Worst Restaurant Experience

[zorry]

TA/Petro has a new Comfort Food Menu.
This excited us as the selections looked like a good change of pace.
The waitress said DO NOT ORDER CORNBREAD.
How bad can cornbread be ?
The most disgusting thing I've eaten in a restaurant in years. Maybe worst ever !
The two meals were awful too.
Hopefully a local, isolated problem of overspicing.

Although I'm a big TA fan, we've been to that TA three times since and haven't even thought of entering the restaurant.

My worst experience was probably at the TA in Pleasant Prairie, Wi.
Driving for Roadway, I had a 30 minute window to eat.
I placed my order and got on a phone. 20 minutes later I questioned a manager as to where my food was.
He informed me that this section was closed. Then he told me I DID NOT order food from this area.
Soon another waitress told him I did in fact order my meal.
My waitress had gone to the kitchen and gotten into an argument . She stormed out the back door,taking my order with her.
The manager, forgetting the customer (me) raced to the kitchen to sort things out.
All I had time to do was sulk to my truck and return to work, hungry.

Boy, am I glad my wife can perform miracles in the truck !
( She can cook, too !)

 

[zorry]

The Cornbread in Ca will be different as it will be gluten free.

On a funny side note, as I meal ended I got off a phone call.

I told our waitress that a homeless shelter asked the TA in Denver to not send anymore leftover cornbread.

SHE BELIEVED ME !

 

[runrunner]

I have never liked T/A food,only eat there when forced by HOS.

 

[zorry]

It has improved greatly in most places.

 

[Turtle]

The Cornbread in Ca will be different as it will be gluten free.

Most of the cornbread I've ever had that wasn't made in the South wasn't even cornbread, it was corn cake. Any cornbread that's made with more than about 3 tablespoons of flour to 1.5 cups of cornmeal ain't bread, it's cake. I ordered cornbread at a seafood place on the Oregon coast one time, and was all excited because I was gonna get cornbread. What they brought to me looked, and tasted, like Bundt cake. I'm not so sure they didn't even bake it in a Bundt pan. Proper cornbread has little or no flour, corn meal, an egg or two to bind it together, butter and or bacon grease, baking soda, salt, and buttermilk (or regular milk with a dash of vinegar with turns it into buttermilk). And it must be cooked in a creaming hot cast iron skillet.

 

[guido4475]

Most of the cornbread I've ever had that wasn't made in the South wasn't even cornbread, it was corn cake. Any cornbread that's made with more than about 3 tablespoons of flour to 1.5 cups of cornmeal ain't bread, it's cake. I ordered cornbread at a seafood place on the Oregon coast one time, and was all excited because I was gonna get cornbread. What they brought to me looked, and tasted, like Bundt cake. I'm not so sure they didn't even bake it in a Bundt pan. Proper cornbread has little or no flour, corn meal, an egg or two to bind it together, butter and or bacon grease, baking soda, salt, and buttermilk (or regular milk with a dash of vinegar with turns it into buttermilk). And it must be cooked in a creaming hot cast iron skillet.

Bundt cake...LMAO....Pretty funny...

 

[LDB]

If my Granny or Momma didn't make it it isn't cornbread, it's something being called that. Some of it is passable though.

 

[zorry]

On Thanksgiving my wife put just the tiniest amount if whole kernel corn in the batter..
Added a little burst of sweetness to each bite.

 

[Turtle]

On Thanksgiving my wife put just the tiniest amount if whole kernel corn in the batter..
Added a little burst of sweetness to each bite.

Lots of neat things you can do with it. Whole kernels or even a little creamed corn. Cracklin cornbread is always a favorite. I like bacon and cheese. Fry up 4-6 pieces of bacon in a cast iron skillet, then remove the bacon and pour off and save half the bacon grease. Then put the skillet into the oven to keep it nice and hot. Crumble up half the bacon and mix it into the batter. Then dump a handful of grated cheddar into the batter. Pour the batter into the hot skillet and put it in the oven. Half way during the cooking, top the cornbread with the rest of the crumbled bacon and some more cheese and then finish cooking.

 

[Ragman]

Lots of neat things you can do with it. Whole kernels or even a little creamed corn. Cracklin cornbread is always a favorite. I like bacon and cheese. Fry up 4-6 pieces of bacon in a cast iron skillet, then remove the bacon and pour off and save half the bacon grease. Then put the skillet into the oven to keep it nice and hot. Crumble up half the bacon and mix it into the batter. Then dump a handful of grated cheddar into the batter. Pour the batter into the hot skillet and put it in the oven. Half way during the cooking, top the cornbread with the rest of the crumbled bacon and some more cheese and then finish cooking.

Wow! Not only a successful expediter, a master chef also. Dennis would be proud.

 

[guido4475]

I like my cornbread moist and damp. That way when I put butter on it, it sticks to the cornbread. Not the other way around.

 

[zorry]

Moist and damp. The differances between the two ?

 

[zorry]

Correction, wife added cream corn on thanksgiving.

I stay out of the kitchen.

 

[Tennesseahawk]

Most of the cornbread I've ever had that wasn't made in the South wasn't even cornbread, it was corn cake. Any cornbread that's made with more than about 3 tablespoons of flour to 1.5 cups of cornmeal ain't bread, it's cake. I ordered cornbread at a seafood place on the Oregon coast one time, and was all excited because I was gonna get cornbread. What they brought to me looked, and tasted, like Bundt cake. I'm not so sure they didn't even bake it in a Bundt pan. Proper cornbread has little or no flour, corn meal, an egg or two to bind it together, butter and or bacon grease, baking soda, salt, and buttermilk (or regular milk with a dash of vinegar with turns it into buttermilk). And it must be cooked in a creaming hot cast iron skillet.

Thanks for clarifying that for us. We can all sleep better at night, knowing you're on the job.

 

[Tennesseahawk]

I like my cornbread moist and damp. That way when I put butter on it, it sticks to the cornbread. Not the other way around.

Oh crap. There goes my dirty mind again.

 

[Ragman]

Oh crap. There goes my dirty mind again.

I'm sure all guys had the same thought.

 

[zorry]

I feel better knowing I wasn't the ONLY one.

 

[MissKat]

those Oregonians......Merry Christmas!!!!

 

[Turtle]

Wow! Not only a successful expediter, a master chef also. Dennis would be proud.

I wouldn't go as far as claiming to be a master chef, but I was trained in a French kitchen, and in my grandmother's kitchen. I can cook.

It's actually one of the largest downsides to expediting for me, that I can't be in the kitchen on a regular basis.

Moist and damp. The differances between the two ?

Moist is not crumbly, damp is borderline soggy. You want moist cake. Cornbread shouldn't be moist, unless you've made corn cake. But you don't want cornbread that's too crumbly, either, because you can't put butter on it (although using room temperature butter makes a world of difference). What you want in your cornbread is that it be properly bound together, using an egg or two and oil or grease, which will give it the same desirable butter spreading properties as a moist cake without actually being moist.

Thanks for clarifying that for us. We can all sleep better at night, knowing you're on the job.

I am the protector and defender of cornbread. I am Cornbread Man.

The griddle and grill pan I don't use for cornbread, but the others are just some of my Lodge Cast Iron cornbread tools.


I read this just the other day at Men's Health: "I'm a total cornbread snob. I want the best: soft, cake-like texture with a burst of flavor."

He's not a cornbread snob, he's a corn cake snob. The basis of the recipe is 2 cups of cornmeal, so far so good. 2 cups of four, that's cake. 1 cup of sugar. ONE CUP?!?! In Cornbread? That's desert! Cornbread? No.

If you like your cornbread (cake) sweet and fluffy like cake, then that's how you should have it. But it ain't cornbread. Eat what you want how you want. Don't let people tell you how to eat what you like to eat. If you want to put ketchup on your baked potato and Ranch dressing on your French fries, go for it. If you want to put ketchup on over easy eggs <gag> then that's how you should eat your eggs. If you want to crumble up your too-crumbly cornbread into a tall, cold glass of milk, now yer talkin'.

those Oregonians......Merry Christmas!!!!

Oregonian Cornbread
​

 

[highway star]

I put ketchup on scrambled eggs. I get some looks from time to time.