Making a pita at Pita Pit

Mo’s Smokehouse Barbeque: Delicious Homemade BBQ Sauces!

Mo's Smokehous Barbeque

Mo’s Smokehouse Barbeque is one of those restaurants that captures the overall feeling of San Luis Obispo. When one thinks about San Luis a few things that come to mind could be the beach, how beautiful it is, maybe Madonna Inn, and the impact agriculture has had on the area. Next to engineering, agriculture is the biggest college at Cal Poly, and a large part of campus is devoted to agriculture related facilities. Barbequing is big in San Luis Obispo, and I think agriculture is somewhat part of that. There’s Firestone Grill, F. McLintocks dining house, Downtown Brew serves delicious barbeque tri-tip sandwiches, and then there’s Mo’s Smokehouse Barbeque.

There is plenty of seating at their location in downtown San Luis Obispo.  The best things on the menu to get at Mo’s are the shredded pork sandwich with cole slaw, the Texas toast, the beef or pork ribs, some kind of chicken tender sandwich, corn bread, and the sweet potato chips.  The sweet potato fries are amazing, and can be a meal all by themselves. Usually when I go with friends, and I’m tight on cash, I just get the sweet potato fries and a water cup.  I walk out only spending $2.65.  

One of my favorite menu items at Mo’s, though many disagree if they have never had it, are the chipotle chicken tacos.  The set of two tacos is the perfect meal, and the sauce they put on them is what makes it worthwhile- truly delectable.  Everyone I have convinced to order them has agreed with me, though it’s always hard to describe the fusion of flavors you taste from it.

One of the main things, I believe, that sets Mo’s apart from the other barbeque joints in San Luis Obispo is their barbeque sauce.  Mo’s makes four different flavors of barbeque sauce: original, hot, Philthy Phil’s, and Sweet Carolinas. All of them are delicious. Sweet Carolinas is my favorite out of the four, being very sweet, and it tastes like honey in barbeque form. I don’t really delve into the Philthy Phil sauce, as it packs quite the spicy kick. All the sauces are available at the condiments counter, and they are all free which is an added bonus. Mo’s also sells bottles of their barbeque sauce, which would make a great gift to any barbeque lover.If you are really pinching your budget you could take some sauce home with you, just load up on the sauce, and then when you are back at your dorm spice up your bland food from VG’s with some of Mo’s barbeque sauce.

I recommend Mo’s to all meat and barbeque lovers.

• Directions from Cal Poly campus to Mo’s Barbeque Smokehouse

Downtown Starbucks in Barnes & Noble: Sip, read, relax, and munch.

I have tried not to review franchise restaurants or corporate places like Starbucks, since I am trying to review local places around San Luis Obispo, but I think this counts as a cool calming San Luis Obispo experience as well.

One of my favorite things to do, when I have time, is to go to Barnes and Noble on a free Saturday or Sunday afternoon and just squat down with a chai tea and an English muffin sandwich, and just read a good book and do some people watching. It calms your mind, especially if you have had a rough week of midterms or need to take a break from studying, and the people watching gives you a good feel of San Luis Obispo.

I would rather not get into Starbucks politics or anything like that. Whether you are for ‘mom and pop’ local coffeehouses or for Starbucks is for another blog.

When I go on my calming excursions to the bookstore I usually get a grande no water chai tea latte from the Starbucks Café right across from Barnes and Noble, not the one in the bookstore, only because they don’t offer the English muffin sandwiches. This is the Barnes and Noble in downtown San Luis Obispo next to Downtown Cinema on Marsh Street, and down the cross alley if you are coming from Higuera. I opt for tea instead of coffee, because I find that a nice chai tea eases tension a bit more naturally than tea, and lifts any anxiety I have for the coming week. Depending on the barista working at the counter, your tea can come out nice and milky and full of cinnamon or, if you get an inexperienced barista, there could be too much chai in the tea adding a some bitterness.

To add to the chai tea or whatever beverage you choose the sausage, egg, and cheese on an English muffin is an excellent afternoon lunch option. It is a pre-made sandwich, but every time I have had it has tasted pretty fresh. The English muffin is hot coming out of the toaster oven, and you should wait a little bit for it to cool down. The English muffin sandwich is a very simple, and comes in a small white paper bag making it easy for you to look around the bookstore while waiting for it to cool. Now that you are all fitted out with stress relieving goodies its time to to relax, sit down, and get sucked into a book.

Quiz on inexpensive food and deals around SLO!

http://www.mystudiyo.com/act114599/go/

Instead of trying Frank’s ‘not so’ Famous Hot Dogs try some of the other menu items.

For a place that boasts having ‘famous hot dogs,’ they are quite disappointing. They serve your every run of the mill dog, and I’m

Crinkle Cut Fries

 sure many people will just satisfied with that, but I was expecting more. Besides lackluster hot dogs they offer a lot of other salty options that are much better in my opinion. On most days they have a special which can be located on a little white board near the counter. Usually the special item are pretty interesting, I once had a patty melt that was quite satisfying. Their hamburgers are pretty good, not the best I have ever had, but okay. The sauce they put in their burgers is a bit odd. It’s some sort of hybrid barbeque half Tapatio sauce-pretty weird. I would go in on Monday though if you want burgers, since Monday mini burgers are $1.00.

The breakfast sandwich is awesome. It’s everything you want in a breakfast sandwich. Their hash browns are those deep fried triangles, if that’s how you like your hash. Their chicken strips is the best thing on the menu. Battered, crunchy, moist, hot strips dipped in ranch, and usually consumed at a quick pace as well. The fries are pretty good too, I would go with the crinkle cut ones.
Try the chicken strips or the breakfast sandwich, and your ill thoughts toward their hot dogs will quickly fade away.

 

 

• Yelp Reviews
• My Favorite Hot Dogs- Nathans
• Or a place with better hot dogs and better deals- Costco Post

Toppings at Yogurt Creations is a great alternative to expensive movie concessions!

Fremont Theater

Most everyone knows that the concessions at movie theaters are overpriced, yet time and time again movie goers still buy popcorn and boxed movie candy at outrageous prices. I shouldn’t be speaking though since I usually purchase a $4.00 box of Butterfinger mini-bites every now and again when I see a movie. Though sometimes its hard to avoid the high prices at movie theaters, I advise that one find an alternative. Here in San Luis Obispo I found that instead of paying an arm and a leg for popcorn and candy, as an alternative, I can go to Yogurt Creations and fill up with a cup of toppings. Not only is it incredibly cheap to fill a cup up with gummy bears, snow caps, gummy worms, and more; it’s extremely delicious, and you have a diverse list of goodies to choose from.

So the deal is before you go to see your movie at the Fremont theater or over on Marsh Street next to Barnes & Nobles head over to Yogurt Creations first to stock up on a wide assortment of inexpensive sugary goodies. Yogurt Creations has a serve it yourself philosophy, which so many other places are against, and works perfectly for the movie concession idea. At other frozen yogurt stores they will not let you make your own yogurt, and put on your toppings by yourself. Unlike the other frozen yogurt places, Yogurt Creations allows you to serve your own yogurt, and pick your own toppings. So you go in get a cup, possibly get a small amount of yogurt at the bottom to not arouse anyone of your suspicious behavior, and then just go crazy with the toppings. The toppings weigh much less compared to the yogurt, and the most I paid for a whole medium cup of gummy bears and snow caps was around $2.50-$2.75. I think this is the best alternative to having to pay $4-6 on candy at the theater.

Yogurt Creations

Yogurt Creations is also much cleaner and spaicious than Bali’s and has a location in Atascadero for everyone in North County. The yogurt is also very good, even though I’m not partial to Euro tart, and that seems to be every bodies favorite.

Snow Caps

Sunshine Donuts in SLO 24/7!

When it comes to donuts in San Luis Obispo, this place is definitely my favorite place to grab a donut in the morning and is also excellent for late night sugar snacking. Usually when my roommates and I have a big midterm the following day, and we are studying most of the night, Sunshine Donuts serves as a awesome study break snack spot. They are open 24 hours a day so whenever you’re craving good cheap donuts, they are available to you.

The staff is very friendly and the place is usually pretty clean. It can get very crowded late at night, especially on weekends. I’m sure it’s quite crowded in the early morning, though I have not been there too early.

All the donuts are quite scrumptious, but my two favorites are the applesauce, and raspberry filled donuts. I had never tried the applesauce donut until the summer following my freshman year, and before that I thought of it as some novelty lost in donut obscurity, but I was proven wrong. One late night in the summer my frieProxy-Connection: keep-alive
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s and I stopped at Sunshine Donuts, as we did many a late night, to fill up on some sugary goodness. Usually we stick to routine, and order four glazed, four pink donuts with sprinkles, four raspberry filled donuts, and mix and match the last four depending on what we’re craving that night. As we began to choose our last four donuts, we went with two maple bars and two chocolate old fashioned donuts. “Wait,” I said. “We always get maple bars, and Kevins the only one who eats them, lets get something else.” This is true. The rest of us didn’t have any appetite for maple bars, which had frequently become a recurring sight every time we left with our pink box filled with a dozen donuts. It was time to shake things up! Try something new, and break out of our monotonous donut routine. I searched the trays behind the counter, and quickly spotted the oddest flavor for a donut I have ever seen-applesauce. It was a given, we asked for two applesauce donuts instead of the regular maple bars. I wondered what

The Applesauce Donut

how they could get the taste of mushy applesauce into the donut. My thoughts faded away as I turned toward action, as I was the first to take a step into the unknown. The taste and feel of the applesauce donut was much more welcomed and soothing than I had expected. Mmmmm… It tasted like an apple pie covered in glazed cinnamon. It was wonderful, though not tasting much like applesauce at all, applesauce quickly became a regular in our late night dozen donut runs.

So if you have not eaten at Sunshine’s yet, I highly advise it, and while you are there do not be afraid to try the applesauce donut.

• Recipe for applesauce donuts.
• Map from campus to Sunshine Donuts
• Various Donuts and their nutrition information

Quiz on good inexpensive eats aound SLO!

Link to quiz

Map of the recent affordable restaurants I have dined at.

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Firestone Grill and their delectable tri-tip sandwich!

Firestone Grill

There is not much to complain about this place. Of course there is always a big line, and a long wait, but it’s worth it. Firestone Grill was the first place I ate at in San Luis Obispo when classmates and I were passing through on a high school club function. Even when my parents and I were scoping out colleges junior year we had Firestones for lunch, and now so far throughout my first two years a t Cal Poly it has been a frequent eatery for me. My favorite menu items probably being the tri-tip sandwich and the barbeque pulled pork sandwich. This is probably the most well known restaurant in San Luis Obispo, at least among Cal Poly students.

The menu is made up of various barbecued meats, burgers, onion rings, French fries, and healthy salads. My favorite menu items are the amazing tri-tip sandwich and the barbeque pulled pork sandwich. The most well-known item on the menu, the tri-tip steak sandwich, consists of tender slices of barbeque tri-tip topped with their signature barbeque

Tri-tip Sandwich

 sauce placed on a grill toasted French roll that has been drenched in garlic butter. Their signature barbeque is great; perfectly sweet, tangy, and can be easily used as a substitute for dipping my fries into. When you’re eating the sandwich, it’s like sinking your teeth into butter! You never have to worry about pulling tough or fatty pieces of steak out of the roll after taking a bite. For me, this might be the best tri-tip sandwich I have ever had. If you have never been to Firestone before I highly advise you get the tri-tip sandwich as will not be disappointed, and you will most assuredly come back.

The pulled pork sandwich is also an excellent choice, with succulent shredded pork drenched in barbeque sauce oozing out between the two buns you cannot go wrong. Expect to get a little messy with those two items unless you are really good at avoiding falling barbeque sauce.

The basket of onion rings or fries is a good side, and often come in large portions. The fries are on the thinner side and seasoned perfectly. They go great with Firestone’s signature barbeque sauce. They have however been on the soggy side a couple times when I got my food to go.

Fries

The ABC burger (avocado, bacon, cheese) is another great choice.  The combination of those three ingredients along with a big, juicy burger is heaven on a bun. On days I feel like being a bit healthier, I like to get the steak cob salad.  The portion of the salad is pretty big and surprisingly filling for a salad.  

 Now the prices are not too cheap, but affordable, and I am always willing to pay a little more for a satisfying meal here.

This place is probably one of the most popular places in downtown San Luis Obispo, so be prepared for a crowd just about any time you go.  The line often runs out the door but it does move relatively fast. 
For those who have never been to Firestone’s go now, as soon as you can, and confirm the hype for yourself. Those who have already dined there know what I’m talking about. 

• Yelp reviews on Firestone Grill
• Map from campus to Firestone Grill
• Learn about Tr-tip