I don’t know what it is about December, but even the most reclusive of curmudgeons end up throwing a party. As it is, I’ve got something going on the Friday, Saturday, and Sunday of every weekend leading up to Christmas. I know, boo effing hoo. J and I have sensibly decided to sit December out for entertaining and let those with saner heads than we host events. However, I am not so out of the holiday party loop that I can’t bring the perfect cocktail party snack to a gathering – my version of the Union Square mixed nuts. This is the perfect party food. It allows guests to just nibble and converse. No balancing of plates and no utensils involved. I love the aromatic spiciness of it. This mixed nuts recipe has been around the block. Both Ina Garten and Nigella Lawson have their versions. I based mine on Nigella’s, but went crazy with different flavors. The core of the mixed nuts is the brown sugar and rosemary. On that, you cannot compromise.
So get about six cups of a variety of nuts. I usually do a mixture of cashews, almonds, and Brazil nuts. And to save money, buy them in bulk. Both Whole Foods and Yes Natural Market have bulk nuts (oooh dirty). Roast the nuts at 350 degrees for about ten minutes until they are slightly browned around the edges. In a bowl combine 1 tablespoon brown sugar, 1 teaspoon of salt, 1 tablespoon finely chopped rosemary, a pinch of cayenne pepper (to taste) and two pinches of paprika. Mush it together with your fingers so that everything is well distributed. In a large wok under low heat, melt a tablespoon of butter and a teaspoon of sesame oil. Add the brown sugar mixture and stir until the brown sugar and butter are combined. Add the roasted nuts and toss as if you are tossing a salad. Make sure that every nut is slick with the buttery sweetness of the brown sugar and butter. As a final touch, add a tablespoon of maple syrup and toss some more. When everything has been coated with the butter-maple syrup-brown sugar turn off heat and pour into bowls for serving.
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29Nov
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25Nov
“Put a shrimp on the Barbie” has somehow become the quintessential American phrase to describe Australia. Which makes no sense at all. First of all, Australians mimic their mother country in using the word ‘prawn’ to describe those crunchy crustaceans. And second of all, it’s impossible to imagine an Australian eating anything but fried potatoes covered in sweet chili sauce, or reheated, plastic-wrapped meat pies. Oh, and really really mediocre and expensive fusion.
Alright, that’s not true, every once in a while there’s a food gem. But in general it’s back to hunter/gatherer basics as Australians desperately try to ward off scurvy.
With one huge exception. Hobart, capital of Tasmania is possibly the best place in the world to eat fish. And to prove it, this one-time penal colony fronts a ridiculous number of restaurants for such a small population.
Every single fishing pier is covered with fish restaurants: fancy restaurants, fresh fish and chipperies, a sushi bar, fish markets, and barges tied up to the sides of the docks selling, yes, more fish and chips. Even restaurants not lucky enough to own waterside space tout curried scallop pies, huge fish menus, yet more fish and chips, and signs boasting their own private suppliers.
Here, as in all of Australia, the trick is to stay simple. All snobbiness aside, anything more complicated than frying or boiling seems to confound most Australian chefs. The open scallops and poached blue-eye at the swank behemoth Mures Upper Deck, are fantastically unmemorable, but the fish and chips at Fish Frenzy on Elizabeth Street Pier are perfect: hot and slippery and crunchy; covered in fresh beer batter or crumbed (which apparently means ‘covered in crumbs’).
The locals seem to know which is freshest among the barges at Constitution dock, so I suggest going for wherever the lines are longest. Flippers has some sexy crumbed Travelly and battered blue eye, while the barge second to the end has crumbled everything, chips covered in a buttery curry sauce, and Cadbury ice cream delivered fresh from the factory just outside of town.
Steer clear of anyone selling ‘shrimp’; they’re definitely not Australian. -
24Nov
Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!
As my friends are probably tired of hearing, I think of Thanksgiving as a sortof gateway between the season of guilt (beginning with Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur) into a season of unfettered greed, crass commercialism, and selfishness: the winter Holidays. You see, after Thanksgiving comes what a good friend calls Black Friday, which is the biggest shopping day of the year in the US, when retailers can best count on getting in to the black. And then there are all the historical fallacies and political nightmares surrounding this holiday.
When you come right down to it though, Thanksgiving is about food. Every family has its own traditions, its own recipes – some secret, some not – and its own idiosyncrasies. My family gathers, en masse, at the home of whichever relative calls it first – this usually happens around Passover, because whoever hosts doesn’t have to worry about driving home, and gets the best/most leftovers – sits around a big table, drinks too much wine, eats too much…errrr….everything, and talks a bit too much about politics. A true Washington Thanksgiving! -
21Nov
A couple of weeks ago, while planning for the vaguely-infamous Brunch 2.0, I came across Clotilde’s recipe for yogurt scones, which looked both intriguing and easy enough for my measurement-impaired style of baking. You see, I have a very short attention span for following directions to a tee. I think it’s genetic: my great grandmother famously vexed her daughter – my grandmother – by keeping her ‘recipes’ on slips of paper that listed ingredients and quantities mostly unrelated to the way she made things. My grandmother simply doesn’t seem to use recipes, and so on. Consequently, my attempts at baking have a habit of being disastrous. Surprisingly, I thought these scones, based loosely on Clotilde’s, came out pretty tasty.
~1 ¾ cup flour
– Just under 7 tsp white sugar
– Just over 2 tbs. butter, (at room temperature)
– 1 tsp baking powder
– 135 ml plain yogurt, plus three tablespoons later on
– 2 Tbsp milk
– A small handful of chopped dates and ¾ tsp poppy
seeds.
(Yields 8-ish scones.)
– Preheat the oven to 400°F.
– Line a cookie sheet with wax paper, and dust it with flour.
– In a medium bowl, mix the flour, sugar and baking powder.
– Cut in the butter until the whole lot is crumby-looking.
– Add the measured yogurt and milk.
– Mix the dough until it gets doughier, adding the additional yogurt as you go until it has a nice doughy consistency.
(Apparently you’re not supposed to over mix the dough, but since I don’t really know what this means I ignored it.)
– Once the dough is the right consistency, fold in the dates and seeds.
– Fold in a few more dates and poppy seeds, because what you have probably isn’t enough.
– Smoosh dough into a ball and place on floured wax paper, then press it down with your hands (or something more elegant, like a rolling pin, if you must).
– Cut into as many pieces as you like.
– Sprinkle some more seeds and date bits on top of each one (I actually for got to do this, but it would’ve been a good idea).
– Put in the oven for about 15 minutes. Remove from oven – they probably aren’t done yet.
– Panic, but then take the opportunity to brush some melted butter on to them, which you probably should have done in the first place, and put them back in for another 5-10 minutes or so.
– Remove from oven, let cool a bit (but not too much), and serve with strong coffee and mimosas.
If you prefer a more traditional approach to baking, please refer to WRC’s previous recipe and prnounciation guide.
Image shamelessly lifted from NM. -
18Nov
Franco Nuschese, the owner of Georgetown’s possibly-too-chic-for-its-own-good staple, Café Milano, and DuPont’s new-ish Sette Osteria, wanted to leave the city and tackle the less formal suburban market with a more unconventional assortment of Italian fare. Unconventional, that is, for American (and particularly DC) tastes. To promote this new venture, Franco’s friend and AU professor Gemma Puglisi assigned her senior business undergrads to be Sette Bello’s PR machine. Two of her students contacted me (hi Tony and Rob!), and set me up to talk with corporate chef Domenico Cornacchia and later with Franco, who invited me along to try out his new place.
Sette Bello opened in Clarendon this October, to less fanfare than one might expect, but judging from the crowd on its second Thursday of operation, enough fanfare indeed. I had a bit of trouble finding the entrance, which is not actually on Wilson Blvd., but on Highland Street – maybe the suburbs are just too complicated for this city boy. It is more or less directly across the street from the Clarendon Metro, which makes it super-convenient. For the ‘burbs.
The entrance leads to a square foyer, where a cheery hostess and manager Brian Scott greeted me, apologized that Franco was stuck in traffic, and escorted me to the bar. This place is bloody huge. The bar is very pretty, but due to its size and highly styled appearance, feels a bit cold and sterile. Amazingly, it is not as noisy as I’d expect such a cavernous space to be.
I sat at the very pretty bar, and ordered a Sapphire martini, because, well, it’d been a rough day. The martini was served in its own shaker – you shake and pour your own – which is cute, but very messy. Condensation quickly soaked my cocktail napkin, and made pouring the second time more difficult. I drank my martini(s), and ate some tasty olives provided as bar snacks (no peanuts here). The bar staff is lovely; they seem to be having fun. Rumor, however, has it that they may not be.
Franco arrived midway through my cocktail adventures, and instructed a host to bring me over to his table when I’m ready. I finish my drink, pay up – cough$16plustipcough – I expect to pay $8-10 for that drink in Dupont, and Clarendon is ever so not Dupont. Yes, you could call it two martinis, since it certainly filled the glass twice, but I didn’t order – or, frankly, want – two martinis.
Sitting at the bar, I did not partake of Sette Bello’s main gimmick – “Italian Sushi” – which would be better recognized and more appetizing to me if it were just called “crudo” like in normal places, but from what I saw at other tables, it did look really good. Particularly intriguing were the Ostriche con Limon – oysters prettily arranged on a large shell with lemon confit – and the lovely looking Trittico di Salmone – a trio of cured and tartare salmon, with salmon roe and salsa verde. An interesting note is that Franco doesn’t like (Japanese) sushi. Adamantly so, in fact. Crudo is very different than sushi, and it is the kind of food Franco and Domenico remember from their native Italy. Why they needed to use the word ‘sushi,’ when ‘crudo’ would have been crystal clear, is a mystery for the ages. Or the PR department. Either way, I would’ve been happy to try any of it. I just didn’t.
Sette Bello
(703) 351-1004
3101 Wilson Blvd. Arlington, VA 22201 -
18Nov
Of all the cheesy gimmicks a restaurant can come up with, having really really good food isn’t a bad one. Filling this niche is The Ugly Duck Out of Swansea, Tasmania, pop 529. As one of the few places in Australia not to major in frozen meat pies, Ugly Duck uses local organic products (sheep) to amaze stupid American tourists (us).
Here’s a recipe suggested to us by the Duck’s Mark for a Banana Smoothie…interpreted slightly for those of us who don’t have a neighbor with beehives.
Ugly Smoothie
Combine in a food processor:- About 1 cup of fresh plain yoghurt- the extra creamy Greek-style stuff if you can.
- 1/3 cup of honey: Tasmanian leatherwood if you can, anything sweet if you can’t.
- A peeled banana.
- Maybe 2 ice cubes. One if it’s a biggy. Just enough to cool things down. That’s my addition, actually.
- A pinch of cardamom
- Cover with milk, but not too much- you can add more later if it’s too thick.
Process on low until everything’s smooth. Then slurp it like it’s the first non-fried food you’ve had in weeks. Which it might be.
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17Nov
Plenty of things can only exist in a vacuum. Anti-matter. Hell yeah, that stuff doesn’t like being around other stuff. Picking up really hot chicks. Apparently it can only happen in the absence of anyone who can back you up when you boast about it later.
So it’s no surprise to see the current trend of food books: ingredient specialization. Not for these, the concept of focusing on one cuisine, one preparation, or even one dish. The idea of this genre is to choose one specific ingredient X and show how X, and X alone, has sculpted the human race into what it is today.
They each sound pretty convincing. After all, lots of ingredients are universal, and food, or lack of it, has probably had a much greater impact on history than we realize. But there just can’t be a dozen different ingredients where each is the only one to affect human experience. No really, I took high school physics.
Now, I appreciate that taking a sensationalist stance is, academically speaking, the only way to get tenure. But this doesn’t need to be a culinary version of the mêlée over which culture first found America (currently in the running: Basque, Flemish, Chinese, Viking, Spanish, Portuguese, Scottish, and of course, folks from Atlantis). Let’s just calmly sit down and agree that the food most responsible for human history is going to be water.
Salt . Mark Kurlansky argues that salt is the sole cause for early agriculture, trade routes, wars, and modern law. With recipes.
The Hive. Bee Wilson argues that honey is the sole cause for early agriculture, trade routes, wars, and modern law. With recipes.
History of Bread. Bernard Dupaigne argues that bread is the sole cause for early agriculture, trade routes, wars, and modern law.
Cod. Mark Kurlansky argues that cod is the sole cause for early agriculture, trade routes, wars, and modern law. Yes, it’s the same guy who wrote salt, so he must know that they can’t both be right. The only mitigating fact is I think, historically, folks used a lot of salt on cod. -
15Nov
I don’t know about you, but if you are a foodie and übergeek like myself (and my fiancé), you probably use the internet to do your research on the restaurants you potentially want to visit. This of course involves the ubiquitous google search for your favorite place, to look at their website and menu offerings. I’ve come to realize that not every restaurant has a webpage or menu online, and now Menupix tries to fill the void. Search by neighborhood and/or cuisine to find the address, type of cuisine, whether it delivers or not, and its menu (if available). -
15Nov
Nothing can make you scream “Vacation!” more quickly than the prospect of a FREEEE hotel, so when my sister was tapped to present a paper at an engineering conference in Orlando, I quickly hopped on for the ride. The result was four manic days and four late nights in what bills itself as the most magical place on earth.
But for me, magic can’t be present without good food, so my sister and I made trying new (and often overpriced) restaurants a part of our Disney experience. No chicken fingers for this crew! Here are some of the results.
bluezoo:: Restauranteur Todd English of Olives fame has a trendy, largely-seafood place stationed in the Dophin Hotel, at which we were guests. The place isn’t cheap – Mandy and I dropped $75 each for two entrees, an appetizer and wine. But the place has a cool vibe and the food is prepared with care – beef tenderloin is juicy and flavorful, mahi-mahi is light and well-accented. Side dishes were unremarkable, and the whole place had a bit of a style-over-substance feel, but it was still a great meal.
Wolfgang Puck Café. Fans of the California legend have their pick of options in Downtown Disney and Pleasure Island – the cafeteria-style Express, the mid-priced café and the upscale dining room. We took two trips to the in-between option and were more than satisfied with both. Pumpkin ravioli was artfully dressed in a brown butter sauce with a balsamic glaze. Sushi was fresh; red snapper was jazzed up with a delicious pesto. My favorite was the rosemary roasted chicken, in which I practically consumed my weight. The place has jazzy drinks and killer desserts – two delicious offerings were a thick carrot cake and an unbelievable pumpkin cheesecake on a chocolate crust. Avoid the calamari – it’s nothing special and the sauce is underwhelming; plus you’ll want to save room for the rest of your courses. -
13Nov
I’m not quite sure how long it’s been open, but Amelie and I decided to check it out this past Friday. The decor is reminiscent of Morimoto’s in Philadelphia insofar as the wave theme has carried over into Paulimoto’s. We were expecting a bit more, I suppose, because the Morimoto’s in Philly is really something else in terms of appointment and furnishings. Paulimoto’s is more spartan and industrial- open ducts, naked woods and solid brown bakelite-like tables.
Paulimoto’s advertises that it serves Chinese and Japanese food. The menu reads a lot like PF Chang’s except the Japanese (Morimoto-inspired supposedly) dishes are a bit more fusion-ey. We decided to skip the Chinese and go for the Japanese and that was a wise decision. We looked around at the other tables’ orders and the Chinese looked less-than-exciting.
We started with an agedashi tofu which was very good, and we also decided to order lettuce wraps (just like PF Chang’s), because we just can’t get enough of them. The lettuce wraps are identical to the ones at the other Asian bistro to include the “special sauce” that they put together for you.
We ordered three robatayaki just to see how they were here and they weren’t very good. I should say the Kobe beef one we got was very good, the asparagus was ok, and the scallops were down right awful. I honestly thought they served us dried scallops on sticks.
For the main course, I got the miso black cod and Amelie got the tempura halibut with spicy miso. Luckily, both the entrees were well above the quality of appetizers. The miso cod had enough miso to flavor the entire cod steaks and the halibut was lightly fried in cubes and served with a spicy miso sauce on the plate. Both were served (as are all entrees) with brown rice (you can get white rice if you want). We did also order a side of wasabi mashed potatoes because Amelie had never had them before, but neither of us liked it so we didn’t eat it. Too buttery, and for my palette, butter plus wasabi equals not good.
So all in all, the Japanese entrees were very good, particularly considering they were about $16 and you’re in a shopping mall. The appetizers, ehh… not so good. The Kobe beef robatayaki was good though. The Chinese choices were nothing extraordinary from what I could tell and I wouldn’t go there to eat Chinese anyway. If you’ve been to the Morimoto’s in Philly, you’ll recognize the inspiration of a couple of the entrees, but aside from that and the Morimoto sake, there is no clear influence of the Iron Chef here. Total bill for two appetizers, three robatayaki, two entrees, one side dish, and three Pellegrinos was $80. Not too shabby.
Definitely make a reservation if you want to go, otherwise you will wait a long time for a table. Also, as of the time of this writing, they didn’t have their liquor license yet so we couldn’t have any Morimoto sake.
Pauli Moto’s Asian Bistro
Tyson’s Corner Center
703-556-7777
