Pauley’s is a new restaurant and bar that opened up on West Clayton across the street from Transmet and between General’s and Cutter’s.

I was really excited about a new, creative restaurant that wasn’t too big to handle and had a lot of personality. In case you didn’t know, Pauley’s specialty is crêpe-making (pronounced KREHP…with the “e” like “egg”). Now, as a wannabe Parisian and self-proclaimed crêpe connoisseur, I was ready to taste a crêpe Athens-style.

During my first visit, I went there with Anna for dessert. My assumption is when most people think of crêpes, they think about dessert crêpes. I may be wrong, but that’s what we went for.

It’s a very long and narrow restaurant, but it has a lot of personality and intimacy. Anna was waiting on my at the second table on the right. I plopped myself up on the tall barstool and began to look at the menu.

There were a lot of options, but the two of us decided to get a S’Mores crêpe (Anna) and the Nutella with strawberries crêpe (me). When I studied abroad in Paris, I think me and my friends ate at least two crepes per week, and I don’t think I had had one since I came back to the U.S. almost two years ago.

Needless to say, my date with this crêpe was long overdue.

We also ordered some wine (Hey! It’s Thursday night…) and sat and talked about all things girlie until our dessert came. Anna, too, had studied in Paris (the same trip I did but a year after me), so we were equally excited about our “leetle French treet.”

I’d say the crêpes were about the size of a medium-sized piece of pizza. They were definitely thicker though (unless you go the meat lovers, I guess), and the Nutella and strawberries were oozing out of mine. I could see the back of Anna’s, and the crêpe looked perfectly folded in a triangle with pieces of graham cracker and globs of marshmallow creme drizzling onto her plate.

Hungry yet?

I don’t think there’s any sense in trying to hide the fact that we both ate our crêpes in their entirety. They were wonderful, delicious, and hot. That’s the key.

The only thing we thought was different was they’re a little thicker than we were used to. In Paris (probably b/c a lot of the street vendors are cheap and don’t want to use a lot of crêpe batter on you), the crêpes are very thin- about 1/4 the size of a pancake. These were about half as thick, but they were still good. Since it didn’t hinder our eating, though, I’d say they were pretty good.

A week later, I went back with another friend of mine, Sarah, to catch up over lunch. Neither of us had been there for lunch, and we were excited about the menu. Sarah is a vegetarian, but she had no problem deciding what to get. There are a lot of vegetarian options, which made her happy.

I ended up ordering the chicken pizza crêpe, and she ordered the house salad. We waited a while but were thrilled when they came.

My crêpe was even thicker than the dessert one because of the chicken. It tasted just like a chicken pizza, except softer because it was a crêpe, not pizza dough. There was tomato sauce, mozzarella cheese, spices, and chicken inside, and they drizzled the top of it with some tomato sauce. Nice presentation.

Sarah’s salad came in a huge, flat bowl with a crêpe on the bottom. She didn’t know what one was, so I explained it to her. After eating her romaine lettuce, red onions, croutons, and dressing, she ate some of her crêpe and took the rest home.

Overall, I think Pauley’s is a fun, semi-cheap, unique place to go for any small occasion. They have a full bar, and 78 beers on tap (I think that’s right.). Try it, and I think you’ll like it. This also isn’t just a “chick place.” When I went with Sarah, I ran into my friend, Eric Tonn, who was there with one of his dude buddies.

Pauley’s- not quite Paris, but good enough for girls and guys.

I still don’t understand the social phenomenon of karaoke.  What IS it that makes us fearless, despite our nasty singing voices, horrible dance moves, and blatant “you!” points at all of our friends.

Seriously.

Despite my misunderstanding, I. LOVE. KARAOKE. 

So, last night, my friend Jenny and I decided to host a Disney-themed karaoke party for all of our friends in the Arch Society at Shokitini.

Shokitini, a local sushi restaurant on West Clayton, has three karaoke rooms: small, medium and large.  A note: if you want to reserve a room, SERIOUSLY listen to the lady when she tells you how many people the room can sit.  I thought the room was going to be big with a karaoke stage, but it’s so much better.

They are small, but they have huge booths for everyone to sit in and TVs on the front and back of the rooms.  That way, you don’t have to turn around and look at the screen when you want to face your friends.

It makes you look more like a karaoke baller.

Apparently, karaoke is really big in Asia, too.  I think I knew that before, but I guess I forgot.  Three-fourths of the song book had Korean songs.  Of course, we stuck to the small English section, but the TVs would show Korean music videos/soap operas/something like that in the background when our songs would play.  At one point, a bride was trying to drive off a cliff. It was interesting.

I actually forgot to order sushi, but many of my friends decided to order.  It was awesome.  The waitress came to our room, and gave us menus.  You write your name on your menu and then give it to her.  She brings your sushi up to you, and you don’t even have to pause your song!

Now, I know you’re wondering what we sang.  Here is just a sample of the musical delights (sorry if these choices make some of you feel old).

-KC and Jojo: All my Life

-Backstreet Boys: I want it that way

-Celine Dion: It’s all coming back to me now (This was sung by all the girls in the hiz-ouse.  We all agreed it was the most therapeutic thing we’ve ever done.)

-Dixie Chicks: Goodbye, Earl

-Lynrd Skynrd: Sweet Home Alabama

-Neil Diamond: Sweet Caroline

-Mariah Carey: All I want for Christmas

-Britney Spears: Oops! I did it again.

If these don’t make you happy, I encourage you to go to Shokitini and see what kinds of songs you can find and BELT as loud as you can.

We left karaoke feeling like we’d been to a concert.  Our voices were gone; our adrenaline was rushing, and we were TIRED.

The medium sized room was only $40 an hour, so we ended up paying around $115 for a two hour rental with tip.  It was a pretty dang good deal for how much fun we had.

Here’s the reservation line if you want to call: 706-206-6800.  Dianne will answer the phone, and she can hook you up.

Has anyone else been to karaoke at Shokitini?  Tell us about your experience!

Many of you will be delighted to know I finally made it to The Last Resort Grill.  I have eaten there many times before, but I hadn’t been back since the conception of Dawg Food.  I think I may go back again soon, though.

Yesterday, my friend Camille, another JS intern in Atlanta, came to visit our Athens office.  She wanted to see the town, so we went to lunch together (and then proceeded to shop afterwards ).  I was trying to brainstorm good lunch places, and I randomly thought about The Last Resort.

I had thought about eating lunch there many times before, but I never felt like waiting for 45 minutes when my lunch break is an hour.  However, there wasn’t a wait on Wednesday, so we ventured in.

To spice things up a little, Camille and I sat at the bar.  No, we didn’t get sloshed before going back to work, so don’t even let that creep into your minds.

The bartenders are very attentive and personable.  I like how they’re a little rough around the edges with their speeches on the specials of the day.  Their sincerity for the quality of our meal made up for not really knowing if the ravioli had a cream sauce or tomato sauce on top.

I ended up ordering the Southwestern Grazer.  It was a wonderfully HUGE salad with cherry tomatoes, pepperjack cheese, black beans, corn, avocado, cucumber and carrots.  It was tossed in their jalapeño honey mustard which was fabulous.  Don’t worry.  The jalapeño wasn’t too spicy.  Very mild.

The lettuce was crisp, and the veggies were fresh.  My favorite part about the salad was its pre-tossed presentation.  They put together the salad; added the dressing, and then tossed it all together.  No dressing clumps in my salad!

Camille decided to go with the Fried Green Tomato Sandwich.  One aspect of The Last Resort that I love is how healthy they want their meals to be.  Instead of partnering Camille’s sandwich with French fries or chips, all the lunch sandwiches come with a mixed green salad.  Genius, huh?

Camille got the vidalia bacon (their house special) dressing on her salad, and it also comes on the sandwich.  I’m a sauce person, so this would have been heaven for me.

Our waiters/bartenders were especially attentive and made sure we were happy customers.  That’s all I could ask for.

Unfortunately, we didn’t go for the cake, but the salad was more than enough for me.  I even put some of it in a to-go box and ate it for dinner.

Both of our meals were about $8 including the teas we got to drink.  I don’t know about you, but I think that’s a steal!  It was so yummy, and it was cheap.  The perfect combo.

Moral of the story: if you go to a restaurant with a friend, eat at the bar.  You get special treatment.

I went to the best sushi place in Athens, Utage, with my Jackson Spalding mentor, Ashley, on Friday for lunch.

We thought it would be a relaxing, low-key Friday in downtown Athens, but we were definitely mistaken.  UGA graduation was this past Saturday, so it was packed- even in the sushi joint.

Ashley and I sat at the sushi bar, and we both decided to go with the super duper lunch special.  You can order two choices from their lunch menu, soup and a salad for $7.95- a total steal.

I ordered the daily nigiri and the shrimp cucumber roll.  Ashley got the shrimp cucumber roll and the shrimp tempura roll.

Our soup and salads came out first and very promptly.  I’ve had the same waitress there the past couple of times, and she is fabulous.  My soup had a lot more seaweed in it than usual, but I like it that way.  It was piping hot and definitely a nice little start to the meal.  The salad was fresh, and I love the cucumbers they put on it.

Because it was busy, it took a little while to get our food.  I kept having to remind myself that it takes a little longer to put together a sushi roll than slap some chicken salad on a sandwich.  Ashley and I had some nice convos, though, so it wasn’t too bad.

When it came, my nigiri (tuna and salmon) was very fresh and cold.  Unlike grocery store nigiri, my fish did not come with a pile of rice under it.  It was just plain fish.  I didn’t mind it because it had a fresh, non-fishy taste.  It might freak some people out, though.

My eight-piece shrimp and cucumber roll was perfect.  I managed to eat my entire meal with chopsticks- a huge feat for me.  I’m terrible with chopsticks.

Ashley and I cleaned our plates, so I think our meal was pretty good.  The staff at Utage is always friendly and willing to get you whatever you want.  Utage is a little hidden in between Molly O’Shea’s and Junkman’s, but it’s a wonderful little nook when you find it.

After pancakes on Saturday, Dad and I decided to go for brunch after church to the Bluebird Cafe.

I’ve posted about it before, and I think my favorite part is still their biscuits. I’ve never had anything like them! Huge, whole wheat, thick…you can’t get much better.

I wanted quiche on Sunday morning, but the chefs were in the process of making them when we came. I don’t know why they didn’t make them before 10 o’clock on Sunday morning, but it wasn’t my decision.

So, I settled for a Greek egg white omelette. It was pretty good! I knew it had Feta cheese, but I wasn’t expecting it to have Feta and Monterrey Jack. It was a little too cheesy for me, so I picked some of it out. Otherwise, the black olives, tomatoes and pesto made a nice combo!

Dad decided to go with the veggie omelette (sans onions and garlic), and he ate all of his. He decided it needed a little ketchup, and I don’t blame him. I love ketchup with eggs.

Here’s one thing I don’t understand, though. The Bluebird Cafe is vegan and vegetarian friendly, yet they use Smucker’s jam and apple butter that contain high fructose corn syrup. One of my favorite parts of the Bluebird Cafe was their apple butter, but now that experience is bittersweet. I know that vegans and vegetarians don’t boycott high fructose corn syrup, but it seems to me that they would know how bad it is for you. I just thought that was interesting.

Again, the service was a little spotty, but I think it was better than the last time. They just don’t have their wits about them when it’s gameday.

I saw my friend, Victoria, there with her mom, and she told me today she wasn’t very impressed with her meal. “Well, I only got granola and fruit, but it still wasn’t that good. My mom and my friend got the French toast pancakes, and they loved them. I guess I’ll just have to get something different next time.”

This goes to show, ladies and gentlemen, that you can go back to a restaurant another time and order something different. If you think the restaurant has potential, try it again! It seems to be that way with me with Bluebird.

This past weekend, my Dad came to Athens for the Father-Daughter Weekend with my sorority. I was actually in charge of planning it, and I wanted the whole weekend to be an optimal opportunity for Dads to visit with their daughters and their friends. So, everything we did tried to imitate something you “do” with your dad!

Hence, The Grill. When I think of my Dad, I think about pancakes. They were a tradition every Saturday morning of my childhood, and I thought many girls shared the same memory.

If you don’t know about The Grill, you should. It is a tradition for many Athens visitors to stop in, and Athens locals and students love it as well.

Here’s the basic info:

Location: On College Avenue, on the block between Broad Street and Clayton Street. You can’t miss it.

Phone Number: 706-543-4770

Web site: No

Reservations: No, but they’ll work with you if you want to have a pancake breakfast!

Price: Very cheap and reasonable. We paid $5 each for two humongo pancakes, a meat, coffee and OJ.

Best Meal: Any meal when you feel like eating greasy, wonderful food.

Open and close: Open 24-hours!

Group friendly: I’d say so.

When I called The Grill to initially set up the pancake breakfast, their manager, Jeff Wineberg, was really excited to plan it. No one has ever done something like this with them before, so it was comforting that we were both newbies.

To the food: after most of the Dads and daughters got to The Grill, our two servers took our orders. I sat at a booth with my Dad, my roommate Amber and her Dad. We gave our waitress three orders of blueberry pancakes (me, Dad and Mr. Davis), and Amber decided to go for the kill and ordered chocolate chip ones.

While we were waiting, we drank coffee and chatted about the weekend so far. The people at The Grill were so chill that it was nice to have them to bring in the day. After 10-to-12 minutes or so, our yummy breakfast came.

I have small hands, but my two pancakes were about as wide as one of them stretched out- maybe about eight inches in diameter. If this sentence meant nothing to you, here it is a little plainer. They were HUGE! The blueberries were nice and juicy, and the bacon was crispy.

In case you didn’t know The Grill makes their own fresh squeezed OJ. I didn’t have any, but Mr. Davis said it was great.

Until Saturday, I had never been to The Grill for breakfast. I think it’s going to become somewhat of a tradition. The pancakes were too good not to have again!

So friends, visitors, UGA-ers and other wonderful readers, go to The Grill for some super-awesome pancakes and bacon (or sausage). You won’t be disappointed!

To see more pictures, click here.