A week ago I went for a magical four
mile walk and every time I went into a bar they gave me free wings.
Yes, I was one of the celebrity judges at this year's Pillars Wing
Crawl. Last month I was asked to be one of the celebrity judges and
asked for an interview for the Cleveland Scene. 4000 hits on my blog
and 26 wings later has lead you to read this blog and me to have
indigestion.
I met Lakewood Patch.com's Colin McEwen
at Around the Corner. We planned to make a straight line down
Detroit catching all the bars as we go. The only curves on a trip
were to pick up the random things Colin left behind at most of the
bars. Around the Corner had real good wings, especially their black
pepper wings that stood out ahead of most of the wings of the day.
They were also able to keep table service going at a reasonable rate too.
Next we made our way to the Harry
Buffalo. The service was fast even though the bar was packed. I
really liked their wings. They weren't the best or the most
original, but I they stood out as wings I'd want to eat again. Their
buffalo wings made my top 3.
After our first back track for Colin's
voting sheet we went to the Riverwood Cafe. The wings and service
were good. We also stole the booth from the principal of Lakewood
Highschool. Luckily, we were able to finish our wings before they
got theirs and quickly departed. We then quickly came back and
picked up Colin's glasses.
Our next stop was Guys Pizza. The
service was slow, we didn't get napkins and the batch of wings we got
were almost too freezer burnt to eat. I hope, normally the wings and
service are good but we were there at the wrong time.
The Booth has been one of my favorite
bars that I've gone to during my blog so far. My expectations were
high and I had no complaints about their wings. I especially
enjoyed their Sriracha wings but I try and put cock (rooster) sauce on
any food I can. Service wise the bartender was friendly and helpful
and this was the only bar that trusted us to get our own wings (as a
good thing.)
Next I went to the Local. I enjoyed
both wings and gave them a solid score. I was disappointed that the
kickin BBQ wasn't hotter but you can lose points with some people for
being too spicy. I did like that my wing experience was enhanced
with a fog machine!
Another one of my blogged bars was the Plank Road Tavern. Their moroccan dry rub wing was my favorite taste of the
crawl and I will be back for more later. They also had the smallest
wings of the crawl, which goes to show that good things can come in
small packages.
This was my first time inside of Eddy &
Iggy's. We spent an intermission here playing foosball. Word of
advise the slim side has a gravity advantage. Also, I'm no good at
foosball and lost both matches. We had real good service. The
bartender took time to talk to me about their beer even though they
were being hammered with crawlers. I really liked their buffalo
wing, it held to a much more classic style instead of going for fancy
and they hit a home run with it.
Merry Arts' wings tasted good, but
their service didn't keep up. It took us a couple minutes to figure
out how to get the wings (from the cook.) But since the cook was
busy cooking, by the time I got the wings that were sitting out they
were cold. I wasn't allowed to grab them on my own because I was
informed that “You don't steal from a pimp.” The citric taste of
their second wing complemented its cool temperature, honestly.
Jammy Buggers had the best actual wing
meat of any of the bars we went to. I gave their buffalo wing my
highest rating for that genre. They put a ton of work into their
Top Secret Recipe #6 wings and it was really good but it was also a
bit nutty and I don't like nutty. It was definitely an improvement
over their Top Secret Recipe #5 wings that were a bit squirrelly and mildly triangle.
Last but not least was Deagans as the
reigning champs (and as I am late on getting this blog done, the
still reigning champs) my expectations were high. They were great.
The wings were a high quality, though my batch was a little over
cooked. The buffalo wings were the hottest wings of the day, I
really liked them. But, even though we were sitting to the right of
the taps behind the register we couldn't get anything to drink.
After watching 5 different people walk in and immediately get service
I decided I would raise my hand because that's what I was taught in
school. Colin said he could get someone to wait on us instead. So,
he tried his talking to people way and I tried mine. I won.
Deagan's second specialty was real good as well.
We then trekked all the way back to our
cars at Around the Corner. We wanted to hand our votes to the Pillar
people because we didn't feel comfortable giving our votes directly
to the bars. We stopped at the Root Cafe on the way back across
town. Everybody knew Colin there and they probably have the nicest
bathroom in town.
I'd like to thank the 11 bars that made
wings for us and the Lakewood Pillars that put all their hard work
into making a great Lakewood event. Also, thanks to Shawn Juris who invited me as a celebrity judge! It was a great day and I ate a
lot of good wings.
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