Recommendend Products

My most recent addition to my website is a page on Recommended Products. It is a short review of 5 products which i find particularly useful. Check the link out here, http://blonorestaurantreview.webs.com/recommendedproducts.htm

In this article I review and recommend Stride Spearmint Gum, Lawry’s Black Pepper Season Salt, a Garmin Nuvi GPS, Frank’s Red Hot, and a Bloomington Wall Map. The Stride is my favorite gum. I like the Spearmint because it is not over powering but provides just enough mintiness. The Black Pepper Season Salt is also a favorite of mine. It is great on just about every food imaginable. If you are interested in the whole reviews and the other products click the link above and read some more. If you like what you read then click the product link and purchase for great values on Amazon.

P.S.

The pumpkin seeds turned out excellent. They were the perfect amount of savory and crunchy. They were so good that I wish that I had another pumpkin so I can cook up another batch. I am going to go out and get another pumpkin and try another flavor of seeds. I read some recipes about other ways to season them. The one I really want to try next is worcestershire sauce, garlic, and butter. There is also a recipe for cinnamon brown sugar. I will let you know how these turn out. Thanks for reading.

How to Save Money

Are you like me these days? Broke but still hungry? In this post I will be going over a few money saving tips about eating out. I will have written on this topic before (http://blonorestaurantreview.blogspot.com/2009/08/staying-full-without-going-broke.html ) so this post is going to be a brief overview of a few of these tips, tricks, and suggestions.

1. Look for specials

I know that this sounds fairly obvious but a lot of times restaurants offer daily specials. This can be a great way to save some cash but still get a good meal. I know that Garden of Paradise offers daily specials for all days of the week except Sunday. I have gotten a few of these in the past and it is a great deal. You get a full meal for a few dollars off regular price. Not too shabby.

2. Split a Meal

Going on a date but afraid you can’t afford it? Well one solution you can try is splitting a meal. I know several restaurants like Chili’s and Applebee’s are offering deal were you can split an appetizer and have two entrees for $20. If you think about it this can be a great deal. If you were to get an appetizer for $5 or $6, and entrees for around $8 to $12 you would end up spending a lot more than $20.

3. Make Yourself Dinner

I know that cooking is not everyone’s favorite past time and that some people are just plain bad at it. But this is a great way to spend less and get more. I suggest buying items that can be made in large portions. I like to make spaghetti and when I do I make a LOT of spaghetti. I find that I spend about $10 or so and end up eating the spaghetti several times over the next week or so. This is, in my opinion, the easiest and most efficient way to save money while still eating well.

McAllister's Deli

Today I went to lunch with my girlfriend at McAllister’s in the Bone Student Center. She works there so we get a pretty good discount on days that she works. Other ways I would not go to McAllister’s because I think that it is too pricy for what it is. This being said I do like their food. The menu consists mainly of sandwiches but there are few other options besides a simple sandwich. And there are a lot of sandwich choices. In this post I will talk about of few of my McAllister’s favorites in hopes that it will someday help you with their HUGE menu.
On the sandwich side there is ton of variety. There are options for everyone. Today, and every day, my girlfriend get The Big Cheese with her own additions including lettuce, tomato, onion, mayo, honey mustard, and some others, I had a bite and it was far superior to other cheese sandwiches. There’s also a sandwich called The Big Nasty. The Big Nasty is roast beef, McAllister’s famous “come back” gravy, and cheddar cheese served on a piece of open face 12” Italian bread that is toasted. There are also many many more options that I do not have time to go into here.
There are also choices beyond sandwiches. For instance McAllister’s offers a wide variety of “Spuds” or baked potatoes. Today I had the Spud Ole, it is two potatoes with chili, melted cheddar cheese, and jalapenos. They also offer several soups each day including a great chicken tortilla soup. For those of you looking to count calories there are also some healthier options like salads. Whatever you choose to have I think that you will like it. Whether you like the price tag or not is another story.

The Economy and Tipping

Recently I have noticed a trend in the service I have been receiving at restaurants. Let me start by saying that I have noticed this at many restaurants but not all. I am not going to say were or when I have been noticing it but poor service has been on the rise around Bloomington-Normal. I do not necessarily blame the wait staff for this poor performance, I think there is a larger issue.

With the economy the way it has been in past year or so everyone is looking to cut out a bit of spending. This means that fewer and fewer people are eating out as often as they used to. This can lead to poor sales at restaurant. These restaurants then have to turn around and look to pinch pennies themselves. This often times means cutting hours for servers. When a restaurant cuts hours they put more pressure on the waiters and waitresses who are scheduled. They are required to cover more tables over a longer period of time. This would get to anyone and you cannot blame them for being frazzled at times.

I think it is important for all of us to remember that they are doing there jobs as best as they can. Waiters and waitresses earn below minimum wage and are dependent on tips to make up the lack of wage. So remember even if your dining experience isn’t the stellar outing you had hoped for always tip your staff. It is the most basic rule of dining out.

Favorite Posts

Today I am going to write a little bit about all of my work and the network that is bringing you Bloomington Normal Restaurant Review. I have been working on this project for about 2 months now and I am starting to see my dream com to fruition. It has been a lot of hard work but it is very rewarding. Thanks to everyone for the patronage and don’t forget to check out my sponsors.

Here are a few of my favorite things I have done in the past few months.

http://blonorestaurantreview.webs.com/lospotrillos.htm

This is my very first review. I was nervous about what I was doing and wanted it to sound as professional as possible. I ended spending a lot of time on this review. It is for Los Potrillos in Normal. It was very weird for me to go into a restaurant with a pencil and paper. I felt self conscious and thought the waiter might start asking questions. It only got worse when I started taking pictures of the food. But I got through and wrote one of the best reviews I have done to date. Check it out and learn about a great Mexican restaurant.

http://blonorestaurantreview.blogspot.com/2009/09/garden-of-paradise.html

This is a link to my favorite blog post. It was a mini-review of Garden of Paradise in Bloomington. I call it a mini-review because it was a condensed version of the one I posted on my website. The blog post is a little more bare boned than the full review, which you can find on my website at http://blonorestaurantreview.webs.com/gardenofparadise.htm. The blog post is just as good as the full review on the website but the website contains a bit more about each dish, the atmosphere, and even color pictures. It is definitely worth checking out.

Well those are just a few of my favorite posts. If you have a favorite let me know and leave a comment below. Thanks for reading.

Urban Spoon

Urban Spoon

Are you looking for a great new restaurant in your price range? Or are you looking for a specific kind of restaurant in your city? Out of town, on vacation, in a new city? All of these problems have only one comprehensive solution. Visit www.urbanspoon.com and check out your city. This website is a great resource for all major cities and metropolitan areas in the US and even in Canada. This is my favorite way to find new restaurants and to provide helpful reviews for other people who are in the same position.

This website ranks website on three different facets. The first is an obvious distinction. The town, borough, suburb, or neighborhood you are looking to dine in. The second is what kind of ethnicity of food you are looking for. This category is very expansive and can include types such as Indian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Latin American, Mediterranean, Mexican, sandwiches, seafood, pizza, steakhouses, and many many more options. The third category is the price range you are looking for. This is divided into four categories. The first is called $, this category is for the cheapest and usually not the best places. An example that came up for the combination of Normal, American, and $ was Jimmy John’s. The second category is $$, this category is for low to mid range prices. An example for this category is TGI Fridays. The third category, if you haven’t guessed the pattern by now, is $$$. This resulted in Ozark Steakhouse in Bloomington under the barbeque category. The fourth category is $$$$. The result that came up for this category was Lancaster’s Fine Dining in Bloomington. Lancaster’s is a very expensive restaurant with $25 entrees, certainly no place for someone like me.

Blo-No Links

There are a lot of great websites out there for Bloomington Normal Restaurant Reviews other than mine, www.BloNoRestaurantReview.webs.com. In this post I will be going over some of my favorites and discussing their pros and cons.

10 Best Bloomington Normal Restaurants

http://www.10best.com/Bloomington%3BNormal,IL/Restaurants/

This site is an alright source for reviews in the Bloomington Normal Area. It is a nationally run site that covers all of the major cities and has user submitted reviews. It is good for a quick check with a medium range of reviews, just under 30. My only problem with user submitted reviews is that the person could have a bias. Also having many reviewers creates a case of subjectivity. In other words one person who really likes one restaurant that most people think is terrible can really rate up this place. You can never really get a feel for what that person is like and why you should trust them.

Urban Spoon Bloomington Illinois

http://www.urbanspoon.com/c/93/Bloomington-restaurants.html

This is a great source for finding a new restaurant. Urban Spoon is one of the big players out there on the web for restaurant reviews. This site features all of the restaurants in Bloomington as far as I can tell. It also includes fast food joints and bars. This is great if you are looking to find somewhere you have heard of but are not sure where it is located at. The only problem with this website is that not all of the restaurants have reviews attached to them.

B-N.com Restaurant Reviews

http://www.b-n.com/pages/restaurantreviews.html

This is a locally run site that contains all things Bloomington Normal. This sight really gives the sense of community that Bloomington Normal is all about. I like the feel of this site a lot. That being said there are some downfalls to this site as well. The number of reviews is very limited. There are only 12 reviews on the site at this time. But since anyone can submit a review this number may be on the rise with your help!

Check out my website!

Can’t get enough of the Blo-No Restaurant Review Blog? Check out my website if you are looking for more insight into the world of Bloomington Normal's restaurant scene! The site features more in depth analysis of the restaurant featured on the blog plus even more great content! The website www.BloNoRestaurantReview.Webs.com is your place for everything Bloomington Normal Food related. I run the website and update just as often as this blog.

Here you can catch up on reviews of great restaurants and other content like

- Los Potrillos

- Coffee Nation Micro Roastery

- Garden of Paradise

- Links to other great sites about Bloomington Normal

- My Web Ring

- Contact Information

- A little bit more about Myself

- With much more!

Also on the website I am looking into adding several new article and sections not about restaurant reviews. I will soon be adding a page on recommended products and books that may help you achieve full satisfaction from every restaurant and even your own kitchen. One of the new articles I am working on, and will recap here in the blog, is going to be a How-To article. You will have to visit the site to find out what I will be teaching you how to do! If it goes well then I may make this a regular feature of my website and blog designs.

As always if you have any feedback, recommendations for restaurants, or just want to say hey please comment on the post or email me via my website www.BloNoRestaurantReview.webs.com on the About Me page. While you’re there please donate some money to The Food Guru to ensure I can continue to help you with the do’s and don’ts of dining out in Bloomington Normal.

Have a Great Day!

The Blo-No Late Night Food Scene

When its late night and you have got an urge for some good food after a long night studying or having some drinks with friends you have got a lot of choices in Bloomington Normal. Whether you want pizza, gyros, calzone, burritos, or burgers there are a lot of options. Here’s the best of the best.

- Bocata Fresh!
- With gyros, burritos, nachos, and paninis Bocata Fresh! has something for just about everyone. Located on Main Street across the street from 707 Liquors. They do not offer delivery but Bocata stays open until 2 am on Thursdays and 3 am on Fridays and Saturdays.

- D.P. Dough
- Who needs a greasy pizza that you have to share with all your buddies when you can get your own personal calzone? With around 40 choices of ‘zones on the menu and even a Construction-Zone where you choose your own ingredients there is always a zone to match your munchies’ needs. Located in Uptown Normal across the street from Maggie Miley’s with delivery available a zone is never too far away.

- Jimmy John’s
- With two convenient locations in Normal on Main and in Uptown Normal, these “Freaky Fast, Freaky Good” sandwiches are always a solid late night choice. Offering your choice of 25 sandwiches this sandwich shop will knock your socks off. They make the sandwiches in less than a minute, and with a delivery option that is almost as fast there is no waiting around for your food. Open seven days a week and until 2 a.m. on weekends you can't go wrong.

But don’t let this small list limit your options. The Bloomington Normal area is ripe with late night food joints. This is something I think a lot of my fellow college students take for granted. I think we should start embracing our late night food culture. Expand your palette! Try something new and possibly scary sounding. Branch out! Live a little! Besides your probably gonna be drunk when you eat so maybe you won’t even remember it!