Friday, March 22, 2013

I love my insane chicken salad

YES! It's Friday! That means I get to have my insane chicken salad from Zaxby's. They have one of the best takeout salads. I'm a regular customer for them at 11 AM every Friday. I've worked it out in my family's budget that I get to have this treat each week.

For those that don't know, the insane chicken salad is the house salad from Zaxby's with a chili head kick. I discovered one day that they will make modifications to the salad upon request. So, I order the house salad with buffalo chicken dipped in their insane sauce. The insane sauce is the hottest sauce that is available. I absolutely love it! I always get excited when I smell the intense flavor when it comes through my window

I remember I discovered this on my way back from southern GA when we stopped in Atlanta for lunch. I ordered a regular house salad and 5 insane level chicken wings. The cashier then asked me if I would like the salad to have insane sauce on it as well. I said, "YES! I didn't know you could do that!" That's the day I fell in love with this salad. Thank you ma'am for asking that question!

One time when I ordered it, a worker brought it out to my table and said "Sir, I don't know how you can eat this!" That made me laugh.

I had something similar happen at Baumhower's restaurant when I ordered their hottest wings. I ordered wings with the Bring Da' Pain sauce and the waiter asked "Do you like to taste your food?" Why yes. Yes I do. I just like for my food to be intense.

In closing, I highly recommend the Zaxby's house salad.  In particular, those that are willing and ABLE, try it with the insane chicken.  But, I caution you.  The insane sauce should only be consumed by professional chili heads.

Tuesday, March 19, 2013

Choosing not to be a sluggard

My favorite book of the Bible has to be the book of Proverbs.  I just love the little nuggets of wisdom that can be gleaned just by reading a few verses.  Well, I was reading through chapter 10 today and one verse just jumped out at me.


"As vinegar to the teeth and smoke to the eyes,
    so are sluggards to those who send them."
- Proverbs 10:26 (NIV)

This verse spoke to me because I had been slacking off on a few of my tasks lately.  I just kept thinking of this verse over and over.  As I continued to think about this, I realized that I did not want to cause any of my superiors to have any sour taste in their mouths from my doing.  So, I prayed that God would help me to excel in all my tasks so that my superiors would have the taste of milk and honey instead.  I want my efforts to shine with excellence from my hands.  I hope that I can continue to work every effort in the right spirit but I know there will be times when I need to remind myself of this verse.

One other thing.  I have been described as a person who likes extreme flavors in food.  I have also been described as a person who has burned off all of my taste buds.  One reason for these comments is that I am a person who thoroughly enjoys a good hot sauce.  Most of the hot sauces that I eat contain vinegar as the primary ingredient.  So, I was thinking.  Did Solomon just not like hot sauce?  I actually love the taste of vinegar when mixed with peppers.  I also enjoy balsamic vinegar on my salads.  Vinegar is a good thing!

But, even though some of us like using vinegar in our foods, that does not change the meaning of this verse.  I can only imagine how vinegar was viewed in those days.  Maybe I'll just remember the second part of that because I absolutely hate having smoke in my eyes.  It dries out my contacts and makes my eyes burn.  Yes, that would be a better description for this chili head to use.

Fun on a kiddie coaster

I got to be a kid today.  I took my daughter to a local amusement park and she really wanted to ride the roller coaster.  However, since she didn't meet the height requirement, that meant I had to ride with her.  Oh sure, that's my excuse.  It's not like I didn't want to ride it.  After all, this is the same roller coaster that I fell in love with as a boy growing up.  For all those that worry, this is a very tame coaster that is much more jerky than exciting.  But, my daughter thoroughly enjoyed going up high and seeing her mother watching her from below.  Since I'm much bigger than my daughter, I had to hold onto her real tight due to the jerky ride and my larger legs blocking the lap bar from restraining her smaller body frame.  No worries though because I could hold onto her and sort of absorb the shocks for her as we took the only two turns on the coaster.  I will say that I had fun but my daughter was extremely excited and wanted to ride this over and over.  I would even lift her slightly out of her seat a little more as we went over the negative-g hill that naturally adds to the excitement of the ride.  I was so glad that I was able to share one of my childhood thrills with my daughter.  I believe she'll be my ride partner for thrill rides when she grows a little older.  Maybe when she grows a little older, we can take her to Six Flags to ride the Superman coaster.  That should be tons of fun as long as I can withstand the thrills when I grow a little older.  Ha. Time will tell.