Restaurants

Restaurant Review Roundup: Pure Pizza, Jackalope Jacks, Maria Bonita, & Mortimers — Charlotte, NC {restaurant review}

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There’s no sense in beating around the biscuit–let’s get down to the nitty gritty on  four Charlotte restaurants I’ve eaten at recently:

PURE PIZZA:  Located uptown in the 7th St Public Market, Pure Pizza is quickly becoming one of pure pizzamy favorite spots for lunch.  They specialize in farm to fork pizza, and their toppings are seasonal and sourced straight from the market.  You have your choice of dough:  sprouted ancient grain (which includes quinoa), classic Neapolitan  or gluten-free.  My favorite pie is the chorizo, which comes with organic radishes, onions, cilantro, and lime.  Each pizza is served with a small container of honey for dipping the crust, which I found surprisingly tasty.  Recently, PP expanded their menu to include several sandwiches.  For lunch last week, I tried the caprese sandwich, which comes panini style, pressed and oozing with fresh mozzarella cheese.  I am in love with their balsamic dressing—it’s tangy, sweet, and super thick, almost spreadable.  Pure Pizza also sells adorable half bottles of wine and beer, there is plenty of seating available, AND the market validates parking.

 

jackalopesJACKALOPE JACKS:   by appearances alone, this place is incredibly deceiving.  From the outside, it looks like someone scrapped an arcade and a miniature golf course and repurposed the parts into a  restaurant. If you can look past the fake grass, you’ll find several holes-in-one on the menu (the golf analogy ends here, I promise).   Their house chili is one of my favorites in town and their salads are surprisingly large and fresh.  My top picks on the menu include the southwestern wrap with corn and black bean salad, teriyaki chicken skewers, and the jalapeno mac and cheese (if you like things extra spicy, that is).  Jackalopes offers more than just standard bar food, though they do have awesome tater tots.  They also serve brunch on Saturday and Sunday, with everything from “garbage plates” to crepes.

 

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Food Talk

How to make leftover pizza taste like it was just delivered.

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Pizza is one of few foods for which I will risk third degree burns of both the mouth and esophagus.  As soon as I open the box and locate the slice with the most ample crust, I’ve got it dangling above my mouth, scalding cheese be damned.  The crust is by far my favorite part, and it alone can make or break a pizza.  I cannot fathom why some people think of the crust as merely a handle used to transport the pizza to their mouths, ceasing to eat once they reach that sweet spot where sauce and cheese meets bready bliss.

Pizza delivered to your door is one of life’s simplest pleasures, but leftover pizza can leave a lot to be desired.  There’s always the option of eating the leftovers for breakfast, cold and straight from the box, but I crave the smells and textures of a freshly delivered pie.  When years of college dorm living taught me that microwaves turn pizza crusts to rubber, I found my solution in the oven.

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Food Talk

There’s more than one way to slice a banana.

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I haven’t cooked a thing in the last six months.  That’s not true.  I have cooked my weekly batch of oatmeal and my one-whole-egg-plus-three-egg-whites scramble every morning.  I’ve also cooked at least fifty English muffins slathered in peanut butter and sliced bananas, and cooked a bazillion or so no-cook salads for lunch.  But, I haven’t done any REAL cooking lately simply because I’ve been swamped with work (and life) and because it was just way too friggin hot this summer to bother with anything involving the oven.  As I sit here eating my late night peanut butter toast that I slaved over a hot toaster for, it dawned on me that just because I’m not cooking doesn’t mean we can’t talk food!

A month or so ago, my mom came to visit, and since I was under the weather she cooked me one of those peanut butter and banana English muffins I mentioned earlier.  My whole life, I’ve been making this little snack with strategically placed slices of banana perched atop the muffin halves, so you can imagine how baffled I was when my mom appeared with this:

peanut butter banana sandwich

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Features, Food Articles, Urbanspoon

How to order wine like a boss.

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Fervent Foodie is a contributing writer for the official Urbanspoon blog.

Whether on a hot first date or trying to impress the bigwigs at a business meeting, ordering a bottle of wine at a restaurant can be quite intimidating for a wine neophyte. A successful attempt requires balance: ordering with confidence, not looking like a cheapskate, and above all else selecting a wine that actually tastes good.  With all the stuffy jargon and wine lists that include dozens, if not hundreds, of varieties, wine is often seen as a complex beverage only enjoyed by snooty oenophiles. If you don’t even know what an oenophile is, this article is for you, my friend.

(continue reading about how to order wine on the Urbanspoon blog)

 

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Giveaway

The Fresh Expo – Ticket Giveaway

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The Fresh Expo, Charlotte’s Healthy, Natural, and Green Living event, is happening October 13th!

The expo will feature healthy living presentations and cooking demonstrations plus healthy tastings, product samples, and swag bags chock full of fresh goodies.  Exhibitors will include Healthy Home Market, Edible Charlotte, Food Matters, Coconut Bliss, Earth Balance, Luna’s Living Kitchen, Earth Fare, and TONS more all with the common goal of making Charlotte a healthier city through foods, products, and health and wellness services.  I am super excited for this event, and I’m even more pumped to offer TWO FREE expo tickets to ONE lucky reader!

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