Big news in seitan: the bipolar chefs over at Weird Fish have once again taken their renowned Buffalo Girls off the menu.  Now before we all go over there and slap the shit outta them, let's remember that this is basically the third time they pulled this stunt this year.  First they pulled their satellite kitchen out of Bender's Bar, a move akin to renouncing one's religion and marrying a capybara, and completely gutted their old menu, ditching the B Girls, among other killer dishes.  Then a month later, they brought the menu back following a bunch of so-called “vegan outrage.”  Then it was gone again.  Then back again in June.  It all seemed good at this point, even a month ago I could still order their famed seitan dishes.  Well, they are up to their old antics again.  When I asked about getting Buffalo Girls, the waitress had a quick response, “We aren't making those anymore.”

“But they were so good.”

“They were, but we're moving onto other dishes.  We're trying to keep the menu experimental and weird.”

Mind you, Weird Fish might just be calling wolf again hoping to send the foodie blogs into a tailspin, but they seem way too committed to ditching their best dish this time around.  An hour after ordering food, a table sat down next to us, tried to order the Buffalo Girls, and was delivered the same, scripted response from the waitress.

Not really sure what it is with Mission chefs killing off some of their popular dishes.  Mission Burger did it in the fall of 2009 when they abandoned the vegan burger.  Mission Chinese Food ditched the chinito over the summer.  Now Buffalo Girls are gone.  Perhaps it is the same reason Radiohead refuses to play Creep at their shows: artists getting bored with the hit that made them popular.

I'm crying rivers for their plight.

(photo by Ray Everett)

You can blame my inability to take a decent photograph for why I couldn't get a shot of us ACTUALLY pouring the Loko into the glasses.

Last night, four (ha!) of the foremost (okay, I'll stop) Mission District experts on Four Loko gathered to sample the new, fun-free caffeine-free formula.  And, I'm sorry to say, it's pretty terrible.  Now I'm not saying Four Loko was great in the first place, but it was passable given how cheap of a drunk it was.  Well, it's still 12% alcohol sugar-water, so even though I was 'way gone' by the end of the evening, the taste was much worse than the original.  None of us could quite put our finger on it, but at one point, the words “acid” and “blood urine” were thrown out there.

Now, to be fair, none of us went into this excepting it to taste any good, so perhaps our perception of the drink was purely psychological, but somehow I doubt it.  Plus, I didn't want to go on a caffeine-fueled terror spree through the city afterwards.  The horror! 

Anyway, if you want to ingest 23.5oz of drunk fructose for yourself, head to the market on 22nd and Mission next to Popeye's.  Pick up some aspirin and an It's-It while you're at it.

If you really needed another reason to visit Doc's Clock, they recently got their hands on a brand new Indiana Jones pinball machine.  Like, BRAND NEW.  Fresh out of the box.  As any other Bay Area pinball snob can tell you, this is a BIG FUCKING DEAL because most pinball machines in this city are BROKEN PIECES OF SHIT.  Anyway, this machine not only works, which is generally qualification enough, but also has magnets and an epic multiball (see video below).

Plus, if you are lucky, you might also stumble across a guy wearing an Indiana Jones hat playing the machine.

Did you know you can get both Farolito and Mission's Kitchen delivered right to your bar stool for free?  Well you can, and once you do, you'll come to the same conclusion as Stu:

So the moral of the story is: I’m never waiting in line at either of those places again.

Read up.

(Photo by Thomas Hawk)