Zesty? I Think Not!

Bouds Pinehurst Pub

11753 15th Avenue Northeast

Seattle, WA 98125-5025

(Jen's Experience)

Bouds Pinehurst Bar in Northgate is awesome! One of my favorite bars to visit when we go to see Jasons mom. There is always some good people watching to be had, and the Mac and Cheese is off the charts! A few months ago when Jason I and visited the Pinehurst bar for the first time, we had a blast. We even invented an awesome drinking game that we have to play anytime we go there. Previously, when we visited Pinehurst there was this awesome bartender. She was cute, fun, and loved our drinking game. This time when we went we had a lady named Jyl, we had to go up to the bar to order, and she hardly paid any attention to us. But we will still be back.

On to the wings... As you might know by now, I am a big fan of saucy wings. These wings are dry... They have alright flavor if you like dry wings, its a little peppery. If you ask me I think their menu is a bit misleading. It says their wings are "zesty" to me that means some sort of sauce. I dont think they were even spicy, or "zesty". However, if you like dry wings, and dont like spice, then you might like these. Also, take a look at the picture, the wings do come with celery and carrots, but check out the size of the carrots! Its like they got tired of cutting the carrot in quarters and just decided to give us a half of carrot with the wings.

In conclusion I would highly recommend this bar to anyone! Great people watching, great day time drinking, awesome bartender (day time), and the BEST MAC AND CHEESE!

(Jason's Experience)

I too am a big fan of this bar. Big glass pitchers of Bud Light for 8 dollars. That works for me. Bouds is great because there are no frills or gimmicks. Two pool tables, a juke box, lots of big tvs, and an old cigarette machine. This was our third trip to this watering hole and we finally decided to try the wings. I prefer wings with sauce but I do like dry wings. Bouds wings aren't zesty as the menu states, but they are yummy. It's just small drumettes and wings battered and fried. Simple but good. If you are reading this entry to our blog perhaps you have read others and have seen how much I like carrots to be served with wings. Well, I learned to be careful what I wish for. The carrot they served with these wings reminded me of what I used to feed my grandmother's horses back in the day. It was not a dip-able carrot and I wasn't about to quarter it myself so to that I say Boooooo! I probably won't order these wings again but I will return to this bar for the great atmosphere and the unbelievable mac & cheese. It's got bacon in it! Jen mentioned our game that we play there. I will break down the rules so that you can play at home or at your local hangout.

Everyone needs a coaster that their beer is not sitting on. One person goes at a time. You place your coaster with the edge hanging over the side of the table. Then, you flip the coaster by raising you hand quickly and hitting the overhanging edge, thus knocking the coaster into the air. You must then catch the coaster in mid-air. Every failed attempt to do so counts as a drink for you. You continue flipping the coaster until it is caught. Once you catch it you then take your drinks that were accrued in your failed attempts. While you are drinking the person to your left starts their turn. If they catch their coaster on the first try and you are still drinking you must then drink double. I was about to type that there is no winner at the end of the game but that would be false. It is more appropriate to say that there are no losers and the game ends when you either run out of beer or are sufficiently primed. If you ever need a lesson on how to play Jen and I will gladly join you at Boud's or any other beer serving establishment.

There you have it.

Pretty Classy For A Strip Mall

Zato Grill

20609 State Route 410 East

Bonney Lake, WA

(Jason's Experience)

If you haven't been to Bonney Lake in a while you may be a surprised to see all the restaurants and bars that have sprouted up. Zatos Bar and Grill is the location where Jen and I decided to start a chicken wing blog. When I walked into Zatos I immediately got the feeling that this place is too cool for school. It's dark and there are strange murals on the wall. Also there is a room that looks like it could be a VIP room? I immediately looked back from the outside from whence I came to make sure that I remembered correctly walking through a door located in a strip mall next to a smoke shop and what used to be a Godfathers. I made a joke that Zatos is probably the fancy restaurant that the kids from Buckley take their prom dates to.

On to the wings. We ordered the Chipotle wings. They were surprisingly delicious. I have been a big time nay sayer on anything Chipotle. I have never had anything, until these wings, that I liked that was labeled with Chipotle. I once moved out of an apartment because the put a Chipotle near my complex. These Chipotle Chicken Wings are really good. I have had them twice and they have been equally scrumptious each time. I was a little disturbed to see that these wings were not served with carrots and celery. Oh the celery was there, puke, but instead of delicious quartered carrots there were some strange white spears. I was puzzled to say the least, so I asked our server, "Pray tell, fair wench, what is this mysterious vegetable that has been served with my tiny fried chicken limbs? Now don't tarry, fetch me a flagon of mead so that I may slake my thirst!" Or something like that. Anyhow, she informed me that is was jicama spears. I was a little apprehensive to eat jicama. It wasn't too bad, it was like eating a giant peace of water-chestnut.

I will definitely be back to Zato's specifically for these wings. Also the waitress said that they are starting a new happy hour soon with specials from $2.00 to $5.00. So if you happen to be venturing up 410 and have a hankering for some delicious wings and an atmosphere that is diametrically opposed to what you would expect to be in a strip mall in Bonney Lake then hit up Zatos.

(Jen's Experience)

The atmosphere is a little weird, it appears that they are trying to make it look "upper class", but that doesnt last long. As soon as you see the 2 drunk trashy girls hitting on the bar tender, its easy to remember you are in Bonney Lake.

There are 2 different kinds of wings, the chipotle, and some other kind of wings that are not supposed to be spicy, so we didnt even try them. I, like Jason, am not a huge fan of chipotle, but I will give anything a shot. They are about 9 dollars, and I think if you go during happy hour they are half price, but since we didnt go during happy hour, I could be wrong. The wings have a good amount of sauce on them, and have pretty good flavor. I dont think these wings make it in my top 7, but they are good. I do like that it comes with celery and jicama, however, when I think of jicama I think of this horrible job that I used to have and it brings back bad memories, but I guess that is something I will have to get over. The ranch is weird. I am sort of indifferent about it. Its a bit chunky with some green onions and some other spices...decent, but not great. I will definitely eat the wings here again, but if I am craving some amazing wings, I am not sure this would be the first place to pop into my head.

Hooterific

Hooters
6812 Tacoma Mall BoulevardTacoma
WA 98409-9088



(Jen's experience)
Oh Hooters...I love you!

Let me first start off by saying we almost didn't make it to Hooters because Jason said he likes Wingers better. I know what you are thinking, but yes, he is straight. It was my brilliant idea to go to both, so that's exactly what we did.


When we arrived at Hooters we were kindly greeted by our server named "Ashely" she was pretty and very nice. We learned a lot about her (it was slow in her section), and found out we knew some mutual people.


We finally decided on ordering a pitcher of bud light ($8.00 for happy hour, $12.50 for not happy hour) and 20 wings. We got 10 hot, and 10 spicy garlic. Both very good! We ordered the wings with extra sauce cause we LOVE lots of sauce. The spicy ones came out with plenty of sauce but the spicy garlic, not so much. We had to order additional sauce for those. Once we got the extra sauce, the wings were probably the best I had all day. They would probably rate in my top 6 for sure.


Unfortunately we do not have pictures of the wings. We took pictures of the waitress, and myself, but no wings. As you can imagine we got a bit distracted. Oops.

(Jason's Experience)
By the time we got to Hooters I was sufficiently primed. I dig Hooters because you know what you are going to get. Decent wings, decent looking waitresses that are required to be very friendly, lots of televisions with sports on them and cold pitchers of beer. I know that technically it's a family restaurant, I just couldn't get over how many parents bring in their small children to Hooters. I can't define why I thought this was not a great idea but I remember being shocked at how many children were there.

The wings were good. I do like that at Hooters they serve the whole wing. I love eating the little crunchy tips along with the meaty parts. The Spicy Garlic sauce was not only yummy on the wings but makes a great french fry dipping sauce.

One of my favorite things to do is to make my single friends uncomfortable by attempting to set them up with a waitress or bartender. This day was no exception. I was doing my best to try and get the waitress to tell us where the Hooters Girls go after their shift to unwind. She, of course, was not having it but was very kind anyway.

Going forward I am sure we will visit other Hooters Restaurants. I promise we will try a larger variety of what they have to offer.

Love, Peace and Chicken Grease!

Oops...

Wingers

5221 Tacoma Mall Boulevard
Tacoma, WA 98409

(Jen's experience)

Today we were off to finally answer the age old question "which has better chicken wings, wingers or hooters?" The answer is still out for debate and actually might have a different answer if we had ordered the correct chicken wings at wingers. Heres how it all went down...

We went to wingers this afternoon and remembered that they have happy hour every day! This made our decision on what to order very easy. Wingers has an amazing happy hour. We all ordered a bud light with the intent to have one and some chicken wings. We placed our order with our lovely server Chris. We said we would like the " classic spicy chicken wings" This was a "classic" mistake. What we meant to order was the "original spicy chicken wings" rookie mistake I guess. When the chicken wings arrived they were so FREAKING hot (spicy) they I could only finish 2 out of the 4 chicken wings! On a side note, I love spicy food. Nothing is ever too spicy for me, so i was surprised when I couldnt even finish them all. Please take a look at what Marc looked like after finishing all four.

They were so HOT, Marc ate his wet nap....Thats right, he ate his wet nap to cool his mouth down. I cannot say I have ever seen anyone do this before! Some of us (Jason and I) ordered another beer, and Marc ate a wet nap. Different strokes for different folks, I guess. We decided we couldnt come all that way to not have the chicken wings we came for, and being as how the happy hour is amazing, we figured we would order another order of the correct wings. They came and were faboulous as usual. AMAZING!!

The only down side to these wings (as you can see in the picture at the top of the page), they did not come with any celery or carrots! What the heck?

Two things are for sure. The chicken wings are wonderful, and the happy hour is awesome! You get 4 large chicken wings for $4.00, and microws for $2.00. They have some other stuff on the menu but I cannot imagine going there and eating anything else. If you havent been there you must check it out. Look out for Chris and say hello from the chicken wing bloggers!

(Jason's Experience)

I love Wingers. I first fell in love with Wingers' wings about 8 years ago in a little town called Moscow, ID. I was with my fellow WSU throwers, we each ate 3 lbs of wings.

Do not hesitate to stop in at the Wingers in Tacoma. Free popcorn, reasonable drink prices and the Original wings are THE BOMB. If you want a buffalo wing get the Classic at Wingers, but try the Original., It's sweet and a little spicy. A sweet glaze suggests that the wing wouldn't work dipping in blue cheese or ranch dip, but Wingers' Original wings do work with either of traditional wing dressings.