House of Flavor

For some reason I had the insane idea that I never talk about restaurants on here. Skimming back through the archives I realized I talk about restaurants... a lot. It appears that we do nothing but eat out. But that isn't true. I just don't want to bore you with the mundane details of making pork ribs for dinner. I promise we do stay home 80% of the time.

But sometimes something truly Las Vegas catches your eye.

In this case it was Flavor Flav's House of Flavor.

Right? How could you not want to go to?

It is by its own description a southern style take out restaurant. Chris and I always intended to go and one day it showed up on Groupon and we knew it was meant to be. Our Groupon was $12 for an 8 piece mix of fried chicken and red velvet waffles.

So one Saturday night I was waiting for Chris to come home from work and I decided to search for website to see what other offerings they had. Strangely, I could only find news articles and blogs about it. One looked promising so I took a chance at reading the review that another LV local had posted on her blog. Her blog was hilarious! And she swore it was some of the best chicken she had ever had. She even pointed out that as a self proclaimed "Fat Girl" she had sampled her fair share of fried chicken. I trusted her opinion and grew even more excited.

I am not linking her blog or review here. As I continued to read her blog, I became more and more horrified. While the one blog was funny and helpful, the others were horrifying. I started to question her judgement and get nervous. This was a blogger who posted that artificial flavorings are superior to natural flavors because they are designed by smart men in lab coats to taste just like the real thing but without the harmful side effects that natural flavors can sometimes have.

I swear to you I am not making this up.

Also "Fat Girl" is a serious understatement on her part. She chronicled eating 7000 calories a day which involved eating 2 lbs of bacon "like chips".

I'll give you a moment to digest that. Because I know I'm vomiting in my mouth just recalling this.




......So I did what any sensible person trying to achieve balance in her life would do....

I walked to the gym.

Seriously called Chris and told him to pick me up there, walked 1/2 mile to the gym and stayed on the elliptical until he got there. I want that damn fried chicken! But somethings just cannot be unseen!

So here's my review/experience at Flavor Flav's House of Flavor. From start to finish because this was definitely and experience.

First, If you are ever in Las Vegas and want to make the short trip off strip to Maryland Parkway and E. Desert Inn, I highly recommend it. I just want to make that clear. That being said, when we arrived at the House of Flavor the counter girl informed us that she was out of chicken.

Yep.

She said she only had 5 thighs and some chicken strips available. The food truck hadn't arrived and she didn't expect it for at least 30 minutes. We had anticipated waiting anyway. One of the selling points of HoF is that they freshly prepare the chicken when you order it. It's take out food, not fast food. There are no heat lamps.

We told her we had the Groupon and we would take whatever she though was equivalent. We're not picky. We are hungry and adventurous and willing to wait. She offered us chicken strips, the 5 thighs, or extra waffles. We told her to pick whatever she though was fair. It should be noted also that the cook came out to apologize to us for running low on chicken. He was wearing his white Le Cordon Bleu chef's coat.

When the counter girl rang us up she said that we just had to pay the tax, $1.10. Sounds good. She checked off our Groupon took our $1.10 and when we asked to add a drink she said there was no charge because of the inconvenience. So Chris sat down with our 2L of Strawberry Crush (seriously when was the last time you saw Strawberry Crush?) while I snapped some photos for you guys.

Floofy Floof meeting other celebrities.

The Jamaican restaurant next door. Next time I'm craving curried goat and manish water I know where to go.

Yes, they had a stream of Public Enemy videos playing for us. This caused me to say Fight the Power over and over again for days. Including while jaywalking to the craft store. Because that is how rebellious I am.

Chris and his strawberry drink. It has so many artificial flavors that it must be one of the least poisonous foods available.

See that little Flavor Flav icon? Chris wouldn't take my picture posing with it. :(

Despite the dinner of Fried Chicken and Strawberry Drink, look at how much weight Chris has lost!

Interesting thing is, none of the other patrons you see in these pictures got food. The counter girl told them they were out of chicken and they left.

Then a red SUV and a Chrysler 300c roll up in the parking lot. Two really well dressed and wealthy looking black men enter and go strait to the back of the shop. Chris and I are eyeballing each other. We had already been discussing how we think this chicken shop with a lack of chicken is just a place to launder drug money. I don't know that I should even write that on the Internet but we were definitely whispering about it. After these two gentlemen roll in, I comment that I feel like we are in the presence of someone really important and we just don't know it yet. These guys were Tag Heuer watch and leather shoe fancy. Not Floyd Mayweather's Rolls Royce Motorcade scary fancy. ( And yes, Chris has seen that first hand.)

When the gentlemen leave one of the comes up to us and asks how we heard about the House of Flavor. He wants to make sure that we are happy and apologizes for being out of chicken. He tells us to try the new sauces. He seems very genuine and when he leaves Chris says he must be one of the partners. End of story? No. I continue to look at all the photos on the celebrity wall and I spot one of the same man and Flavor Flav shaking hands. So I ask the counter girl who he is.  " Oh that's one of the partners, Farrah" she says. Then she gives us a coupon for the 8 pieces assorted so we can come back and get what we were supposed to have. We insist that it isn't necessary. She insists it is.

Then she gives us our food. 3 big to go bags of food. We are stunned. What is all of this? She tells us to take it. We do. Since she refunded our Groupon with the coupon we paid $1.10 for three bags of food and we don't even know what is in there.

And we feel like the biggest assholes because three families came in and left without any food.

It was definitely a surprise when we opened those bags.

That's 3 Red Velvet Waffles, a pint of Mac and Cheese, an 8 pc wing basket, 4 chicken tenders, 5 chicken thighs, sauces and a 2L of Strawberry Crush.

The chicken really is some of the best fried chicken we have ever had. Seriously. The chicken has flavor, not the breading. Apparantly they marinade the chicken for 24 hours and fry it in only flour. And unlike other fried chicken, the breaded parts stays attached!  The Mac and Cheese was heavenly. It looked like some frozen banquet crap but was incredible. And you could taste the real cheesiness. The waffles however were crap. I took two bites and since Chris can't eat waffles, we tossed them out.

We went on a 1.5 mile walk after dinner. It was a nice cool 92 degress so we felt like pieces of fried chicken ourselves.  We had watermelon for dessert  (but hold your racist comments, we just happen to live where watermelon is 8lbs for .99 so we ALWAYS have watermelon.)

So in short, delicious food and over the top customer service. Go there.

And I couldn't leave well enough alone. Something was bugging me about that Farrah guy. Some quick googling told me exactly who he was. And I was right, he is somebody important. He turns out to be Dr. Farrah Gray. Seriously.