
• 20% - Service was great and you had all of your needs taken care of
• 25% - Your server went above and beyond your expectations
• 35% - You brought messy children, or you drank a lot, or you got a free birthday dessert and everyone sang happy birthday to you.

Other Tipping Procedures

• Minimum 1$ per drink at a bar - Increasing to $2 per drink after your 4th
• Always tip on the cost of the meal before discounts
• If you bring children, tip on the cost of the adult meal
• If you bring children, tip another 5% more
• If you get obnoxiously drunk, tip 35% - 50%

Follow these guidelines and your next trip to the restaurant will be even better than the first!

Kitchens are becoming the micro-melting pots within cities. In them you will find ethnicities of all types. If you work with someone of non-English speaking decent who speaks no English, you will find it hard and frustrating to even attempt communication with them.

Learning a little Spanish, being the most predominate minority tongue of the land, will get you much respect from your fellow co-workers. Even if it is a little at least it is a start. So I present a list of a few key words that will help you out.

• muy - very
• mucho - alot
• mas - more
• caliente - hot
• frio - cold
• vamanos - lets go, hurry up
• cuchillo - knife
• por favor - please
• los siento - I’m sorry
• bueno - good
• mal - bad
  
• todos - everything
• cansado - tired
  
• beso - kiss
  

This is a short list. I will add to it in another post. Also I will post some common Spanish phrases.

Here is a cool new resource for learning Spanish, among other languages - TryMango -