March Madness: A Slice of Fried Gold Edition

Recently I spent an evening writing and watching Travel Channel's Man vs. Food (starring Adam "I don't wash my hands after using the restroom before competitions" Richman), and I realized that if it was physically possible and affordable, I may never actually stop eating. I love food to an almost unhealthy degree (see: David Harper circa 2005).

With March starting up tomorrow, I had been thinking of something March Madness like I could do for my blog. That's when it hit me: what is the one thing I like more than basketball? Food.

I genuinely appreciate restaurants and all of the factors that make them great, from the food to the pricing to the intangibles like service and atmosphere. While Anchorage is a pretty small place, we are blessed with some sneaky good food. But what restaurant has the chops to be my favorite? Well that is what this month is for. I've set up my 32 "favorite" Anchorage restaurants (in quotations because some didn't make the cut due to bracket restrictions) into four different brackets: Fancy restaurants, Hippie restaurants, and two brackets of General. I tried to make an Asian food or Hispanic or Italian food bracket, but there just aren't enough high quality establishments to make it work.

From there I aligned the eight restaurants together by esteem and by logic (in the General brackets, you'll see first round matchups between "down home" restaurants, burger joints, and other like minded establishments), and away we go. Matchups will play throughout the month and all factors will be considered - and I will not be pulling punches. This is also entirely based off my opinion, so if you disagree let me know in the comments section. Check out the bracket below (click to enlarge), and let's get this started baby! That was in a Dick Vitale voice if you were wondering. The competition starts Monday with the first Fancy matchup.