monzyummylunch

Happy New Year!

No real lunch today, just popcorn and Twizzlers (tm) at the flicks. Happy new year!

Waukegan Then and Now!The Man tells us it's the "last Fong's of the year" for brocoli with garlic sauce and vegetable soup. "It was good, though I burned my tongue on both items. BYE BYE 2007!!!"

Something Fishy!The editors were wary when the Copy Editor (CE), having come back from Sedona, urged the staff to head out the the Shedd Aquarium in an effort to...change Monz' lunch? "Our thoughts, his lunch, the world -- they're all connected!" Ok, well, we enjoyed watching the big fish, but Monz had a foot long veggie delite on wheat. And it wasn't even yummy!

So What's Our Excuse?!

Monz, obviously still recovering from the love-filled festivities of the holiday (of which he and Mrs. Monz munificiently allowed the MYL staff to partake in on Christmas Eve), reports in late. Home lunch (after visiting the office) of sorts -- touch base, then off to Stir Crazy for a veggie mix heavy on the baby corn, with a blend of spicy sauces laid upon flat rice noodles. Monz liked!

Our Christmas Gift to Monz!

Some suggestions while we review contest entries -- Merry Christmas Mark Monz! See y'all on Boxing Day!

In It to Win It!Some movies are pretty predictable. In fact, we predict that you can predict the plot of this movie from its dvd cover (especially if you saw the first "Bring It On"). And as life so often imitates art, we bet there are a lot of people's lunches you could predict. But we betcha you didn't guess that on Friday Monz had another fake ham (tofu) sandwich with an apple!

Speaking of "in it to win it" -- don't forget to enter our contest!

Mama Said "Knatwurst's Out"!

The pretenders just keep coming (Monz himself alerted us to this one, though he does appreciate their sprightly use of images). When will people learn that..."Wait!" a shout is heard. "Aren't there any blogs you folks like, you know, other than ones written by your friends?" Oh, a few. And there are a few things Monz likes at China Garden, like vegatable chop suey and vegatable fried rice.

Tis the Season!
Back to Bacci's for a seasonalsalad and bruchetta. We had more on what makes a seasonal salad (crandberries, for example) but our courier service let us down. In the spirit of the season, we forgave them!

Lunch of Fury!Monz has a monzmade fake ham (tofu) sandwich on whole grain bread and an apple. The mind drifts...

have you ever went over a friends house to eat
and the food just ain't no good
i mean the macaroni's soggy the peas are mushed
and the chicken tastes like wood
so you try to play it off like you think you can
by sayin that youre full
and then your friend says momma he's just being polite
he ain't finished uh uh that's bull
so your heart starts pumpin and you think of a lie
and you say that you already ate
and your friend says man there's plenty of food
so you pile some more on your plate
while the stinky foods steamin your mind starts to dreamin
of the moment that it's time to leave
and then you look at your plate and your chickens slowly rottin
into something that looks like cheese
oh so you say that's it i got to leave this place
i dont care what these people think
im just sittin here makin myself nauseous
with this ugly food that stinks
so you bust out the door while its still closed
still sick from the food you ate
and then you run to the store for quick relief
from a bottle of kaopectate
and then you call your friend two weeks later
to see how he has been
and he says i understand about the food
baby bubbah but we're still friends

Monz Nose Best!

It's cold season, and in the spirit of monzmunificience, the crack MYL investigative team have some advice for our dear readers with stuffy noses: don't buy the reformulated decongestants! As longtime readers know, our amazing researchers have learned a health secret "THEY" don't want you to know, a secret more powerful than anything Kevin Trudeau will tell you: the most important science news gets buried in the Friday afternoon news cycle and tends appear in the lightly-read Saturday papers!

So, our advice to cold sufferers? Get the real thing: sudafed, or a generic, that in most states is now stored behind the pharmacy counter (you don't need a perscription but do need to show ID). Why not just take the stuff that's on the shelf? Because unless you trust Dubya's FDA, it doesn't work! Here's the money quote from the same research institution that brought us Gatorade:

Leslie Hendeles and Randy Hatton, both pharmacy professors from the University of Florida in Gainesville, believe that phenylephrine is a poor substitute for pseudoephedrine. They petitioned the FDA to hold a meeting about the effectiveness of phenylephrine. "We're seriously concerned that a 10 milligram does of this drug is ineffective," said Paul Doering, pharmacy professor at the University of Florida and a co-director with Hatton at the Drug Information and Pharmacy Resource Center, in an interview prior to the vote. Doering, who is not a petitioner, said the issue is much bigger than a matter of dosage. He said an analysis conducted by his University of Florida colleagues indicated the evidence about phenylephrine effectiveness "is meager indeed."

Monz also suggests that you all fortify yourself for the winter season with a lunch like vegatable chop suey and a little vegatable fried rice from a close to home establishment like New China, paired with a piece of fruit like a funky nuveau apple.

Tickling the Ivories!

The Music Editor (ME) has a dillema. He has this accoustic guitar which Monz helped him pick out at the local guitar center, several years ago circa his birthday, when he had delusions of teaching himself how to play desipte his fear of blisters and callouses. Despite not having progressed farther than being able to play a clunky version of the main riff to "Blister in the Sun," the guitar has great sentimental value to him (after all, it was the source of a fun Monz adventure!) But now he's thinking he may make more progress with one of those "teach yourself" keyboards by Casio, the ones with the keys that light up and built-in lessons. The pros and cons keep the poor ME awake at night. (You might finally be able to make music! Girls don't dig keyboards, they dig guitars! You could practice without disturbing the neighbors! You could disturb the neighbors!)

Meanwhile, Monz struggled with whether he should clear The Place of noisy young invaders with his mighty bellow, or stay put and dig his footlong veggie delite on wheat. Unlike the ME, Monz was decisive in his decision.

Recovery!

The airwaves are filled with items about celebrities going in and out and in and out and in and out of rehab, trying to recover from some trauma. Monz recently had a trauma at {we're not sure if Monz wants us to name the establishment -- we'll say CP's) The words "something" and "disagreeable" come to mind. Did Monz call the wambulance? Was Monz deterred from dining out ever again? Did Monz go to rehab? No! Monz went to comfortable, yummy ol' Fong's for vegetable soup and vegetable chop suey.

"Hop to It, Hop Sing!"

Monz had two messages for us today. First, lunch consisted of Amy's samosa wraps and an orange. "I like these wraps," said Monz. "They are filling and don't allow you to feel shortchanged after lunch, which is bad."

His second message involved this.

The Real High Life!

We at MYL are perplexed by the recent ad campaign (airing only in the Midwest) for Miller High Life beer, which is centered on the tagline "an honest beer at a tasty price". To us, when you use the word "tasty" in a sentance and it's not describing the beer but rather the price, it sends a not-too-subtle message that the beer is swill.

Now here's living the high life: back to back Bacci's! This time with Mrs. Monz for bruschetta and seasonal garden salad which was large and yummy.

This Price Is Right: Free Monz Yummy Lunch Contest!Announcing the fourth annual Monzyummylunch "Yummify the Monz' Lunch" contest!!! To play, submit via the e-mail link on the blog (not the comments section) a suggestion for a yummy Monz lunch. Entries will be judged on ease of preparation and/or ordering/retrieving, uniqueness, and of course yumminess! Each entry gets a chance to win $1,000.00!!! (shout out to Andy of season 2 of The Apprentice for the idea). The winner gets a gift certificate to a restaurant that Monz has eaten at!!! Here are the lahyaheese rules: one entry per e-mail address (so make it count and please don't cheat by sending different entries with different e-mail addresses!), all decisions of the editors final, void where prohibited, limit of 25 entries total (first come, first played), all entries must be received by December 31, 2007, no Wisconsin residents because they have barred out of state residents from entering their state's short story contest, no Alabama residents because the editors think that outside of Birmingham, the free state of Winston County, and a few other places Alabama ain't no sweet home but rather it sucks, contestants will be assigned heads or tails by editors depending on their mood then a coin will be tossed a lucky thirteen times and if the coin turns up the same pre-picked side each time a pair of dice will be rolled which if turns up the same number of characters as are in the smallest segment of the e-mail address the contestant will receive $1,00.000 (U.S.) in equal installments over a period of fifty years, however the award will not be paid if the submitted lunch makes Monz sick except in the case where lunch is purchased from a commercial food establishment or preparer in which case the entrant is off the hook unless he or she is in cahoots with said establishment or preparer, employees/friends/family/other relations to either the eidtors or the Monz or his place of work are allowed and encouraged to enter this contest. Void where prohibited. Thanks and good luck to Bob Barker!

To kick off the contest, Monz and staff headed to Bacci's for a yummy lunch of bruschetta and spagetti pomodoro.

What a Ham!

The editors have been working all night long attempting to decipher Monz' on-the-road-with-Mrs.-Monz-at-important-meetings lunch report, left on the office answering machine. From what we can tell, Monz and Mrs. Monz, with other assorted bigwigs, went to a Don Shula's Steakhouse. Many at the table joined our heroes in ordering some veggie dish, but when it arrived they discovered it came with ham! Shocked, bewildered and dismayed, the table revolted and forced the Gordon Ramseys in the back to remove all the ham. What came back was adequate, but by then there was little time left for lunch. Of course, they made the best of it and wolfed it down.

All we can say is that with this bad Shula karma, New England's hopes for going undefeated and matching Miami's legendary record are looking better all the time!

Flock Together!Tis the season to be reminded of various things. Like, how the Chicago Transit Authority generously provides heated overhead lamps for our fair feathered friends to ward off a wintry chill. And that we have unclaimed prizes! Or that Monz has evolved from those lunches of cut up chicken pieces slathered in bbq sauce from the Jewel.

A couple of Amy's Samosa Wraps, doublepaired with two small apples.

Our Favorite Mistake!
The Political Editor (PE) made a startling observation today: "you can judge a presidential candidate by what they say their greatest mistake is." For example, George W. Bush in a 2000 debate said his greatest mistake was when he owned the Texas Rangers baseball team and traded Sammy Sosa to the White Sox. In reality, this was not a mistake at all: the Rangers obtained the great Harrold Baines and made the playoffs for the only time in the team's sorry history. Years later they obtained Alex Rodriguez, the greatest player of his day, and they still stunk. Yesterday candidate for president Barrack Obama answered the same question by saying it was when he drank as a teenager and experimented with drugs. Now, one might think that since most Americans have a similar history, and such history wasn't our greatest mistake, that means either Senator Obama is a modern day saint or he's full of it.

We know Monz, if asked the same question, would own up to a serious mistake, like a bad lunch order. In fact, he has, on this very blog! Our advice to the other candidates: give a better answer to the "greatest mistake" question, or we're electing Monz! That said, Monz made no mistake yesterday when he went to The Place, coupon from the Sunday paper in hand, for a foot long veggie-delite on honey oat.

A World to Win!Today's post is about communists. And not just any communists, but hardcore commies: ones that think the post-Stalin USSR was a timid mouse and that the various Maoist movements arround the world were eh...okay, but should be chastised for letting ethnic and nationalist group identity get in the way of the worldwide proletariat struggle. Yes, we're talking about the Progressive Labor Party.

Back in the days when the Music Editor (ME) worked near Chicago's Art Institute and the Monz would stop by for lunch for things like McDonald's pizza (they were testing it), he once stumbled by accident into the PLP's Chicago office, got into a baffling discussion/debate with a young revolutionary, and bought an album for $5: "A World to Win." Some of it was quite catchy, though the ME was quite embarassed when the Monz explained to him the meaning of his favorite track, "Put It On the Ground" (so obvious in retrospect - Doh!). You can now download these and other PLP releases for free!

Comrade Monz liberates a lunch from that bastion of free enterprise known as Whole Foods: Tofu spring rolls and cucumber rolls. Viva la revolucion!

Yes, We Have No Bananas!The Food Editor (FE), moved by Monz' near-vegan quest, spent Sunday scouring Monz' local Dominick's looking for a yummy sauce to spice up his meals. After much effort he found it: a Heinz product from the Phillipines: Banana Hot Sauce! Of course, before presentation to the Monz it had to be tested. It was about this time the Chicago Bears literally threw away their playoff hopes for the season, causing the FE to take leave of his senses and create...a Banana Chilli Buba-Burger Cheeseburger (on whole wheat roll). As yummy as it was, it was so not-vegatarian, it could change a radio dial from Air America to the EIB Network!

Monz dines at home after a Cook County (Stroger!) adventure for a portobello sandwich from Panero. Too much cheese and too too much salt, plus good veggie soup.