Allyson's Kitchen Sandwiches Now in Bend Oregon

Who doesn't like a good sandwich in this country? Sid's favorite meal is the sandwich, followed closely by the burger, followed by the steak, then the fish sandwich, then the shish kebab (or souvlaki will do nicely), and from there anything goes. Working primarily out of Ashland, OR, which has gotten itself some kind of reputation for being a culinary town, you'd think there would be a plethora of lunch opportunities - but the best is hard to find. Ashland has plenty of over-priced food available, so for the locals, brown-baggin' it has generally been the way to go. However, there is a moderate priced and easy to please soup & sandwich hot spot - Allyson's Kitchen.



Allyson's Kitchen is a gourmet foods and kitchenwares store at 115 East Main St., and has featured a gourmet sandwich deli for over 6 years now. Just recently, Feb. of 2008, Allyson's Kitchen opened a new store in Bend at 375 Powerhouse Drive in the Old Mill District. Every morning they make two fresh soups, which have a reputation for being some of the best soups in town. Favorites of Sid's include the Tom Ka Gai, followed closely by Chicken Tortilla. But what good is a delicious bowl of soup without a tasty sandwich to dip in it?

Allyson's Gourmet Deli has a simple, yet flavorful lunch menu with most of their sandwiches named to accompany the Tony Award Winning Shakespeare Festival that draws much of the tourism to Ashland.

Sids top picks are:
Brutus - A toasted Bacon (oh so thick & smoky!), Lettuce, Tomato on Ciabatta Roll

Thesius - Two Italian Salamis and Mortadella with Balsamic Vinegar and Olive Oil on Ciabatta

The Gourmet BLT from Allyson's has an uncanny ability to please pork connoisseurs and those who like their bacon crispy <shudder> alike. How do they do this? Well, the bacon is thick enough that they can slow cook it all the way through to please those munchers who are still worried of the first trichinosis outbreak in 80 years, but without killing the wonderful flavor of pig for those of us who do enjoy it. Often an early morning stop into Allyson's Kitchen will greet you with the scent of bacon sizzling away, and begin the Pavlovian drooling that will lead you to an unforgettable lunch.


This day, I had a special request for a Titus on Ciabatta, with Cheddar Cheese and Bacon added. And a cup of soup, can't remember what kind exactly, but it was good. Sid always gets soup. The sandwich was awesome. Sid stuffed the first half away in between about 3 or 4 gasps for air, then took a minute to give the second half of this Mid-Afternoon Delight a dip in some hot creamy carrot madness. Oh, it was good. It's always a toss-up between getting the bowl of soup, or the cup of soup. With a full bowl, you can dip the fattest sandwich, like a Cornwall (Corned Beef & Saurkrout), without much spillage, while a cup of soup will have to be drained a slurp or two to fit your sammie. You can see by one of the images, the overflow danger level of dipping too early.

By and large, the flavors of smoked turkey with melted cheddar cheese were deftly accented by the red onion and smoky bacon. The Ciabatta roll is the better sandwich bread for dipping, and also a nice sandwich bread all around because The Ciabatta is sturdy, grips well and dips well, and it has a nice texture.

The Creamy Carrot Soup was good and thick, to let you know that Allyson's roasts their veggies and purees the fruits to a hearty and hunger satisfying rich consistency. This soup was good. And here's where the advantage of the cup comes in. After finishing the last bite of sandwich, a satisfying pull on the coffee cup drains the rest of the of creamy soup, and Sid slowly sits back with a sigh, a smile, and root beer or one of their select microbrews.



If you're ever in the Downtown Ashland, OR area, or in the Old Mill District of Bend Oregon, a lunch stop into Allyson's Kitchen will not disappoint.

The Illustrated Sandwich Independent Short Show

: :UPDATE: :
Short Show Episode 1: Chick School can be viewed here.
Short Show Episode 2: The Streeper Show can be viewed here.

: :ORIGINAL POST: :
The Independent Short Show is a locally produced TV show made exclusively for the community of Southern Oregon, featuring local settings and familiar faces from the community of Ashland, OR. The first episode, "Chick School" airs Saturday March 8, 2008 at 11pm on RVTV Channel 15 on your television set. This first episode stars Brian LeBlanc, Dayvin Turchiano, Greg Hartley, and features Austin VanCampen and Levi Anderson.

The second episode, dubbed "The Streeper Episode" will air Saturday March 15.

Episode three, "The Shorts Support Group" will air Saturday March 22.

I can't remember which episode airs fourth on Saturday March 29.

The Independent Short Show goes into syndication with 6 episodes (2 new) already in the can for the Spring Season line-up on RVTV, so beginning Saturday April 5, The Illustrated Sandwich Independent Short Show begins again at 11pm.

With a little help from some financial godsend, the team may even shoot more episodes to fill up all 12 weeks of the Spring Season. Send your support by going to illustratedsandwich.com and clicking on the contact link. Tell Laney you want to give her money, and we'll go from there.

Peace out for now. Tune into RVTV channel 15 at 11pm on Saturday Nights
(after Iron Mike's Metal Video)
For the Illustrated Sandwich Independent Short Show.

MPEG Streamclip

I use the MPEG Streamclip software a lot, generally for ripping the media back off of DVDs I've already published to compile them onto a Collection Disc, or Re-Compress them for web to utilize new codecs. The fact that MPEG Streamclip is freeware is just even better.
- Levi Anderson

From Squared 5 - MPEG Streamclip lets you play and edit QuickTime, DV, AVI, MPEG-4, MPEG-1; MPEG-2 or VOB files or transport streams with MPEG, PCM, or AC3 audio (MPEG-2 playback component required); DivX (with DivX 6) and WMV (with Flip4Mac WMV Player). MPEG Streamclip can export all these formats to QuickTime, DV/DV50, AVI/DivX and MPEG-4 with high quality encoding and even uncompressed or HD video.

{For Mac}

{For PC}

Video conversion is performed in the YUV color space; you can choose to scale video to any frame size using a professional 2D-FIR scaler (better than bicubic) but you can also leave it unscaled. Other optional video processing features include a powerful motion-adaptive deinterlacer, a field dominance converter, a chroma reinterlacer and an option to perform interlaced scaling instead of progressive scaling. Audio can be converted to uncompressed or to IMA, AAC, MP2 or AMR using the high-quality MP1/MP2/AC3/PCM built-in decoders of MPEG Streamclip; it is also kept in perfect sync with video using a timekeeping system.

MPEG Streamclip can save edited movies as MOV files, and (when possible) as AVI or MP4 files. Edited MPEG-1 or MPEG-2 files are saved as MPEG or TS files.

MPEG Streamclip (with or without the MPEG-2 Playback Component) can also convert MPEG-2 transport streams into muxed MPEG-2 files, for immediate burning at full quality with Toast 6 or 7 and Sizzle; it can also demux MPEG-1 and MPEG-2 files and transport streams with MPEG, AC3, PCM audio to M2V and AIFF (or M1A or AC3) files, for immediate burning at full quality with DVD Studio Pro or Toast 6 and 7. A special demuxing option is available for Final Cut Pro 4/5: this application does not work well with M2V files, but MPEG Streamclip can write a special "unscaled" M2V file that preserves full video quality when imported into Final Cut Pro.

MPEG Streamclip can handle files and streams larger than 4 GB, split in any number of segments, or with multiple audio tracks, and can also optionally handle timecode breaks. It is compatible with MPEG-1 and MPEG-2 video, MPEG layer 1/2 (MP1/MP2) audio, AC3/A52 audio, and PCM audio.

The player included in MPEG Streamclip lets you preview the files and transport streams before doing the conversion; it also lets you visually set the In and Out points for the conversion so you can convert just the part of the file you are interested in, and also cut commercials and other unwanted parts, or edit the stream and join two streams with Cut/Copy/Paste.

MPEG Streamclip supports batch processing: just drag some files in the batch list, choose a conversion and a folder, click the Go button and MPEG Streamclip will automatically convert all your files.

Allyson's Kitchen Video Contest

SidFilmz just produced a short contest video for Allyson's Kitchen showcasing an It's All Greek Demonstration Cooking Class. The video is for a contest hosted by Bertolli to win an opportunity to co-host a cooking show with Rocco DiSpirito. The contest ends Oct. 31, so we need your help voting now to boost Allyson's Ratings. Click here to Vote on Allyson's Video, and watch a teaser video to the right.
SidFilmz is currently editing together the recipes that you see featured in this teaser video here. Visit Allyson's Blog for more updates, and to see the new videos once they are posted. And don't forget to vote for Allyson's Contest Video here.
Preview of Allyson's Blog

Paella Party

The beauty of Paella is that you can cook it for an intimate dinner, or expand the quantities to feed a crowd. Paella is a short grain rice-based dish with many variations, from vegetarian versions, to those that include smoked sausages, chicken, and shell fish. The dish is said to have originated in the areas of Valencia and Levante, Spain’s eastern coastal plain where much of the country’s rice is grown.
Paella is cooked in a wide, flat, round pan that starts on the stove and can be finished in the oven. Saffron is one the signature ingredients included in many of the traditional recipes. When prepared correctly, the bottom layer and outer edges of the rice offer up caramelized, lightly crunchy, golden morsels, while the center of the dish is moist and complex.
Most of the preparation for this Spanish feast can easily be done in advance. The tapas require simply assembly, the ingredients for the Paella can all be prepared a day in advance, and the cake can be made up to two days before. And although I know the food will be fabulous, I also know the truly memorable part of the evening will be spending time with our dear friends.
Click here to read more

Single Mom Sued by RIAA

OCT 2007 - The RIAA won their first trial by jury of yet another single mom, this one a native american no less, for $220,000 over illegally sharing (or providing to be shared) 24 songs.

That's over $9,000 a song.

None of them were even any good. These are the songs that you get on the $5 CDs at Freddies, WallyWorld, and gas stations. Shit like Guns 'n Roses, old Janet Jackson, and Journey. In my opinion these songs are all worthless. Nearly every one is played insestantly on the lamest radio stations that fuel most middle class work-days and restaurant kitchens.

What makes this outrageous is that for the jury of peers, this was close to the least amount the woman could have been charged, if they were to convict her guilty - which they did. The record companies could have got a couple million for these outdated tracks, rather than just take their time to create some new and original content for their neglected market.

For the RIAA, the issue is clear-cut. Jammie Thomas, a single mother living in Brainerd, Minnesota, was the Charter subscriber associated with the IP address 24.179.199.117 on February 21, 2005, which is when SafeNet discovered tereastarr@KaZaA logged onto KaZaA with over 1,700 recordings in a shared folder. According to the RIAA, Thomas has used the "tereastarr" nickname online for "many years," leading them to believe that she was indeed responsible for "distributing" the recordings.

- arstechnica

*The RIAA was represented by Capitol Records, Sony BMG, Arista Records, Interscope Records, Warner Bros. Records and UMG Recordings

The Killer Valley Horror Film Festival

The Killer Valley Horror Film Festival festival will be hosted Sunday, Bloody Sunday on October 14, 2007. It will be at Vibes Main 1 in Medford, starting at 2pm. Admission is 10 dollars, 6 if you wear a costume. You also get to be in the Costume Contest to compete for prizes. This festival is in its first year, and will feature indy films of the scary movie, horror film genre. For more information, contact Randy Granstrom, of Rogue Productions or visit KillerValleyHorrorFilmFestival.com.

Killer Valley Films, a local indy motion picture production group in the Rogue Valley is showcasing their short indy, "RISE" at the Killer Valley Horror Film Festival.

Films screening include "Dead Girls," "Play With Me," and "Taking Sides". It is highly likely that Nealham's "The Button Pusher" or "Remote Control Optional" will also showcase at KVHFF.

The event is sponsored by SidFilmz, Rogue Productions, and Noxious Trinity among others.

SidVideoz Return

After the last year of working for other folks and building up their websites, Sid has decided on a new website structure for Sid's own SidFilmz.com. Next Sid begun the task of updating all our old vids from QuickTime format to the more widely excepted Flash Video format. With the help of an awesome MultiChannel video player from the folks at EarthScienceAgency, you can now view the crappy old classic college humor guerilla videos that made Sid a sensation. -- Or, whatever that was that it made Sid into.

As a little extra hype for the guys at ESA, they make a lot of other way cool stuff, too. Sid found them somehow by chance, and was always trying to develop flash video & mp3 player models based off of theirs, but eventually just gave in and bought their Advanced FLV Video Pack.

Anyways, now you can check out Go Time, Good Sex - Bad Sex 2, and the old There Beer Commercial are up again, too.

Coming Soon: Full Length downloads of The Partisan (available via this secret link - but the chapter links aren't working yet) and I Kappa Foo 1 & 2.