edenman

The one-two combo of dinner at Tackle Box followed by beers at Paradiso is pretty great. Fried catfish was spot-on, and although the sweet potato fries were soft, not crispy, they still tasted great.

A friend of mine is also a big charcuterie nerd. He is moving out of the area. I want to go eat a pork-themed celebration somewhere, but can't think of where would best accomodate. He has a gluten allergy, so a focus on good charcuterie with a few entree options would be good. I'm leaning towards EatBar for the casual but still good focus on charcuterie and other pork dishes, but am also toying with the idea of settings up something in advance with one of our great area chefs to put together a tasting menu on an otherwise slow weeknight. Eve? PS7? Vidalia? Proof? Any suggestions?

De Dolle Export Stout. I picked up several of these in '05, and it's really hitting its stride. Hints of acidity in the nose, but the flavor is all big dark fruit, nice carbonation, with a bittersweet chocolate finish. Just great.

Made a test batch of bratwurst last week: the main downside of this model of stuffer is that it leaves a certain amount of meat un-stuffed (since the plunger isn't form-fitted to match the bottom of the chamber). For the first time, I actually weighed the leftover meat, and it came to just over 1lb. Easy enough to turn into patties, but means you really need to make at least 5lb of sausage to keep the linked:unlinked ratio to a reasonable level.

I hear Eve really turns the tables over.

Dupont sucks now that everybody knows about it.

Bacon. Beer. Other contributions TBD.

Killing time on Saturday between a wedding and the reception, and Les Halles happened to be across the street from the reception so we stopped in for a bit, midafternoon. Bartenders were good (although a buddy of mine asked for a manhattan and got something made with jack daniel's ), duck confit was pretty damn good, cheeses were great, and the bar was spacious enough for a bunch of dudes not used to wearing suits to hang out and relax. It really hit the spot, and the fact that they serve food all day long was a serious bonus. My interest was piqued by the country pate (which I think I had at taste of the nation; it was awesome), pork rillettes, escargots, boudin, and the cassoulet. Might wait a couple months on the cassoulet, but I think I'll be returning to try the rest before then.

Got a bunch of beets and cooking part of a beet-themed potluck for a group of 8 tonight. Found this, which looks intriguing, but I've only ever peeled beets post-cooking. "Simply peel and julienne"...I assume peeling raw beets is just done with a standard vegetable peeler?

Beet Salad, Butterfish with Polenta, Veal Kidneys Adam's Cocktail Menu What a great night.

Click - Interesting that they're targeting the older audience. I wonder if we'll see any of the new stuff (it comes in bottles apparently) out here. The Schlitz website only lists distributors in Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Illinois.

Is this a different label from the stuff they've been selling for the last few years?

Enjoyable lunch at the bar here yesterday. Had called ahead to check on sweetbreads, which were sadly not available. However, since everywhere else I felt like going was closed, we ended up here anyway. Smoked Mackerel Terrine ($12) was very nice, but too large a portion for the 3 pieces of toast it came with. Defaulted to the free bread for soaking up the not-overwhelmingly-smoky fish and creme fraiche layer on top. Half Roast Chicken ($19) was less of a hit: good flavor, but soggy skin. I'd go back, but I'm not sure I'll rush back unless someone else is paying: the booze in particular seemed pretty steep, but I guess it's probably on par with other upscale bar/resto locations in DC hotels.

I bought 4 tickets this morning and it ended up coming out to $128 per ticket. For me, it's worth it for the variety of oysters, but only barely. Certainly hard to justify when compared to the $75 it was just a few years ago.

Although fun, I wouldn't put St. Mary's in the same thread as the riot..they are very different events with very different goals. St. Mary's, for instance, didn't mention what variety of oyster you might happen to be eating, and seemed to be more focused on the various oyster preparations: fried, chowder, broiled, etc. I missed out on the riot last year, and a friend and I both woke up at 7:15 this morning to make sure we got tickets. Can't wait.

I should really read the entire thread before replying next time.

FWIW, Riggwelter is $10 at Rustico as well (as are most of the 16.9oz English bottles we carry). I don't really deal with the ins and outs of pricing or subsidizing, just a point of comparison. Maybe WF takes a lower margin on it in order to move the product quicker? Or maybe the distribution overhead is lower in DC? (not sure what WF location you're talking about). (this can be moved to a "pricing beer/alcohol" thread if an editor so desires. might be an interesting topic to discuss, if it hasn't already been done)

Just back into town and fiending sweetbreads. I've loved the renditions at Eve and Proof; who else has them and doesn't screw them up?

@ ?

Unfortunately, few of these beers travel/keep well (I had a spoiled bottle of Anchor Small last year) and I've not heard of our local brewpubs doing anything under 4%. Bottle seems to be the best bet, but the freshness issue makes it difficult unless you can ensure you get it as soon as the vendor (bar or liquor store) does. Coniston Bluebird Bitter is one that seems to hold up pretty well, and it's effing delicious to boot. ETA: the Italian craft brewers are also putting out some great session stuff, but it's expensive.

I just recommended Cork to a co-worker, who found this on http://www.corkdc.com/menu.html:

NYT on session beers. Paging Dr. CrescentFresh...

http://www.beermenus.com is also quite excellent for NYC beer-hunting. Wish we had one like it here.

Can't wait to see this actual list. The fact that we beat out Portland, Oregon and San Fran has me seriously questioning the criteria. Don't get me wrong, I like the recognition, but still. Am I really underestimating us that much?

Even if I wasn't morally opposed to pumpkin ale, I've got too many other brews in the pipeline to squeeze that in. Not really morally, but flavor-ally.