Hello internet! Long time. I’m pretty much the worst blogger in the world, aren’t I? I mean, who goes out and even has lives separate from the internet anymore?

Okay, I’m sorry. I really am. I have this growing backlog of interesting things I keep meaning to tell you about in the most roundabout and smarmy of ways, but alas, I can hardly come up with the time. But hey, here I am. Quiet your angry keyboard pounding and just pay attention.

If you have a decent memory and/or the incredible ability to look further down the page at the older posts, you’ll know that I spotted a crazy looking cthulhu citrus fruit at Whole Foods. What the what, you may have collectively asked yourselves in quiet bewilderment. I can answer your question in a quick smarmy link, or you can just look at the pictures and decide for yourself.

From the day I set eyes on that bumpy hide, the gnarly tendrils, and the grotesque severed-limb appearance, I knew I just had to have it. I figured that the best way would be to go on the offensive: buy one of these doggone things (I paid something like $8 for this gargantuan beast. This thing was a major novelty and also a major dent to my wallet for what it was worth) and gather a bunch of friends to launch our collective attack on it.

Our purpose was two-fold: we would somehow put this grody thing in our mouths, but before doing so we’d try some of the Miracle Berry Tablets that I had recently got from ThinkGeek.

Mystery indeed.

You take a tablet, set it on your tongue, and it alters your tastebuds’ perception of mainly sour and bitter things to make them taste sweet. It basically takes the edge off of things such as citrus fruits and the bitterness of beer, and transforms your tongue tasting landscape into a trippy candyland.

Ready to get a little crazy and messy, a hush fell over our party as the first cut was made into the buddha hand lemon. It was the same sort of anticipatory silence you get in parts of horror movies just before the killer jumps out and starts hackin’ away. It was the same sort of dead air before the sharp blade slices into limbs and red dye corn syrup splatters all over the screen.

Uh, well, I guess it was hardly exciting. If you were looking for a juicy fruit, you ain’t got one. This whole thing was rind. Imagine not only the plain ol’ disappointment, but the frustrating bouts of embarrassment as it all dawned on us we weren’t really supposed to put these in our mouths… after having chewed at it for a little while, of course.

But never mind embarrassment. Think about all the indigestion. As a party idea I thought it was killer: group of friends, disgusting food, trippin’ tastebuds, hilarity ensues! Ah yes, tastebuds were trippin’, hilarity ensued, but disgusting food stayed in our systems, and luckily no one died so group of friends remained intact.

The disgusting food we tried after triggering our tastebuds on miracle berries was bountiful. Some of our findings were as follows.

Limes: delicious. Removes the bitter and sour notes, and leaves behind an almost floral citrusy note.
Grapefruit: in my opinion, the best thing ever. It removes the bitter crust to get to that smooth citrus flavor.
Guinness: tastes chocolatey.
Chipotle peppers: don’t try this. It does nothing except burn your eyes when you forget that you’ve touched the chiles with your fingers and then rub your eyes.
Tabasco: do do this. Tabasco has vinegar which, once removed, has a very interesting heat and flavor to it. Becomes ultimately very savory.
Honey: sickeningly sweet.
Balsamic vinegar: warm, lush flavor and without the sour, increasingly like honey.
Salt and vinegar chips: turned almost.. sweet. It was really bizarre.
Goat cheese: tasted like cheesecake. We could not get enough of this insanity.

Other items either were unaffected by the tablets or did not seem overwhelmingly all that different. All in all, it turned out to be a great party with little to no digestive problems, even if I would’ve guessed otherwise. I can live another day to fight another battle with some gnarly, overpriced fruit from exotic lands.

Until next time.

(You get bonus points for recognizing the subject without needing a quick Google.)

One of my favorite places that’s close enough to work is Toyo Sushi. As per your typical Japanese joint, it’s got sushi. That’s all fine and dandy. But you know what the fun bonus is? Random Korean food!

My coworkers and I are a tiny obsessed with the Al-Bab here: fish roe and other miscellaneous items arranged in colorful bloom. Even in a takeout box the spread is so appealing. The spectrum of flavors varies from savory to slightly sweet to a tiny bit pickled.

Like your other Korean rice/babs, you take the lottery wheel of yummy toppings and you spin it all around until you’ve mixed it up nice and good with the rice. The result is little dabs of beef, roe, pollock (I think), beansprouts, oshinko, pickled seaweed, and kimchi all in a hurricane of deliciousness chaotically ramming against your different senses of taste in one fell swoop.

This isn’t something that’s for everyone, but if you can stomach it, it is so-oh-oh-oh good. On a scale of never-go-near-my-mouth-orifice to I’d-probably-snort-it-if-I-could, this is a definite loves it til I die of disgusting food overload. Mmm.

» Toyo Sushi on 2211 Cambie Street (604) 879-0990

creepy cthulhu citrus, originally uploaded by dreamoo.

I caught this at the Whole Foods just a while ago, and while it looks a Lovecraftian alien bent on destroying all that is good and sacred, it’s just a lemon.

How on earth do you eat this thing? I mean, besides the basic logistics of preparing it, how do you put this in your mouth? It looks like it not only has a (possibly wretched, tortured) soul, it looks like it eats souls.

Next update: I will get one of these, try one of those wacky miracle berry tablets and see if I taste the apocalypse in my mouth.

P.S. I really enjoy that the top of the tag says “conventional”. Oh, of course. Just the run-of-the-mill extraterrestrial Avatar-tentacle citrus. No biggie.

Hello world!

Tibbidy Fibbity is no more. We are now brand-spankin’-new… bestdamnfoodblog.com. Nice and fitting. Rolls off the tongue. Sexy, subtle, slightly salty.

Glad to be back. Going to be throwing (words about) food your way real soon, internet. Real soon.

2 comments

Closing shop

Hi guys,

I guess I don’t really need to ‘fess up. You know what’s going on (or rather, what hasn’t been going on). This site was my darling last year, starting from a fledgling piece o’ gourmet crud to the slightly-more-veteran piece o’ gourmet crud it is today. I have eaten a lot, made a lot of bad jokes, written irrelevant things and made a few friends. You have been decent to me, internet.

My domain is coming up for renewal and frankly, I’m not big on the tibbidyfibbity name any longer. All the opinions I had solicited before I began my blog were unanimous: it’s a terrible name. I knew it, and I enjoyed it. However, I now know it and no longer enjoy it, so change must be made.

I’ve come to realize I no longer am such a big fan of writing about food any more – I love being sarcastic, obviously, and more often than not most restaurants don’t deserve any particular opinion of any caliber. There are just too many meh places out there that I don’t need to tell you about. I’ve been writing my personal blog for a bit of time now and while that’s not for everyone, I hope someday I can come back with another more public persona with entertaining tidbits you might enjoy processing.

For now, toodles.

Hey, long time no see. I know, I know, I’ve been gone a long time. Summer has been beautiful and really hot this year, just the way I like it. Why stay in facing a hot stove when you can be out in sandals on a patio drinking sangria? It’s a rather difficult choice, obviously.

I’ve been spending less on eating out lately – if you haven’t been living under a rock or in a cave somewhere, you’d know that the province will be implementing the HST shortly, meaning that eating out will be pricier. It all adds up. I’ve always handled my money very conservatively and nowadays I watch my numbers like a hawk most of the time. I was just at the bank this week to set up RRSP mutual funds. What can I say? I’m hoping to retire by, oh, I don’t know, 25.

When I retire I’ll probably end up cooking all the time, and maybe I’ll figure out a whole plethora of recipes that I consider tried and true. However, I only really only have a handful of those kinds of recipes right now, and I’ll share with you my favorite. This one is a no-brainer: these are the best chocolate chip cookies (to me). Everyone likes their own ccc differently; my favorite has a soft chew, an appropriate amount of chocolate, and sometimes a smattering of mysterious nuts. This is how it’s done.

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5 comments

Dona Cata

I love Mexican food. I’m not gonna lie, because I can’t say I know what authentic Mexican food could possibly be really like, but I like almost anything I can get. Vancouver is good for having a variety of authentic cuisines available within reach, but (so I’ve heard) we’re sorely lacking in good Latin American restaurants. When I spot a Mexican restaurant that doesn’t look particularly frou-frou or clearly un-authentic, I immediately make a mental note of it to go back there when possible.

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Guys, I met some food bloggers. Let me tell you something: Meetups are inevitably always a little weird, but I’ve been to plenty before and they’re always a lot of fun. The weird bits are always fantastic in one way or another because you either have a barrel of fun or at least have good stories to tell about afterward. I was at a photography meetup once and being in an Irish pub with about twenty other people all pointing giant lenses at each other is not only the epitome of weird, it’s just plain hilarious. I also couldn’t figure out if I felt more in place or out of place in such a crowd.

When I waltzed in fifteen minutes late into Alvin Garden on Saturday evening, a table of twelve greeted me. I definitely felt out of place at that point, awkwardly grabbing a chair and planting myself firmly in what was already a cozy table. However, it didn’t take long to settle in, and we were soon gabbing away.

Alvin Garden is a Hunan style Chinese restaurant, Hunan being one of the Eight Great Traditions (I had to look up what this was in English, but in Chinese it’s known as one of the 八大菜系). Geographically speaking Hunan is in the Southern portion of China, its name literally meaning south of the Lake (in this case, it’s Lake Dongting). It’s not only geographically quite close to the better know Sichuan, but also speaking cuisine-wise they are both really similar. Both cuisines are firey and full of hot, spicy flavors, although there is a small divide on what kinds of heat each cuisine packs. Apparently (I had to look this up) Hunan spice is more of a dry spice with liberal amounts of fresh chilis, shallots and garlic, while Sichuan heat is more often than not numbing from a variety of dried ingredients. Either way, I can’t handle my spice particularly well so you generally won’t find me stuffing chilis in my mouth like no tomorrow. But more on that later.

The dishes all look horrific, to me at least. The majority are crowded plates of deep reds: chili peppers are thrown in whole, sliced, diced, minced, any way you can have them. I mean, look at this beast:

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Hey, remember me? Yeah, me neither. I’ve been MIA for a long while, and I ain’t got no particular reason. I just got bored (and poor). It’s a recession! Eating out is a sin! Since I had nothing particularly exciting to talk about (no one would want to read about me making poverty meals at home anyway) it seemed like I was in a downward spiral of foodblog starvation.

But not really.

I’ve been taking a food and travel writing course which has been quite nice. One great highlight of the course was that the class would have a big night out – one evening where we all went out to dinner and would review the place. How exciting! I thought in my nerdy inner monologue, That sounds like something I could pass off as legitimate blog material! My inner nerd got all kinds of excited when it was revealed where we’d be going: Connor Butler (restaurant). Oh, hey! It’s that weird place down on South Granville! I’ve always wondered what that was. I had always thought it was an antique store. Okay, enough terrible inner monologue, and onto the terrible writing that I did for my assignment!

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Chocolate Buffet!

My stomach just made a noise that sounded an awful lot like the smoke monster in Lost. If you’ve never watched Lost, don’t bother. The smoke monster is, like everything else in the show, inexplicable. Essentially the noise it makes sounds a lot like the creak of a rusty ocean liner. My stomach just made a noise that is possibly not even biological. “Oh, what sort of overeating did you partake in now? Tibfib, you card!” That is probably what you are wondering.

Actually, if you’re wondering that, you missed something. The title of this post is CHOCOLATE BUFFET. Bet you can’t guess what I’ve been gorging on. The sound my stomach made was probably indicative of the fact that people, as a general rule, should not eat like this. This is a warning to you sensible folk out there. For the rest of you just as insane as I am, keep reading and take notes.

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