Aldi: Not to ruin my brothers secret spot, but he picks up Goose Island Root Beer in bottles there by the caseload, and only for a song as I understand it. Tis a fine thing.

aldi is a bargain hunter's dream, but it won't help you with your grocery list unless you get lucky.

I love how your (largely unnecessary) political editorializing is crammed into this post. You're double-dog-daring the conservatrolls and the folks-who-think-you-ought-not-opine-on-politics to come back and comment again. Linkbaiting extraordinaire.

Both the donkeys and elephants are constantly coached by their handlers before interviews. She just happens to be bad at hiding that fact. It makes for an amusing interview. I've never been less interested in voting.

Andrew,
I am really curious, so why do you think Obama has any qualities to lead? He has spent a total of 174 days in session in the Senate...
That is experience?

I shop at Aldi's - for specific items. Cheap milk, tator tots, bread, frozen veggies, chips, pasta mixes, etc. Product too, but if you don't get there early, you may not find what you want. You may not always find what you need, but you'll always find things you can use. My husband, son & I ate at Refuge on the River on 8/26 - our 30th wedding anniversary. Very disappointing. Our food was "warm" at best - definitely not hot. I expected more exotic meats on the menu. I asked if they had baked potatoes - and the server said - not tonight - the chef was feeling lazy. Lazy, a baked potatoe? No wonder our food wasn't hot. If you go - pass on the french onion soup - that was lukewarm - the cheese was barely melted. Not many customers there - so not sure what the problem was. Our food tasted good - just not hot & the service was so-so.

Thanks for the run. It was fun. Maybe I'll check back in after the election.

We're all fooled if we believe that we can trust any of these phonies. They seem genuine and probably are until they get into office (Wellstone) and then they move off to D.C. and lose touch, forget promises and forget their people (Coleman). So, go ahead clowns, build up the posts in this blog of withering originality as it is just another log of writing by some fathead who fascinates himself with his ability to keep tens of people entertained.

Oh Andrew, did you have to use the word "backlogged" in your title...in your food blog?

Love you, love your blog and am happy with the great restaurants you suggest - thanks!

ALDI... there are NONE of those in NYC or Long Island. I didn't encounter one until I moved to Watertown about 5 years ago, and again when I recently moved to Elmira; both in NY.

Aldi is good for certain cheap things; juices, lunchables, etc. Beyond that, I'm not that into it.

Love the show... think you're amazing, and I wait patiently for new Tuesday episodes... which is why I'm so psyched for SICILY tonight!!!

Gosh... LOVE YOU!

Governing should not require special training, a law degree or "previous experience." Representative democracy should mirror its constituencies; we want leaders not because they're "smarter" than us but because just *are*just*like*us*. We ALL need to be capable of leading.

The surest path to dictatorship and authoritarianism, is to put your complete trust in institutions instead of your neighbors.

I like that you interject your opinions - both the food and the political kind. Lord knows both sides of the aisle have plenty to say. It's refreshing to see a regular guy espouse his thoughts vs. a highly paid loud mouth in D.C. No question about it, Palin is a piece of work (and she's making this fall's election pretty dang interesting). I wonder what are friends watching from the other side of the Atlantic and Pacific are thinking about the U.S. right about now?

I just got back from Europe. One of my friends, whom I stayed with for about a week, used to work for the European Commission and has been very active politically.

We discussed the Obama-Biden and McCain-Palin ticket. She's very liberal in her politics, so I was expecting her to be in the Obama-Biden camp.

Imagine my surprise, when her position was pretty much the same as mine! We don't have enough ACCURATE information to be adamantly taking a position on either side.

We also agreed on one other point. If your desire is to President of the United States, you must have just a little bit of a screw loose. I wouldn't want that job for any amount of money in the world.

Geri: There is so much more "information" that comes flying at us day in and day out about politics or any other subject than ever before. The truth is that the quality of information, especially on the internet is incredibly poor. If you just removed the extremist flamers who run around using alias' while engaging in emotional fear-mongering and then the useless and pathetic comments of the apathetic 50% of the problem might be cleared up.

Robb,

Exactly my point. You can't necessarily believe everything you hear or read.

But I do hope that you understand that when you try to make a point and throw in all the name-calling in the process, your perspective and "fact providing" comes across much less credible and not any better than those who "comment under an alias". It's belittling and small to not only the recipient, but also to you, yourself.

While I am a conservative woman, I am reserving my judgement on Palin until I learn more about her.

On the flip side, rather than automatically flinging mud onto the other side of the political fence, I am spending the time to dig into the truth about both sides.

And I am certainly not expecting to get a fair and balanced perspective of EITHER side through this blog (no offense to you Andrew) or any other blog, for that matter.

"Shop at Aldi? No thanks..., that's just for the poor democrats (aren't they all?) "

See what I mean? Once it all gets political, the blog becomes just a shouting match of idiots. Bye for now, Zim.

Geri: I agree. That's what politics has digressed to over the past 8 years -- name-calling and flame throwing histrionics.

I think your blog just got much more interesting. Food and politics do mix. I think you've tested those waters here before.

Please please tell me you have not eaten at the Ropongi restaurant! Oh the horror:O

I think Robb is right! Everyone that doesn't agree with one of our pre-packaged parties must be apathetic, and how true that their comments are useless and pathetic. The amazing thing is that I have now found a source for reliable, non-biased info to guide my political leanings in a food blog called Chow and Again w/ special commentator- Robb (with 2 b’s). He’s right! We should stop the name calling (Flamers) and the fear mongering (beware the fear-mongers) which has only been a factor in politics since 2000. Good call Robb---good call.

here is a fantastic story about a new state fair foods in texas. seems to be the Year of Bacon.

http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/fea/taste/stories/090208dnmetfriedfoods.33839923.html

OK, please tell me Roppongi is NOT one of the places you ate at in the link above? That is a visual I do not need swimming around in my head.

To skip the donkey and elephants and go straight to the edible animals, I had the pleasure of enjoying the kangaroo at Fugaise as part of the tasting menu this past weekend and the general consensus was that it was the best red meat any of us recalled eating in quite a while, and while were no meatatarians, it left most of us contemplating adding more non-cow non-chicken animals to our menus.

Aldi- good place to find food that expires in 6 days. It's cheap and just fallen off the truck, so great for those food donation dates at the local high school, food pantries don't want all that ramen people typically bring along. Instead, drop off 100 cans of green beans for the same price as 100 packets of ramen. True story.

Chef Saunders is so, so talented and geniunely a nice guy! I'm bummed I'm going to miss his Third Anniversary dinner!

AZ - Although I don't agree with your political opinions, I have no problem with you using your platform to voice them. I would also hope that Americans would not base their political views solely on the opinions of the Andrew Zimmerns, Sean Penns and Susan Sarandons of the world.

With all due respect, I see about as much credibility in your political comments as I would see in a Sean Hannity restaurant review. I do hope that your comments will cause people to learn about the issues and the candidates so they can formulate their own opinions.

All I know is that even though I'm a Righty and you're a Lefty, we're both Foodies, and you are my favorite culinary pundit!

I'm not a fan of Aldi's. Since I like to try to cook actual food as often as possible, I find visiting there to be a huge waste of my time since their produce usually sucks, and they have zero "specialty" items. (I use that term VERY loosely here - think ginger). If I lived off of pre-packaged food, I'd save the petrol and buy the same stuff at the gas station (though, admittedly at a slightly higher price) - their selection is about the same.

Also - love that you speak your mind on your blog. Sarah Palin is a very frightening woman and unfit for the Oval Office in any capacity.

New topic: How did Barrio turn so crappy in just three weeks? Did they base their initial customer response on the conventioneers? Friday night, on a return visit, the food was haphazard, the service well-meaning but second-tier at best, and the music was 70s rock all night. Van Halen? Skynyrd? Are they borrowing mix CDs from TGI Fridays? What a horrible experience. Glad the place has caught on with the Len Druskin crowd; that way they won't miss us.

I'm with you all the way on Palin, and even if I weren't, I'd love you anyhow for going balls out - on your blog, in your life, and for your eats. Rock on.

Now those restaurants are bizarre.. If anyone is so rich and bored with life that you need to screw a goat or dog then eat it, please throw some of that cash this way.

I shop at Aldi for staples but they don't have anything specialty. The reason to shop there is that the prices are much cheaper than a regular grocery store but you have to rent your cart and bring your own bags. I went through a nine-month period of two mortgages and Aldi allowed me to still eat. Typically, however, if Aldi's on your list, plan to need to visit another grocery as well. I still go there occasionally but being a bit "richer" now, I usually go somewhere where I can get everything on my list. Time is money too!

noodleman wrote: "Governing should not require special training, a law degree or 'previous experience.' Representative democracy should mirror its constituencies; we want leaders not because they're 'smarter' than us but because just *are*just*like*us*. We ALL need to be capable of leading."

It's still morning and I've already found my "stupidest comment of the day." Are there really voters out there who want to be led by their next door neighbors or people they could have a beer with? I want the best minds running the most influential government in the world, not the bozos we've currently got. I don't want someone just like me, I want someone smarter, wiser and more committed than me running this country. I want the geniuses, the elites (in the true sense of that word) running the country, not the douchebags.

Oh, and I'm down with Aldi for commodity groceries -- cheap bread and milk, stuff to pack in my kids' lunches, snack items. I never buy meat and very little produce there, but I can still cut my weekly grocery bill (for a family of 4) by $10-20 by buying the basics at Aldi. So I save $500-1000 per year doing it, and it's 2 blocks from Rainbow, so it doesn't really require me to go out of my way.