Dayton Food Blogs are Blowin’ Up

While I was working on our Dayton Blogroll I couldn’t help but notice that out of the blue we have a gajillion Dayton food blogs!  Esrati announced the new Diving Through Dayton blog (as in restaurant dives), but there are actually quite a few – some that have been on the scene for a while and some that just popped up.  Here is what we have discovered so far:

Dayton Dining is brought to you by Lisa Grigsby – former director of the Miami Valley Restaurant Association and expert foodie.  In addition to some fun posts about Dayton restaurants and food in general, she also lists some area Early Bird and Happy Hour specials, as well as various food and drink events happening in the Dayton Region.  Lisa is also a friend of mine and I can attest that she knows about everything there is to know about what is happening in the Dayton restaurant scene.

Dayton’s Diners and Dives was created by Romas Neal who started posting in January of this year with a review of  The 4200 Place in Moraine.  As the title suggests, Romas will be reviewing the Dayton Region’s greasy spoons as well as posting menus from the places he visits.  There are only a couple reveiws so far, and unfortunately he did not appear to like one of our favorites – The Brunch Club.  But we’ll continue to keep an eye on this one, as this region is probably full of fantastic yet unknown diners and dives.  A tip for Romas – try Tanks for breakfast!

Dining in Dayton started this past December by “Mr. D” and has a wide range of restaurants reviewed – from popular independents like the Meadowlark and Dublin Pub to chains like J. Alexanders to some lesser-known spots like George’s Place and Slyder’s Tavern.  He has quite a few posts in the short time the site has been up, and let’s hope he continues the pace.

Diving Through Dayton is a fun new addition to the Dayton food blogosphere.  Created by somebody who goes by the name “The Goat’s Stomach”, you can probably assume this is a guy who likes to eat.  He started his reviews with one of our favorites – Terra Cotta Cafe, and has a funny post about Wah-Fu.  I wouldn’t call Terra Cotta Cafe and Flavors (in Centerville) “dives” though so perhaps this will include all types of restaurants.  The site could use some different formatting and pictures, but the posts have personality – which is more important anyway.  We’ll be looking forward to more posts, and we hope he continues the humor.

We round out the list with the Dayton Daily News multiple offerings.  First up is our favorite in the DDN line-up:  The Leadbelly Boys!  Brother Ron (Rollins)  is another friend of ours and along with Brother Ray and Brother Jim these guys have been doing fun restaurant reviews in Dayton for quite a while now.  If you want info on pizza, burgers and chili then these are the experts to read.  Next are two different blogs from DDN’s Mark Fisher – Taste: Dayton Food & Restaurants and Uncorked.  Taste is not so much a review site as it is a information site about Dayton area restaurants and food news in general.  Uncorked is a valuable blog about wine, and it is definitely worth reading if you are a wine connoisseur.  Both are good blogs.  Finally, the DDN’s ActiveDayton.com has a restaurant review section that also includes pictures and standard info on each restaurant covered.  It looks like anybody can sign up to be a reviewer but it doesn’t appear that they get much action there.  Probably because anybody who wants to write restaurant reviews simply starts their own blog – hence the creation of this post.

Finally – a plug for our own DMM Forum – Food & Drink section where several of our over 300 members have been talking about various restaurants and other food news in Dayton.  At the time of this post we have over 60 topic threads with over 450 posts.

If you know of any additional Dayton food blogs then please share them here and we’ll add them to our blogroll.  Until then, get out there and enjoy some of the great food Dayton has to offer.  And if you want to know one of our personal favorites then check out Taqueria Mixteca – when it comes to Mexican, there is nothing else that compares.  Buena Comida!

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