Category: Reviews

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The Baker’s Dog: Taste Testing

The dogs received a present courtesy of Paul Reynolds at The Baker’s Dog today: a sample of Paul’s new doggie Oreo-type cookies for taste testing and a mixed gift bag of dog biscuits.

Baker’s Dog surprise
Doggie Oreos

Note: the dogs would like to say that the mixed gift bag had absolutely no influence on how well they enjoyed the doggie oreos (I suppose I should call them sandwich cookies or something to avoid trademark infringement). They happily enjoyed all of the treats equally.

The new sandwich cookies are pretty substantial: two of the lamb and rice cookies dipped in carob with a solid yogurty type filling between them. They look pretty tasty, and I have to admit I was tempted to nibble on one because they looked so good. I’m not sure how many calories each one would come out to, but these probably aren’t something you want to give your dog lots of or you’re likely to end up with a very chubby dog. They’ll definitely appeal to dog owners looking for a tasty wheat/corn free treat (me being one of them) to reward their dog with.

Doggie Oreo

On to the taste testing. Simba and Barkley aren’t exactly the most discriminating eaters, so they gobbled down their cookies right away and came looking for more. Simba did pause a little bit to lick the carob coating before eating his though. Nala is much more discriminating and had to sniff and lick her cookie a few times before eating it.

Nala’s new treat
Nala eating her treat

Nala’s a pretty messy eater and ends up dropping crumbs all over the place, which Simba is always more than happy to help clean up.

Simba cleaning up

Nala making sure to get all the crumbs she dropped.

Cleaning up the crumbs

Final verdict: based on how fast the doggie sandwich cookies disappeared, two paws up. Barkley is still sniffing around looking for any crumbs that might have been missed.

Paul, the dogs will be very disappointed if these don’t become a regular item.

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The Baker’s Dog: Doggie noms

Baker’s Dog packages

The dogs have thoroughly enjoyed their treats from The Baker’s Dog, especially the Lamb and Rice ones. The lamb and rice cookies are small hard cookies that the dogs seem to really like. First they crunch crunch crunch, then sniff around for any crumbs they might have dropped and lick them up. Then they look at me hoping for another one.

Baker’s Dog lamb and rice cookie

Nala was a little sceptical about the PB and Honey treats at first. When I first gave one to her, she took it, then dropped it out of her mouth as if to say “what the heck is this?”. She usually does this any time I give her something new though and eventually decided it was good to eat. The other dogs didn’t hesitate at all before downing them. I’m not sure they even chewed.

Baker’s Dog peanut butter and honey treat

While The Baker’s Dog probably won’t replace The Good Dog Bakery as my dog treat source, mostly because they’re just down the road from me (and they also sell some pretty rocking treats that the dogs love), Baker’s Dog will definitely be on my list for regular purchases. Paul Reynolds has done a great job setting up the online store and making the online purchase experience fun and easy, especially with the custom labels. In fact he made it almost too much fun and I ended up sending out gifts to a few dog owning friends before I made myself stop.

Sending out bags of treats with a picture of your own pet(s) couldn’t be simpler. Create an account for yourself at the store and add the treat of your choice to the shopping cart. Adding a photo is as easy as uploading the photo and selecting the region that will be printed on the label. There’s a one time fee of $4.99 for each photo, and after that you can use it on as many bags as you like and as often as you like. You can even share the photo with others (they won’t have to pay the fee) so they can use it for their purchases.

Two paws up (any more and the dogs would fall down) for The Baker’s Dog. Go visit them, online or in person if you happen to be in the Myrtle Beach area.

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Review: ingenuiTEA

I’m not a huge tea drinker. I used to be years ago. Now that I have one of these ingenuiTEA cups (courtesy of my brother), getting back into the tea habit will be made that much easier.

Using it is super easy.

  1. Add tea leaves
  2. Add hot water
  3. Steep
  4. Put ingenuiTEA over cup
  5. Profit!Drink!

ingenuiTEA holds 16 oz of water, so you can make 2 or 3 small cups of tea to share with others, or one big cup to enjoy all by yourself.

Pro: If you like loose teas (which I prefer), it makes brewing single cups really easy. The strainer part is fine enough that you don’t end up with tea leaves in your cup (unless you like that sort of thing). It’s also fun watching the tea drain out. Also comes with a little dish to catch drips. Microwave and dishwasher safe too!

Con: Because ingenuiTEA sits on top of the cup, you can’t really see how full your cup is getting (unless it’s clear) so you’ll kind of have to guess from how much has drained out. You’ll have to be quick because ingenuiTEA drains pretty quickly. Of course if your cup is bigger than the amount of water you’ve put in, this isn’t a problem.

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Review: Linux Server Hacks

Linux Server Hacks is filled with tips and techniques (written in cook-book style) for getting various things done in Linux. I don’t know that I’d go so far as to call them hacks, but there are a few useful tips contained in the book. As computer books go, this one is pretty long in the tooth (published in 2003) and there are a few things that are probably no longer current unless you’re using a 5 year old Linux distro. For the most part though, a lot of the tips and tricks in the book should be pretty portable to any system and usable even on newer versions.

There are 100 tips in 8 sections covering a wide range of topics from Server Basics to Backups, Revision Control, SSH and Networking to name a few. Personally, I found the sections on SSH, Networking and Information Services to be the most interesting and useful.

Some of the tips in the book are a little on the esoteric side and probably not useful for everybody. If you’re already familiar with Linux internals and diving into the command line, you might find a few useful tidbits in this book to use.

3.5 stars out of 5.

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Zia Taqueria

Made the first of what is likely to be many more visits to the new Zia Taqueria that opened a few weeks ago in the former Fez location.

This place is full of yummy. The atmosphere is casual, and very conducive to just hanging out. Most items on the menu you can order a la carte, or you can choose from a few platter dishes instead. Order placing is kind of a hybrid between a fast food place and traditional sit-down. You go up to the counter, place your order and go grab a seat. After a reasonably short wait, during which you can munch on tortilla chips and salsa, one of the servers brings your meal out to you.

The salsa, while very fresh tasting was pretty heavy on the cilantro. I probably would have enjoyed it if not for my anti-cilantro gene or if there was no cilantro in it.

I opted for the Beef Barbacoa platter with the Borracho Beans and Mexican Rice as the sides and wasn’t disappointed. With the New Mexico Red Chile sauce, I could have easily stuffed myself with 3 or 4 more. The enchiladas were stuffed with tender, flavourful shreds of beef, and the chili sauce provided a nice chile flavour without a lot of mouth-searing heat.

The Borracho Beans were just as tasty. Kind of like a bean soup, it had a rich tasty broth and a little bit of spicyness for kick, but not too much. The Mexican rice was a little under seasoned, but was good as well and helped cut the heat from the Habanero sauce (one of 3 hot sauces you can choose from at the cutlery/iced tea table) I added to my enchiladas.

Tables outside provide additional dining space, perfect for the milder fall temperatures these days. Now when I’m craving Mexican, I can save some gas and just walk up the road to get some.