As seen with Dave, Mark and K K on St. Mark's:

The Col-Pop: emerging technology from South Korean fried chicken chain BBQ Chicken. Popcorn chicken rides up top; cola chills out below.

Proving yet again that South Korea is light years ahead of everyone else in fast-food technology is The Col-Pop. The nation that brought the world the spiral-cut potato on a stick and hot-dog-stuffed pizza ushers in a new era of snack portability with this mashup of drink cup and food container that holds popcorn chicken up top and a cold drink in the bottom.

The Col-Pop is the brainchild of BBQ Chicken, a South Korea–based fried chicken chain that has recently set its sights on worldwide chicken domination (though at this time, it only has locations in New York, New Jersey, and North Carolina). From the looks of this container, on-the-go America will certainly eat it up. It's perfect for handy snacking while walking, driving, talking on the phone, or—as we discovered the other day—blogging.

And the genius doesn't stop at popcorn chicken. In South Korea, sister company BHC Chicken also offers spaghetti, french fries, and fried mozzarella balls in Col-Pop containers. The Col-Pops we inspected come in two sizes: small (20 ounce cup) and large (32 ounce).

And if you don't think that's bad enough -- watch out for "Pizza In A Cone!"

This article appeared in the KC Star on January 6th: "You don't know how much this hurts, ladies and gents.

I've been dying to try one of these damn pizza cones since I first heard about them in April of 2004. Yeah, you read that right. 2004, people. And whenever this pizza-cone meme would resurface on Boing Boing or somewhere else, kind readers would send it to me—"OMG! Have you seen this cone pizza?!?" Of course, yes, I had, so their emails were only torturous reminders that I couldn't get one of these in New York City.

And now, my mom emails me, basically telling me that one of my white whales of pizza, one of my holy grails of pizza, one of my long sought-after food items, had been just a 20-minute drive away—at Oak Park Mall in Overland Park, Kansas—the whole time I was in the KC metro area for Christmas.

Not only that, but the article in the photo here tells us that this is the first U.S. branch of Kornet Pizza. Would you look at that—and in the very mall I used to rat around as a teen-ager.

And to think I didn't stop by the mall this year for a slice at Original Pizza, as I had planned. I'm sure I would have run into Kornet there as well.

Aarrgh!

This is the first time I've been jealous of Kansas City when it comes to pizza.

And, yes, Mom: I got the pictures.
Kornet Pizza

Address: In the food court of Oak Park Mall, 11519 West 95th Street,
Overland Park KS 66214"

Listen to today's song, The Meatmen - Fast Food Fist Fuck (Portions of today's blog were ganked from http://www.seriouseats.com)

---

In other travel news, it was Dave and Mark's turn to travel to New York and hang with me last weekend! We went to Lucky Cheng's drag cabaret show and dinner "theatre" on Friday night, over to the Orchid Show at the New York Botanical Garden on Saturday morning. A walk through parts of Central Park, followed by dinner at Spice and then grand entertainment at Fuerzabruta!

Following all of this, we snacked on Chocolate Bread Pudding from the New York Dessert Truck!, went to several clubs and bars, including the Boiler Room (East Village) and Uncle Charlie's (Piano Bar).

Obviously, we had a very full weekend -- but wait! There's more!!!

On Sunday, Dave and Mark's last day in NYC, we went to the world-famous Popover Café on Amsterdam Ave & 86th St and another trek across Central Park back to my place to collect their bags and rush to home...

PHEW! It's been quite a weekend... and I left some things out!