The Best Thing I Ever Ate - Atlanta

As I’ve gotten older, dining out has become a hobby of mine; the ultimate goal being to find something that reminded me of food from my childhood.  Along my journey, I discovered some great tasting things in the city of Atlanta.  As an aspiring foodie, I decided to tap into the taste buds of my friends to find other treasures that I may have missed in the city. So I asked them, “What’s the best thing you ever ate in Atlanta?”

            Shrimp & Chicken Alfredo at Franco’s Restaurant – 1740 Cheshire Bridge Rd. NE, Atl GA

Big shrimp and large pieces of chicken breast over fresh pasta covered in a creamy Alfredo sauce.  A former co-worker said he would drive more than 20 miles to get this dish.  He described the restaurant as “not too pricey and having a wonderful wait staff” that makes the entire experience enjoyable.  As an end to this great meal, he suggested the Tiramisu.  Since living in Atlanta, I have driven past this restaurant several times. Now that I know the best item on the menu, a lunch time stop is being scheduled as I type.

Black Spaghetti at La Pietra Cucina – 1545 Peachtree Street NE, Atlanta GA

The pasta in the entrée is made with ink from a squid, giving it the black color in the name. Along with the pasta and tomato sauce comes rock shrimp, scallions and hot Calabrese sausage. My girlfriend said this was her favorite dish on the menu and the restaurants best seller.  I have had the pleasure of eating at this particular restaurant and I passed on this dish. What in the world was I thinking? This dish sounds absolutely dreamy!

 Jalapeño and Cheddar Cheese Grits at West Egg Café – 1100 Howell Mill Rd, Atlanta GA

Sounds easy enough; put cheese and jalapeños in some grits.  But making grits is an art. They have to be creamy and smooth.  Choose between milk or water and the correct amount of butter.  According to my friend, who dreams of this side dish, West Egg Café must have gotten the recipe right.  I have yet to eat at West Egg but this dish has put them on my radar.

Catfish and Grits at Vickery’s Bar and Grill – 1106 Crescent Ave, Atlanta GA

The catfish in this meal is lightly blackened and served over cheddar grits with chorizo sausage, peppers & onions, topped with a roasted jalapeno & citrus beurre blanc. My most picky eating friend enjoyed this meal and swears by it to this day. Everything sounds delicious except this mysterious beurre blanc ingredient.  I found out it is a hot white butter sauce and as a lover of butter, I am all in.  

Fish Tacos and a side of Corn at Original El Taco – 1186 N. Highland Ave, Atlanta GA

The fried fish tacos are made with jicama-serrano slaw, sprouts, and toasted sunflower seeds on a flour tortilla. Compliment this taco with a side of corn grilled in lime mayo and I bet you will be satisfied with your meal.  This restaurant makes my list of places to eat for the yummy sounding side dish alone. 

Flash Fried South African lobster tail at Chops Lobster Bar – 70 West Paces Ferry Rd, Atlanta GA

This delectable piece of seafood is served with honey mustard and drawn butter.  My co worker has eaten this meal quite frequently and gave me the following description, while wiping the drool from his mouth.  “At first glance it looks like a chicken finger but when you put some on your fork, dip it in sauce, and put it in your mouth, the delicate lobster flavor as well as the sauce makes you long for more, even while you're still enjoying your current bite. It's WONDERFUL!” 

After polling the room and getting such lovely suggestions, my dinner schedule has instantly become full for the next few weeks.  I still have a few nights open to eat even more, so tell me what is the best thing you’ve ever ate?

Bowl Championship Series vs. Football Championship Subdivision

Let me start by saying that I am huge football fan who was taught the game by a father who wanted boys but had all girls. My earliest influence in life was Lawrence Taylor. I wanted to tackle people and take them down in the way that he did.  I broke my first bone in sixth grade playing football. For clarification, the other player was in my way so I ran over her. 

Over the years, my Sundays were filled with hours of football, but my Saturdays not so much.  In the past, I only watched college football, when I was in college.  I would get up on Saturday morning, get dressed and walk across the street to Bridgeforth Stadium at James Madison University. That was all the college football I knew or wanted to know. It was what you did in college; support your team whether good or bad. I knew several guys on the team and I was there to cheer them on.  After college, my interest was no more.  However, after dating a college football fanatic for several years, I have totally submerged myself into the chaotic and sometimes dramatic world of Bowl Championship Series football.

One Saturday after slaving over a keyboard, I came home to news of my Alma mater winning the 2004 Division I-AA National Football Championship (now known as the Football Championship Subdivision or FCS).  I was elated and almost jumped through the roof, but I felt I missed the best part of the win: the entire season.  I had ignored college football because it just wasn’t significant to me anymore, until that day.  After that win, I began to watch how college football unfolds every season. I noticed how passionate people in Georgia behave about “their” college teams.  The flags on cars and houses, the big stickers on back windows; college football was serious business. I had been missing out for years, but now I understood the pride and excitement felt after winning a championship. 

I made a conscious decision that I was going to learn as much as I could about college football. And the first thing I had to attack were the letters and numbers that my boyfriend continued to toss around. He frequently referred to the BCS, SEC, Big 12, Pac -10, Big Ten and ACC.  I recognized the ACC as the Atlantic Coast Conference only because I grew up a Duke Basketball fan.  I had to assume that they had football teams as well.  So I took to the internet for my in depth research, starting with this BCS thing that I heard people complain about all the time. 

For people who have been living under a rock as I was, the BCS or Bowl Championship Series determines each year which college team is the best in the country. There are a few factors that decide who gets to play in this championship.  First, the top two teams get automatic berths into the National Championship game.  So if by the end of November, your team is not ranked number one or two; the national championship is not in your future.  Secondly, only certain conferences are guaranteed berths to the BCS games. So if your team is not a part of the ACC, Big 12, Big East, Big Ten, Pac-10 or the SEC, again there is no national championship in your future.  I didn’t understand why the BCS/Division I schools couldn’t create some sort of playoff system? I watched the NCAA basketball tournament every year and that seems to work well.

These first two rules alone narrow the field greatly and also saturate the BCS top ten with certain conferences.  The rankings of each team are determined by the AP poll, Coaches poll and a computer average. I know that reads like a lot of jibber jabber, but these rules and calculations are responsible for millions of dollars being awarded to colleges every year.  In my BCS virgin mind, there had to be a simpler way.  

I asked my friend Dominick Brady what he thought about a playoff system and he denied that there was a need for one.  The self professed UGA/SEC football fanatic feels that a team’s season is the playoff.

“Every game means everything, every week. It’s a roller coaster and I enjoy the ride.”

I was convinced that his love for the SEC and the fact that a school in that conference has won the national championship four out of the last five years jaded his view of the BCS.  He assured me that was not the case at all.

“'I’d be a fan of the BCS anyway because in the FBS (Football Bowl Subdivision), the season is so much fun.  Every week is do or die.  Each week all of the teams in the top 25 have some sort of shot to make it into the mix. All they have to do is win.”

After talking to him about the BCS, I started to rethink my views on the FCS playoff. The FCS currently has 125 teams that are eligible to participate in the playoff. Every week the teams are ranked in a top 25 poll based on their weekly performance.  This is very similar to the BCS format but at the end of the season a field of 20 teams participates in the playoffs. It is a win or lose situation; win and you move on, lose and you go home.  There are several schools in Georgia who could possibly be a part of these playoffs. And now that Georgia State has a football team and Kennesaw State following them in 2014, who is to say that a FCS national championship would not be in the future for the state of Georgia.

Based on popularity, the BCS is well known and generates the most money, but the FCS gives more teams an opportunity to bring home a national championship and bragging rights. In your opinion, which system do you think would work better for college football?

Memories of California

I can’t remember much about living in California. I know that father was in the Marines and stationed at Twenty Nine Palms military base. I remember the desert, my Mexican baby sitter and tortillas for breakfast.  But beyond those small details, everything else is a blur. I have always seen pictures of me standing in front of my childhood home, playing with the neighborhood kids and I think that I remember those moments. I close my eyes, try to feel the sun that is shining brightly in all of the photos, but there is nothing. 

I can’t remember my one trip to Disneyland as a child. I remember being afraid of Goofy, but I did take a picture with him. I know I took the picture because my mother has it in the family photo album. It was strange that I had this fear of Goofy because he was my favorite Disney character.  I watched him on TV and he was the one my mother said I spoke of most frequently. But the fear that came over me when I was asked to stand close to Goofy still registers with me to this day. Maybe it was the larger than life plastic head on an adult sized body that caused my anxiety.  Beyond that, I only have the photo as a memory of that event.  I am not interested in revisiting the anxious feeling that came along with occasion, so I never try and recall.

I can’t remember the cross country drive that brought my family from California back to my home state of Virginia. The trip probably took more than a week but it felt like two days to four year old Tamara. On my mother’s dresser, there is a child’s turquoise and silver ring that my parents bought on an Indian reservation.  It was a ring that was given to me by a Native American vendor.  My mother says he thought I was a cute kid and wanted me to have the small piece of jewelry. In my mind, I can see his face. He was an older gentle man, very wrinkled with small eyes and long white hair.  At least I think it’s his face and not that of a movie character.  The only reminder I have is that very small ring.  I think when I have a daughter; I will give it to her.

I can’t remember what started the fight my parents had in the car during that trip.  I was asleep at first and then I heard yelling. The yelling was normal, but we were in a moving vehicle and it was moving fast. I do remember my mother wanting to get out of the car and my father pulling over so she could.  But the events that happened in the next two minutes are vague.  I know there were squealing tires and my mother screaming “the baby”.  But beyond that the story that I know and retell as often as possible came from my mother.  There was no accident that day but the car tire did blow out after my father slowed down.  I always remember my mother’s face when she tells the story and how it ends with the line: “He could have killed us that day, the crazy way he was driving.”  That memory is not mine, but it is one I won’t ever forget. 

Shortly after the trip across the country and the birth of my younger sister, my parents separated. I remember that. My sister, only a year old, doesn’t have a recollection of that time. She doesn’t have childhood memories of my father like I do. There aren’t even any photos that include my father and sister or any photos that I could use to tell her stories about my father.  What my mother does have in her photo album are hundreds of pictures of my sister and me.  And those stories are happy and funny; at least that is how I remember them.

What exactly is dating?

Dating is a process of elimination. You could look up the definition in Webster’s dictionary but that would be too standard of an explanation for all that dating encompasses.  A person encounters many different people until they find someone to whom they are compatible. Hopefully, the feeling is mutual and those people become a couple.  Dating is just that simple. But when you add emotions, personalities, and an overwhelming ratio of women to men, dating then becomes complicated.  

In the summer of 2007, I started a blog about dating.  I was not so good at dating but I was determined to get it right.  It was never difficult to gain male attention but after I had it what was I to do.  My friends[1] and I sat around many a Saturday night drinking wine and discussing what was wrong with our dating lives.  We exchanged funny stories and laughed at our misadventures.  And after I gave it some thought, it seemed logical to share my stories with more than just my friends.  The next day, “Black Girls Don’t Date” was born.

In my young mind, dating was easy.  I have always subscribed to the philosophy that if I liked a guy, he liked me, we would spend time together, and thus we could date.  Maybe it’s because I started “dating” at an early age.  Even though I was a late bloomer (had my first kiss at 16), I had my first “boyfriend”[2] at the tender age of 9.  I was a little girl who never experienced the “icky boy” phase.  So anytime that I liked a boy, I made sure that he knew

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[1] Tangela, Tamika, Synitta and I are Moscato lovers and had no luck in the dating arena. In an effort to maintain my friendship, I won’t tell their stories, but I will disclose the horror that is my love life.

[2] My first boyfriend was a neighborhood boy named “Heavy”.  He was 13 years old when he approached me about being his girlfriend.  It was supposed to be a secret, but I couldn’t hold water and I had to tell my friends.  He was the closest thing to LL Cool J that Gracetown had seen.

 

that I liked him. My openness about how I felt made it easier for guys to approach me, but it also allowed me to get my feelings hurt more often too.   

By the time I was 13 yrs old, I was hitting the teen club[1] every weekend and phone dating. Phone dating consisted of me monopolizing the phone in my house to talk to some boy on the other side of town that I had never met.  Most of the time it was a little brother of an older family friend[2] or the buddy of my girl friend’s phone boyfriend[3].  I was enamored by their voices and knew that I had this dating thing locked down.

Unfortunately, during my most formative years (6-13 yrs old), there was no man in my household.  And because I was a “fast ass” growing up, I always sought out male attention. My mother taught me about being my own woman, being strong, and independent, but never what to expect when I started dating.  So I constantly had a new boy at school or in the neighborhood that I was enamored with.  My mother always said, "You change boys like you change your drawls[4]."  And after hearing that phrase so many times, I deduced that I was supposed to stick to one boy at a time. That did not seem so bad, but being true to my Sagittarius nature caused me to get bored easily (we are nomadic people). To solve that problem, I stuck with one boy at a time, but for very short periods of time.  Again I was hit with disapproval from my mother.

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[1] My best friend Heather and I went to Zoids every weekend to dance all night (until 11pm). I got my first hickey in this club. That is a whole different story.

[2] Arthur was my first real phone boyfriend. I was 13 and he was 16. It was so wonderful until we actually met. He thought I was unattractive and I thought he was unattractive. So that relationship was over before it started.

[3] Tommy was the second phone boyfriend, but his jheri curl was a turnoff when I met him. He omitted little detail from his physical description.

[4] Drawls is the southern pronunciation of the word drawers i.e. underwear

 

Shortly after my 13^th birthday my mother remarried and I was happy to finally have some male insight. Up until then I had no point of reference, never determining if my dating actions were right or wrong.  My stepfather would said, "You never give guys a chance. You should give them an opportunity to mess up before you toss them aside." So this is more advice that I took to heart and tried to integrate into my dating repertoire.  

So when I went off to college, what I knew about dating was 1) that I need to stick to one guy at a time and 2) to stick with them until they mess up.  My first year of college, I was the sole Black girl in my dorm suite and I was trying to abide by my dating rules. I watched my white suite mates go out every weekend and bring home a new guy each time[1]. THOSE WHORES! Actually I didn’t think that about them, they looked like they were having a great time. I spent my first semester pining after blue eyed Craig[2], who eventually told me he just wanted to be friends. But I convinced myself I was being patient and taking on one guy at a time.  I liked a lot of guys in college[3], but I never let it be known because I always heard my mother's voice. So when most young girls were sowing their wild oats, I was behaving like an old maid.

I had spoken to my closest friends and they had all experienced the same phenomena. I saw some of them experience it in college with me. When I relocated to Atlanta, I decided that I

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[1] I had the pleasure of walking in on my roommate while she was having sex with one of her hook ups. It was one of the most unpleasant moments of my college career.  I think I was temporarily blinded that night.

[2] Craig was the black, blued eyed, blonde boy that was my main interest my freshman year in college. I happened to still be a virgin and he really wanted to have sex. So, another one bites the dust.

[3] One of my closest guy friends in college gave me nickname. I was deemed “First Team All Madden”.  I knew about the Madden video game but was not sure if this name was good or bad. My friend explained to me that I had at least one guy in every position on the football team that was interested in me. And I liked them, all 22 or so of them.

 

could reinvent myself. No one knew me here and I could do what I wanted. So I started dating. Yes, more than-one-guy-for-a-short period-of-time dating. I don't remember all of their names or even what some of them looked like, but I met guys and had great adventures with them. There was no guilty momma voice, no obligations, no long extended tolerance of bad behaviors, just fun times had by all. I even made some good friends along the way[1].

Now in 2010, I am trying to single-handedly encourage all Black women to date.  I have two success stories[2] and I am diligently working on a third. The goal is for all single Black women to see as many men as possible. I don’t want woman to sleep with all the new men they meet, but experience a vast variety of men. It helps you make the correct selection when you decide to settle down. If you need some help, advice or suggestions, feel free to contact me[3]. Remember, I am the expert.

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[1] Online dating garnered me two great male friends, Anthony and Jay. Anthony and I were great together but, he wanted to be great with other women also. Jay was a very cool guy, but there was no spark from the beginning so I hooked him up with Tangela. My attempt to play Chuck Woolery failed miserably.

[2] My best friend was coached into dating several men that she went out with for different events. At our last meeting, she was up to three different guys that she was juggling. Because I was the catalyst for her to change from a serial monogamist to a successful dater, she checks in with me like I am her sponsor i.e. Alcoholics Anonymous.  My other friend dated around and has now found a man to her liking.  I am hoping to con my third friend to committing to 30 dates in 30 days. Look for that one on my blog!

[3]  http://blackgirlsdontdate.blogspot.com, www.twitter.com/blkgrlsdontdate, blkgrlsdontdate@gmail.com