Monday, August 18, 2014

Bochi

As I told you in my last post, I have some pretty exciting new discoveries for you guys! There is a new food truck in town and they are slanging Asian street food-inspired boneless chicken wings that they call Bochi.

The Bochi Truck
Xiong (pronounced Shoong) and his family moved to Kansas City with dreams of starting a food truck (solid plan given the growing food truck scene here). Being of Hmong decent, and the Hmong being a displaced people with a cuisine that is not as well known in the US, Xiong decided to bring you his take on this popular Asian street food instead of taking a gamble on selling Hmong food to Americans. I am very thankful for this, not because I dislike Hmong food (I have never had it, but would probably love it), but because he introduced me to the Bochi!

The Bochi
The Bochi is a chicken wing that has been stripped of its bones (Think KFC "I ate the bones!" commercial. For as much as I don't care for KFC, other than when I am watching NASCAR and drinking Busch Light with friends, I LOVE that commercial!) but left the hand part of the wing on for you to hold the Bochi with, stuffed (with fried rice) or unstuffed, and sauced with one of a variety of sauces (I do not have any idea how the stuffing doesn't fall out, it is held together by only itself, no toothpicks or the like). They are amazing! They come with a pretty killer Asian slaw too!

Inside the Bochi (Sounds like a Kung Fu movie or Wu Tank album title)
Although the Bochi is the truck's namesake, it is not its only offering. You will often find other favourites, like: combination fried rice, egg rolls, and the ever so trendy ramen (the real kind, not the stuff you buy for $0.20 a package at HyVee).

Bochi may be new to KC {they have only been doing this for less than 2 months), but it is catching on pretty quickly. If you find out where the Bochi truck is going to be, do not try to show up fashionably late, they sell out quickly! So go see Xiong, go see him early, and tell him I said "What's up?".

Bochi Truck on Urbanspoon

Thursday, August 7, 2014

Para Llevar

Or "Takeaway", in Spanish. Yes, I realize that what I am going to post about is delivery, not takeaway, but there is a bigger point I want to make here.

First of all, how is everyone doing? I hope you are all doing well! I ask because I realize that I have been neglecting this blog with the persistence that most of you neglect to floss. Perhaps I can shed some light on my recent flakiness...

I do this blog for fun, not for money. That being said, I obviously have to do something for money. Logically, the thing that I do for money has to take precedence over the blog. However, though it may not be money, I do get some pretty amazing takeaways from this blog that money cannot buy! I have made countless friendships: food truck owners, restaurateurs, chefs, celebrities, writers, bartenders, PR people, twitter followers, and even community managers for social media outlets that I have yet to contribute to (my bad Matt). I have stumbled into a good number of exposures that I am still rather unsure how I happened upon them. And I have had some pretty amazing meals (and some lousy ones too).

All of that being said, it's not fair to blame all of this on the 9-5. As with anything that you do for fun, it is easy to keep up when you are inspired. Similarly, it is a bit harder to keep up when you are uninspired. Admittedly I have a long way to go before I can say that I have even eaten at every restaurant in my own town, much less taken part in all of the foodventures that are out there to be had, but its easy to lose interest when most of the recent restaurant trends are so lazy. I get it, you spent a lot of money to make your restaurant look like a cheap barn. "Edison bulbs! High five!" - they are no longer novel when everyone has them. I get it, you are a Gringo who makes over-priced Mexican food that tastes like crap compared to authentic places on the Boulevard/KCK. I get it, you put bacon on things (like donuts) because you don't know how to make them taste good otherwise. Don't even get me started on "artisan toast" (spits on the ground). But it is not fair for the hipsters, who have now become the mainstream (yeah, choke on that irony, hipsters), to ruin everyone's fun (or my attitude).

Side note: Yes, I do realize the irony of this rant being that the word "awesome" (which I picked years ago to describe the food that I was going to write about) has become played out. Yes, I have considered changing it, but for the sake continuity I have decided to ride it out and wait for it to come back around again (if this blog is still around then).

After a lax few months of pseudo-blogging, I have a few new places for you that have renewed my energy for blogging (spoiler alert: most of them involve chicken). But first, to stick with the theme of this post, I have a few great takeaways (nee deliveries) for you.

First takeaway: You all know my love for Peanut wings! I don't know that I can really say anything more about them then what I said here. But they are now available by mail (peanutwings.com) and I can tell you that this is possibly the best thing that you could send a homesick Kansas Citian or anyone that lives out of town and does not understand your obsession with The Peanut.

The good folks at The Peanut will now ship you wings, wing sauce, and that legendary chunky bleu cheese dressing (frozen, with reheating instructions, of course) for a nominal fee. I would say that the buffalo sauce is just as good as, if not even better after concentrating in the oven. The bleu cheese is great. The oven-heated wings themselves are maybe 80% as good as straight from the fryer, but will still beat anything that you can get in your grocer's freezer section quite handedly!

Before

The reheating instructions that are provided with these guys is also good if you are a pretender and order more wings than you can eat at your local Peanut. If you have to put your tail between your legs and ask for a doggy bag to take wings home, you can reheat them using the instructions shown above.

After

Cream Cheese Brownie
Second takeaway: I have done a post before about mail order brownies, but if the Killer Brownies are a bit too rich for your blood (which there is not shame in, they are not for everyone), then I have a great alternative for you.

There is a budding start-up brownie bakery that is rising up from the concrete in Chicago. That start-up is Rhoyal Decadence. Rhoyaldecadence.com does not have the full line of brownies that are available to order, so your best bet is to contact Rhonda and ask her what she can do for you.

I have had the standard brownie (which is a moist brownie, loaded full of nuts, topped with a cream cheese frosting), the lemon brownie (I am not a huge lemon fan overall, but this one was pretty good), and the pumpkin (which is perfect for the impending fall).