French Fry Diary 281: Worst. McDonald's. Ever.

On a recent trip to North Jersey we stopped at the Vauxhall Plaza McDonald's in Union NJ on the Garden State Parkway. We were hungry, needed gas, and this was convenient. This was also a big mistake.

First, because I am currently addicted to Foursquare, I had to check in, and I was rather shocked at the comments about the place, especially bad were the ones about the drive-thru - which unfortunately we were already in line. Slow, rude, sassy and belligerent were the kindest of the descriptions for the drive-thru lady. I believe however more in actual experience over word of mouth - sometimes that doesn't work out for me.

After ordering, we slowly moved up to the pay window. There was a statue of Officer Big Mac, a forgotten McDonaldland character behind bars on the passenger side. On the driver side was what could only be the woman described in the Foursquare comments. She was yelling through our car at someone we assumed was her boyfriend a hundred feet away in the parking lot. She had quite a mouth on her, and I'm talking both volume and heat, good things there were no children in the car. Luckily she didn't hit us with any spit.

We paid and got away from her as quick as possible, and soon found that order accuracy was also one of her customer service skills. Although I'm sure the rest of the staff helped in the ineptitude. We got Chicken McNuggets in lieu of a cheeseburger, frozen chocolate milk, and the fries were especially crappy, seeming much smaller than usual as if they had been refried.

To their credit, they fixed the cheeseburger mix-up when The Bride went inside, and even gave us more of those crappy fries. Wow. Still, never again, no matter how hungry we are or how much gas we need. It's no wonder Officer Big Mac is in jail. He's ashamed.

Justin Bieber Fries

Perhaps you have heard of the insidious and hilarious David Thorne and his personal mission to make life hell for a fellow office worker. If not, check out the details here.

One of my favorite of his stunts involved superimposing Justin Bieber's face onto a pic of the favorite fried food. That story can be found here.

Mmmm... Justin Bieber fries...

French Fry Diary 280: The Friar's Nook, Magic Kingdom

The Friar's Nook. This was actually where I wanted to go on the last night of my Disney World vacation, but ended up at Columbia Harbour House instead. I had gotten a very good recommendation for their homemade potato chips. They also have teriyaki chicken nuggets that sound good too, but I was mostly going for the chips.

Sudden downpours and storms shut a lot of the counter service places down in the Magic Kingdom earlier in the evening, and The Friar's Nook was one of them unfortunately. I'll get to it when I return in March. Looking forward to those chips. Keep your fingers crossed against rain.

Tornado Fries Unwrapped

For today's Food Network Friday, we have the story of Tornado Fries from "Unwrapped."

French Fry Diary 279: Columbia Harbour House, Magic Kingdom

Any port in a storm, that's what they say, and it was a stormy night in Disney's Magic Kingdom, so after hitting the Hall of Presidents, we went to the nautical and colonial themed Columbia Harbour House for dinner. I loved the Hall of Presidents this time, by the way. There's nothing new really, short of an animatronic President Obama, but the host in the lobby was very well read, and he and I got into a great conversation about posse comitatus. However, The Bride is not the history nut I am, plus we also wanted to stay out of the rain.

At the Columbia Harbour House, I got fries of course, and as always in the parks, they were the Disney standard natural cuts. Remember what I said a few days ago about it being who's doing the cooking not how they're cooked? Well, these were very limp and greasy, not good fries at all. Ick. The Bride enjoyed her salad quite a bit though.

Now it should be noted that these are not the only kind of fries you can get here. As I noticed on the Disney Food Blog after I got home from vacation, sometimes they will serve meatier, and better looking regular cuts with the Fried Fish Basket. I wonder if I could request them next time I go?

French Fry Diary 278: Whispering Canyon Café, Lunch 2011

The Bride and I had had a wonderful breakfast at the Whispering Canyon Café just a few hours before, but we previously had lunch reservations with Dom and Cindy and the kids for lunch, so here we were, back again. We were even joined by The Bride's second cousin who lives in the Orlando area.

I love this place, and not just for the bottomless milkshakes. It's interactive with the waitstaff and there's always a show of some kind, watch out though, you may be part of it. Ask for ketchup, ask for straws, and you'll see that's just the tip of the interactive iceberg here at the Café.

For the most part however it was a quiet lunch this day, as in not much interaction with the staff, but we all had a nice chat getting to know each other better. A rather tense moment was had for all in the dining room when news of an earthquake in Washington DC hit. You might remember as this happened in August, and the quake was felt as far north as New York. We had to call home to make sure everything was all right in New Jersey, all was okay though. It was a scary moment however, almost like 9/11, as everyone in the dining room was silent and on their cellphone, either calling loved ones or checking the news.

For lunch I got the Angus Chuck bacon cheeseburger sans bacon and cheese (I still had the bad taste of the bacon cheeseburger from Captain Cook's on my mind), fries of course, and the wonderful all-you-care-to-enjoy milkshakes (I had two). The burger was very good, and the fries were the Disney standard, natural cuts, good when hot.

It was a rather somber meal because of the earthquake, but good times just the same with friends and family.

Random Tater Pic of the Day #20

This one was taken by friends Dom and Cindy while on vacation with us in Walt Disney World. It's from the Norway pavilion in Epcot, where they took their little girl to the 'Princess Storybook Dining' at Akershus Royal Banquet Hall. The little princess got meatballs and green beans and gravy on a nest of mashed potatoes, with lingonberries - shades of Ikea!

French Fry Diary 277: Lay's Stax

Folks that know me personally, know, that for a variety of reasons and health issues, I take a lot of pills. It's not a big deal, and keeps me kicking, that's what counts. The problem is that not all of these pills go down easy, and some have a rather crappy aftertaste, so there are a variety of things I'll eat during taking them and afterward to kill that taste. A good jellied candy will do it, or a couple M&Ms, but sometimes I turn to one or two potato chips. The processed ones like Pringles seem to work best, but they also usually taste like crap as well.

On the recent vacation I picked up the best alternative, Stax from Lay's. Similarly packaged in a plastic can, this potato flake perfect-formed chip has two grand advantages over the Pringles. First they have weight, a little more thicker and substantial, and second, they have flavor. And if they have flavor, you kinda want to eat more. Not necessarily what I wanted in a chip on my vacation, but still a bonus.

My weapon of choice is the Mesquite Barbecue flavor, which have a wonderful smoky vibe to them. And the thickness also makes them a great dipping chip. Stax also come in original, cheddar, salt and vinegar, sour cream and onion, and ranch. They have a taste and flavor to get rid of any other bad taste in your mouth, and are a great snack anytime as well. Check 'em out.

French Fry Diary 276: Whispering Canyon Café, Breakfast

Circumstances collided and we ended up hitting the Whispering Canyon Café for both breakfast and lunch one day of our vacation. Not a problem though, we like the place. We've been twice before on our two previous trips to Walt Disney World.

For breakfast they had a very tempting, very fattening raisin bread French toast with cinnamon icing, I had to have that. The Bride ordered some potatoes, and promised I could have some. I also ordered a Coke, as I'm not a coffee drinker and orange juice just doesn't wake me up. Check the photo to see what they brought. Even being almost all ice, it was still almost as much as a two-liter bottle of Coca-Cola.

The French toast was to die for, even before the syrup, and fantastic when you get a raisin. It's not as good as say French toast made with raisin challah bread, or the Pop Shop's cinnamon roll French toast, or even the French toast my big sister used to make me on Saturday mornings for breakfast while watching cartoons, but it's damn good. The potatoes were roasted red potatoes, cut into wedges, and were gigantic -

Sorry, I had to stop writing on my iPhone notepad, someone other than The Bride needed the ketchup. And if you don't know what I'm talking about, ask for ketchup while you're here at Whispering Canyon.

As I was saying, before I got interrupted, the potato wedges are so gigantic that you have to cut them up to eat them. They are soft and hot on the inside like baked potatoes and have a nice seared outside. The maple syrup also adds a nice flavor as well. Aces on the potatoes. I can't wait for lunch.

French Fry Diary 275: Aquaman #1 2011

Anyone who knows me personally knows a big comic book geek I am. I've maintained a comic book review site, done monthly reviews of the Avengers family of comics, and I currently do a weekly vidcast about new comics. One of the most exciting things happening in the comics industry right now is DC Comics rebooting their line with fifty-two new number one issues. One of the most anticipated of those issues is Aquaman.

I love Aquaman, and I'm not the only one. If you don't believe me, check out my friend Rob Kelly's terrific website, The Aquaman Shrine. Joke if you like, non-believers, but the man's time has come, Aquaman is cool. Of course, I've always known that, and now that the rest of the world is catching on to that, DC Comics has given the king of the seven seas a brand new series, and brought on two of the industry's finest to produce it - Geoff Johns and Ivan Reis. Trust me, these guys are superstars in their field.

Aquaman #1 came out this past Wednesday, only days after the character's 70th anniversary, and in my opinion was the absolute best of all the new fifty-two comics. Of course, you might wonder why I'm writing about Aquaman here on French Fry Diary, besides my obvious passion for the comics and the character. Oh trust me, there is a method to my madness.

In the sequence pictured here, Aquaman visits a diner he and his father frequented when he was a kid. He orders fish and chips. Yeah, baby, that's right, Aquaman likes French fries. I knew there was a deeper reason I loved Aquaman.

And if you think that's odd, think harder about it. When Aquaman lived on land in his youth, he would've eaten the same things most humans eat, and that would include fish (and French fries!). And when he took on his destiny as King of Atlantis, really, what do you think Atlanteans eat? Of course they eat fish, there's only so much seaweed and kelp you can eat. Protein is needed, ya know?

Seriously, Aquaman rocks. Buy the comic. Visit the website. After all, the man likes French fries.