Donut RIsing

I have now been to Donut Rising several times, because it it just that good. Donut Rising is the new donut place located right next to the Safeway on Nord.  They are a specialty Donut store which prides itself on using local and homemade ingredients in addition to no Trans Fat.  They have a ton of different donuts, but rotate the selection on a weekly basis.  The donuts that I have tried are:

Apple Fritter - I had this warm, or more like hot and it was amazing because it literally melted in my mouth.  It also has chunks of apple in it, so you sort of feel like the donut you are eating is "healthy."
Blondie - A standard glazed donut.  So simple, yet very very good.  The donut is perfectly fluffy, the glaze is sweet and the donut is a great size.
Chocolate Bar -Traditionally my favorite donut.  This is a very large chocolate bar and totally worth it the price.  The donut is fluffy and the chocolate frosting is creamy and delectable.
Purple Haze - Another "jelly" filled donut.  Not anywhere near as good as the Raspberry Beret, but then again, I am not a filled donut kind of girl.  This is a..."Old school yeast donut, filled with organic grape jelly, topped with purple icing and grape dust."  This donut was just to sweet for me with the combination of the grape jelly and the icing and the grape sprinkles.  If you like sweet and you like filled donuts, try this one.  

Raspberry Beret - My favorite donut from Donut Rising.  I usually do not like filled donuts because they are just too overwhelming.  This donut is different.  It is made with homemade raspberry jam and lightly dusted with powdered sugar.  Sometimes they get a little crazy with the amount of powdered sugar, but you can always brush a little off it is too much for your liking.  I highly recommend trying this donut in particular.

Brooke, Justin and Thomas have also tired:

Iced Chocolate
Iced Vanilla Cake with Gems
Jack and Coke
O'Canada Bar
Old Fashioned
Peanut Butter Bliss
The Popo
Maybe a few others

Almost all of these have been great hits, whereas a few have been standard.  The bottom line is that none of these donuts were a disappointment.  Gourmet donuts are all the rage these days and this place definitely gets the craze down.

Burgers & Brew

Burgers and Brew is one of the newer restaurants here in Chico and it adds quite a lot to downtown.  Located on the corner of 2nd and Broadway, Burgers and Brew offers exactly what they boast, Burger and Brews (beers).  Let me start with burgers,  being the creature of habit that I am, I always get a cheeseburger with cheddar cheese, no mayo, no pickles and no tomatoes.  The sesame seed bun is always fluffy, you get to order your patty cooked to order and when you put it all together, it tastes delectable.  Let me get on to all the other great things about this place.

ONION RINGS- In case you haven't noticed, I am mildly or majorly obsessed with onion rings and Burgers and Brew has by far the best onion rings or any place around.  They are so good.  They are the perfect thickness of onion, the right amount of doneness, crunchy but not burnt.  Everything about them is epic.  I could write an entire blog about how amazing these onion rings are, but that is boring.  If I could eat them everyday I would.

They have tons of beers on tap and bottled.  I am not really too much of a beer fan, but Justin has found several things that are in his 1,000 beers to try before you die book that he can cross off the list by going here.  My favorite thing to drink here is the Woodchuck Hard Pear Cider that they have on tap.  It is the best drink ever and Burgers and Brews is one of the few places in town with cider and the only place I have found with this specific cider.  This is the best one, it is fruity and light and delicious.

I highly suggest that any who lives in or comes to visit Chico try this place, because in my opinion, it is one of the best around.

Updated To Do List

So, it looks like I haven't been doing very well at keeping current on my blog, however I have been eating at these places, so it time to do some writing.  I hope to have almost all of these crossed off by the time I leave.   If anyone has any other suggestions for things I should try, let me know.


The Bear
Nobby's
Burgers and Brews
Big Al's
The Graduate
Donut Rising
Country Morning Bakery and Cafe
Brooklyn Bridge Bagel Works
MOM's
Sin of Cortez
Great Harvest
Tres Hombres
Tea Bar/Teaz Me
Panighetti's Eatery
Italian Cottage
California Pasta Productions
Broadway Heights
Crush 201
The Banshee
Pluto's
5 and Eye Cafe
Sierra Nevada
Hula's
Raw Bar
Rice Bowl
Dutch Brothers
Celestino's Live from N.Y. Pizza
Mountain Mike's
Monstro's
Kona's
Smokin' Mo's
Basque Norte
5th Street Steakhouse
Leon's Bistro
Pita Pit
Chipotle
In-n-Out
Chili's
Olive Garden

The Bear a.k.a. Madison Bear Gardens

I have been to The Bear many many times, however there is of course one time that distinctly stands out in my mind.   The Bear is a restaurant and a bar located on the corner of 2nd Street and Salem in downtown Chico.  Drinks, decent, dancing, a little creepy, bouncers, extreme, food, incredible. Where to start.  The things which I have eaten there which are delicious is everything I have tried.  I have to remind you that I am a creature of habit and once I find a delicious meal, I stick to it.  For the first 4 years of college, I got the Sourdough Burger with either French Fries or Onion Rings.  This burger is incredible.  A burger on Sourdough Toast!, such a California thing to do.  This burger is described as "Our famous burger all dressed up with spicy mustard, pickles, grilled onions, and cheddar cheese on grilled sourdough bread."  It is extremely yummy, but what I had always been intrigued about is the Jiffy Burger.  It is a burger, with peanut butter smeared on instead of condiments.  This may seem like a strange and undesirable combination, which is precisely why it took me so long to try it.  I got to try it in November of 2010, when I went with my Panhellenic girls between meetings.   A few of them got the jiffy burger, so I was able to steal a bite without risking getting something I would hate.  It blew me away with how amazingly good it was.  Now I get it every time.  The combination of the sweet and salty and creamy tastes is incredible.  I highly recommend that everyone try it at least once, because you never know, but it could become your new favorite.

Nobby's

On Friday, March 25, Thomas, Brooke, Justin and I went to Nobby's.  It was the first time eating there for me,  Justin and Thomas.  First off, like all of the reviews online say, it is tiny.  Like real small.  There is maybe 20 chairs inside.  They do take cards in addition to cash, but of course they charge a small fee to use your card.  We went around 6:30 and the cashier was really nice, also unlike the review, but it wasn't the "normal" cashier.  For drinks they have sodas, in a can only and milkshakes made with real ice cream, which are available in vanilla, chocolate and strawberry.  I didn't get a milkshake, but two of the others did, and they both greatly enjoyed the,.  They were very thick and looked delicious.  As sides, they offer fries and onion rings.  Both of them are delicious.  The fries are thick-cut and seasoned perfectly.  The onion rings were very crispy and were the best onion rings I have ever eaten.  So incredibly delicious.  The burger was good.  It comes with lettuce, tomatoes, pickles, onions, mayonnaise and mustard.  Cheese is an add on, but that, along with the bun is the best part of the burger, so get cheese.  They use a much larger piece of cheese, so the cheese melts off the edges and gets crispy.  Very good.  The bun is good, and the burger is ok.  I got it dry, because I don't like stuff on my burger really.  It was so much food and I could not eat it all.  The best part by far was the onion rings.  I would go back and get onion rings, fries and a strawberry milkshake.  In fact, I might have to do just that.

Things To Try In Chico Before I Leave

There are so many wonderful places to see, to many fun things to do, and so many delicious places to eat.  Seeing as I love food, I want to make a list of places which I have already/ or have to before I leave, eat at. I will then attempt to write a blog about my experience after trying this food.  If anyone has any input about other places I should try, or wants to give their input about their experience, please feel free to join in the fun.  This is just something fun I wanted to do, sorry if I don't love the same restaurants as you.  If you are coming to Chico, feel free to use this as a guide of some places you might want to try.

The Bear
Nobby's
Burgers and Brews
Big Al's
The Graduate
Donut Rising
Country Morning Bakery and Cafe
Brooklyn Bridge Bagel Works
MOM's
Sin of Cortez
Great Harvest
Tres Hombres
Tea Bar/Teaz Me
Panighetti's Eatery
Italian Cottage
California Pasta Productions
Broadway Heights
Crush 201
The Banshee
Pluto's
5 and Eye Cafe
Sierra Nevada
Hula's
Raw Bar
Rice Bowl
Dutch Brothers
Celestino's Live from N.Y. Pizza
Mountain Mike's
Monstro's
Kona's
Smokin' Mo's
Basque Norte
5th Street Steakhouse
Leon's Bistro
Pita Pit
Chipotle
In-n-Out
Chili's
Olive Garden

That is all I have for now, but I might add some more as I come up with them.  Have fun eating.

Blogging at It's Best

Finding the time to blog is difficult, especially when there are so many other things one could be doing with their time (for example, homework).   However, I started a blog for a reason, so that I would utilize it and write on some sort of regular basis.  Considering that my last post was in December, right before I took the LSAT, I clearly have not been keeping up with blogging with any sort of regularity.  Now that I am realizing this, I figure it is time to begin writing more often.  My goal is to try and post a blog about once a week.  These blogs will presumably be about anything and everything, which I feel like writing about.  This week's post will be about the weather.  Everyone has been all freaked out about earthquakes in California.  Since the disasters in Japan, it seems that everyday there is a new concern about the safety on the United States, especially California.  There have been a few interesting weather phenomenon occurring recently. There was a "tornado" in Santa Rosa, which was really a funnel cloud, but it still messed some buildings up near the JC.  In San Francisco, there was a "hurricane" which was a waterspout.  Last night in Chico, there were 50 mph gusts of wind, which knocked down trees, powerlines, etc.  In addition, it has been raining for multiple days in a row, and it is supposed to continue raining for many (7-10) days to come.  This is a little ridiculous, but there is no toxic amount of radiation coming over and into California and if there is an earthquake, which happens all the time in California, we can deal with it, because our building have to be built to comply with very high building code standards, and we can easily react to the damages that an earthquake may cause.  Until then, I think people need to relax, and live their life as they normally would, just be cautious.