McDonald's Does BACON in a Big Way - A Review

Two all-beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese,
pickles, onions – on a sesame seed bun and now with BACON!

I  don't have  anything good or bad to say about McDonald's as a general rule. It does seem that they try to get away with as little quality and innovation as the market will bear. That said, today's fast food market in the U.S. is driven by McDonald's! They could use this power for good, and now they have! They are offering BACON on several dishes including their flagship BIG MAC®. They also have a Quarter Pounder® with Bacon and Cheesy Bacon fries.

As anyone who knows me can attest, I like bacon. I have tried bacon gum, bacon toothpicks, bacon toothpast, bacon floss...I have a bacon necktie and a shirt with a bacon slogan on it. I have tried it on many dishes but until now, never on a Big Mac®. It was lunchtime and I was passing a local McDonald's so I thought it was a great way to buy and try their newest offering. Pictured at right is a comparison with mine on the left side and theirs, (as pictured on their website), on the right. I don't think any restaurant can claim their food tastes as good as they MAKE it look, so I am always willing to TASTE it and decide. I may be at a bit of a disadvantage since the Big Mac® has never been my favorite burger at McDonald's, but when I worked at Wal-Mart, you could smell the bacon cooking as it wafted through the vents.
Let's begin:

The Big Mac® Bacon: This was a good burger! The bacon made it better and I don't have anything bad to say. They actually put a fair amount of bacon on each burger and though I would like more, that's my problem. I would recommend they make this a permanent menu item!

The Cheesy Bacon Fries: Normally, I like fries at McDonald's. These were NOT good! The bacon was okay, but the cheese was HORRIBLE! It was worse than any canned cheese I have ever tasted. Next time I might say "Cheesy Bacon Fries please...hold the cheese!" No. I will never order these again.

As always, McDonald's knows how to cross promote. Left is a clip of the bag my food came in. I have yet to try the Quarter Pounder® with Bacon, but I am sure it will be good too. Funny thing, the Quarter Pounder is Daughter #1's favorite, but she doesn't much care for bacon (we're still awaiting the DNA test because she might not be related😊)

Try the Big Mac® Bacon! DO NOT TRY THE CHEESY BACON FRIES!!!

Earl Compares Three Cheese Snacks

I can't express how much I like CHEESE! It is not only good by itself, it is good as an ingredient...I can honestly say I have never found a cheese I didn't like! Of course there are some I like more than others and some that are usually out of my price range (that's what I love about grocery stores that have good cheese sections - THE SAMPLES!) It will come as no surprise then that cheese snacks are almost always in my cheese keeper (fridge). For this post I am reviewing three cheese snacks. One is the one my #1 Daughter loves, one is a favorite of my wife (a.k.a. "Turkey"), and one is a newcomer to the marketplace at Sam's Club, Members Mark Jack Snack Cheese.

Let me start at the very beginning...a very good place to start, with the Jack Snack. I expected this to be a knockoff, like so many store brands. In fact, I was surprised that knockoffs of Babybel hadn't happened before now, at least near me. But when I opened it and tasted it, I was pleasantly surprised. From the name, I expected it to be a Monterrey Jack, but nothing on the package identified the type of cheese, just it's components. It is a semi-soft cheese, but not like the Babybels I have tried. It was sharper and tangy-er, a bit like Swiss, but not really, and I loved it. They come in a bag of 26 and run about 29¢ each. If you like cheese, you should buy these! As you can see from my photo, they do not have a nice red coating as the Babybels do, but that really means less trash!

The next in this taste test is Mini Babybel Mozzarella style. This is Daughter #1's favorite. It's texture is semi-soft, it's flavor is VERY mild, and much like mozzarella in bricks at the store. It seems an attempt to compete with string cheese, but this is NOT string cheese. It is smooth and quite delicate. No rubbery cheese here, and of course, no strings...don't even try. I like it, even if it has no identifiable flavor profile. These run 35¢ each and are also sold in a bag of 26.

My final review is my wife's favorite of the three. Mini Babybel light. "Turkey" (a.k.a. my wife) does not like cheese plain. On crackers, as an ingredient, melted on top of...fine. She likes to take one of these and mix it with her scrambled egg for lunch, or on a cracker with a Little Smokie for a game-time snack. I started buying these rather than the original to cut some fat calories from our lives. It hasn't worked, but I still have hope. These are very nice to have around. Like the mozzarella style, they are semi-soft and wrapped in plastic and red wax coating to remind you of it's heritage, coming from a French version of the Dutch EDAM cheese, which also is often red wax coated. Surprisingly, this is the most expensive of the 3, running 38¢ each, at Sam's. Not much, but if you extrapolate it to price per pound, it is more than $8/pound!

I started my taste test with trying to take a similar sized bite from each of the three. As you can tell from the photo, the Jack Snack is larger in diameter but also slightly less thick. All three weigh in at ¾ of an ounce.

I also tried them on a cracker. My cracker of choice is a Club Cracker. It's buttery goodness compliments the creamy texture and the salt kicks the flavor a bit, but my rankings remained unchanged with or without the cracker.


 My rankings are  as follows:

• First: Jack Snack—I liked the tangy element this offered, and the price is also the lowest.
• Second: Mini Babybel LIGHT—Because of the fat calories. It almost came in last because of it's added cost.
• Third: Mini Babybel Mozzarella style—This is a great snack and only came in third because I have so many other mozzarellas to chose from, I don't need another, but I may sneak one when I am at Daughter #1's!

My price comparisons were all from Sam's club, and Mini Babybels are quite a bit more at the grocery store. 

There are many more cheese snacks available, I chose these because I had them available for comparison. While I have had string cheese that wasn't stellar, mostly I would choose cheese over candy bars any day!

Birthday Breakfast With Daughter #1 at Penny Ann's Cafe - A Review & Celebration!

You may have noticed by now that I like breakfast. I am not a breakfast snob, it need not be omelettes at a nearby resort, It can be something as simple as a Sausage McMuffin. I credit my mom for my love of breakfast. We always had something good and homemade to start our days off right. I think because of that I have always liked making breakfast for my family. But until recently, I didn't make it for myself very often. My gandboys LOVE dippin' eggs and once told me I should open a restaurant that served only breakfast. I never tire of fixing breakfast for them and the never seem to tire of eating it. They will both request it when they come over and I happily oblige.

But this post is not about me or my grandboys, rather it is about the birthday of our first born, Daughter #1. Somewhere it became a birthday tradition to celebrate family birthdays at places featuring breakfasts. This year I decided to take my Daughter #1 somewhere she had never been Penny Ann's Cafe. A side note here - Daughter #1's middle name is Ann as is the middle name of my #2 sister and my grandmother. Penny is also the name of by youngest sister who lived less than a month. So Penny Ann has a familiar ring to our family.

This nice little restaurant is tucked away in a shopping center and isn't really visible from the street, so you have to know where you are heading to get there. No big, bright signs or marquee. I will say that my first experience at this place was several years ago after hearing rave reviews. I took grandboy #1 and we were unimpressed, so I have not returned. But I mentioned it to my daughter and she seemed game so we headed there.

Penny Ann's is famous for what they call "heavenly" hot cakes. My daughter also ordered their scone and boy was it a giant. I went bor their "big breakfast" and my daughter dis an ala carte thing. We were othe amazed and delighted. I tried my pancakes with both maple syrup and boysenberry syrup (they charge extra for real Vermont Maple Syrup), and they were both just right for their hot cakes.

Daughter #1 Ordered a Sausage patty that was almost as big as her pancakes. My big breakfast included two eggs, ham, sausage, bacon, potatoes and, of course, their heavenly hot cakes.

Because it was her birthday, (which I made sure to mention), they offered my daughter a free slice of their freshly made pie. I don't normally have dessert for breakfast, but I had signed up on their website and and in return they gave me a slice too!

My daughter had the chocolate mouse flavor and I had a childhood favorite, coconut cream. We were too full to eat it there but is was very tasty later that day.

I went in only having tried Penny Ann's once, and not enjoying it, but today they totally won us over. Everything was tasty, the portions were more than ample and the service was excellent all around. My only regret is not having been back sooner, something I will rectify soon!

By the Numbers:
Service ⭐⭐⭐⭐
Food ⭐⭐⭐⭐
Price 💲💲 (not cheap but well worth it and you get what you pay for)

Conclusion
This is a great place for for a lovely breakfast. If you go, sign up online and get a free slice of pie, but even if you don't get one free, the pie and everything we had was well worth it.

Earl Revives Party Pasta Salad for "Turkey"

As you may have read here, my wife (a.k.a. "Turkey") does not care for most pasta dishes. She thinks "pasta" is well named, as Webster defines it: "paste in processed form". I have managed to get her to like some pastas when cooked right with the proper sauce. In the 1980's pasta became SALAD. Not a dish served hot, with a rich, meaty & cheesy sauce but cold and mixed with veggies and, unbelievably - uncooked ramen noodles!

At Daughter #2's birthday party last week, we ate well and laughed hard. We ate burgers and all beef hot dogs cooked to perfection by my son-in-law (a.k.a. "Rutt") and pasta salad made by my daughter. We also had a Texas Sheet Cake, expertly crafted by my son-in-law's mom. The wind kicked up and the candles looked like a mini forest fire. What a great way to spend an evening! Family - Friends - Food, an unbeatable combination.

All of this leads me to the reason for this post. We came home with some pasta salad leftovers and I was able to make it into something "Turkey" ate and enjoyed. To the basic pasta salad I added:

• Avocado
• Tomatoes
• Pepperoni
• Balsamic Vinaigrette
• Italian Cheese Mixture
• Fresh Spinach

If it seems like I made a whole new salad, I did add lots of components to make it a refreshing dinner on a VERY hot summer's evening. Thanks to my daughter, we I ate two very different  pasta salads that week, both of which were much better than those of the 80's!

Birthday Boy's Birthday Super Slam is a Home Run - A Review

My Granboys and I have a long standing relationship with Denny's. It started when my daughter (#1) would take the day off for her son's birthday. For years we would go to breakfast for grandboy #1's birthday, and for many years Denny's was our go to. Then 2 things happened. The first was the opening of of "The Original Pancake House" nearby, the second was the closing of the Denny's nearby. My grandboys and I have eaten in many Denny's in Utah, Idaho & Nevada. Their prices are good and our favorite meal, breakfast, always hit the spot. So it has been quite awhile since we ate at a Denny's for a birthday breakfast, but this year they are offering their Super Slam Breakfast for just 6 bucks! I stole their site ad just to show you how good it looks and we loved it.

2 Eggs, 2 sausage links, 2 slices of bacon, 2 pancakes and hash browns! It was as good as good as it sounds.

Daughter #1 went a bit lighter with the Value Slam. A good value, if you don't want as much  food as we MEN wanted! She also scrambled her eggs but we got ours runny, as eggs should be cooked and eaten, but she likes to use them to absorb ketchup.

Our server was excellent. She was friendly and funny. The only thing was she couldn't find a Chewbacca cup. They were sold out.

We arrived hungry and left full and fulfilled. Happy Birthday to My Grandboy #1