Since Cafe 49 opened several months ago just acrossed the street from my office in Lake Wylie, I have become a regular. The food is almost always excellent and today was no exception. If you are looking a family restaurant with a home-cooking type theme - I would highly recommend it.

I ordered a grilled pork chop and had 3 vegetables - okra and tomatoes, green beans, and fried okra with sweet tea. The pork chop was extra tender and juicy and was grilled to perfection. All of the vegetables were great today. The fried okra almost always comes out hot and crispy. The green beans are some of the best I have ever had at a restaurant and the okra and tomatoes were bursting with flavor. The sweet tea is some of the best around as well.

In the short time they have been open, I have probably eaten there 20-25 times. I usually go for lunch as it is so close to the office, but have also been to breakfast and dinner as well.

The wait staff is always friendly and doesn’t seem to have turned over very much since their initial crew which gives is a consistent “hometown” kind of feel. You will most likely be reading many review on Cafe 49, as you can see that I go there a lot.

I visited Fuel Pizza in Rivergate (Highway 160 and S. Tryon St.) for lunch yesterday for a meeting. My expereience was typical with what I have grown to be accustomed to from Fuel Pizza. The service was great and the food was ready really fast. The downside is that when you order by the slice (as is the norm at Fuel Pizza), the slices are not always hot and fresh. They reheat the slice quickly (not sure how) and then deliver it to your table. The overall quality of the ingredients and the selection of toppings is excellent but in my opinion it loses something in the process that it goes through to get to me (the end customer). I can not really comment on getting a whole pizza cooked fresh because I have never done it - although I would imagine that it would be much better.

I will continue to go to Fuel for the simple matter of its excellent location and fast service coupled with its lower than average price (as compared with other restaurants in the immediate area). Also, the food is better than some of the fast food options around. Another good thing is that since it is by the slice, I can get mine loaded up with toppings and my wife and child can get their plain cheese version.

For those that do know know much about Fuel Pizza, it is a chain that originated in Charlotte and has expanded to nine locations (per their website).

Let me know of your experiences at Fuel Pizza by leaving a comment! I would be especially interested in hearing comments from someone who has ordered a whole pizza there.

Welcome to my Food Blog. As you can tell by the title, I am from Charlotte, NC. I actually live in Lake Wylie, SC just a few miles from the Charlotte by car…..less than a mile by boat!

Both my wife and I are CPAs and we have our own firm here in the area. Since this blog is about food, I will not bore you with all of my work history and qualifications related to my profieincy as an accountant. If you want that information, visit my Periodic Ramblings of a CPA blog.

By creating this blog, I hope to create a journal that is both helpful to myself as well as others. I want to be able to share my dining experiences with others - both the good and the bad. While this blog will contain a lot of reviews and experiences with local area restaurants, I do not plan to keep the focus that narrow. I will also detail my experiences cooking at home and dining when out of town. Hopefully, it will help somone when they are on vacation. There is nothing worse than going on a trip and being unable to find a decent restaurant [this is where I would reference the post to Carolina Beach if I had already written one].

Anyone that knows me can vouch for the fact that I love good food. I love it a lot. I have a true passion for great food. Feel free to send me your favorites or to add comments on mine. If you feel differently about a restaurant, feel free to comment and let everyone know. The more input we get, the more this blog will help us all in the never ending quest for the perfect restaurant.

I might also add that I have a 2 year old that loves food too - his deal is that he only likes food that is shaped like a dinosaur and contains chicken. You will probably see a lot of reviews of chicken nuggets over the next few months!