Lucky Burger

If you haven't been to this place you should immediately go. They have the best onion rings I have ever tasted, and I've tasted a lot of onion rings. A lot. These taste good dipped in ketchup, they taste good by themselves, and they taste good if you tie your hands behind your back and eat them just using your mouth.

The thing about Lucky Burger is that it looks from the inside like it was built alongside a train, like it's in some sitcom that takes place in New York or Chicago or a major city that has a decent public transportation system. It's real small and narrow, and it has the red checked table clothes that tell you it's authentic and real (as opposed to other table clothes, which say, "this is a fake restaurant, don't eat here, it's all holograms and sugar substitutes"), and the window blinds were drawn even though it was eight thirty at night, in order to keep the glare of the train cars out of diners eyes. +21 It was really nice. Sometimes living in Houston feels like I'm living in a really big town rather than the third largest city in the United States, as I don't get the stereotypical big city activities in (riding in trains, walking decisively down downtown streets, wearing blazers while drinking cosmopolitans and discussing my kooky love life.) Most of what I do in Houston involves driving down 59 and screaming at Lexus SUVs for cutting me off, so I like to get these experiences in that match my romantic ideals about big city life.

Here's what's important about Lucky Burger: displayed right next to the cashier stand is their award from Marvin Zindler, given to them in 1998 for extraordinary cleanliness. This is precisely the sort of thing I want to see posted in a restaurant and I wonder why more restaurants don't have them!!! It's a bit alarming I'll admit that their latest award was from 15 years ago, but any bit of reassurance is good, I think it's safe to assume that there is no horse meat in their burgers +12 Can I just weigh in on this controversy? I would like to start out by saying that I love IKEA meatballs and even if horse meat had been found in a meatball that I was about to put in my mouth, I would still eat it. But I still think it's kind of sad to think about, just because when I was younger I took horseback riding lessons in Waco and there was this one horse there that was so nice and beautiful and she had sweet little horse eyes and her name was Meg and I know lots of people eat horses, like those weird Canadians and also the Dothraki (heh heh Game of Thrones reference, you guys wouldn't get it it's too high brow for you) but I don't think I could do it. Also I imagine it tastes like goat and as you guys know I hate goat.

The other thing about Lucky Burger is that they deliver! Anywhere within a three mile radius, which guess what! Counts as the restaurant I work in! +8 There's nothing I love more than someone not making me leave my home/place of work, thanks a lot Lucky Burger you're personally taking away from the amount of time I have to spend on 59 (or I guess in this case Richmond Avenue) and increasing the amount of time I spend feeling like a real city girl! +184982

In conclusion Lucky Burger is awesome and we should all immediately terminate our leases and move into their delivery zones and eat nothing but onion rings for the rest of our lives.

Whole Foods

There are two main advantages to going to lunch at Whole Foods. And I'm not talking about going to Whole Foods and buying things to go back to your own home and make; for those of you who are living under a rock (or perhaps are the older school Republicans, who refuse to do hippy things even when they're really trendy; I wish I could stick to my guns like you but unfortunately I do believe in gun control) Whole Foods does indeed have a cafeteria section where you can select foods, point them out, pay for them, and then consume on premise. The first advantage to this is, of course, that you pay for your food by the pound. I think this is pretty cool just because I have this wacked out bathroom scale which seems to have been dropped on it's head as a child, and I like to weigh myself before I eat, know how much I consume, and then weigh myself again. Today for lunch for example I consumed 1.2 pounds worth of salad and quinoa (seriously guys what the hell is quinoa, I only selected it because I thought it would be cool to find out, turns out it only tasted like the parsley that was mixed into it. That's pretty sad, when you're blander than parsley. C'mon quinoa let's get it together). A quick measurement of my weight showed that I actually managed to lose 3 pounds in the time it took me to eat this salad; of course let's be generous to my bathroom scale there was also the substantial amount of exercise walking twelve feet from my kitchen table to the bathroom and back again. +32 Also, it's important to always know how manly you are, and today I was manly enough to demolish 1.2 lbs of food.

The other good thing about getting your food at a grocery store is that there are lots of opportunities for cost saving. Say you want to eat 1.2 lbs of food but don't want to pay for it. That kind of stuff doesn't fly at Taco Bell, but at Whole Foods, no big deal! All you have to do is run a few laps around the store; there are plenty of opportunities for free samples! Today I managed to get a handful of shredded wheats, an orange slice, some brioche (this word sounds as fancy as quinoa but I'm happy to report is much tastier), and a few spoonfuls of some apple thing that they were advertising for Passover. +28 Anyways, not that I've ever felt bad about my scavenging, but I did get some validation today. There was some fancy guy in a suit at Whole Foods at the same time I was, and I'm happy to report that his scavenging reached levels way above my own. I ran into this person, who seemed to have a real, adult person job with a real, adult person paycheck, no less than four times at four separate scavenging stations. He never had any groceries in his stands, and whenever we made knowing eye contact, he seemed not sheepish but cunning and calculating. I hope I can be like him when I'm a real adult with a real adult job.

It's not all pay by the pound food and free scavenging, though. There is a real problem eating in the Whole Foods cafeteria, and that's the fact that it's located in Whole Foods. There are so many cool things to buy there! All sorts of sparkling drinks and fruit juices from fruits you've never heard of! They have drinks with live cultures in them that you have to keep refrigerated, with a warning right on the bottle that there will be sediment in your drink because there is bacteria living inside it! How could you not want to immediately buy that?? Plus it's even worse than that, they have all sorts of specialty chocolates on them, and they're so covered in words like "organic" and "free trade" and "this chocolate was made by pregnant women who would have no other means of supporting their unborn children and your purchase is saving lives" and "buying one chocolate bar supports a Somalian family for six years" that it's impossible to remember that Whole Foods chocolate will make you just as fat as HEB chocolate, but by then you've already spent your whole paycheck and you might as well eat all of it. Look all I know is I went in there to buy lunch and came out with enough food to eat for a week. -16

Sushi Rock

Look Sushi Rock is on Holcombe, a street I drive up and down approximately a million times a week, gloating at the fact that my zip code makes me sound rich and professor-ly. I drive past Sushi Rock all the time, let's be honest, it doesn't look like a serious restaurant. It's called Sushi Rock and it's sign kind of looks silly, it's this kind of pinkish dot with "Sushi Rock" in yellow font on top of it. It's silly guys it looks like you're going to go buy Kroger sushi. -12 Not that there's anything wrong with Kroger sushi I actually eat it all the time.

Anyways, that place is straight legit when you walk in! I'm talking hardwood floors, authentically Asian waitresses, a sushi bar with a guy who will really stand there and talk to you and make you sushi in front of you, and one of those cats with his hand raised! I'm not trying to tell you that this is the most sushi-est sushi restaurant in town, but I am saying guys, don't be fooled by the sign! +7 Look chumps the main problem I can see with them is that they don't deliver, you do have to occasionally leave your apartment if you want to eat there, but if you want you can just pick it up and return to your home and spend the evening not wearing pants, laying on your back, playing the Sims 3 and pretending like you're doing homework. +19

The good thing about eating at your house, of course, is that when I returned home, my roommate's boyfriend showed the two of us a music video that I found to be rather uninteresting. If I were at the restaurant, I'd have to sit there and listen to the whole thing. In the comfort of my own home, I was able to shout, "this is terrible Andre! Shut off that noise, ain't nobody got time for that!" and he did. +31 for being at home, suck it Andre, that band was awful.

That's the main problem. Here's the less main problem: the acoustics in that place are not that great. Or I guess I should say, the acoustics are amazing, in that you can hear everything that is happening in every corner of the restaurant, no matter how badly you'd rather not. It's so still in there that as I sat there, reading my book on the Affordable Care Act, every time I turned the page, the people sitting in the opposite corner could hear what the letters on the page were. (You're welcome for the education, fellow diners, if interested feel free to take a course with one Professor Harrell Rogers where you will learn a lot more interesting things, such as stuff about horse rumps and Beijing). -9 Imagine trying to have a private conversation in there! The only positive would of course be that if you were a private investigator, like, trying to catch people selling nuclear secrets or the like, it would be fairly simple to catch the perpetrators, save America, save the world, win the girl, etc. But I'm not a PI and the guy sitting next to me kept saying, "I'm hungry. Hit me with another one." And the sushi guy would say, "Another what?" And the guy would say, "I don't know, what do you got?" It was so frustrating! The menu was right in front of him! He could have just looked at it! Ugh I was so mad at him! I work in a restaurant and people are always calling in, and I think they want to place an order so I'm poised to take it and they ask me, "So..... what do you guys have on the menu...?" Hello it's on the internet! What do you want me to read you our entire menu? All of the possible pizza toppings? No! Not going to happen! And then whenever this chump did refer to the menu he'd say stuff like, "Do you have any flying fish eggs?" Come on, man, do you see any flying fish eggs on the menu? Also why would you even want flying fish eggs? Look I'm no fish egg connoisseur, I'll be honest. But don't they all kind of taste the same? Like someone put tiny bubbles in salt for a year and then hardened them with fish spit? Come on guys come on. I really need this guy to pull it together. It's 8:00 on a Wednesday, he really should have better things to do than that.

Anyways. Don't worry. I think that guys gone, it's OK if you want to go hang out at Sushi Rock, he won't attack you with his ignorance. If you have any recommendations for places that will deliver sushi to my home, please email me at arbitrarycriticism@live.com.

Underbelly

So I went to Underbelly last week with my student organization, Texas Restaurant Association, Cougar Chapter. That's right beyotches I'm just part of clubs and organizations all over the place. I know what you're thinking, Catherine, how do you have time to be so rich and successful, and join any organization that you think you can get a free meal out of, too? Well guys, life isn't just about scrolling through the internet, in your bedroom, only wearing your underwear, until your battery gets so hot that it catches your duvet on fire. If it were, duvet manufacturers would be much wealthier. Take it from me, guys. You have to get out there and meet people too.

Which is why I found myself at Underbelly last week even though I don't have a real person job. Here's the thing is, it's very dark in there. Look I understand the concept of mood lighting, I do. But there's a difference between not wanting to watch Catherine Martin struggle to eat food in an elegant way and not being able to see your food at all. There was this one embarrassing thing that happened. My student organization had set up some sort of tasting menu to be sent to the table, and whenever the plates would be dropped off the waiter would tell us what each one was and we'd happily much away. They brought some sort of dumpling to the table and I bit into one, not listening to what the waiter is saying. I stop, chewing, disgusted. What is that marinara sauce? It is so gross and rancid, how is this a thing at a fancy dining restaurant. I shoot glances to my peers, and one says, "Yeah, I don't really like goat either."

Goat? Guys it wasn't even marinara sauce, it was just goat, and thanks to the dim lighting I would have never known and I would have come here onto my famous weblog and told everyone that Underbelly uses some gross marinara sauce, when really it turns out I just don't like goat, probably because their eyes are so creepy to look at (and also because they seem like they would be really soft when you look at them, but when you pet them, they aren't). -28

Here's what's pretentious about Underbelly. Instead of regular menu covers, they've taken the covers of old books, flattened them out, and used them as covers. The only problem is it's not like they used Alice in Wonderland, or like, Jane Eyre, good books that I like. They used textbook covers, such as "McGraw-Hill Series in Mechanical Engineering" and "Prospecting your way to Sales Success". I realize that we're a student organization, but what that means is that normally, when we go out to eat, we want to escape the horrors of having to learn things, not romanticize it. -17 At least we were all Hotel/Restaurant Management majors instead of engineering (or sales, because I'm pretty sure if I were majoring in that sort of thing I'd have to stab my heart out and then braise it with goat meat.)

You know what's cool though? Well I guess I should say creepy. I'm pretty sure that the guy who was sitting at the table next to me was the guy who writes this really funny blog, b4ttlesong. Some of you guys probably read it because it's hilarious, and I also read it, and I feel really creepy because the reason I think it was him was because he had this tattoo on his forearm that said "Come and Take It" and I know from reading his blog that he has a similar forearm tattoo. This is the creepiest way to recognize someone in a restaurant, I know. I've officially crossed a line or two. But don't worry, I didn't get up and talk to this man like a normal person. No, I scurried away to the bathroom, looked up a picture of him on the internet, and silently compared the two until I was sure that he had left and I could safely return to the table without seeming like a stalker. +12 for the presence of food writers in their restaurant. Also now we know that I can never move to LA, or any other place with a high population of famous people, because I will creep everyone out and nobody will want to be friends with me.

I guess that's all you need to know. Also I don't have any tattoos, guys, so if you're hoping to recognize me in a restaurant just look for a girl with glasses and freckles who can't handle chopsticks and that's probably me.

The Egg & I

Look let's get started here, did you know this was a movie from the 1940's? Yeah. We all thought this was just a normal restaurant that served breakfast and closed at a weird afternoon hour, but turns out, it's named after a movie that is described this way: "Green Acres '40s style! Claudette Colbert hits just the right note of exasperation in this lighthearted comedy about a society girl whose new husband (Fred MacMurray) convinces her to move out to the canebreak and start a chicken farm. The finishing school graduate struggles with the hardships of rural living -- and keeps an eye out for the seductive neighbor down the road. Features the first film appearance of Ma and Pa Kettle." I didn't realize there was this movie when I ate here, but let's be honest, it's colored my feelings for the place. Mostly because I refuse to believe that there is anything seductive about a chicken farm, and I have to assume that even in the 40's making fun of rich girls by putting them in dirty settings had to have been played out. (With the obvious exception of the movie Overboard, which defies all genres simply because the shoe closet Kurt Russell builds is so awesome that I don't even know what the rest of the movie after we see the closet is about, I'm still in a daze.)(Also with the obvious exception of the third season of Simple Life, when they're interns and Paris and Nicole get into kooky situations and laughs ensue.) -14 Regardless of whether or not these people have ever seen this movie they should feel bad about it.

Here's what else I don't like about the Egg & I: the whole place just seems like it's straight from Santa Fe. They got bizarre, not really that great Chicano art on the walls, and even worse, EVERYTHING is covered in green chili! Have you guys ever been to Santa Fe, or like, New Mexico in general? I'm not sure what's wrong with them, their name has "Mexico" in it, but they cannot make Tex-Mex to save their lives, I HATE it. They put this gross green chili on everything and when they're not putting green chili on stuff, they're putting an equally gross red chili. I mean come on, haven't you guys ever been to Escalante's? Now there's a place that knows how to use spices effectively. These people in New Mexico have not. Also, it snows there. I mean come on guys, give me a break. But the worst part is, the Egg & I is not even from there! They don't even have that excuse! They're from Colorado and they put green chili on stuff! I can't stand it guys I'm never leaving Texas again, one time I ate a burrito in South Dakota and it was the worst experience of my life, I don't even know what I would do if I had to live somewhere outside of commuting distance to Spanish Flower. -31

Look it's not the worst place in the world though guys, it's not like it's Louisiana. Here's what they have available for you to put on your French toast: Smucker's brand blackberry jelly! I'm not sure if you knew this, but in an independent study performed by middle school Catherine Martin, Smucker's brand blackberry jelly is the best jelly in the free world! You can try other brands of blackberry jelly and they won't even compare, and no other Smucker's products even come close (with the possible exception of their strawberry jelly, which, I won't lie, is pretty awesome.) There is of course a small problem with this jelly in that if you make yourself a peanut butter and jelly sandwich in the morning, by the time your lunch period rolls around all the jelly will have soaked through the top piece of bread making it sticky and unappetizing to look at, but if you just keep your eyes close you can't even tell the difference. +7 I do have a warning to issue with this: in the basket on my table there were three Smucker's brand blackberry jellies but there were also an equal number of the sugar free variety, and I can't stress enough to you that this is not the same thing and should be avoided at all costs. It will make you weep with the sadness of a thousand bad days, and guys, you just don't want that in your life. *

That's everything that's important about the Egg & I. On an unimportant side note, their Eggs Benedict is actually really tasty but just a reminder you have to look at a menu filled with green chili to get to it, and you'll have to judge for yourselves if that's worth it.


*This blog post was unfortunately in no way endorsed by Smucker's, which would have been great and Smucker's if you're reading this, I'm willing to sell out to you. I'm very willing.