New Slogans for a few of Montgomery's Night Spots

We at LITG think every local bar should have an honest-to-goodness slogan to let patrons know exactly what they're getting into. With that being said:

Pine Bar - Young attorney's gotta have somewhere to drink too!

LeRoy's - Wanna go to a bar in a storage room and order a beer you've never heard of?

Rock Bottom - Looking for somewhere to wear your new Affliction shirt?

1048 - When those 12 steps just didn't take.

Bud's - When you're pretentious enough for Pine Bar, but Daddy hasn't hired you at his law firm yet.

El Rey's - Nothing goes with morning "beer runs" like an $18 burrito!

The Exchange - Winter: God, it's FREEZING out here! Can't wait for summer! Summer: God, it's SWELTERING out here! Can't wait for winter!

Stuckey's - Your weed guy is here.

SandBAR - Too cheap to go out of town but still want to pretend you did?

Sous La Terre - Good LORD, are you still out?!?

The Blue Iguana - When you're too classy to drink in a bowling alley, but too drunk to leave.

Aviator Bar - Because Air Force plebs need assistance from the decor to act cool.

Club Liquids - Because you want to dance like a fool and get applauded for it.

La Jolla - Pretend to be cool, try to forget you're drinking at the mall.

AlleyBAR - We could be cool, but hey, it's Montgomery; why put up the effort?

Head on the Door - Remember us? Not really? Well, we're still here!

The Tipping Point - I know the sun is still out but it's closing time, get the kids.

--Thanks to LITG Facebook stalwarts: Robbie and Erik Poole

"Nobody knows the truffles I've seen...." or The Trouble with Truffles.

Truffles have twidges

The rumors of the death of our blog are exaggerated. I personally admit, however, to being distracted for months by my introduction, at an advanced age, to real fresh white truffles from Italy and the resulting obsession they have created.  I have been the victim of a delicious distraction from the important work which is blogging about lunch in the Gump. Why, most of my retorts to statements about the "fiscal cliff" are usually: "What does this have to do with truffles?" or "How will this affect the cost of truffles?" or "Can truffles be grown at the bottom of cliffs?" While it is somewhat of a blessing to be addicted to something so rare and expensive that a high-level "Statey" could never afford enough to ever need rehab, the realization that there are no restaurants in the Gump actually serving them does bring on the need for excessive amounts of Rye Whiskey and maudlin recollections of "American Pie." Such is a life of perpetual trade-offs.

Scallops, black garlic, "truffle" and mushroom risotto at La Jolla.

This post is not only about truffles, but about a dinner at La Jolla where they purport to serve "Pan-Seared New Bedford Scallops with Black Garlic, Truffle and Mushroom Risotto" for less than $30.  I was a little skeptical. After all, truffles are the most expensive food in the world.  They cost up to $3,600 a pound.  So, although a part of an over-large group of loud locals, I specifically asked the waiter whether the dish "really" involved truffles.  I was assured that it did and that the truffles cost $50 per oz. I decided to put my doubts aside, and order the scallops.

Now, had I not just returned from San. Gimignano in Tuscany, perhaps the meal would have fooled me. It was quite good and certainly worth the price. But, once you have tasted a dish cooked with fresh white truffles from Italy or France, you are unmanned and ruined.  Nothing else tastes like truffles.

"The Trouble with Truffles" which aired on 60-Minutes in January 2012, laid out the scandal which is the infiltration of Chinese and Oregon truffle knock-offs into American cuisine.  I would wager that the "truffles" used for my dish were not Italian or French white or black truffles but rather were the relatively tasteless variety from China or Oregon.

And don't get me started on truffle oils.  Although I have heard that oils from Urbani or Antica are genuine and a great way to introduce yourself to cooking with truffle flavor, many so-called  "natural" truffle oils are usually not made from real truffles but from chemical recombinations derived from one of the main components found in real truffles.  High price is also no guarantee of the use of real quality truffles.


Truffle hunting dog before a truffle hunt with an interesting band of truffladours

How can I write of truffles without paying homage to the talented beasts that find them?  Allpots used to bore me with his whiskey-infused memories of his pet truffle-hunting pig Mortimer.  Not any more.  Not since my senses were awakened. But I will tell you that the pigs are no longer the hunter of choice for serious truffle-hunting.  Why you ask? Well, the same reason one should never trust me to hunt them: The pigs eat them unless you stop them immediately when they locate a truffle.  Very intelligent reaction I say. Dogs, on the other hand, although less intelligent have great noses and can be trained not to bother the truffles. Indeed, there is a 'Truffle Hunting Dogs' website in the U.S. for dogs "worth their weight in gold."

Preparing a young Gumpund Shedder for a hunt.

You may also find it interesting to know that by far the best truffle hunters in the world are a breed which originated in our area.  Indeed, the noble Gumpund Shedder*--a breed of which our own Shadow Pup belongs--has shown terrific abilities to find truffles without damaging them.  Apparently, it has something to do with spending their young puppy weeks in the Humane Shelter that gives them a sensitive nose.

So now you know a little more about truffles than you knew before you stumbled upon this blog.  If you ever enjoy the real thing, you will savor true truffle joy not to mention that you can have fun with the word "truffle" because it sounds funny and rhymes with trouble.  Trouble indeed is what you will have if you enjoy truffles too much for, at the very least, you will risk plunging over the "fiscal cliff."

As for me, see you at the bottom of the cliff.....

Whiggin a/k/a "Whiggy B in the Velvet Undershorts"

*Shortened version of the full name: American Gump Pound Shedding Mutter.

Lunch Bowl Championship Series System Explained

The Coveted Silver Lunch Bowl Trophy

Ed. Note: There have already been questions raised about the unfairness of the LBCS rankings. Should "The Wishbone Cafe" or "LaJolla" be eligible although they serve in an area of weak franchises known as West Shorter.  Is it fair that the established Gump areas such as No-Clo or Z-Red get preferences.  Is it fair to exclude restaurants from the Northern Territories of the River Region just because they are not in Gump County?  Is it for love of money?  Is it to protect the establishment?  Well, there is a method to the madness and here, such as it is, it is....C.N.A.

The Lunch Bowl Championship Series Standings are used for:

1. Determining the two restaurants that qualify to serve the LITG gang in the BCS Gump Championship Cookoff;

2. Determining any other automatic qualifiers; and

3. Establishing the pool of eligible lunch spots for at-large selection.

The LBCS Standings are released for two consecutive weeks each year, including the final Standings on Dec. 1. The Lunch in the Gump Foundation compiles and releases the Standings each week.

This year, the LBCS Standings will once again include three components: LITG US Today Readers Poll, The Montgomery Health Department Ratings Poll and an average of six computer rankings of various lunch reviewing sites such as Urban Spoon. Each component will count one-third of a restaurant's overall LBCS score in the LBCS Standings.

Ineligible For Lunch Consideration

On July 30, 2010, the LBCS announced that lunch disasters which are no longer available for lunch or have been shut down due to health hazards and the like will be removed from computer ratings for the purposes of determining the LBCS Standings. Shadow Pup shall provide a "sniff" test also.

Each of the six computer rankings providers have notified the LBCS group that ineligible lunch dives or health hazards will still be included in the individual computer rankings during the season to ensure the integrity of their data and in fairness to other active lunch spots. But, for the purpose of determining the LBCS Standings, ineligible health hazards will be removed from each computer ranking and all others below it moved up one position.

"Basically, we will take each computer ranking, remove the ineligible dives, and move all the places below the open position up one spot. It's fair, it's consistent, it's simple, and it's transparent," said Bidgood Bob,  Executive Director of the LBCS and CEO of the Irritable Bowel Foundation.

The average of the six computer rankings is one-third of the components of the LBCS Standings. The three components are averaged to create the Standings, which include only lunch spots that are still eligible (according to the Health Department) to serve lunch in the Gump.

The US Today Readers Poll and the Urban Spoon Interactive Food Review Poll said earlier this summer that their polls will not include those dives that are prohibited by the Health Department from serving food to humans or their pets.

The first and only LBCS Rankings for 2010 will be released December 1.
A breakdown of the ranking components:

I. Urban Spoon Interactive Reviews (1/3rd)

Replaces the Zagat Poll since no Gump eateries are rated on Zagats. The first poll will be released October 1, then weekly through December 1. A lunch spot's score in the Urban Spoon poll will be divided by 2,825,000 which is the maximum number of points any place can receive if all 51,113 voting members rank the same eatery as Number 1.

II. Reader's a/k/a "Gumpheads" Poll (1/3rd)

A lunch spot's score in the US Today poll will be divided by 1,475,000, which is the maximum number of points any team can receive if all 59,000 voting members rank the same team as Number 1. .

(Better understanding the polls: In both human polls, voting members fill out their own top 10 rankings ballot. Each team receives 1-10 points in reverse order of the way they are ranked. The 10th place team on each ballot receives 1 point, 9th place gets 2 points, 8th receives 3 points... first place receives 10 points. This inverse point order is also applied to the computer rankings.

In the Urban Spoon and Gumpheads Poll, a restaurant will be evaluated on the number of voting points it receives in each poll. The number of actual voters, which can vary, is figured into the computation on a weekly basis in stating each resturant's percentage of a possible perfect score.

III. Health Department rankings (1/3rd)

The health department's rankings percentage is calculated by dropping the highest and lowest ranking for each restaurant and then dividing the remaining total by 100, the maximum possible points.

Simplifying the formula

The percentage totals of the Urban Spoon Interactive Poll, Gumphead Poll, and the Health Department computer rankings are then averaged. The restaurants’ averages are ranked to produce the LBCS Standings.

A = Restaurant No. 1 in Urban Spoon Poll with all voters = 1.000

B = Same Restaurant is No. 1 in Gumphead Poll with all voters = 1.000

C = Same Restaurant is No. 3 in Health Department Rankings = 0.920

Result: (A+B+C)/3 = Total Score of 0.9733


No more than two restaurants operated by the same family may be selected, regardless of whether they are automatic qualifiers or at-large selections, unless two non-champions from the same family are ranked No. 1 and No. 2 in the final LBCS Standings.

If fewer than 10 restaurants are eligible for selection, then the LITG gang can select as an at-large restaurant any non-Gump restaurant with a Quizno's machine that is lunch bowl-eligible, has been reviewed at least nine times on a blog and is among the top 18 restaurants teams in the final Urban Spoon standings subject to the two-restaurant limit noted above and also subject to the following:


•1) if the health department rating is below 70, the place must be disinfected and

•(2) from the restaurants ranked 15-18, the LITG gang can select only a team from a location that has fewer than two restaurants within the same city block in the top 14.

Note: in order to participate in a LBCS cookoff, a restaurant

•(a) must be eligible to serve food to humans not confined to hospitals under the rules of the City of Montgomery Health Department and, if it not an independent local eatery, under the rules of its franchiser and

•(b) must not have imposed sanctions upon itself for unhealthy fare or for infractions of the rules of the Health Department or its franchise.

•(c) must not be sniffed out by Shadow Pup for a relative in the freezer.

En Jolla La Jolla

We love our friends even when they live on the wrong side of town.  Monday night, our friends from East Shorter held a birthday dinner for a member of our gang at La Jolla.  Accordingly, we held our breath and somehow got past the cameras at the Vaughn Road/East Boulevard intersection and snuck through the rear entrance of East Chase to meet for cocktails and dinner with 16 of our closest friends--one of whom just turned [CENSORED].  Because some in the group turn into pumpkins at 9 p.m., we met at 6:30 p.m. and had the only big table in the bar to ourselves until the "beautiful people" filled the bar stools.  Before the meal we enjoyed martinis with Ketel One at $8 a pop. Mine was not "straight up" as I ordered but the other ingredients requested were present so I went with the ice flow. A minor inconvenience.

Among our crowd are some fairly finicky eaters known to send back entrees at the drop of a hat for the slightest variation from expectations.  However, except for one "so-so" rating, most of the entrees were rated very good to excellent.  I ordered the wedge salad ($7) and the Grouper Yvonne with crab, scrimp, shrooms, 'chokes in a Hollandaise sauce ($23). The salad was better than most wedge salads you get in the area.  I liked the blue cheese dressing.  The fish tasted fresh and the sauce made the dish. My friend next to me loved the Blackened Elk Chops ($32) and, knowing they have a place in Jackson Hole and eat Elk, Red Deer, Buffalo and other western meats often, that rating registered as probably solid. The Grilled Beef Ribeye ($32) to my left was so large it survived the rather large appetite of another friend who said it was well prepared and a good piece of meat. At that price it definitely should be. A friend that does not like seafood although she grew up in St. Pete, ordered the Pork Scaloppini with lemon soy butter on a house-made pasta ($21) and declared it delicious.  So the verdict was 15-1 in favor of a high rating for the food.  The service was very good for a large group with 8 checks.  Our check was correct the first time and the 20% gratuity was clearly already added although you could add a tip to the check if you wished.

Some of our "outside the Gump" friends confided that La Jolla was their favorite restaurant and I could not argue the point.  If it were located closer to town I would no doubt visit more often.

Some fine desserts are available but the staff kindly let us bring in a birthday cake (prepared by one of our male members who loves to bake). I do not know if they charged a "corkage fee" for the cake but they did kindly cut and serve the cake for every one at the table after the [CENSORED] candles were blown out.

This was actually about the fifth-sixth time I had eaten there and I cannot remember a bad meal or experience.  A little pricey, but arguably one of the top five places to eat in the area.  If you are ready to spend about $100 per couple (with drinks), you will probably be pleased with your experience.  Actually, I am a little surprised that La Jolla has a rather low rating on Urban Spoon.  It must be the expense that turns some people off as the food, at least Monday night, was darn good.

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