The Striped Flamingo: celebrating southern {food and drink]

Happy Tuesday, friends!

I'm linking up with Mrs. Leslie today for her week-long post series called Celebrating Southern.

This is a series of posts (and link-ups) dedicated to the South. Being Southern, I'm thrilled to join in on the fun!

Today's theme is Food and Drink.

Where do I start? Y'all know us southern people love our food. And I LOVE to cook! But sometimes, I just want someone else to do the cooking sometimes.

So, today's Food and Drink themed post will be about some delicious restaurants located in my region of the U.S. of A. ?(Note: I live in North Carolina, so when I say "regionally" I'm referring to NC, SC, GA and TN for the most part. We don't claim VA as part of the south. HAHA. Just kidding. But not really...)

1. Bojangles
The new worship pastor at my church (and his fiancee) are from Indiana. They had not been "Bo'd" yet and thus asked what it was. Well, let me just tell you that Bojangles (Beau-jain-gulls) is a chicken and biscuits restaurant serving up traditional southern dishes with a slight cajun flair. My favorite is the chicken supremes (like chicken tenders).

DELISHYUS!

2. Cookout
Dear Jesus, please have Cookout barbecue in heaven. Thanks, April. Headquartered in the great state of NC and located all over the Southeast, Cookout has the most delicious burgers, shakes and barbecue of all! They have about eleventy-billion different flavors of milkshakes. (Okay, not eleventy billion but a lot.) My favorite is the Reese's milkshake but they also have Cheesecake Chocolate Chip, Caramel Fudge, Orange Push Up, Peanut Butter Banana and Peach Cobbler, just to name a few. This restaurant has almost everything. Don't believe me? Look at their menu...

Another southern themed restaurant (I'm sensing a pattern here) that boasts a casual dining experience rather than a more fast food type like the first two. Fatz has great service and GREAT food. My favorite is the Calabash Chicken Wrap.

4. Fuzzy Peach
This is a Wilmington (Southeastern NC) local froyo chain. They frequently partner with other local restaurants to come up with new froyo flavors. For example, they're doing a year-long partnership with Coastal Cupcakes for a cupcake batter flavored frozen yogurt. It's amazing!

Well, I guess I didn't really talk much about drinks, did I? Here's a quick deciphering code to ordering drinks in the South.

If you order:

Tea

You'll get:?

Sweetened Tea (with sugar)

If you order:

Coke

You'll get:

Coke or Pepsi depending on what they carry. "Coke" is a generic term for soda or pop.

If you're asked:

"Would you like a Coke?"

It means:

"What kind of soda would you like? Coke? Diet? Sprite? Dr. Pepper?" You'll need to clarify which.

Substitutions:

Cheerwine - a local soda that contains neither cheer nor wine. It's flavored similarly to a Cherry Coke or Mr. Pibb, but a bit sweeter.

Sundrop- similar to Mountain Dew or Mello Yello.

One more thing for my Southern-venturing friends...

A cookout is the act of cooking outdoors. It may contain burgers, hot dogs, chicken or pork.

A barbecue is an outdoor cooking/smoking of actual barbecue (chicken, pork or beef).

Clear as mud? :)

Source: http://www.thestripedflamingoblog.com/2012/07/celebrating-southern-food-and-drink.html

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