edenman

A bit inundated by a huge meal experience at CP tonight, but I'll try to hit the highs and lows. Sunday night is definitely the time to come here: it was delightfully slow, almost empty. No pressure to hurry up and finish dishes, so we took our time and really explored the menu. Amuse - A fried risotto ball, similar to the Suppli al Telefono I had at 2 Amy's, but smaller and slightly less cheesy. Ricotta Ravioli with Peekytoe Crab - This was a favorite. The mushrooms and leeks contributed a welcome crunch, and the crab played beautifully with the ravioli. The baby corn was the only thing I would've omitted here, but it was still really nice. Ribeye - Probably the best-seasoned steak I've had in DC, although I am admittedly far from an expert in the area. Morton's was too salty, S&W under-salted. This one was spot-on...A great steak, bone-in and beautifully cooked (although one of my friends ordered his rare and it came out looking identical to my medium rare) The sides were good: gnocchi was creamy and filling, and the spinach was good if not great (Ray's definitely wins here). The truffled potato was a bit disappointing...I had never had truffles, and I don't think this sparse introduction was a good way to get into them. Good potato, but not worth writing home about. Dessert - cheesecake, and tastes of a few cheeses (it was an indulgent meal for sure). Humbolt Fog, a Blue from MN, and a sharp aged gouda. Oh, and port (a 20yr tawny that was excellent). Port and cheese make me happy. Food coma. Sorta glad I'm not doing the fit for summer challenge: this would've been a major setback. $140 before tip (guess I'm eating grilled cheese sandwiches for the rest of the week). ETA: they actually have a few decent beers. Hennepin!

Any other mac users seeing this? I don't have one to test on, so I can't speculate as to the cause.

Agreed. I was there tonight, and the only smell was angst.

I have the exact same apprehension about going into brewing as a profession. The things I enjoy about brewing are the creativity and the spontaneity, which are usually driven out when you have to actually make money on every batch of beer (or meal the kitchen puts out, etc)...consistency makes alot more of a difference when it's a commercial product that people expect to be the same every time. And then of course, the pay cut would suck. But it's nice to dream.

Make bacon? I have a friend at work who did this, and she had to special order the belly.

I actually just got my copy in the mail, so I might've read some of it by then, but I already know I can't make that night (got a friend in town all week and we already made plans for thursday). Ah well, there's always next time.

So it seems that this is an intermittent problem (mktye and i just traded a few PMs and only got single emails for each)...if anybody else sees this issue, lemme know (post here or PM)

The beer selection at Annie's is beyond awful. I think I had a bud the last time I was there...it was (amazingly) the least offensive option.

Good points, I had forgotten about the prospect of trying to clean a carboy....even as it is, I tend to use the shower as a cleaning area, since my kitchen sink is nowhere big enough, especially for my brew kettle (14gal pot). Of course, cleaning a 12gallon conical fermenter will still require that large of an area, but at least the opening at the top will be large enough that i can easily get an arm in there. And of course, I haven't even considered how I'm going to move the conical inside after transferring the wort from the kettle into it. I boil outside (propane + inside = bad), and i do it a good 30 feet from my door (and up some stairs), so that's definitely going to be a two-person job at least.

I've thought of going glass, but I know I want to go steel at some point, and I'm not sure I want to make the investment in glass (I'd have to get a siphon, and the glass itself is like $25/per) if I'm just gonna ditch it after a year. Plastic buckets are cheap and I can get 3-4+ batches out of them before they start to show flavors of previous batches. Plus they are stackable, which is a very important attribute in a small studio like mine. Gifts of carboys will rewarded, but probably not by an entire keg

I don't currently have plans for either day, but the 20th is safer (since even if I go out of town for the weekend, I'll definitely be back for Tuesday).

ha! no sweat socks, but I (regrettably) am still brewing in plastic buckets. I'm still saving up for a conical steel fermenter, but for now, the plastic retains plenty of jenny say coy from previous batches. I've got an experimental hoppy wheat ale in the buckets at the moment, and it's showing more banana/clove character in the aroma than expected. We'll see how that one goes once it goes on tap. Maybe I'll have a little mini tasting/fiesta here since I rarely travel with homebrew. ETA: anybody who wants to buy me one of these gets several kegs of whatever kind of beer they want brewed

A homebrewed imperial stout at 10%. Brewed in September, kegged in November, and getting better every time I try it. Chocolate, a touch of roast, and just enough hop backbone to balance out most of the residual sugar. Still a good bit of alcohol on the aroma, but it seems to be continually mellowing as it ages.

Because it's a pain in the ass not to take them. Some places do this at the bar (Black Cat and 930 Club spring to mind), but I imagine the bartenders have to put up with tons of people who don't realize the restriction even though it's posted clearly. It probably doesn't lose them many drink sales, but it probably has at least a little effect (drunk asshole orders drink, tries to pay with credit, realizes he can't, "goes to the atm" and never returns?). The bottom line is that for most places it's not worth the hassle or the potential loss of a sale, especially considering how ubiquitous it is that people pay with credit. And it's one less interaction when you're paying your tab at the end of the night: "close it on the card" as opposed to "can i get my tab" + fumble through wallet for cash + "can i just get $2 back please"

A friend just tipped me off to the super-positive review in the post last week. Click!

"RFD" and "decent price" are two words you rarely see in the same sentence.

Ron Lindenbusch, the guy from Lagunitas who was talking at the tasting, said that the recipe originally came about because they were trying to make the barleywine and overloaded their mash tun. Since they didn't get enough sugar from the grains, they had to drive around to every grocery store in the area and buy all their brown sugar. I imagine the recipe has been altered as time goes on, since buying grocery store brown sugar is likely to give different results from buying it in bulk. Bottom line: it's still way too sweet for me.

Yea, 120 minute is too much sweet for me too. At that alcohol level (~%20 depending on the year), it's hard to balance out the ridiculous amount of sugar and the alcohol esters, no matter how much you hop it. Dogfish's World Wide Stout is much preferable, imo...the roastiness is a nice foil to the booze. In other beer news, the Lagunitas tasting last night at the Brick was fuuuun. Some of their beers aren't to my taste (brown shugga in particular), but others are spot-on (Pils, IPA, barleywine). And the Brick has more character in that downstairs back room than all of RFD, so that was nice.

The only way I manage to get myself to the gym is to play racquetball. Because it's a game, I don't get the "God, I hate this. Working out sucks" thoughts, and instead only get the "I'm gonna kill this shot" thoughts. It's almost a suprise at the end of an hour when I realize I'm drenched in sweat. I tried the early-morning approach for a few weeks, and maybe having the workout buddy would've helped, but I somehow always knew I could just go back to bed and get another hour of (glorious) sleep. I stopped trying that and now I stick to the lunchtime or post-work gym visit. I'd recommend the "play a game" approach to anybody who has as much workout motivation trouble as I do. Of course, even if I get to the gym 4 times a week (my target), it doesn't really put an effective dent in my drinking/eating. Such a shame that most good beers are really high in calories/carbs.

Rest In Peace (let me know if that link doesn't work, it's a NYT link)

Wow, that's unexpected. I expected that deal to mean the place would be packed during that hour. Will have to check it out (once r week is over). Welcome to the board, Owen!

I finally got to the downtown location a few nights ago to try this again. The bartender was confused when I asked for the "Triple Double IPA" because apparently the menu just labels it "Triple Double" and he didn't bother to read the description which clearly states the Double IPA side of it. Bartender gaffes aside, it's $5 for a 10oz pour, and worth every penny. Since they don't brew at that location anymore, they apparently don't know how much longer it'll be on tap, so I'm just gonna keep trying to fit it into my schedule until my luck runs out.

It's truly bad, yes. In the 19th/L area, you're much better off getting a noodle dish at Nooshi, imho.

I'm not sure if you got the name right, but if it's the deli around the corner from that newish Fuddrucker's, then yes, that place is very crappy. I got a corned beef sandwich there the last time I flew out of DCA, and it was really quite bad. Soggy bread, an unadorned lump of corned beef, and some very odd mustard. On a completely unrelated "Airport Food" note: in a couple layovers at O'Hare, I've managed to find this little hot dog stand that has a Goose Island "Honker's Ale" tap. The hot dogs are very mediocre, but that beer is worth the sacrifice. It's between two terminals, near this (if memory serves): DCA ORD

cornbread that my buddy cooked while i was working on my beer-chili. he's in the kitchen making his chili now. battle is on.