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"A thing of beauty is a joy forever..." It's what we tell ourselves during the 49 weeks of the year when there are no garlic scapes.

Yesterday marked the beginning of the best three weeks of the year, if you happen to be a garlic junkie (like, um, Gut Check). Garlic scapes, the bright green, curly offshoots of garlic bulbs, made their first appearance at the Maplewood Farmers' Market (7260 Southwest Avenue, Maplewood; 314-241-2337). You should be able to find them at the other markets, too. They're cute, they're tasty, what more do you need to know? How to cook them?

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Kholood Eid

Taco Bell's Doritos Locos Tacos

​Earlier this month Gut Check caught wind that Taco Bell was launching its classic signature tacos with a new twist: Doritos-flavored shells. First thought we had upon hearing this news?

There is a God.

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Ian Froeb

Barbacoa tacos (and a carnitas taco in back) at Tienda El Ranchito

Tienda El Ranchito (2565 North 32nd Street, Fairmont City, Illinois; 618-875-1521) is by no means a secret. This here publication honored it last year as having the "Best Guacamole" -- and it's damn good guacamole.

Still, this Metro East grocery store and restaurant doesn't get as much attention as the taquerias on Cherokee Street or by the airport. It's time to change that.

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Brenna Haysom is every mother's dream: She had a Harvard degree and a lucrative job in finance -- which she then quit to develop, with no pharmaceutical background whatsoever, an over-the-counter hangover remedy called Blowfish.

Gut Check was fortunate enough to receive a sample of Blowfish, and we risked life, limb and liver to see if it's the morning-after cure (er, the other kind of morning-after cure, we mean) it purports to be.

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Chrissy Wilmes

We'd originally taken this photo for our soup countdown, but we ran out of space on the list due to the high volume of awesome soups in St. Louis. We still want to acknowledge this deserving dish, so guess where we ate it, and we'll reveal its identity and give you a prize pack full of coupons and gift certificates.

Rules: To be eligible, you must leave a valid e-mail address (or Twitter handle or Facebook profile URL) in the comment-entry field. One guess per e-mail address. Employees of the restaurant in question and Riverfront Times are not eligible.

Update: Congrats to commenter Jeff, who correctly guessed our soup came from Lemongrass.

Want more opportunities to win free swag? Subscribe to Tip of the Tongue, the Riverfront Times' food newsletter.

January is National Soup Month, which makes sense, considering the first month of the year is typically marked with below-freezing temperatures, snow and slush. What's better than a delicious, hot bowl of soup on a chilly day? A delicious, hot bowl of soup that you don't have to make -- that's what. This January Gut Check will revisit some of our favorite hot soups to help guide your belly through this month-long soup celebration.

Stephanie Tolle

When you need a soup that will put hair on your chest, you need menudo. The traditional Mexican tripe soup is hearty, earthy and, to many Americans, kinda scary. Tripe is cow's stomach -- in menudo's case, the fatty lining of the second stomach. (A cow has four!) The flavor of tripe is difficult to describe, but it has a very subtle earthiness to it, and a bit of a tang. The texture is what frightens people: that chewy, slightly rubbery, slimy texture that Americans don't want in their meat. In Mexico, however, menudo is a breakfast favorite, said to do wonders for hangovers.

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January is National Soup Month, which makes sense, considering the first month of the year is typically marked with below-freezing temperatures, snow and slush. What's better than a delicious, hot bowl of soup on a chilly day? A delicious, hot bowl of soup that you don't have to make -- that's what. This January Gut Check will revisit some of our favorite hot soups to help guide your belly through this month-long soup celebration.

Erika Miller

On too many occasions, beef stew means a thick mixture of beef chunks and soggy vegetables. Not so at Bahn Mi So #1 - Saigon Gourmet (4071 South Grand Boulevard; 314-353-0545), where hu tieu bo kho, a Vietnamese version of beef stew, is light, flavorful and fragrant.

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Ian Froeb

"The Crab Cake" at Bricktop's

When I went to bed last night, several hours after my hometown Baltimore Ravens' agonizing loss in the AFC Championship Game, I didn't feel too bad. Wine, Tater Tots (my comfort-food guilty pleasure) and a couple of episodes of Archer had helped to dull the pain.

When I woke up this morning, I felt once again like I'd been punched in the gut. Since I couldn't mourn collectively with my fellow Baltimoreans, I decided to seek out a taste -- however fleeting -- of home.

If, you know, I could also visit a new restaurant that I needed to try anyway, that would be ideal.

Which is how I ended up at BrickTop's (1701 South Lindbergh Boulevard, Frontenac; 314-567-3600), the two-month-old restaurant at Plaza Frontenac, eating a crab cake.

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January is National Soup Month, which makes sense, considering the first month of the year is typically marked with below-freezing temperatures, snow and slush. What's better than a delicious, hot bowl of soup on a chilly day? A delicious, hot bowl of soup that you don't have to make -- that's what. This January Gut Check will revisit some of our favorite hot soups to help guide your belly through this month-long soup celebration.

Erika Miller

When the weather in St. Louis turns cold (relatively cold, at least) and the Super Bowl is right around the corner, vats of chili thick with meat, beans and other trimmings are at the height of their popularity. For those looking for a spin on this seasonal classic, try the duck and smoked jalapeno chili at The Shaved Duck (2900 Virginia Avenue; 314-776-1407).

Creamy and smoky, this bowl is laden with melt-in-your-mouth bits of the restaurant's namesake. The duck provides enough meat to satisfy any carnivore, and the smooth texture of the meat and broth is offset by firm bits of bean and tender smoked jalapenos.

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January is National Soup Month, which makes sense, considering the first month of the year is typically marked with below-freezing temperatures, snow and slush. What's better than a delicious, hot bowl of soup on a chilly day? A delicious, hot bowl of soup that you don't have to make -- that's what. This January Gut Check will revisit some of our favorite hot soups to help guide your belly through this month-long soup celebration.

Mabel Suen

For those particularly unforgiving windy winter nights, nothing hits the spot quite like a big bowl of hearty, spicy stew. The mulligatawny stew at Shameless Grounds (2650 Sidney Street; 314-773-9900), for instance, provides enough sustenance to subsist as a meal on its own.

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