This burger is a tasty stretch

By Scott Beveridge

McMURRAY, Pa. – The Ostrich Burger's name on the menu at a Belgian beer bar chain in Pittsburgh is enough to pull any hungry man's head out of the sand at suppertime.

That burger is also more than enough to capture the attention of a small group of journalists, including myself, who gather last week for happy hour at its Sharp Edge Brasserie in Peters Township, Pa., and decide to divide one of the sandwiches up for a taste.

"It's a bit gamy," I remark, repeating a phrase some people say when they taste wild duck, turkey, pheasant or quail.

There is probably a much better word to describe this sandwich made with lean ostrich and sirloin blended with caramelized red onion, cracked pepper, pepper jack cheese and ancho chili aioli. That last ingredient sounds really fancy for something that a subsequent Google search reveals to be hot-spiced-up mayonnaise.

"I think it tastes likes a meatloaf kind of oniony spicy kind of flavor," says Amanda Gillooly, a freelance writer whose witty musings sometime show up on this blog.

She is right, I think, after dribbling up the tiny leftover clumps of food on the plate. That meat tastes better without the bun, really.

Another friend, who will remain nameless to protect her from losing her new newspaper gig, said she prefers the bar's soup over this burger.

"I don't think it replaces the the hop devil potato soup," she said.

And, after the plate is cleared, Breadline blogger Michael Jones chimes in, reminding us that $13.37 is a wee bit of a steep price to pay for any burger. He's probably right on that call.

Chasing a chicken in the hills of New York

ONEONTA, N.Y. – There is a classic flashing pink neon sign outside Brooks’ House of Bar-B-Q displaying a chef wielding a hatchet chasing after a chicken.

This sign, as well as the jam-packed parking lot, give me the immediate impression the food is good and fresh in this roadside restaurant in south-central New York.

I take a seat at the curving Formica lunch counter the color of an orange Creamsickle and begin to take in the kitschy ambiance. The counter has swiveling wooden captains chairs. Images of large chickens are stamped across the brown, red and white wallpaper surrounding the room. There are more chicken doodads hanging on the wall facing the counter.

More than 20 people are standing in line for one of the 300 seats in the adjoining dining room, and nearly as many wait in the lobby to place take-home orders. A large moose head hangs above the dining room entrance alongside other animal trophies that add a strange hunting lodge feel to this 1970s-style restaurant that could well have been the backdrop for a Brady Bunch episode.

“Is this where everyone in town comes on a Friday night?” I say to the waitress, after she drops before me a paper placemat with descriptions and images of the different barn types in the region.

“It’s pretty much where everyone comes most nights,” she responds.

I’m directed here while on a trip to the area by a bubbly coworker at the Observer-Reporter, Chistie Campbell, who grew up in nearby Delhi, N.Y.

“They’re famous for their sauce,” she says.

The city, pronounced oh knee yawn ta, is home to a little more than 13,000 people, most of whom vote Republican. It supposedly takes its name from an Indian phrase for “place of open rocks,” a reference to an outcropping of tablerocks.

Among Brooks’ most-famous customers is Hillary Clinton, who stopped here in 1999 during her successful campaign for New York’s U.S. senator. But Oneontians were not especially nice to her when she arrived at the business at 5560 State Route 7 to a large crowd of hecklers.

My waitress, though, has a pleasant smile as she takes my order for a half-dozen wings with mild sauce. Then I watch waitresses deliver platefuls of grilled chicken breasts and spareribs to chubby diners. This is much more interesting than studying those illustrations and descriptions of such barns as the New England connecting or Dutch Gambrel.

My wings arrive in short order. The sauce they drip doesn’t taste any different than your average red-hot Buffalo sauce, but the chicken is especially plump and moist.

It isn’t until I place a cell phone call from the counter to Christie that she tells me the best juice in the house is the yellow chicken variety.

I purchase her a bottle of the stuff while paying the $4.99 tab for the wings, and continue on my journey south to Scranton, Pa. She promises to prepare some chicken in this yellow magic sauce for the newsroom. We’ll let you know how it tastes.

George Jetson-era doughnuts

It’s hard to believe in the digital age that there isn’t a Web site advertising DeAngelis Donuts, a funky coffee shop at a busy intersection northeast of Pittsburgh.

So newcomers like us are forced to call the business in Rochester boasting a retro plastic sign capped with a giant spinning doughnut to find out when it opens and closes.

The waitress on the other end of the line today said she usually locks up when the donuts are sold out, but will be there until 5 p.m. So much for regular hours at this roadside attraction at one end of the Monaca-Rochester Bridge crossing the Ohio River in Beaver County.

We arrive about 4:30 p.m. to find the inside lights aglow, a chubby customer at the counter, the doors locked and a friendly waitress who ultimately decides to let us inside. I am happy and on a mission to sink my teeth into what the sign outside promotes as “Delightfully Different DONUTS.”

By now, I am craving greasy, sticky arteries-clogging glazed donuts of a heavenly variety. To my surprise, there are several rows of surviving chocolate cake donuts covered in dark sprinkles, those with fancy swirls that pretend to have a French connection and others dusted with powdered sugar in the sour dough family. The doughnut gods are surely smiling down upon us. She bags us a half-dozen assortment that cost just under $5 and we are out the door.

In the end, there isn’t anything special about these donuts. They are kind of small, actually. But that's OK.

It’s the original 1950s architecture, shiny chrome counter stools and giant geometric George Jetsonish sign that make this business a worthy adventure in the New Millennium.

There is gold in the new m&m's

Mars has rolled out a new specialty treat that is not your grandmother’s m&m’s in a campaign targeting chocolate lovers with discriminating taste buds.

The candy-maker introduces a fancy variety of its time tested, bite sized classic, the new m&m’s Premiums, which is billed as “a delightful chocolate gem with a colorful outside and rich, scrumptious inside.”

It comes in such flavors as Mocha or Raspberry Almond, pieces coated in bright marbleized, paper thin candy that disappear before melting in the mouth. Those Mochas look like shiny nuggets of gold covered in hues of coffee and burnt orange that make them far sexier in appearance than traditional m&m’s.

It appears Mars is appealing to people who shop for premium products to convince their friends they have refined senses of elegance.

The new candy is selling in local Giant Eagle markets for upwards of $5 for one 6 oz. box that is clumsy to seal after opening.

A box of the Mocha label amounts to enough chocolate to fill one cup, 920 calories and 160 percent of the recommended daily dose of saturated fats in a healthy diet. Regardless of the potential damage to my arteries, I like this coffee-flavored junk food a lot, and pass it around to my coworkers to see if they agree with my fondness for this stuff.

An unofficial, random sampling today among the news staff at the Observer-Reporter in Washington, Pa., resulted in unanimous approval of the Mochas and feedback that will make Mars smile.

“They are worth every penny and calorie,” an editor said, prior to leaving work to find more of them more at Target.