Shaken, stirred, whatever...

I have been known to enjoy a vodka martini from time to time. So it was with great interest that I rushed to read Slate's vodka round-up, but I was a little disappointed. The judging methodology was a bit off the mark for a martini drinker (straight shots followed by Russian appetizers), and one has to question the judges' ability after sampling all of those vodkas in a single sitting.

Ultimately, the winner was Chopin, a not altogether horrible choice. Interestingly, Grey Goose was derided for being too smooth and subtle - which I suppose is a bad thing if you're doing shots, but exactly why it's a great vodka for making flavored martinis.

I would be interested to see how a couple of other vodkas would have fared - one of Desiree's favorite restaurants swears by Vox for its martinis; personally, I've been enjoying Effen recently. Not only is it an excellent vodka, but you also get the guilty pleasure of saying "gimme an Effen martini!" as though you're being surly but stopping yourself just short of being profane. As chance would have it, both Vox and Effen (as well as Ketel One and Van Gogh, which makes wonderful flavored vodkas, if you're into that) are all products of The Netherlands - who would have guessed that the Dutch could make such fine spirits?

City weblogs

A fairly busy schedule today (not to mention general laziness) prevents me from checking to see if I've posted about Gaper's Block before, but it's a weblog focused on all things Chicago. I bring this to your attention because now we also have Chicagoist, which (at first glance) seems to have a refreshingly less "hipper-than-thou" attitude than the aforementioned and appears to be a close relative of the New York equivalent, Gothamist. Gothamist is, in turn, a lot more satisfying than the "was that two parts snarky and one part ironic, or the other way 'round?" online scene 'zine for NYC, Gawker.

I think I'll try keeping Chicagoist on the list of occasional reads until I can form a more complete opinion, but I'm hopeful that it'll be good.

A pizza a week sounds about right

Regular pizza eating may prevent cancer of digestive organs. I guess I'll have to suffer through more of Chicagoland's finest...

Wheat Beer

I know that Dan looks forward to his summer time wheat beer. I came across this article in Metromix listing their pics for the top wheat beers.

Dr. Marten Disappointment

As those of you who know me are aware, I love shoes. Love 'em. Love. 'em. Currently, I've been eyeing these babies and just waiting for Zappos to get them in my size.
(By the way, Zappos is *the* place for shoes...I highly recommend it.)

Anyway, while gazing longingly at these cuties, I decided to take a gander at some of the shoe reviews, and proceeded to come across this article, stating that Dr. Marten shoes are no longer made in the UK and operations have moved to China!

How can this be? The whole mystique of Docs is that they're made in the UK. Now they're going to just be like every other shoe manufacturer. I'm very very disappointed.

Atkins food reviews

For those of you on the Atkins diet or any other carb restricting diet (I'm currently on the Curves diet), here's an article reviewing some of the reduced carb foods floating out there these days. Splenda has become my best friend, but I personally can't stand the Atkins Advantage bars....blech.

Plane Safety

Hmm...if more years like this keep coming along I might stop being so paranoid about myself and the people I care about flying (though this does NOT change my fear and loathing of those little puddle jumper planes).

What? It could happen! :)

Grow your own meat

Are you still a vegetarian if you eat meat that didn't come from an animal?

Source: Diaweblog

Air France = bad

I found out the hard way, but this should be enough evidence for the rest of you to never fly (or be anywhere near!) Air France.

Source: AMCGLTD.com

GearGrip

Stuff for carrying around your computers and monitors. Perfect for those LAN parties...

Slow-cooked == healthy?

An interesting study claims that cooking food high in fat, protein, and/or sugars slowly will cause the food to be less toxic by generating fewer "advanced glycation end products", to use the technical terminology.

However, my personal observation is this may also cause the food to be lower in (if I may also use a technical term) "flavor".