No. 14: onion rings from Fiorella’s Jack Stack Barbecue

To whet your appetite for The Pitch’s annual Best of Kansas City issue, we’re counting down our favorite Top 50 dishes each weekday until October 7.

A certain iconic burger joint in Kansas City makes the town’s worst onions rings: stringy onion circles covered in a crumbly, oily crust, the kind clearly deep-fried in old grease (the tell-tale sign is the dark mahogany color of the ring and a slightly scorched aroma.

Eating one of these third-rate creations only makes die-hard onion-ring fans appreciate even more the finest fried allium cepa to be found in the metro: the beautiful golden bangles stacked on a copper dowel (yes, it’s a very phallic presentation) served at one of the four Fiorella’s Jack Stack Barbecue locations.