Kitchen 67 (Grand Rapids, MI)

Motivation is a fickle mistress. After months of inactivity, Sola Cepa burst back onto the scene, as I renewed my onion ring fixation with an unmatched vigor. Unfortunately, as the ebb and flow of time and life washed over me, my motivation for excess reviews of onion rings waned. A balance must be struck, as the Aristotelian Golden Mean. Sustainable, long-term output is more important than vague bursts of reviews.

That said, here's a review of onion rings from Kitchen 67. Thank you to Dave for the suggestion.

Presentation and Appearance: 3/5

In a unique twist on the classic, the wax paper that lines the squarish ceramic bowl is printed int he facade of a newsprint, an attempt to hearken back to something homey and unique. While it's a relatively convincing fake, and it does add a bit of a twist on the standard white or red-and-white checkered paper, I don't know how much it ultimately adds to the equation. It does, however, stand out.

The rings themselves are demonstrably hand-battered, but not with delicate care. They are messy and haphazard, with hills of gnarled batter climbing off the rings to and fro. They're a bit on the darker side of golden brown, perhaps indicative of a slightly too-long fry time.

Taste: 1.5/5

I often throw around the term "greasy" when reviewing onion rings, but I feel the overuse of that term has led to an underappreciation of the extent of grease that is possible. These onion rings, rather than being delicately brushed with a thin layer of grease, were drenched with a series of successive buckets in a desperate attempt to drown the poor onion rings.

As you can gather, these were remarkably greasy. I got hints of seasoning in the batter at times, but these hints were overwhelmed by the powerful grease. Indeed, after finishing the rings, a small pool of grease collected in the center, something I've never seen before.

Overall, the taste was overpowering, and not all that pleasant. The accompanying dipping sauce, never identified, was bizarrely both bland and poor in taste. All that said, the onions had a decently strong flavor, the only positive of taste yet identified.

Texture: 3/5

The texture was a mixed bag. The batter delicately collapsed with a pop, as it puffed extravagantly out from the inconsistent (mostly thin) cut onion. To deem it a crunch would be a misnomer, and it was far more of a pop.

The batter, however, was oddly heavy, despite the pop in the bite. Each bite built a successive layer in the pit of my stomach, forming a dense layer of greasy batter and onions. There was far, far too much batter for the size of the onions. It might be more accurate to term these "piles of greasy batter that have a little bit of onion inside of them that may or may not be in the shape of a ring" rather than an onion ring.

What little onion I did encounter were decent. They were soft, without becoming mushy and overcooked, and provided a nice, soft, juicy bite. Unfortunately, the greasy ball of batter overpowered that.

Value: 2.5/5

For $2.99, I got a reasonably sized bowl of relatively mediocre onion rings. The quality left something to be desired, but the amount was adequate. They were filling, to an overwhelming extent.

Total: 10/20