Outback Steakhouse: Restaurant Review

These days anyone looking for a casual family-style restaurant has lots of choices. Outback Restaurant is a fine example of the concept. The restaurants have a rustic Australian decor, decorated with Aboriginal art, boomerangs, and other objects d’art reminding you of Australia. Founded in 1988, the chain has made a name for itself among the "steak houses."

We visited the Outback located in Monroeville, Pennsylvania, adjacent to the Hampton Inn, at the junction of Pa. Route 22 and the Pennsylvania Turnpike. Nestled in a heavily traveled area, the restaurant is usually crowded, and was crowed on the night we visited. A group of six, we had an opportunity to sample a wide variety of entrées and appetizers.

Specializing in cuts of beef, the restaurant also provides pasta, fish, chicken, ribs, lamb, pork chops, shrimp, and crab leg dishes. Appetizers include the usual soups and salads, and chicken wings. Other appetizers are Gold Coast Coconut Shrimp ($7.79) and what they call the "Bloomin’ Onion," ($6.29) which they claim is an original but has been in other restaurants for years. The Darling Point Crab Cakes ($8.99) and the Grilled Shrimp on the Barbie ($7.79) were our favorites.

Most of the steaks can be ordered in sizes from 7 ounces to 12, 14 or 16 ounces. They are cooked to order, and seasoned with a secret" 17 spice blend. The largest cut, the "Melbourne" is a 20 ounce porterhouse. ($23.69). The Victoria "Crowned" Filet is a 7 or 9 ounce tenderloin topped with either a bleu cheese crumb crust or a horseradish crumb crust. ($18.49/$20.49). We found the "crowned" filet to have too much topping that overpowered the steak. The Prime Minister’s Prime Rib is oven roasted and comes in cuts of 8 ($15.49), 12 ($17.49) or 16 ounces ($19.49). The steaks are served with your choice of three different side salads or Walkabout soup, and sweet potato, garlic mashed potatoes, Jacket potato, Aussie chips, or steamed vegetables. The steamed broccoli is especially good.

The Outback Rack ($19.99) is a 14 ounce rack of lamb serve with its own sauce and a choice of salad, and can be served as chops if you prefer. We thought this dish was very good if lamb is to your liking. We tried a couple of the combination platters, the Drover’s Platter ($16.49) comes with ribs and chicken and cinnamon apples. The Queensland Chicken ‘N Shrimp ($12.99) is grilled chicken and shrimp over fettuccini Alfredo with a lemon sauce.

Overall, the experience at Outback was very enjoyable and pleasing. For a casual night out with family or friends, the atmosphere is pleasant and comfortable, and the food is good and wholesome. You should not be disappointed.

Is Affirmative Action Fair?

America has a history of racial discrimination, three and a half centuries of maltreatment of its racial minorities. America’s history of racial discrimination in both the public and private sectors, from top to bottom. Discrimination either given official government imprimatur or otherwise condoned and permitted. For generations blacks were denied employment opportunities and chances for advancement, or denied admission into institutions of higher education.

After decades of struggles in the courts and streets of this country, after countless deaths of persons demanding that the country live up to the ideals espoused in its most sacred founding documents, the courts of this country determined that, pursuant to law, a remedy was needed to address the long-standing wrongs of racial discrimination. From its English heritage, America jurisprudence mandates that when a wrong has been established, a remedy is appropriate. Often, fashioning the remedy is as difficult a struggle as was establishing the wrong.

What remedy is appropriate for generations of exclusion? Our society has struggled with this question for only a short time. Affirmative action as a remedy, like most remedies, is not perfect, but is fair under the circumstances. Even an imperfect remedy is preferable to no remedy at all. Only a certain few will disagree that racial discrimination needs to be remedied. Some will suggest that discrimination is a thing of the past, and is no longer a problem. However, various examples prove otherwise, including the Texaco "black jellybeans" case. Racial discrimination is still with us, and failing to address it is antithetical to American values, and weakens the fabric of our society.

Whether a remedy is fair always depends on who answers the questions. Some people will call a remedy unfair anytime it could remotely affect them. Others will misunderstand the remedy, and then call it unfair. Among its definitions of "fair", Merriam Webster includes, "conforming with the established rules or consonant with merit or importance." Certainly, attempting to right or correct the wrong of racial discrimination and its remnants conforms to our established rules of jurisprudence and is of great importance to our society as a whole. The alternative is to do nothing, to pretend that racial discrimination does not exist, or is not a problem if it does. Doing nothing about our history of racial discrimination is unfair to America.

A Closer Look?

Today’s political conversation is so superficial and myopic as to be almost stupid. For example, tonight, I watched Tucker Carlson discuss Rudy Giuliani’s position on abortion and how it relates to his donation to Planned Parenthood.
Tucker insisted that Giuliani’s position was so contradictory as to be nonsensical. However, just a little more analysis shows that the position is not as inconsistent as it may first appear on its face.

At the republican candidate debate, when asked about his position on abortion, Giuliani said that he hated abortion and that he wished there were no abortions. Tucker, I call him Tucker because I kind of like the guy, says Giuliani's position makes no sense because Giuliani donates to Planned Parenthood, and that Planned Parenthood is behind so many abortions in this country. Tucker went on to say that if you’re against abortion and if you believe abortion is killing, how can you be okay with abortion and donate to Planned Parenthood.

Tucker suffers from what many people on the right and left suffer from, intellectual myopia. They see one thing, in this case abortion and Giuliani’s position on abortion, and assume that a straight line analysis automatically gets you to a particular point, in this case, a rejection of Planned Parenthood.

What Tucker ignores is the fact that Planned Parenthood prevents far more abortions than it provides. The core of Planned Parenthood and its medical service is providing information about contraception, accompanying health care, education, and information. The service provides educational programs in 28 different content areas, such as AIDS/HIV, contraception/family planning - including abstinence, family life education, parent-child communication, puberty education, safer sex, sexuality education, sexually transmitted infections, teenage pregnancy, and women’s health. In addition, Planned Parenthood advocates for new policies at the federal and state levels that will advance comprehensive reproductive health care and responsible decision making. According to its website, in 2005, abortion accounted for only 3 percent of its services.

When you look a little deeper, for a person struggling with the difficult and complex issue of abortion, Planned Parenthood is just the kind of agency to support . Last week we heard over and over again about Reagan’s philosophy about when you’re with me only 80 percent of the time doesn’t mean you’re my enemy 20 percent of the time. Here we have better numbers. Planned Parenthood is Giuliani’s friend 97 percent of the time when it comes to abortion. It’s tough to get better numbers than that. Why can’t some people see that? http://www.cnn.com/2007/POLITICS/05/08/giuliani.abortion/

Are Bratz A Bad Thing

A minor controversy has arisen about whether Bratz dolls are appropriate for young girls. This kind of reaction to a toy is not new or novel.

Whether a toy is appropriate or not is, or should be, determined by the child's parents. The Bratz craze is not unlike every other toy craze in history. Some people abject to the Bratz because it is alleged that they portray an attitude unflattering to young girls.

Such an "attitude" cannot be blamed on Bratz. Neither can it legitimately be argued that Bratz perpetuates such an attitude. This "spunky" attitude preexisted the Bratz by at least 10 years. If some find the emphasis on fashion and clothing objectionable, remember that every doll marketed to girls does the very same thing. When Barbie was introduced to the toy market at the New York Toy Fair in 1959, many objected to Barbie for the same reasons. Many mothers objected That Barbie was too sexy. A teenager with a mature figure. An exaggerated figure at that. Along with the figure came the mature and sexy clothes, which were, at first, haute couture. The emphasis on clothing created a "buy me this" attitude that the toy makers love.

This concern over the Bratz is just another phase for parents, such as rock'n roll, Elvis, black motorcycle jackets, horror movies, television, the list is long. Ultimately, what really matters is good adult role models and guidance. Good parenting (guidance) trumps just about everything else.