BBQ in Ann Arbor

I've been meaning to post a shout-out for Satchel's BBQ for a while now. It is a very fine addition to the local restaurant scene and great for take-out too. My favorites are the ribs and the brisket. Plus it is low attitude, with friendly staff and reasonable prices.

How did I miss this?

Wednesday, as it turns out, was National Fried Chicken Day.

I'll second the recommendation by the annarbor.com columnist of the fried chicken at Zingerman's Roadhouse. I have not tried the other place she mentions, but it is now on the list.

Mandatory school lunches

Well this is pretty horrifying. Some Chicago schools are prohibiting kids from bringing lunch from home. I was very fortunate in that I ate only 10 school lunches in my entire primary and secondary career, all on days when my parents were off on vacation and I was staying with friends. I still remember the awfulness of the food. I also still remember how many kids threw out all or a good part of their school lunch.

On the plus side, I can think of few more promising ways to create a cohort of little libertarians.

Pricing at Harold's

It makes me happy that Steve Levitt still goes to Harold's Chicken Shack despite being a bazillionaire. While I spend my time waiting at Harold's keeping a close eye on my property, Steve spends his time trying to sort out the pricing scheme. Presumably a follow-up post will attempt to explain why the workers at Harold's are so damn slow. But the chicken ... let's just say I arrange my travel plans specially to make sure I get to Harold's whenever I am in Hyde Park.

History of kitchens

Megan McArdle takes advantage of a rare opportunity to issue stern rebuttals to both Tyler Cowen and Paul Krugman in a single post.

Megan titles her post"The Economics of Kitchens" but the value-added is not the economics, it is the history. Using an old cookbook and memories of her mother and grandmother, she puts the reader in a 1950s kitchen in a way that neither Tyler nor Paul manage to do.

History is really powerful and that includes the social history that conservatives often mock and of which Megan's post is a small example.

On White Castle

This bit from the Utne Reader is simultaneously patronizing and interesting.

White Castle was not around in Seattle when I was growing up. I first encountered it in Chicago when I was in gradual school. It's persistence remains a puzzle to me given the awfulness of the food on offer.

Is this even allowed in most states?

Pancakes with kale .... oh dear.

Hat tip: one of our amazing, multi-talented gradual students

Where chicken nuggets come from

The sad, pink truth.

Hat tip: Dann Millimet

Farrell's on Food Network

Regular readers will know that I worked at Farrell's Southcenter my senior year of high school and my first two years of university. I learned a lot of labor economics there, and how to make really round scoops of ice cream weighing 2.5 oz.

Saving labor costs in Germany

The new kid on the business block in Germany is self-service bakeries. Unlike traditional bakeries, where a staff person assembles the desired baked goods for each customer, here the customer simply picks out the desired baked goods and then takes them to a cashier. The result, lower prices, 30 to 40 percent lower according to the one company, due to a smaller staff. Of course, there the cost is that some customers may misbehave and handle the food not with the tongs provided but with their hands. The main chains operate with a franchise model; here are the (English language) websites for two of them: back factory and backWERK (which roughly translates as "bakery factory" as well).

Should I note that labor costs are pretty high in Germany?

Hat tip: Michael Lechner

New deli in Ann Arbor

I went to the new Bread Basket Deli in Ann Arbor today for lunch and had a truly amazing Reuben, made so by the heaping portion of really, really delicious corned beef. I'll be back.

Thanks to Dimitriy Masterov for the recommendation, the transport and, with Jess Goldberg, the entertaining discussion.

Let nothing go to waste

Some economics of offal.

A paper topic, if you have the ...

Hat tip: Cheap Talk blog.

Places to purchase particularly pleasing pizza

A list of officially (!) recognized good pizza restaurants from the Associazione Verace Pizza Napoletana.

Who knew that Seattle is the capital of good pizza?

Hat tip: Sue Dynarski

Thanksgiving like its 1899

The Thanksgiving 1899 menu from New York's Plaza hotel.

Your choice of four different kinds of duck!

Via: the agitator

Farrell's coming soon!

The first new Farrell's Ice Cream parlor restaurant (not in Hawaii) in a long time opens later this month in Mission Veijo California. The Orange County Register reports on the hiring process.

Farrell's comeback begins?

Farrell's announces the first new non-franchise store in a long, long time.

I worked at the Farrell's in the Southcenter Mall in Seattle in high school and the early years of college. Farrell's is an 1890's theme ice cream parlor chain that started in Portland, Oregon and once stretched across the country.

Three days after I took the job at Farrell's in the late spring of 1979 I got an offer to work at a bookstore. I have always been glad that I stuck with Farrell's (even though it went strongly against type) because of all I learned, including both a lot of labor economics and how to get along well with the stoner / party crowd that largely ran the restaurant. Employees who could function on Saturday and Sunday mornings were particularly valued at my store.

Oh, and I still have my hat and little tie.

Ann Arbor readers may be surprised to know that there was once at Farrell's at Briarwood Mall.

Ann Arbor food blogs

Feeling hungry? In need of some food porn (or is that food art, or food erotica)? Or perhaps a recipe or a local restaurant review? Then try out Kitchen Chick or Tammy's Tastings, to A2 food blogs that come highly recommended by the resident chef at my house.

Hat tip: Lisa Smith

More on Red Hot Lovers

The Michigan Daily has an update on the story.

Red Hot Lovers

The Ann Arbor Chronicle, a new-ish web paper competing with the Ann Arbor News on the local news beat, provides this story about the strangely closed Red Hot Lovers. I tried to have lunch there with one reader of this blog not long ago and was wondering about the closure. Now I know more, but not all that I would like to know.

For non-A2 readers, RHL is a hot dog place just across from the School of Education and not far from my office. It has amazing cheese fries - second only to a place I used to go to in Chicago - and great dogs as well.

I hope it returns. There is some hope - this mysterious disappareance by restaurants thing seems to be an A2 habit and the last one - Charlie's on South University - did eventually come back. But Charlie's is no RHL.

History of food production: home and market

The Michigan library has an extensive collection of cookbooks and other items related to culinary history; the University of Washington library has an extensive (and very cool) collection of restaurant menus that you can look at on line.

Yum.