it's the ILX FOOD FIGHT!!!! Round One - Group A

Pastries, Bacon, Hard Cheeses, Chicken

The only hard one is pastries v. chicken fried steak, but it's not really that hard if I think of the right pastries.

I kinda dislike oatmeal so that's a no-brainer, bacon duh, & actually find avocados kinda gross though I will eat them on occasion, so though I don't care about chicken, this one is easy

cfs, bacon, hardman cheeses, avocado

went down the first column ; p b o a

Ditto ciderpress: CFS, bacon, hard cheese, avocado.

The toughest here is bacon vs. peanut butter; I like bacon better, but if there were no bacon I could still eat pancetta, lardon, etc., while peanut butter is kind of sui generis (or at least among commonly found items; almond butter is great to tell the truth.)

Avocado vs. chicken also interesting; I eat much more chicken than I do avocado and it would be a bigger life change to give up chicken, but the truth is that chicken, the naked substance, is a less exciting protein slab than an avocado. If it were avocado vs. fried chicken I would probably go the other way.

otm

oatmeal really made the tourney?

Do British people know what chicken fried steak is, by the way? If not, trust me guys, it is better than pastry.

ha xposted there was going to say bacon vs. peanut butter in the first round is like 10000 tears of ;_; for me

pastries, bacon, hard cheeses, avocado

I am British. I know what chicken fried steak is. There are 100 different kinds of pastry better than it. xpost

Pastries, Peanut Butter, Hard Cheeses, Chicken

Yeah I eat enough chicken but I'd give it up rather than lose avocado. The best bit of fried chicken isn't strictly the chicken anyway.

Soooo: Steak, Bacon (only just, this is a tough call), Hard Cheeses (can't think of much that would beat this tbh), Avocadoes

Don't exackly know what chicken fried steak is but I've always thought it sounded awesome. I don't have much of a sweet tooth so it's an easy call for me.

For a vegetarian, this one's easy.

Pastries, Peanut Butter, Oatmeal, Avocados

Ditto!

Pastries, Bacon, Hard Cheeses, Chicken

Bacon is British bacon, right? Your US stuff usually makes me unhappy. (Not always, but I've had possibly the worst BLT of my life here).

how are bacon and peanut butter not both number one seeds

Pastries, Peanut Butter, Oatmeal, Chicken

No fan of bacon, really. I typically don't like meat with my breakfast, though bacon is okay on sandwiches or whatever. I will stan for OATMEAL 4EVA (but that sucks, because I like cheese too). wah.

Bacon is British bacon, right?

I hope not, because I was voting for crispy strips of heaven, not the flabby doormats I get served in the Isles.

how are bacon and peanut butter not both number one seeds

no seeding, just randomizing

Pastries vs. Chicken Fried Steak -- I haven't had a chicken-fried steak in years, and when I did have them they were often gristly and unpleasant. The best part of that dish is the gravy and potatoes. Voted pastry.

Bacon vs. Peanut Butter -- peanut butter is good, but bacon is kinda godlike.

Oatmeal vs. Hard Cheeses -- one wheel of parmigiano reggiano, or even a good domestic parmesan, is worth a tanker truck full of oatmeal. I'm a Cream of Wheat guy anyway.

Avocados vs. Chicken -- this is otm: "the truth is that chicken, the naked substance, is a less exciting protein slab than an avocado."

I have never knowingly had bacon before. Peanut Butter on the other hand, is one of God's finest creations.

BACON yo

i was very happy to be eating vegetarian bacon this week, even though it does not compare

my gf (vegetarian) said bacon is gross, even vegetarian bacon, i said she was mad

two of my friends (vegan) said real bacon is gross and unappetizing but vegetarian bacon is not. i said they were fronting

anyway

bacon is great

i feel like the first line there should have been 'BACON yo (a poem by me)'

Pastries, Bacon, Hard Cheeses, Avocado. Surprisingly easy. Won't be ever thus.

Chicken Fried Steak, Bacon, Oatmeal, Chicken

by the way, chicken fried steak is the greatest food ever invented

but chicken-fried gristle being passed off as chicken-fried steak is one of the worst.

Avocados vs. Chicken

I'll reillustrate my point from a couple days ago: a battle to the death between Guacamole and Fried Chicken would be much more interesting. Those are dishes. These are ingredients. It's like putting Prince against the Beatles, but saying it's Short, Black Guitarist vs. Shaggy Harmonizing Liverpudlians.

Need to remind the Brits that sausage rolls got moved into pastries.

I have no idea what chicken fried steak actually is but am guessing it's not very vegetarian. Is it a steak fried by a chicken?

From wikipedia:

Chicken fried steak (also known as pan fried steak,[1] country fried steak or CFS) is a piece of steak (tenderized cube steak) coated with seasoned flour and pan fried. It is associated with Southern U.S. cuisine and hospitality. Its name is likely due to chicken fried steak's similarity in preparation to fried chicken.

Non-Merkin translation - minute steak cooked like it was Southern Fried Chicken.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicken_fried_steak

not very vegetarian, no

lol, xposts

CFS, bacon, hard cheese, avocado ftw

Proper CFS requires country gravy, mashed potatoes optional.

Though, wow! chipotle cream gravy! WANT

I'll put up groups E - H tomorrow morning (US) btw.

Yeah, the gravy needs to be ALL OVER the steak.

btw, the best thing on the menu at Cracker Barrel is the Chicken Fried Chicken.

i don't think i've ever had chicken fried steak :(

Again, non-Merkin translation for country gravy - pan scrapings with water made into a sauce with flour.

water + MILK

or cream. Any Seattle-visiting ILXORs that want to try cfs, I will make you one fresh. So so so good.

Apologies, that'll be what makes it so white. I have never 'got' it either way.

I'm surprised how well peanut butter is doing here. When I was a strict vegetarian, bacon was the one thing that was always calling to me like a siren. I eat peanut butter all the time but it seems fairly modest in its appeal.

do i have to be in the southern U.S./at Jaq's house to get decent cfs or can i eat it within the next three days and cast an informed vote in this poll?

People from the south have spread out and opened restaurants all over the country. See if you've got one locally.

I'm kinda surprised at the CFS love here -- I kept it in half as a joke because HI DERE was the only one who mentioned it on the noms thread.

I guess he wasn't the ONLY one, but it didn't seem to get a lot of loud support.

if pastries lose here I am giving my screen a glare and suggest quejeidasing y'all

*queijedas, aka pasteis, the pride of Portugal, whose suggestion will be a link to the Lisbon tourism board website

oatmeal vs hard cheeses SUCH a difficult one
voted cheeses because i can always eat, i dunno, grits or something

Chicken fried steak is totally awesome and all but pastries are fucking pastries jesus people cmon

i worry that dudes hatin on pastries have not been blessed w/a bakery that knows that they should not be by nature uber-sweet. lightly sweet pastries are the best thing in the world (esp if the majority of sweet is baked in carmelized gooodness oh god i want a fuckin pastry right now actually)

I voted pastries, but only if it includes savoury brit pastries like sausage rolls and cheese and onion slices. if it's only merkin/francais/dansk sweet stuff then I want to change my vote to the pensionable veal escalope.

This whole food fight thing is going to make all of ILX commit that thing, that -- what is it called again? -- the sin of gluttony.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v296/WilliamCrump63/foodfightbracket1.jpg

image bombing YEAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH

Lie back and think of Danish.

Bacon is my tip to go all the way and win this thing imho.

pensionable veal escalope.

lol

I want a chicken fried steak RIGHT NOW (I have never had one before, but I think it wins anyway over pastries because how can it not be awesome?)

Bacon is my tip to go all the way and win this thing imho.

ewwwwwww

I voted for it here, and the stuff's lovely, but ugh son - nothing that texturally unpleasant* and fatty had better be getting NEAR the winning post

*crispy streaky bacon aside, but even that stuff is not fun to touch - crunchiness aside it's still a slithery, slimy, greasy thing

Chicken Fried Steak, Bacon, Hard Cheeses, Chicken, though the only one of those four I regularly eat is chicken, and I never even heard of chicken fried steak until I moved to Texas, and still don't understand what the big deal is. (My wife, born in Houston, loves it - go figure.) Still has to beat pastries, though. Eating dessert doesn't even occur to me. Ever.

pastries is breakfast, lunch and snakking in gaye europpe

wmc putting my charts to shame ;_;

I assumed pastries was like Danishes or stuff like that so I voted staek

pastries is this massive, amazing, beautiful category, while CFS is just this (delicious) stuff i basically never eat. i mean, steak is great, but how often you really need to bread & fry it?

other than that, bacon vs. peanut butter is tough, but i could much more easily live the rest of my life absent PB than bacon. so bacon.

and hard cheeses (parmesan, aged gouda, manchego, come on) and chicken. kills me to deny avocados, because they are so goddam amazing, but chicken is a universal, basic building block for so so so many other delicious things. avocado is just avocado, you know. or guacamole, or maybe a soup no one ever eats.

pastries, bacon, hard cheeses, avocado

tempted to vote for chicken fried steak, even though i love pastries and have no idea what chicken fried steak. know why?

because a vote for a regional food that is weird and kind of gross sounding is a vote for humanity. go support poutine, guys.

people who are voting for pastries: what comes to mind as an example of an omg pastry i can't give up?

i'm just drawing a blank, i guess i don't care about pastries.

maybe if i'd been to france i would've had a pastry that really blew my mind

as I said upthread, the humble queijedas uber alles, although you'd not do too badly with a good strudel

mind you, top-quality Cypriot baklava will blow anyone's mind, so that

cherry danish

good apple turnover, with a bit of cinnamon

baklava is awesome, unfortunately i don't think i've ever tried a truly top-quality baklava tho

Pastries, Bacon, Hard Cheeses, Chicken

I probably don't like Chicken Fried Steak as much as a true self-respecting Austinite should. Italian pastries are the best, I could use some canolli right now.

Bacon goes well with everything, end of story.

Hard Cheese. Five years ago it would have been oatmeal.

Chicken is my ultimate utility food. It isn't necessarily my favorite (although buffalo wings may be) but I could easily eat it three meals a day.

I tried chicken fried steak when I was in the states a couple of months ago. Wasn't all that impressed, but I had it in a chain restaurant in California so I probably didn't have a good one.

yeah it's a texas thing mainly i think

So, it's kind of a schnitzel?

yeah

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

Fuck right off, chicken. Hard cheeses will annihilate you next round.

oh man, I am gonna be so partisan about that

seriously chicken fried steak is so gross
good riddance

still in the first stage of grief re chicken fried steak but let's face it, it's just a "who gets to get steamrolled by bacon" contest.

pretty sure bacon vs pizza will be pretty close!

pastries can fucking beat bacon. believe. bacon really isn't all that and you goddamn lard-junkies know it

look at that top 5. I see five Pastries. I see three Bacons. And Bacon was up against freaking Peanut Butter

yeah I know Chicken Fried Steak but I've seen people swear on that shit above their own mothers

Tarts of the world, stand by my side!

OK, I've been tallying mi bananas, everybody feel free to check my math.

Pastry 117 > CFS 32
Bacon 87 > Peanut Butter 62
Hard Cheeses 120 > Oatmeal 29
Chicken 80 > Avocados 69