MC Horoscope

http://www.nola.com/news/index.ssf/2008/03...by_falling.html He's ok

DR, Gringada is still open! At least it was in the fall when I trucked up to Laurel on Route 1. Haven't been there in 15-20 years. There weren't too many Mexican places to try back then. I don't think there were so many El Salvadoran places either. I haven't tried the Hogs on the Hill in Beltsville but I know right where it is: on Route 1 in the same little shopping center with the Korean place Oriental Noodle, Myoung Dong. I tried Oriental Noodle a few times and liked it,then tried Yett Gol in Wheaton/Glenmont on Dean Gold's suggestion and prefer that one for their Dol Sot Bibim Bap.

Dropped in on a whim this primary night and thoroughly enjoyed a special of sauteed walu fish from Hawaii. Very tasty and moist! They're doing things well.

Thanks! I am watching it now! Just saw the segment with Chris Rose of the Times Picayune, author of 1 Dead in the Attic, recounting how everybody has a dead man story and the city is redefining what normal means for it. Then Bourdain remarks that he'd have trouble living in a city that served no tomato on the sandwich (poboy). That's good writing.

I wish I had seen this episode. Did he venture out of NO to Acadiana? He could have done a great boudin run.

It's been very good for us! We go there quite often. The service is good and there are always lots of specials. We think Cesco is in the kitchen because we often see him at the restaurant. A couple of weeks ago we had a chestnut soup and an arugula salad with warm goat cheese. There are always fish specials but last time I got a grilled pork chop nicely done. My wife's risotto had artichoke and crab meat. We often get their risotto of the day. Orata is a good fish on the regular menu. I don't recall a period of spotty service and we've been going for years but maybe we've been lucky! The last time Don Rocks posted about passing by a nearly empty Grapeseed then dropping in on David Craig's place we happened to also be in Bethesda, eating at Cesco's and marveling at the number of specials they were offering that night! For us, it's one of our favorites in Bethesda. Maybe we just feel comfortable there and we can easily pop in on weeknights without a reservation.

I belong to quintile 911, FTW.

We went in late December and have reservations for this Friday, so thanks for your timely post! Those selections sound wonderful! Will report back if we try some different things.

I don't have first hand memory of my grandparents (born ~1880) or great grandparents (born ~1850), but I bet my diet growing up was much closer to my grandparents' than my great grandparents'. I recently read Marcelle Bienvenu's book Stirring the Pot: The History of Cajun Cuisine and found it fascinating. (ULL history prof. Carl Brasseaux did the heavy lifting with the historical stuff). I grew up thinking that what we called rice and gravy (more like braised beef with pan drippings over the rice) had been around since God gave Noah the rainbow sign, but apparently not so. Cajuns on the prairies ate a lot more corn than rice (much less white bread) until the late 1800s when the introduction of irrigation techniques helped rice production take off. So in my grandparents lifetime the diet of rice and gravy everyday became quite common, even up to the time I came around. Of course my experience of having a professional slaughterhouse come to the house and "process" our cattle was very different from my parents' experience of communal butcherings. We also had an electric freezer which my grandparents did not have. They preserved meat in oil in large crockery jars in my area, something like the French rural confit, while a bit further north they developed smoking and drying methods for andouille and tasso, etc. So some economic and cultural choices by the farmers also played into what people would recognize as food and food preparation. I have to echo what I understood Ilaine to be saying. My generation has a lot more exposure to non-native foods. A lot of our food may be more processed, but there's more variety too. If my mama could only see me making risotto now! Boy, would she be surprised!

Interview in the Onion AV http://www.avclub.com/content/feature/anth...vclub_rss_daily

We've been a couple of times now and loved the crabcake and lobster roll sandwiches, and the fries! I tried the broiled hamburger this time and found that I liked it but not as much as at Sunshine Grocery on 97 north of Olney at about half the price. The burger platter was a special. It just didn't stay warm very long. Next time I want to try the shrimp salad. We're glad to go to this place.

Ooh, I would call them first. I don't think they are open for lunch on Friday now, or maybe I should say just today. I called last night.

There's a sign in the Hillandale shopping center on New Hampshire Avenue next to the Radio Shack saying that Urban Barbecue is going to open up a branch there. Any idea when that might happen? That seems like a very good location for UB.

We unfortunately can't make it to this event, but after reading this thread my wife and I went to brunch today at CK for the first time. Great fried catfish! The special today was a lobster and scallion frittata. We'll be back for dinner real soon! Y'all pass a good time.

This is a nice new addition for Silver Spring! Lobster fritters were so light and flavorful! Crab cake was also delicious. Agree with the comment above on spicing. Not sure if they will offer valet parking, but if you turn on Thayer Street there is a metered parking lot across from the Safeway.

It's wonderful everytime we go, no matter the season! Last Saturday my wife had butternut squash ravioli with scallops and lobster in a very tasty sauce, and I had roasted monkfish with soldier beans cassoulet. I didn't know what to expect with soldier beans cassoulet, but it was not soupy as I suspected. It was moist and flavorful. Too many places undercook beans but not that night. This is a place we keep meaning to visit more often. We have been eating here for years, but not often enough. I just get a wonderful feeling from the place. This is our second meal in the past year and the new chef is as good as the ones who have come before.

Short review in today's Post: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/conte...7111300442.html

Thank you all. I have been looking into the Maryland Cooperative Exchange Service Web site. I think I will contact them. I contacted them earlier this summer about beetles eating up the leaves on my eggplant and they were very helpful! (The beetles can be deterred by spreading straw around your plants. Apparently they don't like to walk on straw!)

This has to do with preparing the garden for next year. I used one of those do-it-yourself soil testers and it seems that my soil's nitrogen is depleted. No big surprise there. Any recommendations for how to treat it? Is nitrogen just something that should be included in the fertilizers you usually find at nurseries or should I do something special?

PB, you're within distance of Cuba de Ayer in Burtonsville, named in the recent Post dining guide.

My wife and I are interested in Passage To India for 11/27.

Another very enjoyable meal here tonight! We split a salad of pretty tasty yellow and red tomatoes with onion and goat cheese. My wife had ravioli with chantrelles, squash and ricotta, and I had fettucine with something like a Bolognese sauce and wild mushrooms. The ravioli was from the specials. Everything was delicious, as it always is at David Craig's. Can't see why this place is not discussed more often. On St. Elmo, almost across the street from Passage to India.

We went for the first time last night. I hope we can go again soon for a special occasion! Some of the wonderful small dishes mentioned above by Pat were also on our list of small dishes last night, like the radish with butter and roe, and the amberjack with chives. We were also treated to the famous date filled with mascarpone and the gyro with goat meat. In addition we had a sweet roasted green pepper from the north of Spain (shaped like okra) with a cup of pumpkin soup with pine nuts; a roasted fig with orange mint and a tiny fritter on top; and octopus with avocado and a quail egg on lentils. The quail egg was a surprise. Wow! If you have never been to Komi before, you can expect the small dishes to take about an hour. We opted for the pre-selected 3 wines and were very pleased. The sommelier was so enthusiastic. I wish I had a better memory for what we had, but I remember that my wife had a dry German Reisling with her small dishes and I had a sparkling wine made with grapes from Greece. Her second wine, with the pasta, was a Greek Chardonay that was aged in oak barrels, whereas mine was not oaky and had a much different flavor (that's probably obvious to those of you who know your wine, but it was news to me!). Our last wine with the main course was an Italian Santa Barbara Chardonay. My wife's pasta course was a corn-based ravioli with a scallop. Mine was heirloom tomato risotto with shitake mushroom and quail egg on top. That may have been my favorite dish of the evening, along with the octopus I mentioned before. For our main course we split the Bronzini for two. (You remember your Godfather families? Tessio, Clemenza, Tataglia, Bronzini ) What a wonderful fish! It was baked in that salt dome thing, how you say? Very fresh! We were treated to a float of homemade Concord grape soda with ice cream. For my wife, the flourless chocolate cake with olive oil gelato that Pat mentioned above. For me, the Greek donut hole with chocolate mousse, and coffee. That was our dinner menu. We didn't opt for the degustation that has more courses. I sort of which we had so that we could have sampled the cheese plate. We were there a little over two hours, so we really didn't feel overwhelmed. The pacing was very well done. The service was excellent. Definitely now on our list of places to go on special occasions!

What do I do with my oregano? Can I dry it and save it? Sell it in the open air drug markets?

Save yourself the drudgery of watermaking with a new Sunbeam Home Dehumidifier from Home Depot! (Not safe for drinking, cooking, or cleaning)