On Wednesday, the Iowa Pork Producers Association released the finalists for this years Iowa’s Best Breaded Pork Tenderloin. For us blue-collar-to-no-collar folks this is the equivalent to the Beard Awards or Michelin stars. You can have your fancy pants restaurants. Give me a pork tenderloin, a side of onion rings,… Read More »Ireland Day 3
After we left Giant’s Causeway we briefly made a stop in a village nearby and then beat it to Carrick-a-Rede which is a park with a rope bridge that goes over the Atlantic Ocean. 98 feet above the Atlantic Ocean to be exact. After that we headed to Belfast for… Read More »Ireland Day 2: Part 2
I took a lot of cell phone pictures on Day 2 of Ireland. So many, that I’m going to split them in 2. The first part will consist of cell phone pictures I took at Giant’s Causeway. One thing about Ireland is that every day I saw something that was… Read More »Ireland Day 2: Part 1
Last Sunday we left off basically when I was getting ready to get off the plane. We will continue from there. The first day in Ireland. It was my first time really going through Customs in over 20 years. Getting into Ireland was pretty simple. They asked why we were… Read More »Ireland Day 1
Today’s food adventure covers the travel day Andy and I had that began in Fort Dodge, Iowa and ended in Dublin, Ireland. I was going to do a thing where I calculated how much money I spent on food on this trip, but I didn’t do a very good job… Read More »Ireland – Travel Day
The second day of September! No better day to share the THE SELFIE PROJECT images from August. I managed to leave the state of Iowa in August. In fact August was an incredibly busy month. A month that I don’t think I will duplicate any time soon. I got to… Read More »Selfie Project – August 2025
I said last Sunday that this week’s food adventure was going to be about eating next to a lake. But I’m actually going to push that food adventure off for several weeks. Probably a couple of months. This week’s food adventure is about Tall & Meaty’s day competing at the… Read More »Tall & Meaty: Iowa State Fair – 2025
This is kind of a 2 for 1 food adventure. Back in June I went on kind of a boredom road trip with no real destination in mind. In fact, I don’t know that I really went anywhere. My initial thought was maybe to go to Denison and the Donna… Read More »Big Pizza Pie: Humboldt Field Work
By the time this post publishes I will already have picked up my entries for the 2025 Iowa State Fair Photography Salon. So now it is a good time to share them. Selected for Display – Class 16 – Things & Still Life Selected for Display – Class 18 –… Read More »Baklaving It: Des Moines Field Work
A couple months back Teresa and I went to Pleasantville to try the new reigning Best Burger in Iowa. Halftime Bar & Grill. Here is some information from the Iowa Beef website: On the square in Pleasantville, Iowa, family, community, and Iowa’s best burger intersect at Halftime Bar & Grill.… Read More »Burgertime: Pleasantville Field Work
This food adventure is a little bit different. This isn’t an adventure where I went and ate hopefully delicious food. This one, in fact, wasn’t even a full food adventure. The pictures here are from the recent Boone County Fair Barbecue Contest. Logan’s barbecue team Tall & Meaty competed. This… Read More »Tall & Meaty: BCF 2025
Back in May, I went on my annual birthday road trip. This year it wasn’t overly ambitious. Nader went with me again, as he is my one and only true friend. We met up with Willy at the Houby Festival. I will cover the Houby Festival (in Cedar Rapids) in… Read More »Tenderloining: Monticello Field Work
Before I get into the meat of this food adventure, I want to enlighten you to the fact that the Best New Fair Food finalist have been named for the Iowa State Fair. Here is some info from the Iowa State Fair website: The TOP 3 Best New Foods, in… Read More »Tenderloining: Food Truck Showdown Field Work
A couple months back Russell and Andree took me out to the culinary treat knowns as Korean Barbecue for my birthday. I didn’t know that such a thing even existed, let alone in Iowa. I mean I knew Korean barbecue existed because of DaeHee, but not in this kind of… Read More »Cue: West Des Moines Field Work
Back in early May I decided to hit up a different taco truck in Ames other than Rico’s Tacos. This is rare for me, but I decided I would stretch my wings a little bit. So I went to El Primo. This was also the day of the Kentucky Derby,… Read More »Taco ‘Bout It: East Lincoln Way Field Work
First day of July! No better day than to share the THE SELFIE PROJECT images from June. From the images it looks like it might have been a pretty lazy month. I definitely didn’t leave the state again, it almost appears that I barely left Boone. But I did take… Read More »Selfie Project – June 2025
This food adventure actually took place before my work trip to Philadelphia. But I was so hot to trot to get those Philly Cheesesteaks out into the tubes of the interwebs that I pushed this one back a full 7 weeks. But that isn’t to impugn this meal or this… Read More »Cluck! Cluck! – Beaverdale Field Work
Time for the final collection of cell phone pictures from my work trip to Philadelphia. Even though this post is titled Philly Grub: Day 7, I didn’t actually have any food in Philadelphia The flight was too early for me to get any breakfast in Philadelphia. And I don’t really… Read More »Philly Grub: Day 7
If Day 4 was my favorite day in Philly and Day 5 was my least favorite, the Day 6 was near the top. It was the last full day in Philadelphia and I did have to work, but it wasn’t exactly a full work day. Even though I think I… Read More »Philly Grub: Day 6
Last week I covered what was my favorite day of my Philadelphia trip. The day that I got to hang out with Sarah and Tim. This day was probably my least favorite day. The day I had to listen to incessant whining and eventually had to check out from human… Read More »Philly Grub: Day 5
It’s a good time to share the THE SELFIE PROJECT images from May. It was a decently busy month. But I never left the state. I mean why would you leave Iowa? We’re second to last in economic growth. 48th in personal income growth. Our education system, which used to… Read More »Selfie Project – May 2025