Tag: food
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Why Are Pretzels So Expensive?
What is seemingly one of the most inexpensive treats to produce is often one of the most expensive appetizers on a restaurant menu. Pizza will always be near and dear to my heart. However, I am also a lover of pizza’s cousin – pretzels. I’m not talking about the bag of Rold Gold from the…
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World-Class Pizza in Rural Arkansas?
The White River region of north central Arkansas offers world-class trout fishing, but there’s also a little pizzeria called Nima’s that offers world-class pizza. I often scroll through the internet looking for pizza spots I’m not familiar with. Once in a while a place catches my eye that makes me stop to do a double…
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Featured Slices: Why Glory Days Pizza is a Kansas Favorite
Home of Kansas’ most awarded pizza, Glory Days Pizza sets the standard for great pizza in the Sunflower State. A claim of being the “Most Awarded Pizza in Kansas” is pretty bold, but Glory Days backs it with decades of winning many local and regional awards, including multiple Best of Topeka honors and the Community’s…
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Beyond Pepperoni: A World of Pizza Toppings
Unique pizza toppings from around the world might make you curious, while others might make your taste buds cringe, but all of them have one thing in common: they’re loved by the locals. For most Americans, ordering a pizza is usually pretty straightforward. We enjoy our classic cheese slices, pepperoni, sausage, mushrooms, and maybe a…
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An Educational Post About Pizza
People think I just randomly babble about pizza, but there is plenty of research based validity with what I say. Rather than just putting out a post, I felt I should include at least a couple of peer reviewed references to support my pizza content. Providing perks such as pizza for employees has emerged as…
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Restaurant Service Fees Exploitation or Creative Marketing?
We’ve reached an absurd point in commerce where business owners want all the rewards of entrepreneurship, but expect customers to directly manage their accounts payable simply to maximize profit. Is it exploitation? Or is it creative marketing? The FIFA World Cup chose my hometown (Kansas City) to host some of the biggest games on the…
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Pizza Trends Have Officially Gone Too Far
Once upon a time in history, someone looked at dough, cheese, and tomato sauce and said, “Hear me out…” It was simple concept, but it worked, and, it changed many lives forever, including mine. I love pizza. It’s one of humanity’s greatest achievements. It’s right up there with indoor plumbing, air conditioning, and duct tape.…
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Pizza Crimes Everyone Can Relate To
Pizza is supposed to bring people together. Yet every day, someone, somewhere, becomes the victim of a pizza crime so outrageous it makes those around question humanity. 10. Showing Up After the Pizza Order is Paid These people are never around when it’s time to order and pay, but they somehow appear just when the…
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Welcome to Costco. Good Luck.
Costco Is Basically an Escape Room That Ends With Pizza At this point, Costco isn’t really a store. It’s a full-contact endurance event where the reward at the end is a super size pizza slice for $1.99. You walk in needing toilet paper and somehow leave two hours later with a few random samples, a…
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Will Pizza Delivery Take Flight with Drones?
Pizza could soon be logging more frequent flier miles than humans if drone delivery becomes a thing. It might seem crazy, but aerial pizza delivery could happen sooner than later. Pizza delivery is starting to look less like a part-time job and more like a sci-fi movie. Major pizza chains are now testing drone deliveries,…
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Is New York Pizza About to Change Forever?
New York style pizza slices could be in for a pretty big change. A proposed ban on potassium bromate – a flour additive that’s been linked to cancer concerns — is forcing pizza shops across New York to rethink how they make their dough. For generations, many pizzerias have used potassium bromate flour because it…
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Connecticut – The Pizza Capital of America?
How one small state ignited a big argument about pizza supremacy True pizza lovers get VERY defensive about what pizza style is best, and regionally it gets even more heated. New York swears it owns the slice game. Chicago comes in loud with deep dish. Detroit and St. Louis lovers put up a claim also,…
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Pizza Hut Just Upped Their Game!
The pizza chain did something that is sure to make some people happy… When I was a kid in the late 1980s and early 1990s, Pizza Hut was THE place to go. Having my birthday party there was a always something I looked forward to. Getting a delicious pan pizza delivered to the table in…
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Iguanas as a Pizza Topping?
Here’s another fun national news story from the great state of Florida: Bucks Coal Fired Pizza in North Palm Beach, Florida, has decided to stop offering its viral iguana pizza topping that gained attention earlier this year. The restaurant went viral during Florida’s record-breaking cold snap in February, when iguanas were dropping from trees due…
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Featured Slices: Villa Castrioti – Nashville, TN
Nashville may be famous as Music City, but its pizza scene deserves just as much attention. Villa Castrioti brings authentic Italian pizza to downtown Nashville with classic recipes, fresh ingredients, and slices worth seeking out. I visited Nashville for a few days, unsure of what I would find in their world of pizza, but I…
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Kansas City Style Pizza – Yes, It’s a Thing
Everyone knows New York and Chicago pizza, but Kansas City has quietly created a regional style of its own. This Midwest city pizza deserves a place in every conversation about America’s best regional pizzas. Kansas City is best known for jazz, barbecue, fountains, and as late, the Chiefs and Taylor Swift. But unknown to many…
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This Week in Pizza History
Early January has always been a really good time for pizza—whether people realized it or not. Once the holidays are over, life goes back to normal. Work starts up again, schedules fill up, and it’s cold enough that nobody feels like going out. Historically, this is when pizza shines. It’s hot, filling, easy to share,…
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Good Bye 2025
In what seems like the blink of an eye, another year is gone. We’ve survived yet another trip around the sun. While it’s still 365 days, the rotation seems to spin faster and faster every year. My resolution this year was not to make any resolutions, and I held to that. You can’t fail if…
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A Slice of Christmas Magic (With Extra Cheese)
Every Christmas has its miracle stories. Like the ones where nobody brings up politics during the family gathering. Or, the one where the house doesn’t catch fire because of how you wired the lights like in the movie Christmas Vacation. And then there’s the one about how pizza can show up right when needed most.…
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The Probably True Story of Thanksgiving
Despite other stories you may have heard about the origins of Thanksgiving, I think this may be what actually happened. The Pilgrims had a plan. A simple one, really: sail straight, land somewhere promising, start a new life. Unfortunately, “sail straight” turned out to be a lot harder than anyone expected, especially when half the…
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Happy Halloween!
Remember the old song lyrics, “Trick or treat, smell my feet, give me something good to eat? I don’t think the song was referring to a mini size Snickers bar. Imagine a world where Trick-or-Treaters ring a doorbell on Halloween. When the door opens, the resident is standing in the doorway with a tray of…
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A Monkey, A Horse, and Pineapple Pizza
What the monkey considers business, the horse considers play… If there’s one topic that divides humanity more than politics or whether to fold your slice or eat with a fork, it’s pineapple on pizza. To some people, pizza is sacred — a serious, sauce-and-cheese-only ritual based on tried and true tradition that must be protected…
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October is National Pizza Month
What will you do to celebrate this most delicious holiday of the year? Pizza is obviously the most important of all foods, and it definitely does not require a month to remind us to eat it, but the fact that there is a month honoring this great staple of happiness is worthy of thinking about.…
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Pizza Travels: Bentonville Arkansas
I don’t usually write about chain pizza restaurants, but Johnny Brusco’s is worthy of a mention! Down south in the hills of Northeast Arkansas you’ll find the fun little city of Bentonville. Known as the mountain bike capital of the world, the city boasts 140 miles of trails for riders of all skill levels. If…
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What Pizza Toppings Say About Your Personality
What you put on your pizza has a direct connection to your personality… Preface: This post is based on highly relevant, peer reviewed, deeply researched psychological data. By highly relevant I mean I think it’s important. Peer reviewed means by the three of us (Me, Myself, and I). Deeply researched means I listen to the…
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Pizza: An Indicator of War?
Once again, pizza proves it has amazing abilities beyond what we see (and taste)! The threat of global conflict may be hiding in plain sight – right between garlic knots and an extra-large meat lovers pizza. That’s right, the internet’s buzzing again about something known as the Pentagon Pizza Index, a semi-satirical, yet oddly accurate,…
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Did Anybody Miss Me?
I’ve returned from the writing abyss, but I brought back some cool souvenirs! I wasn’t completely gone from the writing abyss; I was really more in a different abyss, because I was writing. It just wasn’t here. For the curious, and hungry, I have released four new books. Yes, 4. Can you guess what the…
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Thanksgiving Pie
Everyone loves a pie on Thanksgiving, but over the years this has been greatly misunderstood. Pumpkin Pie or Apple Pie might be good for some, but what they meant to say was you’re supposed to eat a PIZZA pie. The day is about giving thanks, and we should all be thankful for pizza (I know…
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Pizza Travels – The Other Manhattan (Kansas)
Everyone knows about the Manhattan in New York City, but did you know there is also a Manhattan in Kansas? There may be two Manhattans out there, but they are very different. One is known as being the pizza capital of the world, the other is home to Kansas State University. So similar, yet so…
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Halloween Pizza Magic
Once upon a time in a small town not far from the city, Halloween night arrived with more than just ghosts and goblins roaming the streets. The local pizzeria was having a Halloween pizza party that was in full swing, but unbeknownst to the restaurant owner, one of his employees was a witch! The unknown…
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A Slice of Pizza History
Pizza! Our nearest and dearest friend with an impressive resumé that spans centuries. We all eat it, but no one ever really puts any thought into how it all came to be. The origins of pizza can be traced back thousands of years to ancient civilizations. Way, WAY back, as in Neolithic times. People of…
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What’s Wrong With Domino’s and Pizza Hut?
Whenever I make any commentary about pizza, someone will always jump in with, “Pizza Hut (or) Domino’s is my favorite pizza. There’s nothing wrong with them.” I feel compelled to state my case… If you are looking for a large quantity of pizza for something like a kid’s party, school event, or work meetings, Domino’s…
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Pizza Travels: Omaha, Nebraska
When I travel, I often ask hotel staff where the best pizza in town is. If someone first names off Domino’s or Pizza Hut as a top choice, I know I’m in for a horrible stay. In contrast, if someone names a local family run place, it sparks my curiosity. When the recommendation is followed…
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Some “Cheesy” Humor
We all need a little laugh now and then, so here are a few “cheesy” pizza jokes that will hopefully make you smile. Q. Why did the pizza maker go broke? A. Because he wasn’t making enough dough. Q. What do you call it when a tired dad makes pizza? Papa Yawns Pizza Q. How…
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The Psychological Effects of Pizza and Implications on Well-Being
I was cleaning out some files on my computer when I cam across some forgotten papers that I wrote while working on one of my college degrees. I felt it would be appropriate to post, seeing as how it is timely and relevant to all of my other fine works of culinary writing (aka: pizza…
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A Slice of Medieval Madness (Pizza Stories #1)
A story inspired by the greatness of pizza… Once upon a time in the quaint and quirky kingdom of Cheezonia, where the rivers flowed with molten mozzarella cheese and the trees grew pepperoni instead of fruit, the people were obsessed with one dish above all else: pizza. This delectable creation had sparked a peculiar yet…
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Pizza: The Last Affordable Food
With the cost of living going crazy since 2020, far too many things in our world have dramatically increased in price. Despite the rising costs of everything involved with making a pizza, the cost of a picking up pie from a pizzeria has not really risen much compared to other foods over the years. Why…
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Pizza Travels – Miami, Oklahoma
Driving through Oklahoma is something most people don’t usually look forward to, but in this case, there is a place that makes the drive a little better. Located in not so scenic northeast Oklahoma on the old Route 66, you’ll find the city of Miami. If you’re wondering, the city in Oklahoma is not named…
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I Went To Buc-ee’s (Oh My!)
If you haven’t heard of Buc-ee’s yet, you will… First, I have to let you know up front that Buc-ee’s is a highway travel stop, also known as a truck stop, or convenience store that is located primarily in Texas, but they also have other locations in the southern and Midwest United States. You may…
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Featured Slices: Avelluto’s in Mission, Kansas
Sometimes the balance of the universe is restored, reminding us there is a pizza god. Back in September of 2021, I wrote a story about one of the biggest tragedies of the covid pandemic nonsense: A beloved pizza restaurant closed (Read: Covid Finally Hits Home). This was a horrible time in my life because the place…