When I think good pork, I think of the South's barbecue and country ham, but a visit to my favorite local Latin-American deli, Amigo's, reminded me how great pork can be when served with a Spanish accent. Usually, I go for the Cuban sandwich at Amigo's, but this plate of pork with black beans and yellow rice, topped with onions and peppers, was a small pork epiphany.

The winner of last week's Roadfood.com poll: the sweetness of sugar cones narrowly beat the large capacity of the waffle cone.  In the poll thread, someone mentions dropping a mini-marshmallow in the cone before loading the ice cream.  This very clever idea prevents ice cream drippage out the bottom, but are we the only ones who enjoy biting off the bottom point and sucking the ice cream out?  No, we are not 6-year-olds, all evidence to the contrary!

Forgetting that Clamp's Hamburger Stand closes every day at 2pm (but then reopens at 5pm), I arrived for lunch today at 2:10 only to watch picnickers enjoying the last of their fried-onion-topped burgers. As I grumbled my way back to the car, who should I run into at a table but Ed Levine, author of New York Eats and the man behind the excellent website Serious Eats. Ed and his wife were finishing off a meal with two friends from nearby Roxbury, Arietta and Sam, who had a suggestion: Mamie's in their home town. More...

Two years ago on the eve of the Roadfood.com tour of Massachusetts clam shacks and roast beef houses, a few eaters met at a pub on Beacon Street in Somerville called R.F. O'Sullivan & Son for hamburgers. The burgers were delicious, but for some reason I took no pictures of them. And somehow, I didn't make it back ... until today, when the person I was to have lunch with in Boston asked where I'd like to go. O'Sullivan it was! And while business prevented me from sampling lots of things and paying enough attention to write a review, I did snap this picture of a "black and blue" burger. That's a half-pound patty rolled in cracked black pepper and smothered with blue cheese sauce. Those fries and onion rings on the side are pretty grand, too.

Last week's poll question pre-supposes that there are things one should never order in a diner.  1 in 7 people responding disagreed, saying, essentially, if it's on the menu, order it!  But the "winner" of this poll was salmon; 28% of you wanted nothing to do with diner salmon.  We'd have to agree.  But... we've had some excellent diner salmon.  The key is: where's the diner?  The good diner salmon we sampled was in a Pacific coast diner, and the fish was fresh and gently cooked.

The diners we're more familiar with, those in the Northeast, almost always begin with frozen fish, and even when they don't, it hardly matters, as the fish will be overcooked, dry, and sad (the photo above is of pristinely fresh wild salmon from Ecola Seafoods in Oregon; you'll never find anything like it in a Northeast diner!).  Clams came in a close second.  When it comes to clams, we want no doubts about freshness.  The Italian-style diner pastas we've tried have been overcooked and strangely seasoned.  But it's been mentioned in the Forums how there are Italian diners in upstate New York that turn out serious plates of pasta.  We plan to keep an eye out for them.

The fancy cakes and pastries in diners used to be a popular joke; everyone knew they were awful, and nobody ever ordered them (a second time).  At many diners, this is still true, to be sure, but we've run across quite a few lately that double as more than decent bakeries, especially in Dinerland (New Jersey).

And, we are very happy to report that only 12 people (out of 1036) said they'd never eat in a diner!

Many excellent adjectives can be applied to a length of Louie Mueller's sausage, but tender is not one of them -- as evidenced by the damage done to one of the flimsy plastic forks when only a modest amount of pressure was applied. (Forks really are anathema in these meat-market style barbecues). The beef inside Mueller's sausage is nice and soft -- and insanely juicy -- but the natural casing that encloses it is tough. Chewy. Rugged. More...

I am soon going to write a new review of The Monument Cafe in Georgetown, Texas, because the lunch Jane and I had there today surpassed even the high expectations we had walking in. But until I get to that, let me just rave about dessert a bit and show a few pictures. Above is just about the best coconut cream pie ever, dense and coconutty, heaped with thick, just-whipped cream and crunchy toasted coconut. Below I will post pictures of chocolate layer cake with buttercream frosting -- classic, old-fashioned cake that is indescribably satisfying -- and the cafe's signature pie, which is devilishly fudgy chocolate atop a layer of crisp toasted pecans rather than an ordinary crust. More...

On a short jaunt into the countryside east of Austin prior to the Roadfood tour, Jane and I, having vowed to eat no barbecue until making the pilgrimage on Saturday, broke our promise today and stopped at Cartwright's for brisket and sausage. Cartwright's is a colorful place -- cafeteria service, checked tablecloths, walls plastered with vintage nick-nacks, and hot sauce in Jack Daniel's bottles on the table. I couldn't resist this portrait of Cartwright's sauce alongside a dish of pickles and onions and a bottle of that Texas glucose substitute, Big Red, which is Bazooka bubble gum-flavored soda pop.

Last week's poll winner was barbecue, with 42% of the vote.  Barbecue certainly has distinct regional styles: the mutton of Kentucky, chopped pork, thin vinegar sauce, and mustard sauce of the Carolinas, dry ribs of Memphis, brisket and sausages of Texas, tri-tip of Santa Maria, CA...   Coffee came in last with 2%.  As Starbucks spreads across the country, it seems the Seattle style is becoming the national style.

The photo above  by Michael Stern is of a burnt-ends sandwich at L.C.'s in KC.  Highly recommended!

Virginia's Eastern Shore, between the Chesapeake Bay and the Atlantic Ocean, is best known for the city of Chincoteague and the feral ponies named for it. Like the Eastern Shore of Maryland, it is a place of natural beauty and delicious hard-shelled crabs, but just today at lunch, I discovered another of its culinary highlights: the hayman potato. More...