3rd place in Derby #114: Cooking, with 783 votes!

As this reviewer was seated at Bymar’s, the newest potionerie to join the Nether Side’s hopping enchanted-cuisine scene, I could tell I was in for something memorable. Whether those memories would be good or bad was, at that point, an open question. An ambience best described as “accursed Applebee’s” didn’t do much for the appetite, and I could only hope that those creatures flitting through the shadows were mere mortal cockroaches.

But those quibbles were happily put to rest with the arrival of the house specialty, the Dangerous Concoction. The vivid color of underripe quince, or the ectoplasm of a morally ambiguous ghost, this steaming pot of Ba’al-knows-what was just the thing to chase away the gloom of a dread autumn night – and replace it with an even deeper, more delicious gloom. Tendrils of eldritch spirit-flame strained to take on corporeal life while well-considered notes of dill and henbane kept things interesting. If the servers can remember that water glasses need refilling every once in a while – or if the management invests in some magical ever-replenishing glasses – Bymar’s could have a future as bright as the Dangerous Concoction’s supernatural glow.

But whatever you do, don’t try the frog’s legs. I did, and was repulsed to discover midway through that they used to belong to a guy I went to high school with.

Wear this shirt: if you have that bumper sticker that says MY OTHER CAR IS A BROOM.

Don’t wear this shirt: if you’re just going to spill eye of newt all over it.

This shirt tells the world: “I eat demons like you for breakfast.”

We call this color: Bubble, Bubble, Toil And Black.

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