Van Leeuwen makes some really FORKING amazing ice creams. They are super rich with egg yolks, and other fattening things. Some flavors are all natural with only basic minimal ingredients. Our local Sprouts Grocery sells the Leeuwen normal flavors that are very good. Our Walmarts sell the limited and special edition flavors of Van Leeuwen French Ice Cream. I picked up this container of Van Leeuwen Caramel Sticky Bun Ice Cream. Everyone likes sticky buns…..This flavor should be ok???????? I open it up.
It looks good. It’s the perfect eating temperature. It’s just getting all melted. I taste some melted around the ends…..Eh it’s a little cinnamon-ee…….but there is this strong (ick) toffy taste….that I don’t care for….
Well maybe the lumps in it taste good?….Maybe they will taste like sticky buns?
YUK! The lumps I’m not sure what they are?….They are like animal crackers that were thrown up……..YUK!
Some Van Leeuwen ice creams are better than others but this is the first one that taste awful to me.
To me this one taste like Toffy lace with a little bit of cinnamon with mushed up animal crackers. I won’t be getting fat from this one.
Those were my FORKING Thoughts on Limited Edition Van Leeuwen Caramel Sticky Bun French Ice Cream.
This is a collection of SOME of the better dishes that I have tried in Metro Phoenix Arizona from restaurants and food trucks in no particular order. I’m not mentioning stuff like a very good steak from Confluence or a perfectly prepared sea bass from Tarbell’s because that is predictable and expected. These are dishes that you might not know about. I haven’t been everywhere in Metro Phoenix and I haven’t tasted everything out there. This is a sampling of random better dishes. This also is mostly photos of the dish and name and address of restaurant. I tried to write as little as possible so you can fly threw the long list.
Up above is the bufalina pizza from Fabio On Fire. We have many great pizzas in Metro Phoenix but this bufalina stands out. There are several other dishes at Fabio’s that are also worth mentioning but we have a lot of food to get to here so I will cut it with Fabio’s Strawberry Gelato because it really is the best in all the land.
Fabio On Fire 8275 W Lake Pleasant PKWAY Peoria
Some of the other better dishes were-
Aloo Tikki Choley
Namaste Indian Restaurant 20851 N Scottsdale Rd Scottsdale
Nan Zhou – Hand Drawn Noodle House 111 S. Dobson Rd Mesa
The seared Hawiian Tuna Soba Salad
Wren & Wolf – 2 N Central Ave PHX
Chill King Chinese Food 4721 W Olive Ave Glendale
First & Last 1001 N 3RD Ave PHX
Pollo Asado (Chicken a little over and a little under….. but unusually great flavors)
Bacanora 1301 NW Grand Ave PHX
Confluence 36889 N Tom Darlington Dr Carefree (Confluence is a high quality restaurant that offers many superb detailed dishes and amazing desserts)
Mifan Claypot Kitchen 1616 N Central Ave PHX
Tortas CM 13971 N 59TH AVE Glendalr
Mrs Whites Golden Rule 808 E Jefferson St PHX
Collins Bros Chophouse 8220 N Hayden RD Scottsdale (This might be available at most if not all of the Collins Restaurants)
Honest to God this Pain Au Chocolat was maybe not as pretty but was much better tasting than the Pain Au Chocolat I tried from Dominique Ansel (Some consider best pastry chef in USA)
JL Patisserie 7342 E Shea BLVD Scottsdale
With Traditional sauce
Chick-A-Dee 49 W Thomas Rd PHX
Chula Seafood Greyhawk 20581 N Hayden Rd Scottsdale (Available at all Chula locations)
The Gladly 2201 E Camelback Rd PHX
Biryani Pot PHX 4030 E Bell Rd PHX
Red Ginger Food Truck – Good luck finding them – I found them once at Food Truck Friday West in Glendale.
Bro Bro’s BBQ Food Truck – Serving Phoenix
The Louisiana Hot Chicken Sandwich – Screaming Hot Chicken Food Truck – Serving Phoenix (This is part of Mingo’s Louisiana Kitchen Family)
The Chicken Potstickers
Banh Mi Bistro Vietnamese Eatery 2340 West Bell Rd PHX
Buffalo Chicken Plate (He told us that this wasn’t enough from a smaller chicken and told us to come back for the rest….He was very generous. That is why two photos)
Que Chevere Food Truck (They do have a brick and morter Restaurant in Mesa too)
Everything is very good from Alzohour Market. But the stuffed grape leaves (on right) and the baklava really are the best that I have tried anywhere.
Alzohour Market 7814 N 27TH AVE PHX
The A.G. Burger – 8oz USDA Prime ground in house tenderloin burger topped with a prime rib and more.
The Arrowhead Grill 8280 W Union Hills Dr Glendale
This next one is one of my husband’s two picks.
The Volcano Pork
The Craftsman 20469 N Hayden Rd Scottsdale
My husband’s other pick.
Braised Veal Osso Buco (weekend only)
The Italian Daughter 23655 N Scottsdale RD Scottsdale
This year was a great year for Tia Carmen. I tasted many better dishes there this year. It’s very hard to narrow down to only two dishes. I picked the lunch fish torta sandwich because it deserves to be a top sandwich of metro Phoenix….It’s a YUM-Dinger that is crazy flavorful and different. (pictured below)
Maybe the one dish of the year that I tasted that was the most amazing was the Tuna Crudo from Tia Carmen. It’s a dish that can make your heart skip a beat and is worth driving across town to try.
Tuna Crudu
Tia Carmen 5350 E Marriott Dr PHX
These were just SOME of the better dishes that I tried in Metro Phoenix 2022.
A long time ago in a land far away someone invented candy sticks to make noisy children shut the FORK up for when they are in church. It was also written that some German dude got the idea to put a little religion into the candy sticks by adding a Shepard’s hook.
Some time has passed and someone else got the idea to add hyssop flavor to the candy canes because hyssop was used in the Old Testament for purification and sacrifice. Maybe nobody wanted child sacrifice on their hands so they stopped adding hyssop to the candy canes. But maybe they changed to peppermint flavor because peppermint was cheaper?
Then they added the White Stripes.
Or was it the red stripes? Symbolizing the blood of Christ?
Maybe you noticed that candy canes often anything that’s NOT peppermint flavored?
Brisket flavored candy canes
Butter flavored candy canes
Sour cream and onion flavored candy canes
Kale flavored candy canes
Pickle flavor candy canes
Mac & cheese flavored candy canes
Sardine flavored candy canes
www.mcphee.com
Hotdog flavored candy canes
It doesn’t really matter WTFORK flavor that the candy cane is……If it’s in the mouth the kid with SHUT THE FORK UP!
This was a little bit of what happened to the Christmas Candy Cane.
I noticed these Limited Edition Hershey Strawberry Ice Cream Cone Kisses at my local Safeway Supermarket. I hesitated …….should I….or shouldn’t I?……..As a Youngster I used to like Good Humor Strawberry Shortcake Ice Cream Bars…..So I was hoping that these Hershey’s Strawberry Ice Cream Cone Kisses might taste similar…….????? Well lets see…..
Eeek! They are flesh colored with little red rashes.
I try it and it is gross. WTFork is this? Not sure if I can finish……..
It just taste very artificial ……Doesn’t taste comparable to anything.
As it’s melting I got a crunchy lump. The crunchy lump is ok….It’s sort of cookie like in taste……
But The kiss is still there and terrible. My tongue is burning from it….YUK!
Now I got a weird aftertaste…..It’s something like hops from beer…ICK…GROSS!
On the bright side I won’t be getting fat from them.
I can not recommend them…..Actually I am surprised that they can pass a taste test from Hershey’s…..
Those were my FORKING Thoughts on Limited Edition Hershey’s Strawberry Ice Cream Cone Kisses but I also must note that YOUR FORKING opinion may indeed differ.
So far 2022 has been a better year than most for Metro Phoenix Foods…..Not too many HORRIBLE FRIGHTFUL dishes….But there were a few. I very recently wrote about the next two dishes so if you read my blog then you know where these dishes came from. It’s not my intention to make trouble for any business………(even if they deserve it)…. I tell The Forking Truth….so I mention how my meal was once with the name of the business and once is enough……But these stories and most of the photos are Horrible and Frightful. Halloween time is just that perfect time to share these memories.
Overcooked macaroni and dried up cheese that never was good.
Burnt dried out fish with almost brunt oil filled eggplant.
After this are oldies but NOT goodies.
This was from a fine restaurant in the Biltmore area that is still in business. I do note that the chef that they had at the time left several years ago….By the looks of the polenta on the plate it seems like he might have been pissed off about something.
A certain restaurant on the west side served me a dessert with a hard glob of silicon in it that I had to spit out.
This next one might be the worst thing I ever got from a food truck. It made me scream and I had to spit it out.
It was suppose to be a corned beef egg roll from a food truck that specialized in corned beef. It was dry and awful inside but I still remember that the worst part was the egg roll because it tasted rancid.
Someone in metro Phoenix served me this sandwich.
They are still in business….
Sometimes you go to a restaurant that was very good for several visits………. Then when you eat the food you find out that the chef is no longer with them.
This restaurant closed shorty after I got this horrid dish. It was fishy salmon topped with raw tomato paste flanked by a splat of pureed corn and another splat of corn grits.
I went to a BBQ Restaurant in Phoenix that is still in Business. They served me grits that weren’t cooked.
They also served us meat that was under and still had hard fat on it.
I remember we said something about this but nobody said or did a thing.
A restaurant that is still in business in Peoria served my husband this sandwich.
At the time that restaurant recently changed ownership….It was not great but ok before this……………
It looks like a cinnamon bun but it’s not……….My husband was served a burnt roll somewhere.
This is the worst bulgogi I ever tried……It’s like they threw it in a blender and added cream cheese. It’s like throw up on a skillet.
This Thai Restaurant in Peoria thinks that it’s ok to call a dish fish and serve it without the meat.
I never went back.
This was from a Taco Restaurant that went out of business.
Dry flavorless chicken that might have been microwaved to hard and chewy with some pickled onions and a tortilla that fell apart before it arrived.
This place is still in business in Sun City.
The fish is fishy. The vegetables are obviously from frozen and boiled……I don’t know what happened to the mashed potato. I asked the server why it was green….She didn’t know and asked the chef. She said that he said, “Black pepper turns the potatoes green.”
Maybe my worst Metro Phoenix Restaurant foods came from an Asian Restaurant that I enjoyed on my first visit. I enjoyed the live seafood that was reasonably priced…..So I came back for a second visit….(unfortunately).
We started with some shiitake mushrooms with Asian Greens. They look good BUT….
Shiitake with Asian Greens
The sauce is HORRIFYING……Maybe it is suppose to be that way but I can’t stomach a sauce with the consistency of snot……I couldn’t eat this…..Sadly our main dish was worst.
On this visit I didn’t notice the live fish tanks???????? But ordered the rockfish anyway..This was like a fake fish that was impossible to eat….Like solid rubber and tough. I was going to say something to the owner….But my husband said that all was ok so the owner left.
The server didn’t even question on why we didn’t eat the fish and didn’t even ask if we wanted to bring it or the vegetables home……
Then the scary part is that we got a bill for over a hundred dollars for those two plates (We found out they charged $89. for that fish).
These were only a few of the HORRIBLE FRIGHTFUL Foods that was served to me in Metro Phoenix AZ.
I got lucky and tried some FORKING AMAZING food this week. FORKING AMAZING is not just very good…….It’s FORKING AMAZING! So here they are.
Alzohour Market is a HIDDEN GEM with SEVERAL FORKING amazing dishes. You can taste some of the very best Moroccan and Middle Eastern food in the Valley. This is not a fancy place and the service and the cooking is usually done by one woman so it is slow but it’s worth waiting for. The Moroccan tea is the best that you can taste anywhere. Tea doesn’t sound so special but here it is something different that you probably have never tried before…..GET IT…..It is really special!!!! ………Grape leaves usually aren’t anything special….But here at Alzohour Market they are by far the best that you’ve ever tasted anywhere. These stuffed grape leaves are like FIFTY TIMES BETTER than any other grape leaf that I’ve ever tried anywhere………..They are extra special. I didn’t have this today but I have had the b’stilla (house made sweet pastry with chicken) and it should be mentioned because it is extra special and is painstakingly made. The house made baklava is also the very best that I have ever tasted.
baklava
It’s not too sweet or too gooey. It’s delicious! When I have more room I usually get the house made spaghetti type cheese stuffed pastry…OMG it for certain is one of the best baked goods in Phoenix. Alzohour Market is worth driving across town for. I usually but not always get the fish tagine that is very good.
Alzohour Market 7814 N27TH AVE PHX AZ
602-433-5191
www.Alzohour-Market.Business.site
From Food Truck Friday West in Glendale I hit a few ok food trucks and we shared the FORKING AMAZING Brisket Sandwich from the Bro Bro’s BBQ Food Truck.
BBQ Brisket Sandwich with added corn and fire roasted poblano pepper from Bro Bro’s BBQ Food Truck
OMG it’s overflowing with goodness. You can’t pick it up and you have to eat it with a knife and fork. I wish you could smell it………..It smells like the most delicious BBQ that you can imagine…I wasn’t planning on eating here because I’m not a beef or pork person……but it smelled so amazing I had to make a stop here. This sandwich is on an extra flavorful tasty roll that is embellished with cheddar cheese and jalapeños. Inside is GOLD……..Really tender flavorful smoky brisket chunks and pulled….ad it’s a really perfect mix of lean and fatty….(but not TOO fatty). We added the corn option that is another tasty treat and another perfect accent is that fire roasted poblano pepper that adds another special layer of delicious! This sandwich was FORKING AMAZING!
Bro Bro’s BBQ Food Truck
www.BroBrosBBQ.com
Tia Carmen is a high quality contemporary (mostly South-West) type of restaurant. It’s located in North Phoenix in the JW Desert Ridge Marriott. The kitchen is led by Michelin Star Chef, Restauranteur, Bravo Top Chef, and Cookbook Author Angelo Sosa. I already written about Tia Carmen’s FANTABULOUS Dish (the Tuna Crudo) and I’ve also written about several of their stunning dishes. Tia Carmen has recently opened for lunch Monday-Friday. They offer several of the lighter dishes from their dinner menu and a few tortas and some additional desserts.
It’s hard to imagine a salad as a FORKING Amazing dish but this one truly stands out.
baby greens salad from Tia Carmen
The baby greens salad is a bit spicy and so full of so many flavors. Who knew a salad could be so complex? This salad contains fennel, Persian cucumber, epazote, pickled onions corn puree, serrano chile, and green olive dressing. It sure doesn’t compare to most salads out there and you can add chicken, crispy white fish, or grilled shrimp to turn it into a meal.
We also shared two of the tortas…….The fish torta stood out flavor wise as a FORKING AMAZING FANTABULOUS Dish. It EXPLODES like fireworks in your mouth. THIS IS SOOOOOO FORKING GREAT!!!!!
fish torta with hay fries from Tia Carmen
WOW! One of the great sandwiches in Metro Phoenix. This is a great surprise and also unexpected from this restaurant because it taste like the best Cha Cha La Vong (National Dish of Hanoi) that I’ve ever had. This sandwich is a crispy sea bass with sweet onion jam, spicy mayo, fresh dill, fresh cilantro, turmeric, and other FRESH HERBS that make it POP! It’s the combination and all the FRESH HERBS that make it taste so special. It also comes with fries that they call hay fries…..that are like a cross between fries and crispy potato sticks.
Tia Carmen at JW Marriott Phoenix Desert Ridge Phoenix AZ
5350 E Marriott Dr PHX AZ
480-293-3636
www.JWDesertRidge.com
*****Honorable Mention****
I didn’t eat the Shish Kafta but my husband said that the shish kofta from Alzohour Market is the very best that he has ever tried anywhere because it was juicy and full of delicious flavors.
Mixed Grill Plate from Alzohour Market
The Mixed Grill Plate from Alzohour Market contains a chicken kabob, shish kafta, gyro, with rice and whatever she feels like putting on the plate. Even the green pepper salad is AMAZING!
Alzohour Market 7814 N 27TH Ave Phoenix AZ
602-433-5191
www.Alzohour-Market.Business.site
Got lucky this week and really tried some of the very best plates that Metro Phoenix offers. These were a collection of the FORKING AMAZING Foods that I tried this week. I also got to eat out more than I normally do.
I came across this container of Van Leeuwen Honey Cornbread with Strawberry Jam French Ice Cream today at my local Walmart Grocery and felt compelled to try it. Van Leeuwen is a high quality (usually all natural) really full fattening ice cream. It’s French style so that means that it is made with egg yolks. Their pistachio flavor is awesome and only contains Sicilian pistachios, cream, milk, egg yolks, cane sugar, and salt. I also really liked their hazelnut chocolate mini ice cream bars. But they do some WEIRD flavors….I haven’t tried (as of yet) their Kraft macaroni and cheese flavor or their Grey Poupon mustard and pretzels flavor. But I have tried their pizza flavor. It wasn’t awful……It did taste good but I thought that it was a far cry from tasting like pizza.
Back to the Honey Cornbread with Strawberry Jam French Ice Cream.
I open it up.
Peel it open.
It looks different from what I was expecting. There is hardly any strawberry.
I taste some…….
WOW it’s completely not at all what I expected…….
This one seems light ……….or lighter……but it isn’t…….
It doesn’t have that rich creamy texture like the others did. I would have guessed it to be ice milk………Did it melt in Walmart???????……. or was it mishandled…???????????? Or is this the way it’s suppose to be?????????
It’s milky with what seems like cooked grains of cornbread……..It’s like you spilled cornbread mix that is cooked into vanilla ice milk…..You get very little strawberry. It’s predominantly a cornbread taste. The little bit of strawberry jam taste caramelized…. It’s also not as sweet as it sounds. It’s almost not sweet.
It’s interesting….not sure if I’d buy again but it’s not a throwaway.
Those were my FORKING Thoughts on Van Leeuwen Honey Cornbread with Strawberry Jam French Ice Cream. I do note that YOUR FORKING thoughts may indeed differ.
I like to try foreign snacks once in a while for a taste of something different. Usually it’s weird flavors of potato chips but these chocolate coated corn puffs caught my eye so I decided to give them a try.
In this corner is something called Gusto from Romania.
It was only around $1. at the Asiana Market in Glendale. I can’t read the package and I thought the picture on the package looked like chocolate covered peanut puffs. I should have worn reading glasses because I didn’t even notice the raspberries on the package. ………..These things are Corn Puffs coated in milk chocolate with raspberry flavor. I ate one…These are hard for me to stomach. They are sickeningly sweet and just awful ……..I think that cheap chocolate kind of taste mixed with artificial raspberry is stomach turning…The corn puff has very little or almost no flavor…Its the coating that is unappealing and just packed with YUK.. These are going to hit the trash can after I make my husband try one. Maybe their other flavors are better?????? I read that they make a BOOZY RUM corn snack…..Maybe they make that flavor better????? But this one sucks so bad I doubt I’ll ever feel like trying it.
In the other corner are Bamba Dark Chocolate Dipped Peanut Corn Puff Snacks are marked, “Sold By Trader Joe’s.” Bamba peanut without chocolate are a well known famous snack food from Israel that are sold at nearly every supermarket in little bags. The Bamba dark chocolate dipped peanut flavored corn puffs do cost more than the Gusto chocolate coated corn puffs. They are in a bigger bag but If I recall correctly they were around $2.99 a bag.
I have to admit that I do occasionally enjoy the regular peanut Bamba puffed corn snacks. I read on Amazon that they are made 50% from peanuts….so they are at least 50% healthy….
OMG these Chocolate dipped Bambas are really good……They seem so light and tasty…..they are almost impossible to stop eating. They are not too sweet and not heavy or greasy…..with that indulgent chocolate on that light as air peanut cloud.
DAM You Trader Joe’s! I’m going to have to buy a bag every time I shop in your store until you stop selling them…..Just like you always discontinue my favs……Then I’ll be mad at you again!
Anyways-
……The combination of peanut puff and dark chocolate is very tasty………savory…….They seem light as air…(But I know they are not)……They are very hard to stop eating.
Gusto lost this battle WAY too easily…….I was hoping for a close battle.
Those were my FORKING Thoughts on Foreign Chocolate Covered Corn Puff Battle.
I spotted this White Chocolate Lemon Meringue Bar at my local AJ’s Fine Foods and I had to try it.
I open it up carefully. I attempted to break off one brick….That didn’t work.
These bars have lots of filling and the white chocolate is very delicate and almost soft.
I taste the broken ends. The lemony part is really great and sure does taste like really good lemon meringue filling…Like the right tart and the right sweet……the right amount of lemon……….The white chocolate is pretty good for white chocolate but it does end with a sweet finish like it should like some meringue. (I hate when meringue taste like egg whites…ick)
I think that this flavor is pretty good but they’ve forgotten that lemon meringue is a pie and should have some crumbs for crust. A few slightly salted cookie crumbs on the bottom would have balanced it all really well………But it is still pretty good anyway.
Those were my FORKING Thoughts on Hammond’s Lemon Meringue White Chocolate Bar. Your FORKING Thoughts may indeed differ.
The FANTABULOUS Dish means – Top of the line, marvelously good, peachy keen, and dynamite! WOW what a great surprise . You just don’t always know when a FANTABULOUS dish will show up. This salad just blew both of us away. It’s only named Arugula salad. I picked it to share as an appetizer instead of chips because it sounded lighter and healthy. I wasn’t expecting jaw dropping fireworks of flavors……
The Arugula Salad from REVOLU Modern Taqueria & Bar in Peoria AZ
This salad is made of avocado, watermelon, red onion (pickled), pico, toasted pepitas, cotija cheese, and this MAGICAL chili-lime vinaigrette.
I need to mention as astonishingly delicious as this salad is ………I must mention that it is spicy HOT. Borderline too hot for me but it was so DAM delicious I had to keep eating it. You get sweet from the watermelon, creamy from the avocado, hot and delicious from the MAGICAL chili-lime vinaigrette, Umami from the cheese, yummy from the pepitas and the right amount of bitter from the arugula. It’s far more delicious than I can describe. You can also add on protein to this dish if desired.
The Arugula Salad from REVOLU Modern Taqueria & Bar is an official FANTABULOUS DISH and is WORTH A FORK!
REVOLU Modern Taqueria & Bar
15703 N 83rd Ave Peoria AZ (a second location is in Phoenix)
