Pizza, Pizza!

Today I visited Luisa's Brick Oven Pizza for Pizza a la Carte. Luisa's has been around for awhile and they have a ton of choices for toppings, so I was pretty excited. I picked kind of a weird time to eat because I was off today, so I (of course!) slept in. I say a weird time, because I seemed to be one of only 3 people in the restaurant.

For my pizza, I picked ham, black olives, and mushroom.

The pizza was really good. I love thin crust pizza - this was so thin I honestly had to eat it with a fork and knife. The cheese was soooo cheesy and the sauce was great. I LOVE olives, especially black olives, but I did feel like they detracted from the taste of everything because they were essentially all I tasted. I don't really even remember tasting mushrooms. Next time, maybe some different toppings, but all in all great!

Now onto another subject. In addition to continuing to eat the Top 100 dishes, I have taken it upon myself to find tiramisu in Charlotte that is the closest to that in Boston at Mike's Pastry Shop. So far, I've tried Mama Ricotta's, Vivace, and Dolce Ristorante. All of these were good, but not THAT good. Today, I tried Blu Basil. I saw this restaurant near the Cotswold Banfield and thought it was Thai food. Sadly, it was Italian, but of course Italian means tiramisu! I stopped in today after lunch (WAY after lunch) and tried their tiramisu. Honestly, I liked it more than Dolce Ristorante, which was the tiramisu on the Top 100 list.

I know you WANT me to taste like Mike's

I liked it more, as in it was closer to Mike's. I think it has to do with the wider layers of ladyfingers. This tiramisu, however, had more creamy layers instead of coffee-like layers AND the middle layer was practically frozen. It tasted like tiramisu ice cream...which was delightful, but not like Mike's. The search continues....

The Best of the Rest

Charlotte Magazine has done a (mostly) great job picking the Top 100 dishes in Charlotte. I don't have a magazine, but I do have a blog and some honorable mentions from my 3 years in this area, in no specific order.


1. Viet-Thai Noodle House on Pineville Matthews Road in Charlotte, NC. If you know me at least a little bit and have heard me talk about food, you know that I love Thai food and completely miss Taste of Thai in Knoxville, TN (shedding a tear as I type). I haven't found a restaurant since moving that equals TOT but this place comes very close. It's in a shopping center, tucked away like the best restaurants are.

2. Asian Roll and Grill in Tega Cay, SC. This little place popped up on my drive home from work and I had to try it. It's actually mentioned in the magazine with the Top 100 as a favorite of some restaurant owners. I have had the Pho, a beef dish with rice and fish sauce, vietnamese egg rolls, and sushi here - all good (although not all at the same time!). I first had Vietnamese food in elementary school in Washington DC when visiting my cousin and I loved it. I didn't have it again until I went to NYC on vacation and my best friend's sister, Heather, and I stumbled into a little restaurant on a cold night. That was my first Pho...and it was delicious. This Pho is just as good. When you get it to-go, they separate all the ingredients so the noodles don't get slimy and soft, which makes for some interesting creative mixing, but it has been fabulous every time I've had it.


3. Bleu Cheese Chicken Salad at The Wine Shop in Rivergate (Charlotte, NC). Dr. Goodson, a former coworker, told me about this dish. I was skeptical because I'm not a huge bleu cheese fan, but this is awesome! You can get the chicken salad on a bed of greens with balsamic or on a pita with delicious fries! I crave this at least weekly and have to exert some self control not to eat it all the time!


4. My Chinese and Mexican picks - Whenever I moved somewhere, I try to find a good local Mexican and Chinese place. In Rock Hill, I have Tequila Mexican Restaurant (super cheap lunch specials and chorizo cheese dip - mmmmm) and China near a Food Lion close to my house. China has great crab rangoon and egg foo young but I've honestly never had anything bad there. I do give them more time to make my to-go food because it usually isn't done when they say it will be...but it's worth the wait!


5. PW's Ice Cream in Rock Hill, SC - This place has the best ice cream in RH, hands down. They make a "concrete" (which is basically a blizzard) and they have a ton of flavors. My favorites have been the Heath Bar and the Peanut Butter Oreo. Best of all? They have a drive-thru!

So far, these are my go-to restaurants. Somehow I don't see this list changing other than possibly expanding....

Holy Guacamole!

Ok, so this was forever ago, but Dr. Clinton, Dr. Smith, and I went to Cantina 1511 for dinner one night and it was delicious. The Top 100 dish is the tableside guacamole. Now listen, I'm not a big fan of guacamole, but not enough to pass up on the list! This is one of Dr. Smith's favorite restaurants and I can see why. I got a Cantina Chimichanga, which was filled with chicken, pico de gallo, black beans, rice, and cheese. THEN, it's covered with ranchero and chile con queso sauce. It was wonderful and HUGE. I only ate half of it and saved the other half for lunch the next day.


Object larger than it appears

 But before the entrees, we had our guacamole. They bring all the ingredients out and prepare it at your table, mixing the avocado with the pico, etc. etc. We got it NOT spicy because we're not crazy. It was very good! I'm still a bigger fan of cheese dip but this guac was worth it.

Prepared just for us