Posted January 06, 2021in Food Dude
Tamales are corn’s most divine application. They are to tortillas as fentanyl is to street heroin— 60 times more potent, flavor wise, and relieving. One hundred years ago, the tamale queens of San Antonio became a famous tourist attraction. Tamales have been harder to find in Des Moines since Rosa
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Posted December 02, 2020in Food Dude
Comedian Shirley Fong-Torres liked telling her audiences that “the Chinese word for vegan translates as lousy hunter.” Vegan comedian Dick Gregory told folks that “only the most evolved level of animal intelligence has been able to raise edible foods.” Those two opinions represent 1,000 years of arguments as to whether
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Posted November 04, 2020in Food Dude
It takes a brave heart to open a restaurant business in the reigning realm of fear and seclusion. One also needs a quality product to peddle. Fortunately, the owners of Unrvld and Opa have both. Unrvld is a Texas-style barbecue that opened in July on EP True Parkway. They have
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Posted September 30, 2020in Food Dude
A friend of mine, who teaches law in France every summer, says the success of Subway in that country baffles her. She asked her French friends “Why?” They told her they loved “the American concept of personal choice.” Subway invented an assembly line system in which the diner makes all
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Posted September 02, 2020in Food Dude
I drove aimlessly around town during the power outages, mainly because my car was my only place with air conditioning. Restaurants were closing all over town — three Burger Kings, the S.E. 14th Street Popeyes and the large McDonald’s on University at Sixth all appeared closed while neighbors had power.
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Posted August 05, 2020in Food Dude
St. Kilda is an old town south of Melbourne, Australia, that is quite famous for its restaurant scene, beach and sunsets. The new restaurant named for it in Valley Junction represents a gorgeous restoration of an old historic building in Valley Junction that was most recently a dance studio and
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Posted July 01, 2020in Food Dude
Change is the only constant. The frustrations of quarantine have inspired some people to become seriously cautious and others to become seriously oblivious of caution. I now get as many dirty looks for wearing a mask as for not wearing one. The city seems to have a much higher percentage
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Posted April 01, 2020in Food Dude
The Euclid-Douglas corridor was long considered to be on the edge of town, then Des Moines expanded beyond the borders of its city limits. Now the corridor remains a border space between the tried-and-true restaurants in the ilk of the woe begone Knox Café and the still thriving Iowa Beef
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Posted March 04, 2020in Food Dude
My grandfather, a longtime farmer, said that success was like the morning dew, it could settle just as easily on a rose bud or a cow turd. Epic novelist Larry McMurtry, who grew up on a ranch, later wrote the same thing about the love of a good woman. Just
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Posted February 05, 2020in Food Dude
Restaurants here mostly known for unexpected delights rather than fine-dining superstars. University Avenue is chock full of happy eating surprises. Many of those are hidden away in real estate that entices the initiated rather than the drive-by diner. This is the street of the precisely named Fast Mart & Chester’s
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