While on spring break i went to an amazing restaurant in Florida called Snook Haven. It was heaven! The locals call it old Florida. It is seated right next to a river that is filled with alligators! It features local entertainment such as various banjo players. And as far as the food, it might be the best thing i have ever tasted. Even just starting with the drinks. I ordered a sweet tea assuming it would be nestea or some name brand, but no, it was freshly brewed true sweet tea. I couldn't stop drinking it! I think i must have gone trough a whole pitcher; it must have been the best thing i have ever drank. Now onto the food, i ordered the shrimp and chips, which came with another side dish so i also got baked mac and cheese. I did not have a single complain about anything, and the portions where so generous i couldn't complain. The chips where so delicious, they where home made and the perfect crispiness and thickness. And they had all these homemade hot sauces you could use! I tried a little of each on a chip till i found my favorite (which was the sweetest one they had). Then after i devoured most of the chips i moved onto the shrimp them self. Words cant even describe how perfect the batter on the shrimp was. It had so a deep flavor yet, it was so light and not greasy at all, and it had the perfect crispiness. Just the sight of the shrimp itself was mouth watering. And lastly was the mac and cheese. It had such a great combo of gooey cheesiness balanced with backed crispiness. Ad surprisingly, it just harmonized with everything else on the plate. Over all i would definitely eat there again and i will most definitely start eat more southern comfort foods. -Bailey S

A few weeks ago My family and I spent a day in the city. We tried see as much as possible, and coincidentaly as we were getting hungry little Italy was close by. Much arguing was going on as we tried to choose a restraunt to eat at. I follow my dad up and down streets, finally we turned around this corner and the smell was amazing. I traced the smell back to this little pizza/bakery take out place. It was fresh dough almost with a sweet smell to it accopanied by a rich and authentic tomato sauce much different than what I'm used to topped with the perfect amount of cheese. And what made it better, everyone recieved their own mini pizza in a bag similar to soft pretzels. It was easily the best pizza I have ever had and possibly the most mouth watering meal I have had in Little Italy -Ryan Pisani

I'm not a big fan of messy eating and getting all dirty with finger foods, but when it comes to sloppy joes I can't resist. Sloppy joes are probably one of my favorite finger foods. I don't know why but I love it when its really messy. An interesting thing that I did before was instead of using the sloppy joe sauce for the beef of the sloppy joe try using the sauce for spaghetti it's actually pretty good. It's like sloppy joe but its spaghetti. There once was a bar in Florida that was called sloppy joes and they say that they had the sandwich made there too. Sloppy joe is known as fast food selling product. Making your own sloppy joe is simple, but the sauce might be hard, that's why today if you go to your local grocery store you'll find Manwich which is a sloppy joe sauce. The ingredients for the sloppy joe sauce are extra virgin olive oil, onion diced, bell pepper diced, minced garlic, ground turkey, canned pureed tomatoes, BBQ sauce, ketchup, white vinegar, Worcestershire sauce, brown mustard, and finally chile garlic sauce. All these ingredients may sound bizarre, but they make the sloppy joe amazing! Is that why the sauce is kind of dense? Anyways,you should really try the sauce with spaghetti with meat in it. Its so good. ~Mirna M.

The other day for dinner I had steak fajitas for dinner, with Mexican rice. I started it off by marinating the steak with a lime-cilantro marinade, and let it sit for half an hour. Then I threw the steak on the grill and cooked at medium temperature for about 4 minutes each side. Meanwhile I had cut up some onions and peppers, and then proceeded to sauté over medium heat. Once the steak was done I took it off the grill and cut it up into slices. I mixed it in with the peppers and onion, as well as added in some jalapeños. I then lowered the temperature and mixed in a packet of seasoning with the fajitas. After that I added some water in to make it a little liquidier and kept the food warm while I prepared everything else. I had also been cooking some rice on the side for the meal. Finally I heated up some tortillas in the microwave to have the fajita mix on. It turned out to be very good, I’d never had steak fajitas before only chicken. I would definitely make it again sometime. Jack B

Nicholas Carozza

Last weekend was my cousin’s communion so when there is a communion, there most likely is an after party. So I thought it would be cool to make a chocolate rapture with homemade ice cream. Now to make a chocolate rapture you need 21 ½ oz of brownie mix, 2 two ounce chocolate mousse mixes, 12 oz of cool whip, 8 14 oz heath bars (basically any chocolate bar you want) and 1 cup of chopped pecans. Before I say how the dish is created it serves a lot of 15-20 people so it’s not all for just one person. First what you do is make the brownies and let them cool down. You get a big serving dish its hard to describe what it looks like but if you think of a cake dish with a clear pot on top, that what it sort of looks like. So lets get back to actually constructing the cake. On the bottom layer you put down half of the brownies. (The brownies should be crushed up) Then you make half of the mousse and pour it on the crushed brownies. Next you cover the mousses with half of the cool whip. On top of the cool whip you can sprinkle a lot or a little of whatever candy bar you want. Then you repeat this process one more time until so the bowl is filled. Once you have completed all of these steps put the chocolate rapture in the fridge and let it chill over night so it is easier to serve. Next I made homemade ice cream. To do this I got 2 cups of heavy cream, 1 14 oz can of condensed milk, 3 tablespoons of melted butter, ½ tsp of ground cinnamon and ½ tspn of vanilla extract. What I did was whipped the heavy cream until it became still and would stick to the sides of the bowl. Then I combined the milk, butter, cinnamon and vanilla until they were all mixed well. Then I mixed both of the bowls together until it was stiff and put them in the freezer for 6 hours. (I know this sounds like a small recipe and it is, I might have doubled or tripled it but that is what the recipe I have looks like.) 

Every year when I go spring skiing at Killington VT we always make an effort to eat at The Garlic since it’s a great restaurant. After you order your food the waiter comes back with bread and garlic. Its roasted garlic so it loses most of its potent smell and taste but it’s easily spreadable. After that your dinner comes. I ordered wild mushroom pasta. It had an Alfredo type sauce with wild mushrooms and penne pasta. Then for desert I ordered 3 layered chocolate mousse cake with white and dark chocolate mousse and a bottom layered ganache. My sister ordered tiramisu and that was delicious also. Michael B.

I was in New York City for the weekend about 3 months ago and Mrs. Hoagland told my mom before we went to try the Meatball shop in New York City. I figured if Mrs. Hoagland said its really good then it has to be. So the first night were there, we decide to try it. We had to wait a little bit because it was crowded but I knew it was going to be good because it was already crowded at 5. We finally get seated and I ordered the meatball parmesan. The food come and it looked so good. Every bite I took the food kept getting better. It also came with salad and it was very good. It was a bit different then your ordinary salad but it was just as good. When I finished with my dinner, I ordered desert. I ordered a chocolate chip cookie sandwich with vanilla ice cream in the middle. This was one of the best deserts I’ve ever had. This was probably one of the best restaurants I’ve ever been too. The next time I go to the city, I’m definitely going to go to the Meatball shop again. Michael P

This weekend I had a wonderful dinner. I had fish in chips from from Two Little Fishes in Rhode Island. when they make the fis in chip you get to see how they make the fish the fry it then they bake them. When you order the fish and chips dinner you get fish and chips, frys, colsla, and tarter sause. I Injoy the restrant because it is right on the water and it has good food. by Andy DeWolfe

My Mango Madness

Last Monday my mom bought a bunch of mangos. I was so excited to have one that day. It had been a while since I had eaten one. I asked her if I could have one and she said, "they're not ready yet. Give it at least 2 days to rippen. So I waited 2 days to pass while my madness for a mango got worse. Finally I could have one. There is no easy way to cut a mango and when you do it never looks right. That didn't matter to me. I just wanted mango. My mom started cutting the mango up and she could immediately tell by looking at it that it looked like it was not good to eat. She ended up throwing them all out. I was so disappointed because I wanted to have a mango. My mom knew I was mad about mangos so she went out and bought new ones. This time I decided to cut up the mango. I knew I would eat the mango whether it was good or bad. I didn't even care. I just wanted mango! Luckily this one was good. When I started cutting into my first mango, it had been so long, I was so eager that I accidently ate a piece of the mango skin. Obviously, I wasn't suppose to eat the skin but at that point I didn't care. It still tasted good. I was so crazy for mango that when I continued to cut the mango I almost cut my finger off. That wouldn't have been good. Anyway, right after digging in to my first mango, I decided to make a smoothie with the awesome goodness a mango has to offer. In fact, I made everyone in my family a mango smootie with a touch of banana and vanilla ice cream. It was mango goodness at its best. My madness finally disappeared. All it took was a mango.

Tim P.

I have many allergies. I have seasonal allergies, but I am also allergic to peanuts, treenuts, and shellfish. This makes eating out very difficult because I have to talk to the server or chef personally to make sure that everything I eat will be safe to eat. I am very paranoid just as anyone with food allergies would be, but when it comes to taking  a risk I will not, and do not. I am sure many people are familiar with the restaurant Five Guys, I am too, but I am no judge on their food because I cannot eat there. They use peanut oil for all of their fried foods. When I went to Sanibel, Florida for spring break, we decided to go to a burger place called Cheeburger. Turns out it is a Sanibel version of Five Guys, meaning they serve the same food as Five Guys, and that means they too use peanut oil. At first I did not care and just thought I would get something else off of the menu because they informed me that there were salads and wraps that I could have, but I just decided to leave and go back to the condos. It was a very good thing that I did because while at the beach, a woman was talking to my mom about Cheeburger and said that the manager told her that they cannot guarantee that peanut oil will not touch your food. I completely understand that, and am glad that I had made the decision to leave! However, this got me thinking more about food allergies and how they come to be. 15 million people in the United States have food allergies, and 1 of 13 children have them. Food allergies happen because the body thinks that the certain food or its protein are a harmful thing to the body, and the immune system attacks it. If you have a food allergy, your body releases histamine and it causes the symptoms of an allergic reaction: hives, headaches, adn the closing of the throat. I have never had an allergic reation, and am very thankful. But, I think it is very important for people to take allergies very seriously as they are life threatning and it is not always guaranteed that you will be safe.
Lindsay B

On Wednesday, while in Williamsburg, Virginia, I had my first sun-dried tomatoes.  It was in a chicken ceasar salad.  The fanciest chicken ceasar salad I've ever seen or eaten.  It was laid out on a huge square plate and the salad was laid out diagonally across with huge pieces of grilled chicken on top. The chicken was probably a little too big, but it looked nice.  Along with the salad and chicken there were sun dried tomatoes and the perfect amount of salad dressing.  It was really a great salad.  Beautifully presented and delicious. But the best part about the whole thing were the sun dried tomatoes.  They were seriously fabulous. I don't usually like tomatoes, but these were fabulous.  I urge everyone to try sun dried tomatoes in a chicken ceasar salad, its very tasty.
Meagan F

Unlikely & Easy Snack! I was with my friends this past weekend and we were home alone. We had been outside in the woods for the better part of the day and we were starved. All that we could find was frozen rolls, some slices of cheddar jack cheese, and artificial sugar. So what we scraped together was a low hope meal turned into a delicious snack! We thawed out the rolls for a few minutes, and then put 2 slices of the cheddar jack cheese onto it. We microwaved it until the cheese was almost melted, and then we dipped it in a bowl of the artificial sugar. It was one of the most delicious things I have had in a long time (possibly due in part to the fact that I was willing to eat anything at that point.) Regardless of how gross of a meal this appears to be, it is definitely worth trying!

For Easter Dinner I had many things  to eat.  I had ham, Mashed potatos, Sweet potatos, Green beans, Carrots and Cheese Cake with Strawbarays. My mom and I made most of my dinner. when wegot the ham it was already precooked. thanks to all my great culinary skills I pealed and cut the mashed potatos.
Andy D