Cava

I'm very vulnerable to the power of suggestion. Especially when it comes to food. Today was a meandering sort of day and this afternoon (pre-lunch) I found myself at Barnes and Noble. I thought I'd pick up some pre-trip things but then remembered that Allison, old friend and fellow foodie (well, professional caterer now), told me to check out Saveur: The Greek Issue. Colon and everything.

She knows me well. I started idly flipping through the first few pages..then hit the feature on Greece and was rapt. I got an explanation of the derivation of pastitsio (bechamel being an innovation to a crema-less predecessor, which was added after a famous Greek chef returned from training in France), a brilliant explanation of how Greek food exposes the history of Greek culture, and beautiful pictures of my favorite foods: fish, Greek pastries, feta, masticha, grape leaves, souvlaki. My stomach and then eventually my whole body seemed to be contorting in misery because the photos looked so good and so real but were such unsatisfying, teasing temptations. I thought I could never be happy again until I had some.

I'd heard good things about Cava in Eastern Market, so I pilgrimaged there. I drank glasses of water in rapture (it was hot) and equally enthusiastically eyed the menu full of all the delights that had recently were so painfully two-dimensional. After I was passingly hydrated, I got ouzo.

And dolmades (stuffed grape leaves). It was foolish to twice get things that my grandmother makes beautifully.

They were delicious...and displayed cleverly too. I'm used to dolma juice seeping into my plate full of food at a family dinner or having them be more uniquely formed and bursting out of their veined seams with filling. These grapeleaves, hand-rolled onsite and stuffed with jasmine rice and herbs and topped with yogurt and capers, were for grown-ups: uniform, polite, in their place...not as good as my grandmother's...but delicious.

A little family portrait of things that grow on vines...and their derivatives.

I always like to think that I'm being bold and adventurous when I order octopus. Someone recently pointed out to me that they noticed I had octopus two meals in a row. Ah well, make it a third, it's too tempting.

It was tremendous.. and there was a lot of it. I was satisfied. There was no need for me to order anything else but with such a beautifully diverse menu, I couldn't help getting one of my more recent Greek dessert favorites: galataboureko egg custard served between layers of honey-drenched phyllo.

My brow was less furrowed and I read a girly novel instead of playing backgammon, but I had my ouzo and all was right in the world.

Columbia Firehouse

It was a dark and not-so-stormy night. Our young heroine, after a long day of work, decided to take her work to a local bar, for libations and a little dinner. After a quick phone call home, she'd eat, read, and go home.

It seems that any time our young heroine decides to do something so simple, something else happens. During a phone call with our naive heroine's mother, she realized that the series of helicopters that appeared to be repeatedly taking the same route were in fact the same helicopter. Circling. Eventually with a spotlight. Whatever.

Heroine remembers Nancy Drew days, recalls with fond memories joy of sleuthing. She wanders up and down the neighborhood, trying to determine how many cop cars, where they are positioned, why an armored truck would be needed, what the blast radius could be and if that should deter her from satisfying idle curiosity. She understands from a German tourist and neighborhood lady who's heard neighborhood gossip that someone is in the area, a gun was involved and there's something about a crash. Young heroine shrugs her shoulders, tells the German tourists that Munich is wonderful and wanders up her street.

While idling at an intersection, straining her poor eyes (with sight exacerbated by expired prescription glasses) she hears her friendly dubiously-employed all-day-Starbucks-loiterer friend Brill (yes, that is his real name, like the pad). He tells her that he's heard secondhand there was a car chase, shooting and flight on foot into the courthouse. Heroine's eyes light up that there appears to be a good story here, her stomach rumbles, and she realizes that Nancy Drew wouldn't have gotten her scoop from a guy who reads the Post and drinks iced coffee all day. Nice life, admittedly. But going to Starbucks camp all summer? Eh.

She slinks off to her local pub. By local, she just means a place down the street.

She, continuing to speak in third person as is wont, orders a glass of chardonnay. One single tuna tartare taco. A half dozen oysters. A chilled cucumber soup. And a tomato/mozzarella salad, that each time she gets it reminds her of her beloved brother, who surprisingly likes caprese salads. She's not working that night so admires her food, pines for the photo-taking-then-eating experience, but demurs and just eats.

Into her second glass of wine, a man sits down. Her depth perception is poor because of said glasses, but she notices he throws small clumps onto the bar. Of money. Specifically, one dollar bills.

As she only read Nancy Drew books when young and didn't watch CSI when older, she was uncertain whether he was just drunk or just high or both. He explains to the bartender he would like a ___ and ____ (Coke and something else). And a pint. Bartender fails to recognize the most ubiquitous bar term in use (probably because of the slurring) and asks Nancy Drew-wannabe's neighbor what he wants. A pint, he says!

Heroine continues to read obscure work-related material as money-wadder starts talking. Because our heroine can talk to anyone and is glad to focus the other direction away from the young woman who smells like she bathed in mosquito repellent, she indulges.

It was his birthday yesterday, but he was too [indiscernible] to celebrate properly. Two drinks in front of him, he proceeded to explain he's got Hepatitis C, so the most I (er, she) can expect is a friend. Last night he was kicking away the gnats by his dumpster. And he's a sinnnnger. (He auditioned to heroine and bartender). What instrument do you play, our heroine asked with arched brow, as moments before he pretended to twirl his hair after heroine responded she was reading the "news" (apparently she said it in an overly feminine or mockable way). Heroine learned his ex lived in Tulsa, he'd lived all over the States, favorite place being San Diego and he was from Indiana. Between disease-listing and offers to buy our heroine another glass of wine (but after he tipped the bartender saying, "don't say a poor guy never tipped you!") our heroine soberingly was told that she made her drinking companion feel like a human. Included. Part of the world. The bartenders were watching like it was a show. Bring it on.

Yes, that happened. Among a whole bar of professional working men, the one who talks to me and buys me a drink is the one who wanted to fork over seven wadded up dollars from the depths of his pockets from his birthday stash, from what I saw, 33% of his birthday budget. Ah, the irony.

Bistro D'Oc, Potenza

I went to my favorite restaurant last night. In lieu of ordering my favorite, mussels (well, moules), I had le salade d'artichaut et asperges (baby artichoke, grilled asparagus salad with shaved parmesan cheese) and Croziflette (gratin of buckwheat pasta, French ham, bacon, onions and reblochon cheese). This latter dish is quite possibly the most delicious food ever, as it draws from the world of comfort food (a la Kraft macaroni and cheese), country kitchens (it's served in a cast iron pan), and la vraie cuisine francaise (to pronounce it is to nearly mimic the voices of French-speaking angels).

In the course of the evening, with a little help from Edith Piaf, I realized that little has changed since this written food adventure's inception. Thankfully, I still delight at my own company at restaurants. I have seen all nature of men across the dinner table, however, since this effort's genesis. And their demeanor in the kitchen or restaurant has given important clues into their potential success, in retrospect.

The beauty of a restaurant, though, or a food items is that it can be refashioned and new memories can be created. Which is a good thing, because I can't find good mussels anywhere else. In this vein, I have at times viewed dining alone as something I have to like because that's the only option. But now, having had the precedent of some ridiculous culinary interlocutors, dining alone is both the default and what I actively embrace, while also appreciating more the casual comfort a good friend imbues into a meal.

That's enough of that. This gets better, I promise. Sunday, I decided to wander around DC on what seems to have legitimately been the hottest day of the year. By wander, I mean board the metro stop a mile away from my apartment, ride to the District with a car full of pubescent, sweating boy scouts (misery), and needlessly cross and re-cross streets because I had no idea where I was going.

The goal was to see the movie Restrepo, which was tremendous.

I recently made a vow not to eat French food prior to my trip, which, after two exceptional French meals (the one mentioned above and the other below), I decided was a foolish and arbitrary goal. I reneged, because something about encountering multiple groups of sweaty boy scouts again after the metro (they were in town celebrating their centennial), passing and re-passing Madame Tussaud's while disoriented (creepy, yes, but French), and my increasing general malaise about the hot weather made Bistro D'Oc, a quite-French place, extremely palatable.

This place is right in the middle of general tourist ridiculousness. Tour buses cast their shadow on this part of the block, where this weekend boy scouts congregated in front of it and where the neighboring stores sold "You Don't Know Me" witness protection t-shirts and mini Capitol replicas. I mean, the Hard Rock Cafe is nearby. Big-time sellout tourist neighborhood and everyone knows only tools go to the Hard Rock Cafe.

Ok, so I ordered that once but I was really thirsty. Because just before, I was doing this.

And yes, I know I'm getting a little unbearable, but I really wanted to have a sort of convenient way to also mention the fact that I recently ate pigeon, a supposed aphrodisiac.

And rabbit.

And this crazy dish called koshari, which is beans and carbohydrates. With tomato sauce. And fried onions. Because of course those are natural complements (was amazing though).

A whisk of the hand creates this:

Are you wondering if you can get koshari near you?

But they have other floors.

And I, new vices.


Ok, ok... I really wanted to show off the pigeon and the pigeon had to be showed in context. So returning to the first story after post-soliloquy, Bistro D'Oc was a quiet French culinary island in a storm of tourism. Pastis beckoned me to the bar and quietly whispered that everything would be ok.

I ordered pastis amande, with Ricard. Who knew pottery could be so charming.

It was refreshing like glacier water or a bubbling brook or water from a charming spout.

I only ordered gazpacho to ensure I could catch my movie, but the soup was tremendous. It was almost as if it had a light grated cheese in it to round out the tomato flavor, but it seems it was predominantly tomato, cucumber and cilantro.

After the movie, I was hungry again. I wandered, for real this time. I checked out a few restaurants on E but decided I wanted to try Proof, which wasn't open until dinner time. Nor was Central or TenPenh. I went into both Coco Sala and Cafe du Parc and left because the menus were unappealing (I ascribe that to the heat too). I apparently felt that with no more than three glasses of water that day, I had a right to wander DC until I found the perfect restaurant, despite the 100-plus degree weather. I think it was the absolute opposite of imagining oases in the distance.

I settled on Potenza, only because it was open. It was surprisingly delightful. Of course, the waitress was strange (she lost the wine opener under my chair and proceeded to awkwardly retrieve it) and the sous chefs were accusing each other of making a mess of the line and not preparing well, but I didn't die of thirst, so I was ok.

I ordered another chilled tomato soup, golden tomato soup with cucumber, fennel, celery and oregano.

Snacked on breadsticks and sweet bread (porous foccaccia-like bread, crowned with a dried cherry and sprinkled with sugar).


And admired the pancetta wrapped figs laid out for the anticipated droves of prix fixe menu orderers.

and

I ordered the polpettine carbonizzati, baby octopus, olive oil poached tomatoes, shaved radishes and fried onions.

It was a nice enough place with a few beautiful bars and an impressive pastry/takeaway section.

I suppose the point of all this (if there in fact is one) is that the food doesn't disappoint.

Grace's Mandarin

Today, I was a lady who lunches. This is a crowd I'm not sure I belong to. After a rather laboriously long flight from Oklahoma to Baltimore (via Houston, Texas and Jackson, Mississippi), I was hungry. I drove home in the rain and spent that time (and had spent the hours before that when I wasn't sleeping on the flights) deciding where to go for lunch. This is an important decision for an amateur food critic who is now obligated to expand her circle of dining beyond her neighborhood (I've "tapped out Alexandria," to quote myself).

Because I already missed Oklahoma, I went to the restaurant I asked my mom to find the name of with the google search terms "bull ride national harbor." She gave me all the relevant restaurant information for Cadillac Ranch, a cowboy/country/bull-riding joint. As suspected, while I surveyed the place waiting for the summer-hire hostess to seat another group and come back, I realized this is not the type of place you want to be when the sun's out and you're sober. Or not watching other people riding bulls. It's the type of place you go when you haven't been to Oklahoma in months and don't know the difference, not the type of place you go when you had a toothpick in your mouth leaving a restaurant the night before.

So, I went to Grace's Mandarin, a place I'd scoped out before at the National Harbor, the brainchild of the least competent newspaper family in the country (The Gaylords, who produce The Oklahoman, hardly fit to line the interior of an incontinent bird's cage...so a begrudged Oklahoma link). So, anyway, it's a fascinating place, but has a menu with about 60% of the items over $25. Even coming back from a family vacation, that's exorbitant.

Really imposing soldier statue outside, with really imposing Gaylord hotel beyond.

The interior of this place was remarkably beautiful. Except for the two pairs of lovers eating fried food, glugging wine, and conversing about inanities at the two booths nearby, it was a very sophisticated atmosphere.

And then the bar...

And then the really impressive family-style table at the front of the restaurant:

And in case there was any doubt who took the three photos above, this is the first one I snapped:

Well, second. This was the first. Same room.

Since my brother doesn't read this, I can make fun of him a little. He used to be intrigued by bathroom restaurants. A lot of detail goes into them: sinks, sink handles, towels, lighting, flush power, etc. I thought it was charming there were both porcelain dolls and a bamboo-themed spout. Oh yeah, and dance music. Playing rather loudly in the bathroom.

There was food, too, of course. I ordered the chilled rice paper summer rolls (a little too innovative for my tastes): avocado, smelt roe, crabmeat, kani, shrimp, cumin dressing (seemed like red mayonnaise). The presentation was charming and I could taste little bits of mint, which was refreshing, but summer rolls with vermicelli, mint, a bit of chicken, shrimp, and lettuce, accompanied with peanut sauce is kind of a classic.

Then I had a spicy scallop roll; nothing too incredibly innovative there, with raw scallops, Sriracha (for spice), crushed tempura flakes, all wrapped in rice with tan and black sesame seeds. It was really very good.

It was fun. I got my bill, which was half of what I expected as I got happy hour prices. The interior was sumptuous (granted, overused interior word) and I was neither breathlessly enraptured nor insensibly outraged at my experience. Then I thought I'd pop into the wash room for one last visit. And I saw this, which hadn't been on for my first trip.

Yep, that's a runway fashion show. I got the hell out, and fast.

Republic Gastro Pub

I can't get my act together. There are still untold stories from Vegas and then some other trips I took that bear some recounting, in my opinion (teaser: I ate aphrodisiac foul and developed a deep affection for garlic naan). These stories will get told later, if their creator pulls them from her memory to the screen. In the meantime, however, she had a great dinner last night at Republic Gastro Pub in Oklahoma City, a delightful 100-beers-on-tap, all-American-blond-waiters-working, for-foodie-slash-sports-fan type place.

Republic is in a new commercial area called Classen Curve, an innovative, architecturally striking (eh, euphemism for "severe") string of buildings. The spaces' tall walls are comprised almost entirely of windows, while the overhangs outside feature extended tines of black metal. It's admittedly a bit cold, austere and modern to appear complementary against the hospitable warm and welcoming blue Oklahoma sky, but it was still impressive.

An emerging tradition of my dad and mine is to try beer flights. Oh boy, is it fun. I got the Golden Path, a taste each of Stella Artois (from Belgium), Mustang Golden Ale (Oklahoma),
Avery White Rascal (Colorado), and Maredsous Blond (Belgium). I always thought Stella was such a stand-up, hardy beer but when compared next to blonder Belgium blonds, it seemed so...quaint...and sort of like diet, sugar-free apple juice.

My dad got a broader mix called Best in Show: from left to right, Franziskaner Hefe-Weissbier (Germany), Chimay White (Belgium), Schneider Aventinus (Germany), and Yeti Stout (Colorado).


And then we ordered half the menu. The homemade pub pretzel with serrano-honey mustard and beer-cheese fondue and the pulled chicken nachos with caramelized onions, red peppers,
jalapenos and sour cream to start. It was so good, I forgot to take pictures. Thankfully the pretzel was party to a professional photo shoot:

Then we had the entrees, which by this time was largely unnecessary. My dad and I had the Republic Scottish egg. Has any food item been created that is a more perfect accompaniment to beer? A whole egg, wrapped in sausage, and fried (and then classed up with a mixed greens salad with cornichons)?


For dinner, I had ahi tuna tartar that I only remembered to photograph (again) after it was halfway eaten and the photo..well..looks both obscene and unenticing. It was delicious: cubed tuna tartar atop a bed of onions and avocado, covered in friend shoestring onions and a soy vinaigrette and surrounded by chips. My mom got a granny smith apple and celery salad (a bit too savory for our tastes), elbow mac and cheese with bratwurst, and a delicious seared whole green bean salad (left to right).

And there's more! Our table was like a Rubik's cube, plates being moved left and right, up and down, to accommodate new plates. Dad had American Bangers and Mash, with Chicago style bratwurst, house made sauerkraut, and skillet potatoes and pub mustard. Amateur food critics extraordinaire were we!

But just to show that Oklahoma's restaurants these days aren't just high-fallutin', city-folk-created joints and offer real American food choices, please find a picture of one of my finest meals in recent history, from lunch today at Earl's Rib Palace:


That's baked beans in the top left and then clockwise, chopped beef, fried okra, and turkey. And above that, the BBQ sauces: red (is hot) and white (is not). And oh yeah, I saw BEVO, which as a Sooner, I must prioritize last and put at the bottom.

Vegas, Part Three: Bouchon

I love myself a restaurant general manager (aka GM; see Vegas, Part Two and imminently, Vegas, Part Four). They are the overtly alpha males of a restaurant, usually suave and sophisticated with crisp suits and diplomatic demeanors, who can soften up any overly critical amateur food critic. They're the manly men who straddle the world of business and culinary indulgence.

In Vegas, I melted (ok, for 1.5 hours) at the hands of Mr. St. John. Charlotte (or was it Emily?) Bronte's St. John in Jane Eyre possessed the same, best qualities of Mr. GM at Bouchon: put-together, articulate, handsome, staid. But restauranteur St. John also possessed qualities Mr. Bronte-St.-John did not have: chaleur, sparkle, non-monochromatic clothing, and no desire to do missionary work. Always gets in the way.

After I met/complained to the general manager, an event followed by 36 hours of obsession, yes, with him.

Just an aside: the Palazzo is charming, with lots of... frescoes or paint by number.

If I started at the beginning of why I ended up at Bouchon at all, we go to 2006 in San Francisco. I heard of a restaurant called French Laundry in Napa Valley. I'll add a friend is always tempted to call it "Dirty Laundry." Same difference: untouchable in some regard. In 2006 I also began to understand that Thomas Keller, chef/owner of French Laundry, had another (cheaper) restaurant in Las Vegas called Bouchon. For four years I've wanted to see what the fuss was about. I made a reservation as soon as I realized we were going to Vegas.

We took our seats: I love the feeling of a brasserie, with the spastically-designed tile floors, the intimate tables, the banquette seating. I love feeling the pulse of the busy kitchen emanating into the dining room with a multitude of waiters. Our waitress wasn't to be seen until after half my aperitif was gone (I was going to do it the French way or not at all). The fill-in waiter (what is this, Applebee's?) said "don't tell her I told you, but she had a wardrobe malfunction." She, when she finally arrived, said she "had been busy with lots of tables." Nonetheless, she was barely attentive, brought my wine out when I was almost done with dinner, asked me twice if I wanted coffee with dessert, and just wasn't timely, etc. etc.. I think I have every right to be the steely-eyed, biting critic I seem to be in my head. This was a culinary fantasy I was living out, by golly.

But, I was in love with the general manager (didn't know it yet though) and don't fault him: the food was good. I got my old stand-by, to start: salade de chevre chaud. There was some extra word thrown in and the staff called it the greens salad, but it was a typical French chevre salad: shiny greens entirely bathed in a vinaigrette, chopped shallots, and a small circle of chevre (here, dusted with herbes de provence) nestled on top.

This salad went beatifully with my Ricard (note the cloudiness of the drink).

...And the delightfully textured French bread (there is some name for the pretty French breads created to look like leaves or flowers, but I can't remember their name). We were also served roasted pistachios. I got aperos (pre-meal snacks like nuts, etc) so I was in Frenchie heaven.


For dinner, I ordered something I've never had: boudin blanc. It was delightful; t almost tasted like barbecued pâté but not as heavy. Or maybe like a filet cut..of sausages: smooth consistency, uniformly colored, not riddled with offal or hints of offal. It was served with grilled prunes (delightful, once I shed the AARP connotation) and delicious pureed potatoes. It was a delightful trio of tastes and once I got smart, I took a small bit of each for each bite to create a perfect trifecta. When I had four bites left, I got my chardonnay but it was a damn good chardonnay. I was just fine.

Listen to this phase and don't wince at the Vegas-ness/snooty Parisian-ness of it: Since I had rhum baba the night before, it seemed the best decision that night to instead order l'île flottante. If you're still reading in five minutes, it gets more tolerable, trust me. Anyway, I got the île flottante.


That made 3 out of 4 items I ordered that night significant for historical reasons: Ricard makes me think of my college French foreign exchange neighbor who loved Ricard and hunting wild boar; the salade of chevre chaud was the first French food item I had that opened my eyes to how different French food was; and île flottante was the dessert I ordered when I took myself to the French restaurant Montmartre in 2004 on Capitol hill when I was interning and didn't know that indulging in French food could be so satisfying. Whatever, it was amazing.

Just like Palladio (quick side note and art lesson). Vicenza, Italy, is home of my brother and Palladian art, both of which were represented at the Pallazzo. To commemorate my brother's robust appreciation for the Palladian aesthetic, Lisa photographed me in front of a print of Palladio's rotunda in Vicenza.

And, in all its glory:

Ok, finished. So, food was great but service was poor and, uncharacteristically, I wanted to tell someone about it. I'm not used to my culinary dreams being marred by poor service. I boldly sought out anyone at the hostess stand who would listen to me when walking out and then I met HIM (lovely looking GM St. John).

I explained my general mild dissaatisfaction with my waitress's timeliness, emphasizing that it wasn't a huge deal, but was noticeable. He was the most damn thankful customer service-y person I've ever met. He graciously and prolifically thanked me and offered to have us back for oysters and champagne. Bien sur, I said. I got his card (note: second GM business card I acquired in two days).

After some aspirationally flirtatious emails (only on my end, of course) back and forth, I learned his offer to return for oysters/champagne was in fact legit. So I went two days later. I camped out at the bar, broke out my postcards, and enjoyed St. John's hospitality. There were at any time a maximum of five people at the bar, so there was a mild hum of noise but I was able to enjoy the professional attentiveness of the bartenders. I (believe that I) had three glasses of champagne for free. And six oysters.

I was in heaven. One of the bartenders told me about a new cocktail he was preparing for the staff to try before it appeared on the menu... something with apricot puree (which he gave me a spoonful of), mint (which he let me try), and Domaine de Canton (a ginger liqueur, which he also gave me a small taste of). He also gave me a history of the two sons who created Domaine de Canton and St. Germain (which I sipped), whose father brought Chambord to the States, a story you can read about.

A few delightful hours later, I packed up my stack of postcards, slowly slid off my chair, and admired St. John one last time. Hours later the man thanked ME for coming back in. In true bought-off fashion, I'll say Bouchon was tres bien and if you go, please send St. John my regards.