Tom's Foodie Blog

You can order anything from The Playground’s ever-evolving ingredient-driven menu, but no modifications! If you like your meat well done, bring your own.  This is the playful and creative Chef Centric attitude you find at the Playground. The Playground is the love child of owner Jason Quinn,  who catapulted to notoriety during the Great Food Truck [...]

  Back in early September I attended a Hatch Chili roast  hosted by Melissa’s Produce and Bristol Farms in Newport Beach. What is a Hatch Chili? Read this my past article on Hatch Chilies. Although I took home mostly roasted Hatch chilies, I did take home some green Hatch Chilies to  air dry. A string of chilies [...]

Las Vegas Hotels is in the midst of a title-fight that is pitting the city’s two best buffets, Wicked Spoon at the Cosmopolitan and Bacchanal at Caesar’s Palace, in a battle to be named Best Buffet in Las Vegas.  I recently visited both Las Vegas buffets on a fact-finding mission to determine which buffet is best! I [...]

I have always thought that the transition from summer to fall is the sexiest time of year. The summer is on its last hurrah of sultry weather, but the night brings a cool crisp breeze that makes the hair on your neck stand up like a new lover’s soft touch. When I consider a seasonal [...]

Ever tried churrascaria? Do you even know how to pronounce it (it’s pronounced chew-ruh-scare-ee-uh, and it’s Spanish for “to singe,” if you were wondering)? Although this style of cooking and serving is most popular in other countries, a fine churrascaria restaurant has arrived in Orange County: Agora Churrascaria of Irvine. A churrascaria is a Brazilian [...]