Alliance Texas Roadhouse - BBQ Chicken And Ribs

Texas Roadhouse - Alliance Ohio

I was introduced to the Texas Roadhouse years ago in Gatlinburg, Tennessee. The food was great and became one of my favorite places in Gatlinburg. To my surprise I found a Texas Roadhouse in Alliance, Ohio, just a mere 35 or so miles from my home. We had to go.

The Special Rolls

We got there around 4pm and it was crowded but not to bad and we were seated right away. The building interior was exactly the same layout as the one in Gatlinburg. I was pleased to see that the famous cinnamon rolls were also the same. Fresh baked, hot, and with a cinnamon butter spread to die for.

Coke Zero

I was also impressed that Texas Roadhouse carried Coke Zero, the best tasting diet cola on the planet. The waitress refilled my glass twice. Did I mention that Coke Zero really tastes good...

BBQ Chicken - Ribs - Bacon Cheese Fries

The Texas Roadhouse offers a combo platter of BBQ chicken and BBQ ribs plus two side dishes. The chicken was tender and with the tangy BBQ sauce, it was fantastic tasting. I couldn't wait to get to the ribs. Let me tell you, the ribs were worth the weight. They were fall off the bone tender and bursting with flavor. The BBQ sauce as I said before was a perfect blend of flavor that complimented the ribs, not over powered them. They were excellent.

Mac And Cheese

The side dishes selections were bacon cheese fries and macaroni and cheese. The fries were plentiful, the cheese melted perfectly over them with plenty of bacon pieces. (Not bacon bits the fake kind, but real bacon) The fries were well cooked, not soggy, not crunchy, but a good blend in between. The macaroni and cheese dish was very generic. I'm thinking Kraft right out of the box. A little pepper sprinkled on top and they were adequate.

The service was very good, the food excellent, and the price was nice, under $20 for the entire meal with bottomless Coke Zero, rolls, and roasted peanuts. 

The Grassy Knoll Diner scores 5 out of 5 shots and recommends the Alliance Texas Roadhouse  for dinner.

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Side Walk Cafe - Ober Gatlinburg

Ober Gatlinburg Sidewalk Cafe

The city of Gatlinburg, Tennessee is nestled at the foothills of the great Smoky Mountains. There are an endless number of restaurants to tempt your appetite. But there's more. Take a right hand turn on Ski Mountain road and it will twist you through the mountains and take you to the top where Ober Gatlinburg stands.

At the top of the mountain sits of course many elaborate ski slopes but also a small amusement park, an ice rink, carnival games, a black bear habitat, and several food stands and restaurants.


The Side Walk Cafe over looks the ice skating rink with several retail shops dotting it's surroundings. We had just spent several hours at the amusement park and came inside for a quick bite.

Ober Fries And Corn Dog

Since we were there in the off season, it was not very crowded so there was no line and placed our order. I ordered the corn dog and fries. You are looking at $6 dollars of food here. The corn dog was readily available but the fries were cooking in the fryer. My order was called out in a matter of minutes.

The corn dog was standard fare as corn dogs go. Well cooked, fresh, hot, and good taste. The fries were of fresh cut variety but as you can see, not to plentiful. However, they were fresh, well cooked, and hot and tasted good. It was a good fast food meal that filled me up and got us on our way to our next Ober Gatlinburg adventure.

The Grassy Knoll Diner scores 3.25 out of 5 shots and recommends the Side Walk Cafe in Ober Gatlinburg for lunch and dinner.

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1. 
   

   LOTGK said

   September 23, 2011 at 3:34 pm e
   Moominboy
   One of those days I’ll taste a corn dog 
   LOTGK in reply to Moominboy
   If you like hot dogs, you will love corn dogs. Trust me….
   Reply

Belleria Restaurant - Fried Haddock Dinner

Belleria Italian Bread

Belleria is a very nice and friendly restaurant in Youngstown. They have the standard fare entrees but with their own special touch. Patty and I decided on fried haddock dinners. At Belleria, you seat yourselves and we were lucky enough to find an open booth. The waitress dropped off some menu's and took our drink order. A few minutes later fresh Italian bread was delivered to our table. The bread was fresh, still warm, and very delicious.

A Little Sparse Salad

As I said previously, we were hankering for haddock and the waitress took our order and I added fried cheese sticks for an appetizer. In less than five minutes our salads were at our table. As you can see, it wasn't a big salad, but it was fresh and it did the job.

Cheese Logs

As soon as we finished our salads, our fried cheese with sauce arrived. There were five pieces and a zesty spaghetti sauce. However, notice the smallness in size of the sauce container. It was not enough for all five pieces. The cheese was well breaded and cooked and with the sauce was very good tasting.

Belleria Fried Haddock Dinner

Like clock work our fish dinners were brought to our table as soon as the appetizer was finished. I must say, it was very good service. And friendly. The haddock was a generous portion and breaded nicely. It wasn't as thick as other haddock planks but good nonetheless. It wasn't greasy or smelly but light and flaky. A little lemon and pepper and it was ready to go. The fries were fresh cut and well cooked. A packet of tartar sauce was also present on the plate which I completely ignored.

The price was reasonable, around $10 dollars for the dinner. The cheese sticks were around $4.50 which wasn't bad, except for to less of sauce. Soft drink added and this could all be yours for around $16 dollars not including tip.

The Grassy Knoll Diner scores 3.75 out of 5 shots and recommends Belleria's Fried Haddock Dinner for dinner.

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Quattro Restaurant - Houston Texas

Quattro Of Houston

This year the Halloween Trade show took me to Houston, Texas for five fun filled days. After a hard days work we stopped at Quattro restaurant housed inside the Four Seasons Hotel in downtown Houston.

Quattro Fresh Bread

We were tired and as we were going to our room we spied Quattro so we decided to stop and eat. The restaurant was dark, I don't mean closed, but very dimly lit. We were seated quickly and as my eyes focused to the cave like lighting, I noticed that there were not many people in the joint. No matter, we waited for the waiter to take our order. Twenty minutes later he arrived at our table. (Perhaps the dim lighting prevented him from finding us) Anyway, about ten minutes later, hot fresh rolls were delivered to our table.

9 Inch Pizza

Wanting to just get a quick bite, I ordered a personal pizza. Just plain cheese. It was another half hour before it was delivered to our table. The cost was $15 dollars for a 9 inch pizza.

As mentioned earlier, the service was glacier like. I walked in clean shaven and left with a beard.

The pizza itself was OK. It was hot, but apparently the cook forgot to cut the pizza in slices. All I had was one of those butter knives. I didn't want to ask the waiter for a knife, it might have taken another 20-30 minutes for him to return.

The Grassy Knoll Diner scores 1.5 out of 5 shots and does not recommend Quattro Restaurant for dinner.

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Scarsella's Italian Restaurant - Fried Cod Dinner

Scarsella Restaurant Italian Bread

Scarcella’s Restaurant in Youngstown has been a classic Italian Restaurant for decades and is one that we often frequent especially during the Lent season.

Scarcella’s has the feel of an authentic Italian restaurant. The seating is sparse but just enough. We were seated right away and bread and butter were brought right out. The bread was Italian of course and was fresh and tasted good.

Scarsella's Restaurant Youngstown Ohio Salad

A salad comes With every dinner at Scarsella’s. It is standard fare, a little cheese, lettuce, carrots, tomato. It was good.

Youngstown Scarsellas Home Made Fried Cheese

As an appetizer, I ordered Scarsella’s fried cheese with sauce. In the Youngstown area, all fried cheese is compared to the original Antone’s restaurant fried cheese. Scarsella’s fried cheese holds its own as the taste was very good, the portion adequate, and the sauce zesty and plentiful.

Youngstown Scarsellas Fried Fish Dinner

Fried Cod And Shell Dinner To the main course. In less than 15 minutes, our fish dinners were delivered to our table. The order was fried cod with a side of shells and sauce. The breading was well cooked and crunchy, not soggy like many other fish dinners. The cod was fresh and not greasy. The shells well cooked and plentiful with the same zesty sauce from the fried cheese.
The cost without tip was right around $10 dollars which was a fair deal considering the portion size and quality cooking.

The Grassy Knoll Diner scores 3.5 out of 5 shots and recommends Scarsella’s Italian Restaurant for dinner. Especially during Lent.

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Crepe Cafe - San Francisco Pier 39

Crepe Cafe - Pier 39 San Francisco

Patty and I visited San Francisco recently and of course we made our way to Pier 39 to spend the day. Pier 39 has a carnival setting and atmosphere with plenty of shops, side shows, open performance stage, plenty of food vendors, and of course the sea lions sunning themselves on the pier.

Having the inkling to sample the local cuisine, we stopped at the Crepe Cafe for what else, some crepes. For several minutes we watched from outside the big picture window as the chef rolled the dough and thinned it out and placed it on the griddle to cook. It was entertaining and we went in to buy some.

Strawberry Crepe Breakfast

I decided on the breakfast crepe with strawberries for a filing with whipped cream and of course a generous portion of powdered sugar. In just a few minutes my order was up and my crepe was on a paper plate with a fork and handed to me. A bottle of Coke Zero completed the order.

Believe it or not, I have never had a crepe in my life so I did not have a base line to compare. The crepe looked good, and it was fresh, and I like strawberries, and whipped cream, and powdered sugar, so this was going to be a good thing. Right!

Well, it wasn’t bad, and it wasn’t good. It was bland. But maybe that is what crepes are supposed to taste. I was expecting a pancake with strawberries. After all, that is what a crepe is. A French pancake.

The batter didn’t have any taste, it was like I was eating air. The strawberries, cream, and sugar were adequate, but I was a little disappointed. The cost, well, I forget, but I think it was under $5 dollars. Being in San Francisco, in the middle of a tourist trap, $5 dollars was standard fare. I am not going to score against this dish for lack of a base line so I will just barely recommend the Crepe Cafe.

The Grassy Knoll Diner scores 2.5 out of 5 shots and barely recommends the Crepe Cafe of San Francisco for breakfast, lunch, or dinner.

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Alice Cooper - Billion Dollar Babies - 1973

Alice Cooper Billion Dollar Babies Record Album

Alice Cooper, the shock rocker of the 1970's, continued his legacy with his unique style of music with his 1973 album, Billion Dollar Babies.

The Billion Dollar Baby album cover is snake skin green with a small yellow gold emblem with a picture of a baby with typical Alice Cooper eye dressings.

When you open the album jacket, on the left side are trading cards perforated to easily remove. The trading cards were of the band members.

Band Members: Michael Bruce, Neal Smith, Glen Buxton, Dennis Dunaway, and of course Alice Cooper.

The other trading cards are of the band on stage plus the jacket cover and of course the icon of the album, the billion dollar baby.

Alice Coopers real name: Vincent Damon Furnier.

The right inside offers no real information on the album or the band. However, it has a band wrapper cut into it that held a very large billion dollar bill.

This album jacket has an inner cover tucked away on the left side. When you peel back the outer layer you see the enlarged One Billion Dollar Bill. It also contains the album song list.

Side One: Hello Hooray, Raped And freezin, Elected, Billion Dollar Babies, Unfinished Sweet

Side Two: No More Mister Nice Guy, Generation Landslide, Sick things, Mary Ann, I Love the Dead

The back cover is an almost carbon copy of the front cover with the gold icon on each side. The front depicting a baby with the iconic Cooper black eyes and the back cover revealing several songs inside the album and several smaller gold babies.

The album jacket has a great photo of the band members dressed in white satin with Cooper holding a naked baby covered only by American currency.

Of course the baby is decked out in the classic Cooper black eyes. In 1973, this was a shocking picture. Thousands of complaints by parents were logged to Warner Brothers, the record label to have the pictures removed. They were not.

The back of the album jacket housed the lyrics of the songs from the album. The hit song of the album was No More Mister Nice Guy. Elected was also a hit along with the title song, Billion dollar Babies.

Below are the lyrics of No More Mister Nice Guy:

I used to be such a sweet, sweet thing
Till they got a hold of me
I opened doors for little old ladies
I helped the blind to see
I got no friends ’cause they read the papers
They can’t be seen with me
And I’m gettin’ real shot down
And I’m feelin’ mean

No more Mister Nice Guy
No more Mister Clean
No more Mister Nice Guy
They say he’s sick, he’s obscene

I got no friends ’cause they read the papers
They can’t be seen with me
And I’m feelin’ real shot down
And I’m gettin’ mean

No more Mister Nice Guy
No more Mister Clean
No more Mister Nice Guy
They say he’s sick, he’s obscene

My dog bit me on the leg today
My cat clawed my eye
Mom’s been thrown out of the society circle
My dad’s has to hide
I went to church incognito
When everybody rose the Reverend Smith
He recognized me punched me in the nose

He said, no more Mister Nice Guy
No more Mister Clean
No more Mister Nice Guy
They say he’s sick, he’s obscene

Record Jacket Sleeve

Billion Dollar Babies

Billion Dollar Bill

Billion Dollar Babies Back Cover

Inside Jacket Billion Dollar Babies

Lyrics Billion Dollar Babies

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A Hummer No More

A Grassy Knoll Institute quirky little fun fact:

Everyone knows how to hum. (No, no, get your heads out of the gutter you dirty readers) But did you know that it is impossible for left handed people to hum while holding their nose closed with the left hand. And it is impossible for right handed people to hum while holding their nose with the right hand.

Go ahead, I'll wait for you.

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By the way, it doesn't matter what hand you use. 

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