Lets do a thread on the best thing you ever ate.
A few years ago I was on an Alaskan Cruise. Those cruise ships really feed you well and this boat was no exception.
One day the announced a fresh salmon lunch cookout, outside on the pool deck.
The salmon was cooked on home- shop made charcoal grills. They split 55 gal drums and welded them together.
This salmon was honey coated. And it was way beyond good. There were probably several hundred folks out there eating it.
And we were inhaling it! They couldn't cook it fast enough on the about 100 linear feet of grill.
I asked one of the cooks who do you get the honey to stick to the fish?
He grinned and replied ' we add sugar.' Sugar? Honey is sugar.
I have tried to reproduce this fish as home with some but not total success.
Maybe he was kidding about the sugar?
I have eat a lot of things in a lot of places, but this is the best thing I ever ate.

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NRA LIFE MEMBER

Smoked salmon on the waterfront in Seattle.

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Recycled Bricklayer

My grandmother's turkey and dressing with gravy.

I love food and enjoy trying different foods from around the world. I draw the line at pain. Pain is not a flavor.

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Have Gun Will Carry

Let's see, it could have been my sister's barbecued Cajun-style shrimp. It's very similar to what they serve at Pascal's Manale in New Orleans, but my sister's is better.

Or, it might have been the 28 oz. ribeye at the Grizzly Bar in Roscoe, MT. I thought I was going to need a bag for about half of it, but I didn't. I ate the whole thing.

Then again, it could be the cecina con sopes they served at a place called Alfaro's in Minneapolis, but that place is long gone.

Possibly fresh walleye out of Two Island Lake, just off the gunflint trail in northern MN, in a batter of egg and crumbled saltines, fried in a cast-iron skillet over a wood campfire and washed down with beer and Old Overholt.

Goulash at a hole-in-the-wall restaurant in Budapest. It's not hamburger over macaroni.

Lobster roll.

On reflection, there is one thing better than any I have mentioned, but there is no place for it in a family-friendly forum.

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Not in jail.

Baked stuffed lobster, stuffed with lobster meat.
Only once a year, that is why it is greattttttttttttttttt

Served right here, you may want to check out the menu and drool. Dinner Menu

But nothing could top my Mom's Galapki, AKA “Guwampki”, stuffed cabbage.

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Doesn't hasta call me Johnson

I used to go fishing in Canada about every summer. The best I remember is fresh caught deep fried Lake Trout washed down with plenty of Labatts!
Jim

What sticks in my mind from early childhood was being sick and not being able/allowed to eat solid food for a short time.
I was finally given the green light to eat and my mom cooked up about 6 oz. of ground beef with some white bread and I ate it.
I was probably about 6 years old (1958) and the satisfaction I got from eating that little chunk of hamburger meat when I was really hungry is remembered fondly.

One year at our lake place in Canada our neighbor called us over to help them eat some fresh alder smoked Sockeye. They had just had it shipped in from one of their northern pals and had a technique for eating it that ranks right up there with one of the best ways I have ever eaten salmon. You start with the proper cracker, the ones they were using were about 2" in diameter and quite wholesome, Wheatsworth or something a Canadian manufacture. Next you slathered on a layer of Philly cream cheese, the soft kind. Then a gob of Jalapeno jelly, finally a chunk of freshly smoked Sockeye salmon...its a mouthful but then most sushi is that way also. I had do do some searching for the Jalapeno jelly but it is available, you can also get a red pepper jelly but the Jalapeno is a better flavor with the other ingredients. There are very few things on this old blue marble that I have ever had in my mouth that even come close the taste combination explosion of that "snack". I've eaten Sockeye raw, smoked, kippered, canned, baked, barbqued, fried, poached,broiled,roasted,sushied, and believe this was the best ever, second only to a meal cooked by the former chef for the Japanese ambassador that started with Sockeye egg sushi and ended with the best teriyaki Sockeye I ever ate

I've been on a country fried steak kick lately.

It's kind of a toss up.
I cook special pork chops at least once a month for our anniversary. I use four different spices, three spice mixes and rubbed sage, all added at different times and cook it on a cast iron skillet oiled with olive oil. It's served with rice, brussel sprouts in a butter sauce made by my wife and a bottle of Moscato.
The other is special burgers made by my wife. I'm not allowed to watch her cook them ever since I made some comments she didn't appreciate about how to cook burgers one time.
Then there's ground bison, made into quarter pound burgers, spiced with rubbed sage, cooked in a cast iron skillet, flipped once and left until just cooked.
Yum, sometimes we just eat it with a fork, other times it's between burger buns.
Don't even think of coming anywhere near my bison burgers with a bottle of ketchup.

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Keep on Chooglin'

For home cooked, my Mother's fresh caught crappie, with home cut french fries and hush puppies. A close second would be her fried chicken with gravy and fries.
Eating out, I don't know right now. Too much to recall.

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Wayne
Torn & Frayed

When I was a kid (many many years ago) eating home cooked meals at the dinner table. I never had much in the way of restaurant food. My mother and her two sisters all cooked the same and it was all good. Sunday dinner at one of their houses was the highlight of my childhood. I learned all my cooking skills from them and continue to enjoy cooking both tried and true recipes as well as experimenting on new dishes.

A favorite food? A really thick prime filet done on the grill with a huge baked potato and a caesar salad. I've got the cook time down to a science and medium rare every time.

Oh, with a bottle of good red wine!

I think situation/location more than the food itself is what I think of as the "best." A couple stick in my mind:

Coming back to camp after a long Mulie hunt in D-12 (SoCal) to find breakfast burritos hot and waiting.

A bowl of Boar Stew in Innsbruck, Austria, when three celebrations all aligned on the same day, one was an annual, one was a 100 year anniversary of something or other, and the third was the 500th anniversary of some special gold roofed building. The whole city was in party mode, and the food was incredible.

Beer Day on the Nimitz, 1989...I wasn't on the flight schedule, so got my 2 beers, plus 4 other flight crews 2 beers...that is 10 beers! We had been at sea about 70 days by then.

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No good deed goes unpunished.

A Kobe beef steak at a hotel restaurant in Thailand.

While I enjoy fish I don't think any could ever rate as the best thing I ever ate.

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Regards, Ron
USASA 1965/69

My mother was Puerto Rican and I grew up eating all kinds of delicious goodies. My favorite meal, and the best thing I ever ate, was her roast pork shoulder (pernil), fried plantains with garlic olive oil, and yellow rice. She would make it for my and my son's birthdays and family get togethers, special occasions, etc.. We would eat until we couldn't hold anymore and then pick at the delicious little crunchy pieces on the platter while we talked for a couple of hours after the meal was done.
Alas, Mom passed last December and I will never get to enjoy the best thing I ever ate (my favorite meal) or the company again.

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Don't kiss smiling dogs!

[QUOTE=Kinman;138110936]One year at our lake place in Canada our neighbor called us over to help them eat some fresh alder smoked Sockeye. They had just had it shipped in from one of their northern pals and had a technique for eating it that ranks right up there with one of the best ways I have ever eaten salmon. You start with the proper cracker, the ones they were using were about 2" in diameter and quite wholesome, Wheatsworth or something a Canadian manufacture. Next you slathered on a layer of Philly cream cheese, the soft kind. Then a gob of Jalapeno jelly, finally a chunk of freshly smoked Sockeye salmon...its a mouthful but then most sushi is that way also. I had do do some searching for the Jalapeno jelly but it is available, you can also get a red pepper jelly but the Jalapeno is a better flavor with the other ingredients. [Quote]

My wife has perfected her recipe for Jalapeno Jelly, but she calls it "Cowboy Relish". As stated it is a delicious condiment on almost anything. I had it today on hot dogs. I have threatened to try it on Ice Cream :-). If anyone is interested in the recipe, I will post it here. ........ Big Cholla

Two tied for first. Pulled pork and baked beans at The Shed, Ocean Springs, Miss. BBQ beef, fries and creamed corn at Rudy's BBQ in Austin, Texas. Good thing they're both so far away. I'd have to move into the garage. It's the only door I'd be able to fit thru.

How about the, slow roasted, standing rib roast I fixed for our dinner tonight.

Sorry I can't get the pictures to up-load.

My father made sure we went to Canada fishing in the late 60/s and early 70/s. We ate fresh from the lake, perch, and white fish. Just unbelievable.

I just got done cleaning 25 bluegills I caught tonight, tomorrow I'll dip them in a little egg and milk and then dip them in Andy's fish seasoning and toss them in some 375 degree grease! The long neckers will flow and a fish fry will take place!

My TWO most favorite dishes were made by my Mother: Panamanian style Arroz con Pollo & Lomo, which is a Panamanian style pot roast. All those years I was eating it I kept telling myself I had to hang out in the kitchen & notate exactly how she did everything, but I never made the time. I can get close, but its not the same. I can not express how much I miss her cooking!!!

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Lounge Lizard Extraordinaire

In 2012, my in-laws celebrated their 30th wedding anniversary. We all went to a casino in Tunica, MS. Don't ask me why we went to a casino in Tunica, MS, but we did.

The one high point of the trip for me ( I hate gambling) was the food. Cantaloupe is my favorite fruit, and one of my favorite foods. That casino had hands down the best cantaloupe I ever ate in my life. Each meal, 3 meals a day for a week, had a large helping of that cantaloupe.

I can't positively say that this is the single best thing I ever ate but it's the best NEW thing I've eaten in a very long time. Mine too was on a cruise recently in the Mediterranean and Agean and Black Seas. It was aboard The Seven Seas Mariner and it musta fell right out of heaven. I think I probably posted this pic of it in my "travel log".

The divine "caramel popcorn ice cream sundae.

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Real men love cats!

Best thing I've ever eaten in a restaurant was the only truly, absolutely perfect roast chicken I have encountered in my longish life. It was sublime.

The best thing I ever cooked was the dinner I prepared for my dad's 80th birthday (he died at 90, fourteen years ago). It was a beautiful leg of lamb, generously studded with slivered fresh garlic and rubbed with good olive oil, fresh rosemary, salt and pepper, then roasted to medium rare. Lightly steamed fresh asparagus and buttery mashed Yukon Gold potatoes as sides. It was one hell of a meal, and one he talked about for the rest of his life.

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Oh well, what the hell.

My mother's sauerbraten. especially the gravy on mashed potatoes

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LIVE FROM THE DAWGHOUSE

My grandmother's home made rolls in Finger, TN.

On a fishing trip back in 1976 to Canada with my Uncle
we fished for 5 days and every day the local native guide
would cook us a shore lunch of fresh caught (that Morning)
Walleye. No, it's not the same as a 4 star restaurant but
pulling up on a small island at noon and filleting your catch
and having them cooked up in lard with some onions and
taters was the best meal i ever ate.

Chuck

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They hold no Quarter

Hard to say the best thing I ever ate, but I will say one of them would have to be a burger and cajun fries from a newly opened place called saints cove bar and grill, while on vacation in carolina beach, nc. The owner is a retired marine pilot and seemed like a very good guy, the rest of the staff was also very friendly. They even offer a 10% discount to active and retired military, police, fireman,etc. If you are ever in the area stop in and give them a try.

One that is memorable is from the Water Street Oyster Bar in Corpus Christi, Texas.


Embrochette

8 fried gulf shrimp stuffed with oysters, wrapped in bacon

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LEX ET ORDO

I miss my grandmother's homemade stuffing...maybe not the best, but way up there.

I love to cook and truly enjoy cooking for other people.

While steaks and lobster et cetera are nice, I enjoy simple foods made exceptionally well.

Because it is summer (and unfortunately coming to an end) I have been cooking outdoors and the two best, simple foods, I enjoy are:

1) Grilled and smoked (hickory) homemade pizzas. If you have never had a grilled and smoked pizza...well, you haven't had pizza.

2) Chicken legs. Cheap. Come in packs sometimes of about 18 or so. Grill and smoke them with apple wood. After a around an hour on the grill, get a large stainless pot and add your bar-b-q sauce. Next, add half to a full beer. Pilsners works better... Add a 1/4 cup or a splash of apple cider vinegar. Finally, add about 6 fresh bay leaves. Mix and ensure it is coated in the pot. Let simmer on low for another 30-40 minutes. Take off the heat and let them rest for 5-7 minutes. Enjoy.

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Rather be outdoors

Best thing I ever ate at a restaurant is a reuben at a corner bar. Local place that has been there since the 1940s. Really neat old beer signs in the place, going back to when it was first opened.

Their reuben is so good that when the waitress comes to bring it to the table, I order another one at that time and ask them to put it in a to-go box. You would never expect this little corner bar to have exceptional food and incredibly fresh veggies, etc. Great service, exceptionally clean, local hangout in the city for 60 years that is still doing things the same way they did from day one. Pumpernickel bread, buttered and toasted, corn beef that has been marinating for a day, homemade dressing and sauerkraut. Yum.

If I sat at a table and had a lobster and their reuben at the table, I would eat the reuben and leave the lobster for another meal. Ok, now i'm hungry and off to make breakfast...

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Rather be outdoors

Mashed potatoes and gravy. After a week of liquid diet and tube feeding.
Sometimes we don't appreciate the in simple things in life. Like freedom to travel and live free or just have a good American beer. Point Special Beer is my favorite.

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Have a blessed day ,
Bull

MY issue is there are no real foods I don't like and at one time or another many have been the best. I like ALL Hispanic type foods, Mexican/ Puerto Rican/ Cuban, especially the pork & coffee, Thai/ Japenese/ Chinese, Italian/ Greek, YOU NAME IT. 21 days on clear liquids prior to a surgery, if I had been on a lifeboat I would have gone cannibal. Good ol USA young cherry pie!

My first sausage pizza at the first pizza shop in my small town. I was about 12 and pizza was a new food in our town.

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I like Ike.

Best ever? One time about a dozen years ago, the Pharma company I was working for rented the Marriot World Center not far from here. They had a reception by the pool with 4 tables of Alaskan king Crab legs, Split lobster tails and U-10 shrimp piled about 3 feet high. I thought "Romans didn't have it this good." Quit eating after about 3 hours, would've filled my pockets if'n I wasn't wearing a suit. I sure miss the opulence of "unlimited money." Joe

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Wisdom chases me; I'm faster

I notice that no one has mentioned spinach in any form.

Actually, I like spinach.

But I can see why fresh salmon is a leader here.

With me, it's probably a tossup between a beef filet cooked medium, turkey with plenty of brown gravy, and grilled salmon. But good roast chicken is also delectable.

The right wine helps matters.

A fresh off the grill flour tortilla, pinto beans, a roasted green chile and some real Mexican grated cheese. Add hot sauce of your choice, I prefer Valentina.

Wait, that's not my favorite. I don't have enough time for this. This will have to do for now.

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That's just somebody talkin.

When I lived in SoCal, I hung around a particular tackle shop. The owner was about my age and our wives got along well. After a couple years, I became one of the "in crowd" and was invited to go along on a "Busman's Holiday" of a long range trip to Mexico. We'd go every hear for 4-5 days, sleeping on the boat. Our trips were usually albacore trips.

At least once per trip, a shark would take a hooked fish. Usually it would be a hammer but sometimes a blue or mako. They'd get it right behind the gill covers. The chef would ask if you wanted to keep the fish or donate it to the boat. No reason to keep it because we'd bring home 1-2 DOZEN albacore and bigeyes. About 10-15 minuted later, a deckhand would be passing around fresh sashimi and some wasabi!

Another trip the albies were way out, so we had to travel all day to get to them. We stopped at one of the Channel Islands (Santa Rosa? San Miguel?) and fished for shallow water rockfish. That was lunch and they finally had to cut us off 'cuz we were eating them faster than we could catch them! Talk about fresh!

I can relate, as I got to hunt a large box blind with some "friends of a friend" back in the mid eighties. They called it Hotel Matagorda and this one guy pan fried some wigeon breasts right after they were shot. Not sure if this was legal, but tasty beyond belief!

got to go back to the 1950's to remember the best..................

mom's home made macaroni and cheese casserole , made from scratch....

Saturday lunch with dad........fried baloney and onion sandwiches

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There's nowt so queer as folk

The best thing I ever ate a BBQ Sandwich and cheese fries from Emos here in Peoria Illinois.

the first time I ate it was in 1990 when I was 5 years old.

all these years later I still eat it regularly.

An Especiale Cuban sandwich with side orders of Frijoles Negros (black beans) and fried soft plantains with Cuban beer, in "Little Havana" in downtown Miami! We ate there at least once a week when I was the Deputy Chief Medical Examiner for Dade County/ Miami!

medxam

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Doc Garrett
Dead Man's Doctor

Some of my best eating was when I worked in the NPS. We always had some old men cooks and all of it was good! Of course living in tents and working at 9,000 ft at 19 years old probley had something to do with it.
At those altitudes I had one cook tell me he couldnt live without a pressure cooker. They would have like a smorgasbord type breakfast laid out and all kinds of cakes and fruits, sandwich makings that we would pack for our lunch bags. Supper was always good steaks etc. This was in 1960/1961. I believe they took about $1.85(?) a day out of our checks for it.
One thing I notice here in utah. Our town sits at about 5,500 feet. All bakery made here isnt that great as at towns at lower elevations. I am sure its due to baking at higher altitude.

I had never had the pleasure of lamb until this most recent cruise to Turkey and Greece. The Turks and Greeks eat a lot of lamb. And I'm a believer in the old saying. When in Rome......

I had lamb several times on this trip and found it to be excellent. I don't often see it in meat markets around here though.

Somebody mentioned fish. For decades my favorite thing was tent camping on the beach. I loved getting up 2 hours before sun up and walking out to the 2nd sand bar and fishing the back side in the gut between the 2nd and 3rd bars. I'd catch 2 or 3 nice specs (speckle trout or spotted sea trout to be more accurate). I'd stake them out in the surf and go in a build a fire on the beach and break out my propane camp stove and get the coffee going. Fry up some 'taters and eggs and then go out and bring in the fish and fillet 'em and fry 'em up good and crispy. You can't beat the freshness of eating fried fish that was swimming around in the gulf of Mexico a half hour earlier. If fish can get any better than that I never heard about it.

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Real men love cats!

[QUOTE=Walkin' Jack;138112503]I had never had the pleasure of lamb until this most recent cruise to Turkey and Greece. The Turks and Greeks eat a lot of lamb. And I'm a believer in the old saying. When in Rome......

I had lamb several times on this trip and found it to be excellent. I don't often see it in meat markets around here.

Me too! Being a Southern boy, never had til I was grown and gone.
I think the best I ever had was up at Los Ojos, NM. They raise the Churro Sheep which is the old original breed brought over by the Spanish.
Was up there for an open house. They were cooking lamb fajita over charcoal. Selling it as tacos on homemade tortillas. Better than good!
The rug store is in an old storefront. There was a combo picking and singing in Spanish. Then they sang a medley of Hank Williams songs, in English.
Be sure and stop by if you are up that way. It's off the highway, South of Chama.

Tierra Wools, doing things the old way | Santa Fe Travelers

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NRA LIFE MEMBER

Nothing like some good lamb cooked on the grill.

I make my salmon with just a light brushing of real maple syrup over the non skin side followed by some chili powder, smoked paprika and pepper. Let it sit for several hours in the refrigerator and and then grill it on a cedar plank.

Before my life was dedicated to law and order, I smoked a bit of weed. Later that same day I discovered the simple, wonderful pleasure of a big glass of chocolate milk with a big scoop of vanilla ice cream in it. Oh yeah, a bag of White Castles helped.

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Why, I aughta.....

I like simple. Cold smoked salmon/meat, raw fish, escargot

I love spinach most any way it can be prepared, but--heresy for purists--hold the damn nutmeg. I don't care for nutmeg at all.

I sometimes have spinach cooked with long-grain rice, butter, black pepper, and a little good sesame oil, as a dinner entrée. Simple, delicious and nourishing.

I might just do that tonight.

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Oh well, what the hell.