Adam Kuban is the Henry Luce of food blogging. To talk about his love of pizza and hamburgers (especially sliders) he founded two Web sites -- Slice and A Hamburger Today -- that took on lives of their own before being incorporated into the Web site Serious Eats, where Kuban is now the managing editor. While he lives and eats in New York, Kuban grew up in the Kansas City area and attended the University of Kansas. Fat City talked to him via a series of e-mails.
You've written in a couple of different places about your love for sliders. [Here and here.] I don't see how a boy from Overland Park -- where I believe there was just one White Castle on Metcalf -- could grow to love sliders so much.
White Castle's not the only slider joint. When I was a kid, we used to drive from KC up to Wisconsin or from KC to Pennsylvania to visit family. We'd always stop at either White Castle or some variant slider joint. So I sort of associated the slider with road trips and fun times. So when I was able to drive finally, I visited that White Castle on Metcalf as often as I could. (There was also a Whitey's in Olathe, briefly, in the late '90s.)
You said you weren't much of a foodie when living in Kansas City.
Before you became so into food what were your favorite restaurants here
and have your favorites stayed the same or have you found new
favorites?
Well, by some people's standards, I'm probably
still not a huge foodie. My real passion is for pizza, and that's what
prompted me to start Slice. And I generally stick to low-end "comfort"
foods -- deep-fried stuff, pizza, burgers, kick-ass sandwiches. I used to
love Winstead's, D'Bronx, Saigon 39 (my first taste of Vietnamese),
Town Topic, Nichols Lunch (RIP), Arthur Bryant's, and Perkins (I was a
proto-emo kid who hung out with goths, drinking bottomless coffee pots).
That
said, the thing I really regret is that I wasn't a huge barbecue hound
growing up around KC. I think I took it for granted. There's crap for
'cue in New York, so whenever I visit my parents, I make sure to
explore the barbecue joints I missed out on as a kid. Favorites that
I've discovered from a distance: LC's and Oklahoma Joe's.
How often do you come back to town and when you do, are you looking for stories and angles or to relax?
Unfortunately,
I only get back once or twice a year -- usually at Christmas. When I do,
I'm not really looking for angles. Before I fly in, I try to make a
calendar with all my possible "open meals" -- non-holiday, non-family
meals. And then I try to fill it in with a mix of places I want to try
and old standbys. That's the hardest thing -- it's like, do I want to try
something new and possibly be disappointed or do I want to stick with
some awesome 'cue that I know will be good and that I can't get in NYC?
What are your top non-barbecue, non-pizza, non-burger places in KC.
Grinders,
Jess & Jim's ... you're killin' me. I pretty much gorge on
barbecue, burgers, the occasional pizza, and home-cookin' when I'm back.
What one single non-barbecue food do you miss most from Kansas City?
Crab Rangoon from any Chinese place. They don't seem to exist outside of the
Midwest. Also Lamar's Donuts. Dunno if this is really a single "food,"
but I miss the Savoy Grill and its old-school charm.
What about in the barbecue category?
I
miss burnt ends and the burnt-end sandwich the most. There are a few
almost decent barbecue places in New York now, but none of them do
burnt ends.
Let's talk about the word "foodie," which
some people can't stand. Do you feel it's harmless and people are
blowhards for disliking it or does it put too much of a cutesy spin on
food?
As a word nerd, I
have some quibbles with it but not enough to keep me from using it.
Sometimes there's not a better word for a person who really enjoys
food. "Gourmand" is too stuffy, and there's only so many times you can
use "food lover" in an article or blog post. It's just a matter of
context.
I do think that people might be reacting (or maybe it's just me and I'm
projecting here), but I do find that there's a certain type of "foodie"
who's annoying -- the person who's always trying to one-up you with things
they've tried or obscure restaurants they know about. I can't stand
those types of "foodies." It's like the food equivalent of the
indie-rock snob. Like your friend who's like, "Oh, well, I've been
listening to Radiohead since 'Pablo Honey.'"
It's just food. Eat it. Have fun.
Do you consider yourself a New Yorker or a Kansas Citian?
I don't know. I've never really felt like I was a resident of anywhere -- mostly because we moved around a lot when I was a kid. I went to three different schools for kindergarten alone and had lived in seven different states before I we finally settled in Olathe when I was in third grade. I was the "new kid" and never felt as much at home as the kids who were born in Olathe/KC area. And now, I don't feel like I've been in NYC long enough to have earned "New Yorker" status. Maybe that's what Slice is about -- trying to earn my place by reporting on one of the city's iconic and most-loved foods.
Check out Adam Kuban's work at Serious Eats and also on his wonderful Flickr page and personal blog. The man is prolific!
(Image via Flickr: Roboppy)
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