If you live in the Northeast, you already know the extent to which ***Dunkin Donuts|http://www.dunkindonuts.com/*** dominates the coffee/donut/bagel marketplace. In the past few weeks, DD has expanded its reach yet again in the city of Beverly. There are now a total of eight DD franchises in our fair city (that I’m aware of). They are indicated by red dots on the map below:

ppp|
Dunkin Domination|ppp

That’s eight DD’s in roughly 2.5 square miles of land. 3.2 DD’s for every square mile. Beverly’s population in 2000 was 39,862, so that puts approximately 5000 Beverly residents to each DD.

DD has been making other moves, too. I recently noticed that the QuiKava coffee hut on Highland Ave. in Salem was just recently taken over by DD.

And their donuts aren’t even that great. Hopefully ***Krispy Kreme|http://www.krispykreme.com/*** can make some inroads – but at this point there are only 3 KK’s in the whole state of Massachusetts.

Inspired by Will’s recent announcement that he’ll be working at ***Taco Bell|http://pulchersentio.prwdot.org/001815.html*** for the summer, I’ve been thinking a lot about Taco Bell today.

Now Becky and I consider ourselves to be pretty big Taco Bell nuts. Consider the fact that Taco Bell was, in a way, the ***common bond|http://prwdot.org/?p=archives/001762*** by which our relationship was first formed. Consider the fact that we regularly went to Taco Bell during college even though the closest one (that we knew of at the time) was 30 minutes away. Consider the fact that we’ll choose it over any fast food restaurant, if one is convenient.

But I had no idea there were so many people who could be more nuts (or beans?) about TB than us.

Today I Googled for “taco bell road trip” to see if I could find a way to get a list of the Taco Bells on our driving route to Ohio this summer. I didn’t end up finding such a thing, but I *did* find the ***Taco Bell Road Trip|http://www.tbroadtrip.com/***. Holy moley. These guys are my new heroes. Because of them, I’m now considering plans for our own Taco Bell-based road trip for later this year.

From their site, I found numerous other ***links|http://www.tbroadtrip.com/Links.htm***, including ***Talko Taco Bell|http://www.marshalls.net/tacobell/***, a user-maintained database of Taco Bell restaurant ratings, and ***Crazy Gorditas|http://www.angelfire.com/extreme3/tacobell/***, a compilation of all past and present Taco Bell menu items, including the famed Steak Burrito Bellgrande (one of my favorites of years gone by):

Steak Burrito Belgrande
Description: This discontinued burrito had steak, green sauce, cheddar cheese, fiesta salsa, sour cream and get this…tater tots!
This burrito retired years ago. However, we have someone who can turn back the clock for us and tell us how it was!!
Kevin’s Opinion: This was GODLIKE. The Steak Burrito Belgrande was what I ordered every time I went to Taco Bell for the entire time they were available. Everything else on the menu paled in comparison. There was tons of steak in the burrito, the cheese blend was perfect, had plenty of the tomatoes/onions/cilantro blend, the perfect amount of sour cream, and the tater tots were surprisingly good. The result was a mix that was so uniqe and flavorful that it shouldve been illegal. Overall, this was the best burrto that Taco Bell ever had…and is only rivaled by the Chicken Grilled Stuft. God I wish the Steak Burrito Belgrande was back. It was almost holy.

I agree on all counts. It was an amazing burrito while it lasted.

Hm. It’s 11:37 pm. Taco Bell’s still open. Should I stay or should I go?

I don’t think I need to say anything – just read about new ***adult-centric Happy Meals|http://money.cnn.com/2004/05/11/news/fortune500/mcdonalds_happymeal/index.htm?cnn=yes***.

Dear Aunt Chris, (who I hope reads this!)

This afternoon I (finally) whipped up the “Strawberry Cake” recipe that you sent me for my Bridal Shower.

I love strawberry cake, and this one definately took the cake! Yum, yum, yum! My parents and brother were here for a Mother’s Day lunch and we all loved it. I’m glad that there are left overs to munch on.

I wonder, would this recipe be just as good if I used blueberries, or cherries? That will be an experiment for another day.

Thanks again!
Love,
Becky (and Peter, too!)

I have just finished eating today’s lunch – leftovers from one of Becky’s Crock Pot creations. As usual, it was delicious. I think it’s called Soda Roast, or Coke Roast, or something like that. Here’s the recipe:

qqq|one 3-4 pound roast
one can of coke
one pack of onion soup mix
one can of cream of mushroom soup
cook in crock pot for six to eight hours|qqq

Yum.

Due to popular demand, I am posting the recipe for “Chocolate Cherry Bars” mentioned by Peter in an earlier post. This is an anonymous recipe that i received at my bridal shower in September 2002. I believe that it is from the Lyttle family, but I’m not 100% sure. Happy baking!

Chocolate Cherry Bars

Bars:

* 1 pkg. devil’s food cake mix
* 1 21-oz. can cherry pie filling
* 1 tsp. almond extract
* 2 eggs, beaten

Frosting:

* 1 cup sugar
* 1/3 cup milk
* 5 T. margarine
* 1 cup chocolate chips

Heat oven to 350 degrees. Grease and flour 13″x9″ pan. In large bowl combine all bar ingredients; stir until well blended. Spread in pan. Bake until toothpick in center comes out clean (25-30 mins) In small saucepan, combine sugar, milk and margarine; mix well. Bring to a boil. Boil 1 min.; stirring constantly. Remove from heat; stir in chocolate chips until smooth. Pour and spread over warm bars. Cool 1 1/4 hours or until completely cooled.

It tastes so good that I had to pause in the middle of eating lunch to post this.

Last night Becky made one of my favorite dishes, “tater tot casserole”. I don’t know the exact recipe, but I do know that it involves ground beef, cream of mushroom soup, cheddar cheese soup, and of course… tater tots. We had it for dinner, and there was enough left over for me to bring some in for work today.

I think that eating it has probably taken a couple of weeks off of my life, but oh… it’s worth it. Maybe Becky will be kind enough to post the complete recipe here later tonight.