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• 5:00 Mommie
• 6:00 Starmount
• 7:00 Greg Humphreys (acoustic)
• 8:00 Connells (acoustic)
• 8:40 Richard Bacchus and the Luckiest Girls
• 9:30 Maldora
• 10:20 Static Minds
• 11:20 Jeanne Jolly

All it takes is a $10 donation at the door to get in (but of course you can do as much as you want!)

The July 2010 issue includes The Wild Turkey Bar & Lounge among 15 American watering holes. It is one of only two bars in the Southeast named as a best bar for doing business.

Stating that the Wild Turkey Bar & Lounge has been “a cross-sectional hotbed of local politicos, big pharma executives and tech tycoons since it opened in 1984,” author Monica Corcoran Harel goes on to write that this is “the best place to strike a deal in the entire Research Triangle.” On any given night, one might run into local and state elected officials, as well as top executives from SAS, GlaxoSmithKline and more.

The review states that the essential attributes of a great business bar include discreet seating, friendly and attentive staff, a compelling crowd, manageable din, a full range of liquor, good lighting, good food, and decent décor.

Mami Nora’s is recognized for its unforgettable rotisserie chicken, cooked in a special marinade, then roasted in our imported oven from Perú. This oven uses only wood charcoal, no gas or electric heat is needed.

According to Yelp and Chowhound reviews, we are “in for a treat”.

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“This once-in-every-ten-years offer will be the first and only nationwide giveaway since the company’s inception,” explains Paul Damico, president of Moe’s Southwest Grill. “We are excited to share this company milestone with our guests by giving away one of our best loved and most celebrated products.”

Additionally, Moe’s is encouraging fans to express themselves and their love for Moe’s white cheese sauce by entering the I Love Queso Video Contest at www.ilovequeso.com for a chance to win $1,000 and free Queso for a year.

Moe’s has been busy recently. They opened their first green location in Burlington, VT, added Junior Burritos and Rice Bowls permanently to the menu, opened three co-branded locations with Carvel Ice Cream, launched a new Web site, and introduced a cleaner, brighter restaurant prototype. Even more plans are in the works, with plans to open 500 locations in the next five years. Moe’s is better poised for growth than ever before.

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As before the even takes place on Fayetteville Street, from the Capitol to the Marriott. The street and all cross streets will be closed in order to facilitate four main music stages (Cherry Bounce, World, Raleigh Rocks, Free Spirit), as well as a beer tent and other entertainment venues and booths. Additionally the space in front of the convention center will be used as well as the new downtown Raleigh amphitheater.

My experience has been that the best place to park for the event is in the municipal parking deck at Morgan and McDowell. A short walk puts you right in the heart of the action. Other options are the parking garages lining Wilmington Street, but be sure to swing several blocks wide of the Fayetteville Street axis in order to avoid stagnant traffic and pedestrians.

The Raleigh Wide Open crew has once again put together a very nice flyer (.pdf) which includes a map of the RWO territory as well as a schedule of the day’s events. Gogoraleigh adds to that experience, however, by publishing this calendar to Google Calendar. Simply subscribe to the Raleigh Wide Open Calendar or just add events that interest you to your personal Google Calendar by clicking on the calendar link, selecting “Agenda” in the upper right, then selecting the desired events.

We recently went to Taste of Chicago and Milwaukee’s Summerfest, both events with rolling musical events at different stages throughout the days. Each even had its own iPhone app, and it made the event much more fun to select events beforehand and let the app plan the day for us. While this isn’t a dedicated app, it still affords you the chance to add events to your calendar and turn on notifications to remind you of them as they approach!

 Subscribe in Google Calendar

Here is the RWO schedule:

11:00 am – Parade down Fayetteville Street
From Morgan through the City Plaza with marching bands, floats, and local celebrities!

Noon – Festival Opens
Food and art vendors, street performers, 4 stages throughout Fayetteville Street

RebBull Motocross Mayhem with Geoff Aaron 
Fayetteville Street between Hargett and Morgan St. Performance times are 2:45; 5:00; 7:15 (add according to time)

King BMX Stunt Show
Salisbury Street in front of RCC. Performance times are 1:30; 3:30; 5:00

Cherry Bounce Wrestling
Hargett and Fayetteville St. Performance times are 5:15 and 7:30

Fire Circus
Flames and high flyers set City Plaza ablaze. Performance times are 8pm and 10pm

Eating Contests
*Free Spirit Stage. Krispy Kreme Donuts at 3:00; Lumpy’s Ice Cream at 5:00

Cherry Bounce Stage

• Jews & Catholics 12:30-1:15pm
• Cherry Bounce SPECIAL Guest 1:45-2:30
• North Elementary 3:00-3:45
• Lake Inferior 4:15 – 5:00pm
• I Was Totally Destroying It 6:00-7:00
• Bomba Estereo 8:15-9:15
• Javelin 9:45 – 10:45pm

World Stage

• Crucial Fiya (reggae) 12:15 -1:45pm
• Shana Tucker Trio (soul) 2:15 – 3:30pm
• Mel Melton & The Wicked Mojos (blues / americana) 4:00pm – 5:00pm
• The Barn Burners (country) 5:30 – 7:00pm
• Old Habits (bluegrass) 7:30 – 8:45pm
• Rubberband (funk / hip hop covers) 9:15 – 10:45pm

Raleigh Rocks Stage

• Adam Pitts and the Pseudo Cowboys 12:30 – 1:15pm
• Will McBride Group 1:45 – 2:30pm
• Big Mama E & the Cool 3:00 – 3:45pm
• Wax Planet 4:15 – 5:00pm
• Sleep Control 5:30 – 6:15pm
• Airiel Down 6:45 – 7:30pm
• Design 8:00 – 9:00pm
• Nigthshift 9:30 – 10:30pm

Free Spirit Stage

• Kappa Xi Chapter of Kappa Alpha Psi (stepping) 12:15 to 12:30
• D.LIV(E) (spoken word/hip-hop) 12:45 to 1:05
• Schizophrenic Octopus (breakdancing) 1:30 to 2:00
• Sabrosa (spoken word/hip-hop) 2:15 to 2:35
• Krispy Kreme Donuts (Eating Contest) 3:00 to 3:30
• Spotlight Creative Studios (Bollywood Dance) 3:45 to 4:00
• Dasan Ahanu (spoken word) 4:15 to 4:45
• Lumpy’s Ice Cream (eating contest) 5:00 to 5:30

Downtown Raleigh Amphitheater

Barenaked Ladies 9:15 – 10:45pm (ticketed event through www.LiveNation.com and also avalable at the Amphitheater box ofice.)

10:45pm – Fireworks

Note: I will repost this on Friday, July 30, as a reminder.

The restaurant is still great as ever, but unfortunately Hamid is having health troubles and needs our help. Holly and Mo are not the types of people who want a ton of attention, but if someone’s biggest regret were that too many people loved them, they’d be the richest person in history. Like it or not, y’all , here is the letter the restaurant’s staff sent to fans yesterday, and information about the ways we can all help (in addition to eating at the restaurant, of course).

Dear friends,

On behalf of Hamid and Holly, we, Vanessa, Kenneth, Jim, Chris, Stan, Cecilia, and Maria, the staff at Mo’s Diner, want to extend our great appreciation for your patronage over the last thirteen years. We are writing this letter to inform you of some very sad news. Hamid has been diagnosed with Stage IV Lung Cancer. It has spread to his spine, and most other bones in his body. He has not worked at the restaurant in some time, and he has been going to medical appointments daily to deal with his situation. Holly has been cooking, managing the restaurant, and accompanying Hamid to all of his appointments. In addition, Holly has been working a second job which provides health insurance. To make matters more difficult, the health insurance for Hamid’s illness has capped, and all of the medical bills are now being paid out of pocket.

We are launching a series of benefits for Hamid to assist in paying his mounting medical bills. We humbly ask that you join us in this endeavor through donations, attendance at the events, and any other means of assistance which you deem appropriate. With the help of Capital Bank, we have set up an account, Friends For Hamid, to manage any funds received for this cause.  If you can not attend an event and want to donate, you can send a contribution to Mo’s Diner c/o Friends for Hamid. 

We have set up several sites to inform you about the upcoming events:

• Facebook Friends For Hamid
• www.friendsforhamid.blogspot.com
• www.friendsforhamid.com

If you wish to send a comment to Hamid, inquire about the events, donate, or offer your thoughts about other things we can do for this cause, please send us an e-mail.

FriendsForHamid@aol.com

With some convincing, Holly allowed us to use this e-mail database to send you this message. We felt that sending it through the database of the patrons of Mo’s, it would reach the most people familiar with Mo’s and Hamid and Holly. Again, thank you for dining at Mo’s for all of these years. We look forward to seeing you at the upcoming events.

With our kindest regards and appreciation,

Vanessa Smith
Kenneth Strothers
Jim Knott
Chris Adams
Stan Krepps
Cecilia Flores
Maria Lopez

Below, are the events we have planned to date. Other events will be announced later.

• Thursday, July 22 @ 9:00 pm
  Table for a Friend featuring DJ Robert Mooney
  $10.00 donation at the door
  Five Star Restaurant
  511 W. Hargett St.
  Come join us for appetizers, great music and maybe a little dancing.
  
• Sunday August 1 @ 6:30 pm
  Wine Dinner
  $100.00 donation
  Poole’s Diner
  426 S. McDowell St.
  creative, simple offerings carefully executed by Ashley Christensen
  
• Sunday August 15th
  Mo’s Better Benefit
  Pour House Music Hall
  224 S Blount St
  Rock Show by Raleigh’s Local Musicians
  
• Sunday August 29th
  Guest Chefs Benefit Dinner
  $150.00
  Mo’s Diner
  306 E. Hargett St.
  Ashley Christensen, William D’Auvray, Bret Jennings, Matt Kelly & Walter Royal
  
• Sunday September 26th
  Art & Music Reception
  Flander’s Art Gallery
  Art, Hor d’oeuvres & Live Acoustical Music
  302 S. West St
  
• Oct (to be announced)
  Silent Auction
  18 Seaboard, Suite 100
  Appetizer buffet, silent auction & live music

The restaurant’s is a typical urban steakhouse themed with a salute to old-time boxing. The dark terrazzo floor, moderate lighting, handsome stained wood walls, and century-old black and white photos establish a very masculine setting that sits well the deco style of the building’s exterior. The menu is a typical steakhouse menu, featuring nine different steak cuts, as well as some seafood options, lamb, and a few others. The entrées come with a lettuce wedge salad, but all other sides are a la carte.

Saturday was our first experience dining in one of the chain’s 19 locations. We had been to the bar to gawk at hookers several times, but had not dined there due to its extremely pricey reputation. Our experience was consistent with that reputation.

We were seated and made an immediate selection of a half-bottle of some Cab from their very nice wine selection. First we were served individual 4” diameter bread rolls that were fine, but nothing remarkable. Next, we started with Sullivan’s the famed iceberg lettuce wedge salad which lived up to its impressive reputation. The blue cheese dressing was outstanding, giving a bias of sweet not found in cheaper dressings. The salad was topped with delicious diced tomatoes. We each opted for the fresh ground pepper (until recently I assumed every nice restaurant offered pepper on their salad). What the dish lacked was some crispy bacon. While the dressing on the Raleigh Times’ version (original menu) didn’t quite compare to Sullivan’s, it did feature some delicious crispy bacon that made this one of the best salads in Raleigh.

We opted for the Mushroom Duxelles Filet and the 16oz New York Strip as our entrees. The strip was excellent, rolled in large grounds of kosher salt and pepper. I ordered the steak medium and it came out, as expected, medium-rare. The Mushroom Duxelles preparation is a finely chopped sauté that was too salty to earn the “delicious” badge, but was still good. My potato was excellent, but nothing particularly interesting. The White Cheddar Au Gratin Potatoes were very good, but a bit too heavy in bacon fat. For desert we were given a flavorless chocolate soufflé.

Our food was excellent overall. However there were disappointing aspects with the meal’s overall experience. One problem that has besieged this restaurant is the deteriorating dress code of the clientele. Sitting next to our table was a guy in a tight t-shirt, blue jeans, and flip flops, eating with his elbows all over the table. Unfortunately he was one of many meatheads in the dining room wearing what amounted to yard clothes. At first we thought we were being unfair, but then we thought about out other recent experiences in other comparable restaurants and don’t remember this problem.

Another irritation was the restroom. After washing the only option to dry my hands was a stack of tri-fold paper towels sitting in a pool of water on the counter. While this is not something that would turn me off in a fast-food joint, we are talking about the most expensive restaurant in town. At least give us a high-grade paper towel, however a linen towel is expected in a fine dining restaurant.

The service was fine, however we did have to wait about 10 minutes too long for our check. Later that week, however, we received a handwritten thank you note from our waitress. It was an outstanding touch that didn’t take much effort, but resonated well with both of us.

This was a $150 meal for two and while the food was excellent, it is a price that exceeded my experience. Sullivan’s is easily one of the best steakhouse options for us in Raleigh, however my food was somewhat forgettable, and the experience is not what it should be to qualify as one of our best overall dining options in Raleigh.

Rating: Five Stars (out of seven)

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While at the market, customers can visit the information booth and sign up for a free raffle where they can win a copy of The Grassfed Gourmet Cookbook, or 4 flex tickets including a parking pass to a North Carolina Symphony’s Summerfest concert of choice ($90). All meat lovers are invited to pick up a free copy of “The Great News about Grass,” an informative publication offering tips for making the most of pasture-raised foods and showcasing great recipes.

Event Schedule

Coon Rock Farm sausage sandwiches will be for sale during the market.

Nevertheless the real reason for mentioning this is that the store had many historical photos and artifacts of Raleigh. If anyone is interested in getting some of these, now is the time to seek the management and see how they plan on getting rid of the items.

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Spring Rolls

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Dixie Belle’s Smokehouse

Dixie Belle has been around for 6 years now. They feature 3 sauces: Eastern NC (vinegar), Western NC (tomato), and South Carolina (mustard). Their signature sandwich is The Big Dixie, which offers…well who cares. That name is hilarious. The menu in Apex (.pdf version) features a surprising array of meats, including broaster fried and rotisserie bbq chicken, grilled or fried shrimp, flounder, and catfish, ribs, wieners, burgers, pork bbq, beef brisket, turkey breast, and pulled chicken. I suspect the Crabtree location will feature an abbreviated version of their menu, and hopefully the smell, while great at first, won’t envelope the entire mall.

I haven’t been to Dixie Belle, but it sounds like a big improvement over the Mr. Barbecue and Stuff that was in the pre-1994 food court.