The one week a year that I get to leave the country (in order to spend my time eating somewhere else) turns out to be the weekend of the International D.C. Wine and Food Festival. To make up for this lack of good timing, I will now tell you about everything I ate in London. Keep in mind that whenever I wasn’t eating, I was walking or climbling stairs, so it is possible that some of the deliciousness was not in the food, but in the sitting.
The cafe overlooking the reading room at the British Museum serves up a very good pot of tea, substantial scones with double cream and oozy raspberry jam, and finger sandwiches: cucumber and cream cheese, smoked salmon, and ham and mustard. It’s not the Ritz, but if your tea budget is closer to $17 than $70 (what does the Ritz put in the tea? Unicorn milk?), then the British Museum is a just-prissy-enough alternative, with excellent service and a really bright, gorgeous setting under the glass ceiling.
The Cow, a Notting Hill-area gastropub beloved by Lonely Planet readers, was about to get a great review for its basic, high-quality food and messy pub charm when I realized that I hadn’t actually eaten anything that was created there. I had Irish oysters with a shallot mignonette and a selection of British cheeses: something old (a smooth-tasting aged cheddar), something new (and sour and brie-like), something crumbly (sheep’s milk rounds) and something bleu. They also served up a “chutney” of cooked apples with lavender honey, and oat crackers and bread. It was all very satisfying, but none of the wait staff could tell me what these cheeses were or seemed eager to go ask the chef. $44 is fairly expensive for pub food, but not for wine, oysters and fine cheeses.
And the winner of the Best Food I Ate In London Is…..a mystery! If you go to Piccadilly Circus and stand on the corner with the bar that was converted from a public restroom, there is a hotel catty-corner that does not actually have a sign up indicating that Indian food is served there. Go in a sketchy-looking door and up to the first floor: where an ugly linoleum room that smells of garam masala, which may or may not be called The Indian Palace. That is where I ate the richest, most intense lamb curry I’ve ever had, for about $12.
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15Mar
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09Mar
The thing you forget, when youâve been out of school for a while, is how annoying exams can be: itâs not even that you donât know the material or that itâs so difficult, it’s just that they sneak up on you. And you worry about little things. Especially on take-homes, which seem like they ought to be easiest: even if the text sucks and youâve skipped all semester so donât have notes, Professor Google is available to rescue you. But the catch is (if youâre a bit OCD like me), that you spend a million years making sure every answer is perfect.
Whatâs this got to do with food, you ask? Well, studying brains need fuel, of course! And what with time constraints and general student poverty, studying brains need a certain kind of food: fast, cheap, and (preferably) healthy!
While working on a particularly unsavory take-home midterm (not a hard one at all â so easy and pointless, in fact, that it took Herculean effort to muster the will to do it), I decided I needed a slightly tastier lunch than the habitual bowl of Cheerios. I had a craving for my Haitian-not-grandmotherâs red beans and rice, but she lives in DC and my time was short; real cooking was out of the question.
Surveying my kitchen for a suitable substitute, I found the following:
Leftover saffron rice;
Half of a Vidalia onion;
A can of red kidney beans (unsweetened);
Olive oil;
Hot sauce (I used Walkerswood Jonkanoo â another might be better for the less masochistic chef) ;
Garlic salt;
Turmeric.
And, of course, the lazy chefâs ultimate hero: a microwave.
I took a bunch of the rice, added about half the can of beans, and nuked that in a bowl for 2 minutes to get everything nice and warm (not very hot, though thatâs up to you). Then, I chopped onion until I had about 2 handfuls worth. I added that, a couple tablespoons of olive oil, and a tablespoon or so of hot sauce to the rice and bean bowl.
I stirred, added garlic salt and black pepper till it seemed right, a bit of turmeric, and ate it.
I was soon much happier, and managed to finish that evil bloody midterm. -
07Mar
This weekend marked the 34th anniversary of my expulsion from my mother’s womb. Friday and Saturday night were set aside for my friends; Sunday was reserved for my mom and uncle, neither one of whom can do shots like my buddy Jeff at the Science Club. My family took me to an anonymous suburban chain restaurant. No sooner did we enter when all the servers gathered together, began clapping semi-rhythmically, and sang their restaurants’ version of “Happy Birthday” to a large group gathered for a child’s birthday. I shuddered in the same way that I shuddered when I watched the movie Saw – I knew it was fake, but I was scared anyway. My uncle, never an example of tact, tells our server at the anonymous suburban chain restaurant that it was my birthday, and asked what treat I’d get. The young lady, barely college-aged, went into some script I’m sure all the servers there had to memorize, asking me “So, how old are you on your big birthday, big guy?”
Lady, I’m 34 frickin’ years old. I’ve been able to drink legally for since you were in kindergarten. My insurance rates don’t get any lower, and I’ve been able to rent a car without a parent’s signature for nearly a decade. My next “big birthday” doesn’t come for another 21 years when I’ll be able to get cheaper coffee at participating McDonald’s.
I hate that fake birthday singing in restaurants. I was in kindergarten when the old Farrell’s ice cream parlor in Tyson’s Corner had a bunch of singing servers, fireworks, a possessed player-piano and circus sound effects go all Britney Spears-crazy for kids’ birthdays. I watched a poor little 3 year-old soil her new dress in fright and embarrassment on her birthday. I felt so bad for that little girl, and while I knew nothing of post-traumatic stress syndrome at the time, I knew a girl who’d need therapy when I saw one. Therefore, on my list of Top Three Annoyances in Restaurants, it ranks up there with Nextel phones going off and screaming, sugared-out kids with no parental supervision. For the record, “food poisoning” and “bad food” would be #4 and #5, respectively. I can understand why Chuck E. Cheese does it, and talented singing is part of Mimi’s in DuPont’s charm. But when I was a server, bartender and ultimately manager, my one consistent question during job interviews was “is this a restaurant that sings for birthdays?” If so, I moved on. A free dessert or a small discount is one thing; making a public spectacle and whittling down my dignity is quite another.
Is it just me? Do people actually go to anonymous suburban chain restaurants specifically for the birthday singing? What are they thinking? “Nothing reasserts my status in the universe than having a motley group comprised of 19 year-old single moms too naive to use birth control, 21-year-old college students worried about midterms, jailbait hostesses wearing slutty dresses that’d make Lil’ Kim blush and table bussers who aren’t 100% sure of the song or the language, sing a corporate version of ‘Happy Birthday’ that really doesn’t sound like the real song and includes more hand-clapping and some sort of embedded advertisement to me in an anonymous suburban chain restaurant decorated to resemble either a yard sale gone mad or a Gulf Coast beach because I’m too lazy to actually travel to a real yard sale gone mad or a Gulf Coast beach and receiving a complimentary calorie-laden dessert?” It’s about the best I can come up with…unless these are the same people who delight in camping out for tickets for the inevitable “American Idol All-Stars” tour because they really felt their phone calls made a difference whether or not that plucky young hillbilly from Kinhump, Tennessee, with the 36D’s and the 36 IQ got propelled into the Top 8.
By appealing to her logic – spending time singing that song to me wastes valuable minutes better spent at other higher-maintenance tables and thereby increasing whatever tips the generally-weaker-tipping-Sunday afternoon crowd offers – I was able to ward off her underpaid cult of clappers. And, given the mega-portions of food the anonymous chain restaurant served, there was no need for the complimentary calorie-laden dessert. Truthfully, I think she enjoyed not singing almost as much as I did. I know it was only one restaurant on one day, a small victory, but a victory nonetheless for those of us who like to dine in relative peace and anonymity.
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Normally I assign Whammy! points in this space, but the anonymous suburban chain restaurant is exactly what it is, the food is exactly what can be found at any other anonymous suburban chain restaurant, and the food tasted exactly what you’d expect from an anonymous suburban chain restaurant. No Whammy! was earned; no Whammy! will be given.
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06Mar
This Thursday, March 8th, is Food and Friend’s Dining Out for Life night. Food & Friends provides no-cost home-delivered meals and groceries to local residents living with HIV/AIDS, cancer, and other illnesses.
Participating restaurants will contribute between 25% and 100% of their sales for the evening to Food and Friends.
This is a fantastic opportunity to eat out at some fantastic restaurants and give back to the local community at the same time. There are about 150 participating restaurants (we can’t link to the full list, but you can find it by clicking Participating Restaurants on the site here.)
And you don’t have to spend a lot to help out. While some of DC’s pricier restaurants are on the list, local inexpensive favorites like Teaism, Thaiphoon, and Hard Times Cafe are participating, too.
If you’re looking for a place, consider checking out some of the standard DCFUD favorites:- Black’s Bar and Kitchen
- Corduroy
- Hank’s Oyster Bar
- Perry’s
- Pizzeria Paradiso
- Sushi Ko
- Tabard Inn
- Teaism
- Tonic Restaurant & Bar
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02Mar
If you go by M’Dawg (Haute Dogs) in Adams Morgan, you might see a shaggy brown dog tied outside. That’s my dog, Otter, and he’ll be spending a lot of time outside the new gourmet hot dog place in the near future, because I’ll sure be spending a lot of time in it.
The much-anticipated eatery is as relaxed and fun as you’d expect the sister restaurant to Amsterdam Falafel to be, with a short but varied menu that includes a garlic sausage, a corn dog, an andouille, a beef dog wrapped in bacon, and the classic DC half-smoke, among others. Most of the menu is in the $4-7 range (with the exception being the Kobe: a $20 kobe beef dog), and you can get them “downtown” style with ketchups and schmancy mustards, or “uptown” with a wide range of unexpected toppings for a buck more. Don’t count on getting dinner for $4-7, though, as with most hot dogs, one is not enough.
I highly recommend the “Glove” (the aforementioned beef dog wrapped in bacon) with apricot chutney and fresh tomatoes, and the half-smoke with bacon crumbles, bleu cheese, and onions. Less impressive was the “Brokeback” corndog, which despite its excellent name is just an ordinary corndog. It’s fine, but does not live up to its hot dog brethren. I also have to say, I do not understand the mad love people have for the french fries, the same as at Amsterdam Falafel.
At least three more trips are necessary before I can say with confidence that I have tried all the best hot dogs that DC has to offer, so my real dog will get to go on a lot of walks down to M’Dawg in the next few weeks. If you see him, say hi–he’s friendly, and don’t worry if he seems sad. He’s just whining because he wants a half-smoke. -
23Feb
Iâve been in Atlanta almost seven months now, but my grad student status has severely limited my ‘extramural’ culinary adventures. So I made a pact with myself at the beginning of this semester that I would work harder at eating good food (as opposed to pizza and burgers, all the time) when I go out. the trick is finding places I can kinda-sorta-maybe-once-in-a-while afford.
Early in my tenure here, I discoveredAprès Diem , and have been going there pretty frequently (OK, like once or twice a month) for late-evening drinks and snacks. The atmosphere is much trendier than Iâd usually tolerate, with its colored âmoodâ lighting and live-dj-techno/house soundtrack, not to mention the almost universally gorgeous staff.* But somehow, Après Diem manages to remain comfortable and easygoing, and it works for me.
Like I said, I’ve mostly been there for drinks and/or snacks, midway through an evening’s carousing. The drinks are good and, if you stay away from the sugar-tinis, not too expensive; the wine list is small but nicely varied, ditto for beers. The appetizers/snacks menu is nice; I really like the baba ghanouj, the hummus plate, and have been made very happy on more than one âlast stop before homeâ by the brie and baguette. The espresso and coffee are good too, and served late enough that Après Diem also makes a good last-stop spot to wait off those drinks before driving home (this is the thing about Atlanta: you have to drive. Everywhere. All the time. No matter what.).
Anyways, I liked snacking there enough that I decided to try dinner there, and one night after a play a friend and I decided to do so. Sadly, the kitchen closes at midnight, and we got there at 11:58, so it was put off.
Fresh off a stressful week, another friend and I decided to finally eat dinner at Après Diem, at a reasonable dinner hour (around 8, as opposed to around midnight). We were seated by a lovely blond woman of ultimately indeterminate – but Iâm pretty sure north English – accent, who was also our server. Her only real gaffe of the evening was immediate: she was quick to offer drinks, even before we had a chance to look at the list, and it wasnât until she had come back again and taken our order that she brought water. No matter, we had beer!
My companion ordered the roasted portobello sandwich, and I the Asian-style tuna. I should mention that my meal came with an appetizer salad, and his did not, but that this is not made particularly clear on the printed menu. Either way, the salad was actually quite tasty (Iâm not sure what the dressing was, but I liked it!), and would have been plenty to share but for my companion’s aversion to green vegetables.
The portobello sandwich looked, and was reported to be, really good. Serving sandwiches on focaccia still worries me sometimes – I feel like itâs too easy for the bread to overwhelm its contents – but my companion reports that it was really what made this dish great. The fillingsâ mix of flavors, and their strength, clearly balanced well with the thick bread, which also has the advantage of not getting so soggy with all that veggie goodness inside.
I ordered my tuna seared (it always makes me laugh a bit when the menu says âseared tunaâ and then they ask you how you want it cooked), and it came out on a very pretty plate with lightly sautĂŠed halved carrots, mini-zucchinis, and grape tomatoes, topped with the âAsian-styleâ sauce and pickled ginger. The flavor was really good, and the veggies perfect, but the fish itself was a bit tough. Tasty, but just not the best tuna Iâve had, which surprised me – it was listed as “sashimi grade” on the menu.
It’s no shock that our two cheques came out rather differently – my companionâs sandwich was $8 and my tuna $20 (plus a couple of beers each), totaling about $50, plus tip. Not bad at all by normal standards, but we’re grad students. We’ll have to await another special occasion (since lotto jackpots are especially unlikely for statisticians-in-training who can’t bring themselves to buy tickets) to return for dinner, but I do plan to do so when the moment arises.
All in all, Après Diem makes a good dinner spot, but its real strength lies as a cool place for drinks and snacks, as the more relaxed portion of an evening out in Midtown.
* Seriously. If the employees,â uhm, assets are how youâre selling your place, Iâm generally gonna be wary. Après Diem manages to pull it off.
Après Diem
931 Monroe Drive (next to the Midtown Art Theater),
Atlanta, Georgia 30308
404.872.3333 -
22Feb
Purchase anything – even a soda- at Hard Times Cafe today and you get a free bowl of chili. You can even get cheese, beans, and onions in it for no extra charge. I verified this with the Clarendon location.
Thanks for Romel at meetin.org for the catch. đ
Hard Times Cafe (Clarendon)
3028 Wilson Blvd
Arlington, VA 22201
703 528 2233
http://www.hardtimes.com -
18Feb
OkâŚwho else is excited about this, Busboys & Poets and about Cakelove opening in Shirlington? This will happen in the late spring.
Busboys & Poets is a great place to hangout and I have had good desserts and appetizers there, and Cakelove has good eclairs and ginger scones. OkâŚokâŚif you let the cupcakes get to room temperatureâŚthey are decent – regardless of my past declarations. Yes, really. đ Cakelove has been growing on me recently. -
16Feb
Hosting a party can be stressful. I have a horrible tendency of setting a date, making the guest list and sending out invitations, not to mention planning music and making CDs, well in advance, only to find myself in a messy apartment with an empty fridge the morning of said event. As a result, my parties tend to rely more on the right mix of music, booze, and people (and often, explosives) rather than gourmet munchies.
Not that this has ever really been a problem, but sometimes I feel like I should at least have some quick-and-easy hors dâouvres recipes lying around, for emergencies. And sometimes, homework is not nearly as appealing as a trip to the farmers market followed by experimentation in the kitchen.
Today was one of those times, and even though I donât plan to host any parties for a good while, I ended up making (for dinner) a dish that Iâll be more than happy to serve at my next soirĂŠe. Assuming I remember to make it.
Like nearly everything I make, this was done on the fly, so I encourage people to fiddle with it all to get what you want.
Ingredients:
Thai eggplants (I used 6, which was plenty for my dinner),
2 tbs. Tandoori spice powder (I used Sharwood’s),
2.5 tbs. Champagne vinegar,
2 tbs. lemon juice,
4 tbs. olive oil.
Preheat your oven to 350.
Decapitate your eggplants, and cut them in half. Mix all the other stuff together in a glass, and spoon enough of it over each eggplant slice (the inside side, not the skin side) to cover the whole surface. Put that in the oven for about 17 minutes, remove and let cool.
You could marinate the eggplant in the sauce for a more powerful flavor, but I think that might be a bit much, and make it a less appealing finger food.
See? Tasty and fancy-sounding hors dâouvres in just 20 minutes!
