120 S Denton Tap Rd Ste 170
Coppell, TX 75019
(972) 393-2424
For $4.99 (drinks extra) all-you-can-eat pizza/pasta/salads, Cici’s has been the destination for budget-minded families dining on the super-cheap. This Cici’s location is roomy and staffed with polite, courteous folks, who keep the buffet lines constantly refreshed and tables cleared. On a weekday night, the line stretched out the door, though curiously the dining room was only half full. It seems that my party had arrived just as the dinner rush was ramping up, and the cheery cashier was doing her best to keep the line moving. I also saw the manager roaming around the dining room, serving full-sized pizzas and checking on customer satisfaction. Cici’s pizza isn’t Chicago- or New York-grade, but it’s value-priced filler. My disbelieving dining partner would not have believed “mac and cheese” pizza until he saw it with his own eyes…other notables include barbecue pizza, mushroom and chicken, spinach alfredo and the super-sweet apple pie pizza–all served fresh and hot. Their pasta for the night was a bland rigatoni drowned in pizza sauce; the salad bar was stocked with typical American iceberg lettuce and standard dressings. There are–without a doubt–plenty of places to enjoy a better pizza, salad or pasta, but very few cost this little and can satisfy the entire family.
8350 N Macarthur Blvd
Irving, TX 75063
(972) 402-9799
Not a place for fat people.
My man is portly, and I’m a little wide on the hips…but my goodness, it’s something of a production to squeeze into those narrow eating spaces with hardly any breathing room to spare. It’s even more annoying when your neighbors’ kids are bumping their chairs up against yours when you’re trying to eat dinner.
But the menu is what we came here for, and despite the slightly cramped dining space, we dove into dinner with great anticipation. An opener of their eggrolls were merely passable. Though my partner enjoyed the meatiness–I felt it wasn’t meaty or tasty enough.
As much as I was leaning toward pho, I decided to try their Hanoi special vermicelli while the man ordered the combination stir-fried noodle with chicken. What we didn’t comprehend from the “combination” in the name, was that the chicken was accompanied by beef, shrimp and squid. So when his dish came out, it was more than what he had asked for. Still he had to give it a liberal dousing of hoisin sauce and sriracha to make it more palable.
In the end, as I downed my Hanoi special (tasty but lacking), I still felt a little hungry and disappointed that the food didn’t knock my socks off. I was ready to proclaim this my new haunt for Vietnamese, but I left the place only mildly satiated.
136 E Belt Line Rd
Coppell, TX 75019
(972) 304-1122
This is your typical Chicken Express outlet dressed up in nicer digs…at this location you have a drive-in along with drive-thru service. The restaurant dining room is also a notch above other Chicken Express locations I’ve visited.
But the menu here is representative of the chain. They offer up catfish, livers and gizzards along with the normal fried chicken, wings and tenders. (Why don’t they offer combo packs of fish and chicken?) The requisite sides of mashed potatoes/gravy, corn, cole slaw and fries are joined by the CE signature sides such as fried okra, mini-poppers and fried pickles. Since my last visit to CE, they’ve expanded their drink menu to offer smoothies and frozen treats. They still sell iced tea, in both sweetened and unsweetened forms, by the gallon.
I wasn’t too impressed with their fried catfish, finding the portions small and overly bland–remedied by liberal dipping into the provided tartare sauce. The chicken also didn’t sit well to me, either coming off as too dry and the batter tasteless to merit seconds.
I will still prefer CE to KFC, but in the future, I’ll remember to go for the atypical selections rather than the standards.
Ever since I secured file transfers to/from the server with SFTP, the built-in WordPress upgrade function stopped working. In order to get the upgrader working a secure manner (as well as add another level of security to the server) I requested SSH2 installed on our server. I would have installed it myself except that our hosting provider refused to correct some initial problems related to the dedicated box, which made the SSH2 install a pain.
Generic donut shop peddling standards such as glazed and powdered donuts, bear claws and fritters, fruit and sausage kolaches, and breakfast muffins and sandwiches. I always go for the sausage kolaches both in croissant and jalapeno varieties, and the good-natured lady running the counter always sends me off to work with a baggie of donut holes.
My rating: 2.5 stars
New New Buffet
3822 Belt Line Road
Addison, TX 75001-4303
(972) 243-1198
If you’re looking for simple, fast Americanized Chinese food presented in a clean, friendly setting, New New Buffet won’t disappoint. Their hot line is representative of all the standards on a neighborhood Chinese restaurant menu: beef with broccoli, chicken with broccoli, sesame chicken, orange chicken, orange beef, jalapeno chicken, lo mein, fried rice, teriyaki chicken, etc. Most are solid renditions of their namesakes, and, quality-wise, are comparable to food court Chinese. New New also has a fried food section containing everything from crab rangoon (or is that just cheese rangoon) to jalapeno poppers and chicken wings; a soup bar populated by the predictable wonton, egg drop and hot/sour soups; a cold bar with california rolls and crab legs in abundance (along with drawn butter and ginger/wasabi sides); a salad bar (nothing exciting here), and a dessert bar overpopulated by cookies and cakes–no doubt purchased in bulk from a local warehouse club. Patrons who don’t like guessing what’s on their plate will be pleased with the taste and value of New New’s buffet. On a Sunday lunch visit, the hit on the wallet was $9.99 a person, plus drinks and tax.
If you’re looking for can’t-go-wrong neighborhood Chinese in bulk, this is the place to go. But if your tastes gravitate to the more authentic, the Josey/Beltline intersection where First Chinese resides is a short drive down the road.
It is 5 days now since I took Dandy to the emergency clinic. She is in constant back pain, and it appears she is losing more of her back leg function. I have upped the number of dosages on her meds to help with the pain, but it doesn’t seem to keep her from crying all the time. Of course, the humans in the house don’t get much sleep either.
I am interested in acupuncture therapy but not sure where to start. I’m also considering natural supplements to ease the pain…however, such things don’t take effect until 3 weeks later. The doc left a check-up message on the answering machine, I may have to ask him if she can have stronger doses of painkillers. Although the pain reminds her that she isn’t allowed to walk.
It’s been 48 hours since Dandy’s visit to the specialist. Dr Rushing had recommended a CT scan and immediate surgery, since it is very likely that Dandy has had a recurrence of a herniated disc. However, the prohibitive cost of both items plus the timing of the last surgery (it’s only been about 10 months) has eliminated surgery as an option. Dr Rushing has therefore prescribed the alternative, medical management. This is often known as the conservative approach to treating IVDD; the doc suggested that the success rate is 50/50 if going this route. Given the quoted cost of $4100 for surgery and hospitalization, medical management is the only option at this time.
Dandy is still mobile however. She still has deep pain sensation and is able to eliminate normally; it is only her gait and speed that has changed. She does whimper/whine when she is experiencing pain or discomfort more than usual. The doc prescribed Tramadol (for pain and swelling) and Gebapentin (for neuropathic pain). We are looking at 4 weeks of crate rest and restricted activity. The IVDD resource recommends 8 weeks of crate rest. So it will be a long wait to see if Dandy can recover from this second onset of IVDD.
She is again residing in a split crate with Doogie; and she has to be carried everywhere, including outside to potty. She has seemingly accepted this treatment and willingly gone along with it. I think she needs the human contact most especially, since she is definitely anxious with what is going on with her body. Of course, being the typical food lover that she is, her appetite has not been affected in the least bit.
