Hurricane Sandy Gone, Back to Food (RnR, Scottsdale, AZ)

Finishing the reviews of food experiences in Scottsdale, AZ last month - there's one more worth mentioning. We were looking for a place to hang out and catch the Giants game Sunday morning (how cool to be able to watch football at 10am?).

The bartender at our hotel suggested we try a place downtown called RnR. She said it was a sports bar with great breakfast burritos and tons of TVs.

Located on North Scottsdale Road, this two storied hang out is casual, loud and has lots and lots of open air seating to accommodate the huge Sunday crowds.

We were lucky enough to get a table on the downstairs patio and even luckier to find a great waiter happy to tune the closest TV to the Giants game (yay!).  With a breakfast menu served until 2pm and unlimited mimosas this is place to eat comfort food, wear your team colors and settle in for a three hour feast.

We ordered various egg dishes - I got the RnR BYOB Breakfast Burrito with ham, bacon, cheddard cheese and pepper jack. It was served with some of the best breakfast potatoes I've ever had.

Since it was more than a month ago, I'm not going to remember exactly what everyone else had...I think Alan tried the Breakfast Taco Plate with three tacos: potato & egg, chorizo & egg and bacon & egg. Dana ordered an egg white omelette with spinach, bacon and other fun stuff. I can't remember Jeff's dish...french toast?

Everything was pretty good - hearty and tasty with the potatoes being the standouts. We ordered drinks all morning long while watching the Giants win. And somewhere after halftime decided to get this beauty...

A monster sized cinnamon role dripping in icing. Oh, happiness! Really yummy and really decadent. It's served with a flaming firework candle to make the whole thing a little more over the top.

So if you're looking for a place to hang out and people watch, game watch, eat and drink I'd definitely recommend RnR.

PS. They put bacon in their Bloody Mary's.

Marketplace: Atlantis Resort, Paradise Island, Bahamas

When Mom, Kiera & Caitlyn arrived at the resort from their early morning flight from Fort Lauderdale, they were pretty hungry. Being 10am, the options were really breakfast and the easy choice was to hit up the buffet in the Royal Towers.

The buffet was set up for breakfast and had a big selection of meats, eggs, omelet station, grill with pancakes, waffles and french toast, pastries, cereal, fresh fruits, breakfast potatoes, quiche and Latin selections with beans, rice and other ethnic dishes. We got seated and went to work loading up our plates. The food itself was perfectly acceptable, standard breakfast fare. The eggs tasted like eggs.

But herein lies the issue I have and will always have with buffets. There's just no way I can or would eat enough to justify the cost. At $25 per person, $100 for the four of us...is that really appropriate for a donut, a waffle, some eggs, potatoes, bacon and fruit? Because that's the sum total of the food spread across those four dishes. When I know I could have made the same exact meal in my own home for $12, it's hard to swallow the price tag. So unless you're Adam from Man vs. Food and can truly do damage to a buffet, elect to grab a bagel and be done with it!

No more buffets for this foodie!!
Rating (adjusted for the value): 60