Samos

I don't get many opportunities to write about places I've eaten at anymore. That and I don't often eat out at places I haven't been to lately.  One place I hit up with friends on Saturday night that I haven't been to is the wonderful Samos in Greektown.  Just a head's up or two: they don't take cards (cash only), you must bring your own alcohol (though they do provide wine glasses), and you need to prepare yourself for a 30 or 45 minute wait for a table.  That's how long it took my friends and I to get seated.  We almost left, but I had waited that long, and I didn't want to waste all that time.

Samos is very compact and very crowded, with Mediterranean murals all over the walls.  They will try to seat you as soon as possible.  Just be patient.  Even if you're dealing with twelve obnoxious drunk women singing Happy Birthday in as off key a manner as humanly possible.

What my friends Eric & Alan recommended was the Tour of Samos ($22 per person, at least two persons).  You get the following:

* lots of soft, hot pita bread.  I've never really gotten into pita bread.  I usually get the stuff cold, hard and cardboard-flavored (if flavored at all).  Samos' is delicious, almost buttery even.  And you get lots of tzatziki sauce to go with it.  They will give you a plate of olive oil and anchovies to eat with it if you ask for it.
* salad.  Pretty standard stuff but good.  The anchovies are good with this too.  Watch out: the olives are not pitted.
* various meze: juicy dolmades, and some of the best breaded fried calamari I've had in ages.  I might have to go back sometime during the week just to order that.
* lamb chops, gyro meat and chicken souvlaki pieces.  The lamb was wonderful, though I enjoyed the gyro meat, which is usually tough and gummy.

There was too much to eat there.  I had to take some home.  And you will too if you come to Samos.

A Spray of Hons

Oh God my feet hurt. After roaming around Baltimore today, seeking out Italian food at the St. Anthony Festival in Little Italy, Greek pastries at the Greek Festival at St. Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church in Greektown* and hons galore (and my friends) at Day 2 of HonFest in Hampden, I am so glad to be sitting down. Again, y'all will see the photos later this week.

I asked "the girls" (our somewhat sizeable circle of gay male friends) if they knew of a collective noun for "hons" - like a pride of lions, a gaggle of geese, a congress of baboons (fitting, no?) or an abomination of monks (that's what it's called).

Eric came up with one. I wish I could take the credit, but this goes to him. Youse listenin' at Cafe Hon? Okay:

More than one hon is a spray of hons (from all dat hairspray holding 'em bee-hahvs togevver, hon).

A pride of lions (photo courtesy of The Sun (UK))

An abomination of monks (artwork courtesy of St. Joseph's Monastery of Benedictine Monks in Natchez, Mississippi)

A spray of hons (courtesy o' dem hons what let us took 'eir pixchure today. Ain't dey just a fab'liss spray of hons, hons?)

Has a nice ring to it, no?

* I actually did not get to visit the Greek Festival, but I did get to drive around Greektown for fifteen minutes looking for parking, only to give up. Now I'm sad :(

Also, this is my very first post using SuSE Linux instead of Windows of any kind. Yippie!

Maybe I'm just eating out too much? Pt. 2 of 2: Mylos Restaurant

The Paper Moon Diner was fabulous, and I MUST drag as many friends there as possible - it's just that fun! But I had more food to follow me the next day, before, again, getting rear-ended.

Mylos Restaurant - Today was not kitschy or rainbowy like the Paper Moon. A longstanding "dinner club" meeting with my sister and some of her coworkers (some of my ex-coworkers) kept on getting postponed, until finally tonight. The place? Greektown. The restaurant? Well, originally it was to be Greek Islands, which got rave reviews in the City Paper. But today I found out, being the first one there, that the place doesn't exist. Its address does not exist! Probably subsumed by the next door Mylos Restaurant. This bar-restaurant gave my friends and I some tasty homestyle Greek food! My pork souvlaki ($11) was so tender, and the pita wrapped around it was good, too. Along with it came fries and a large salad with feta, fresh tomatoes, pepperoncini and olives. The others got equally exceptional baked salmon, gyro and spinach pie (spanakopita) plates (Mmmm. Spanakopita.)

And the desserts? DAMN! The proprietor saw that we couldn't decide, so she let us order four different ones and share them. The best, in my opinion, was the kadaifi (shredded wheat in honey), but there was also an excellent galaktoboureko (custard). The carrot cake was delicious, with a cream cheese icing that had an unusual flavor (in a good way). Underwhelming was the baklava, but that's only because the others outshone it so brightly, and there are so many variations of baklava that I very rarely enjoy it anywhere. Also not as exciting as I had hoped, the avgolemeno (egg and lemon) soup didn't taste very lemony, though the other flavors were there.

The bill for four of us came to $89! We left a large tip, via both credit card and cash (I think the grand total came to about $115). I have to admit, I was worried at first when I didn't find the place I thought I would. In the end, I didn't need to be.