Avocado is toast....brussels, bye bye....hello, hot honey!

If you had told me that those little hateful, smelly green vegetables that get ignored in most grocery stores would wind up not only being one of my most favorite vegetables, but be available and featured in what seems like EVERY restaurant here in Delaware, I would have lost a bet. Thanks to Kourtney Kardashian and her obsession with avocado toast, it started popping up not only on breakfast menus, but brunch, lunch, and appetizer lists as well. So simple. A smear of fresh avocado, a drizzle of olive oil, salt, pepper, and served on (normally) oat or a healthy grain bread option. Restaurants got creative with this simple concept. Personally, my favorite toast concoction is from Nectar Cafe and Juice Bar, located in Lewes, Delaware. Their go-to toast option features sliced avocado, a sweet roasted red pepper sauce, grape tomatoes (hold mine), feta, alfalfa sprouts, and a simple poached egg, all on top of multigrain toast, and served with a side of sweet potato hash (which itself, is another winner at this establishment). Now that the avocado craze has settled, Brussel sprouts took over and we have seen them in every way, shape, size, flavor, and more! Brussel sprouts are one of those foods I avoided my entire childhood and up until four years ago, I refused to even acknowledge. However, thanks to Mogan's Oyster House, in Salisbury, Maryland, their thai chili glazed brussels, tossed with a bit of sesame seeds, had me HOOKED. Obsessed. I have taken friends to Mogan's just for these little green bites of magic, and ok, their other food is pretty incredible too. But you catch my drift. Thanks to Mogan's, I have eaten my fair share of Brussels up and down this state over the past four years, and well, for me, it's a tie between Mogan's and my friends over at Stingray, in Rehoboth Beach, who are serving their sprouts CRISPY, charred, with a bit of a sweet sesame oil and pork belly. The salt from the pork belly along with the charred bites, is pure heaven, and again, a MUST when you visit Stingray. Ok, where was I? Oh right...so what's the new craze? The new Brussels? Hot. Honey. Honey honey chicken fingers. Hot honey mozzerella sticks. Hot honey drizzled on ANYTHING and everything. It's so versatile and can be used in pretty much any recipe or kitchen! But what is hot honey? It's simply honey infused with chilies or red pepper flakes. We tried three of the most popular hot honey products on the market, and well, Mike's Original Hot Honey was the winner. We started seeing hot honey hitting the local menus, including Big Fish Grill (Rehoboth Beach) last October, who were serving up hot honey pimento crostinis, which were made of smoked gouda, pimentos, tasso ham, and a hot honey drizzle! We asked for you to nominate your favorite hot honey featured menu items here in Delaware, and the winner clearly was the Southern Fried Chicken Parm from Benny's Big Time Pizzeria in Wilmington, Delaware. Their spin on a chicken parm features hot honey, stracciatella, and perfectly, mouth-watering pickled peppers.

So tell us....what's your favorite hot honey food right now? Check out the runner-up in our poll, Sirocco Food and Drink in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, who's Chicken and Waffles made the cut, with their hand breaded chicken breast, homemade waffles, and a hot honey maple syrup.