Inqlings: A twist on bakin' cheeseburgers

Being a "fat kid growing up in Philadelphia," says Matt Levin, "I've always loved Tastykake."

Levin, chef-owner of Adsum, a bar-restaurant in Queen Village, was distressed to hear of the bakery's financial woe. "They were once a small business. I'm a small business. I should try to do something to help them out," he said.

And then things got messy.

He is serving Kandy Kake Sliders - burgers made of ground brisket topped with American cheese and a mixture of Sriracha hot sauce and sour-cherry jam and sandwiched between Peanut Butter Kandy Kakes. You got your sweet, you got your salty, you got your sour, you got your bitter. You got your myocardial infarction. Two for 11 bucks. He says he is socking away $1 from each sale and plans to donate the money to the company.

The recipe followed much trial and error with snack cakes. One attempt, pairing Jelly Krimpets and hot dogs, was an abject failure. "I was using [the Krimpets] as a bun, and I couldn't get it to stay. It kept falling out the backside."

Informed of this new application of the Kandy Kake, Tasty Baking's Jon Silvon e-mailed: "WOW."

A wedding is actually better with only a week's notice, says Justin Greenhow, 27, of Paoli. He and fiancee Rebecca Hess, 24, of Moorestown, learned Feb. 4 that they had won a ceremony officiated by WYSP's Danny Bonaduce, who is ordained in the Universal Life Church. "We don't even have time to argue about anything," says Greenhow, who is in medical sales.

After their engagement in December, he and Hess, a speech therapist, discussed a courthouse marriage before his deployment to Afghanistan with his Air National Guard squadron. But Greenhow took a shot at the contest, which had couples answering questions on the air, á la The Newlywed Game. The reception for 200 people was Friday at White Clay Creek Country Club at Delaware Park casino near Wilmington. The couple will take a honeymoon (a Caribbean cruise with Bonaduce and his wife, Amy) after Greenhow returns from overseas.

Shady cabanas, cool margaritas, and hot bikinis by I-95? Developer Bart Blatstein is making good on his long-promised plan to open a private swim club across the street from his Piazza at Schmidts in Northern Liberties. Event planner/public relations exec Nicole A. Cashman is his partner in Arrow Swim Club, at Allen Street and Germantown Avenue, which, starting in May, will be the only private, 21-and-older swim club in the inner city. They plan to sell $1,000-a-year memberships, limited to 1,000 people. (Guests will be allowed at $30 to $50 a pop.) Amenities will include a 41/2-foot-deep pool; private cabanas equipped with cable, PlayStation, and Blu-ray players; hammocks; table tennis; a fire-pit lounge; DJs; and a public bar-restaurant called Chenango. "Bohemian chic" is the aesthetic, says Cashman, who says they will keep the facade of the building, which used to house the Arrow Screw Co.

The Mid-Atlantic Emmys are moving up with the times. A category - video journalist - has been created for the work of the "one-man bands" who shoot, produce, and edit their own stories. Video journalists are found at some TV stations, but mostly work for news sites. This year's nominees, to be announced in August, also will include four categories open to the work of college students.

The Amazing Race host Phil Keoghan on Sunday night will host a screening of his movie The Ride (about his cross-country bike trek, to benefit the National MS Society) at the UA King of Prussia. At noon Monday, he will join Pat Ciarrocchi and Ukee Washington on CBS3's Talk Philly to talk about next Sunday's Amazing Race premiere.

Q102's "Pale for Paradise" contest - which has asked listeners to send in photos of their wintry pallor, with the winner being sent to sunny Miami - irked Q102 fan Austin Mosby. The 21-year-old Temple criminal-justice grad wrote to complain that the contest seems designed to exclude people of color, as he identifies himself as an African American man. As a station rep pointed out to me, the fine print says otherwise. The rules, which are not displayed online with the entry photos, state that the winner will be chosen at random. Deadline is 11:59 p.m. Monday.

Chip Roman (Blackfish) and Brad Spence (Amis), two of the region's brightest young chefs, will go knife to knife at WHYY studios on May 11. "Ultimate Chef," as it is billed, is a benefit for the Center for Culinary Enterprises, a $5.1 million project created by the Enterprise Center and designed to bring jobs, training, and fresh food to Philadelphia. Michael Solomonov (Zahav) will be commentator, and Rob Wasserman (Rouge, 500 Degrees), Jennifer Carroll (10 Arts), and Emilio Mignucci (DiBruno Bros.) will judge. A five-course dinner follows, at $500 a pop; info: www.philafood.org/ultimatechef

Philly's Elizabeth LaBan has sold her young-adult novel, Blind Love, to Knopf. The book, about a love triangle in an Upstate New York boarding school, is the first novel sale for LaBan, wife of Inquirer restaurant critic Craig LaBan.

Doylestown's Justin Guarini has recovered from his departure from the show Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown, his short-lived Broadway debut. He will be one of three new leads down the street in American Idiot, the rock musical based on the Green Day album. He starts March 1.