cgarden

The iced coffee at B&W is also fantastic -- no unpleasant bitterness, nice caramel-y undertones -- a result of the cold-brewing process, or so I'm told. Worth the $3.25 they charge for a large one.

Is there a coralary then? If you live in MoC, but you're willing to trek to Ray's the Steaks because, truely, Mark is so worth that drive; is there a reason to go to Ray's the Classics instead? Since I understand the fried chicken is off the menu, I can't imagine why I would go to RTC instead of RTS.

I believe the bistro special is more extensive at RTC (it might also be offered more often, though I'm not sure about that). I also tend to find the atmosphere at RTC to be a little quieter, though that might just be me.

[snip] most of our programs are in the community, we go directly to public housing communities, and libraries, and recreation centers and parks.

This is very interesting. By any chance, do you work with (or do you have plans to work with) group homes for foster kids or kids in the delinquency system? As I'm sure nobody will be surprised to hear, the nutrition at some of these places (even the ones that house younger kids) can be really terrible.

Any you'd recommend we hit during our honeymoon trip next month? I'm very much looking forward to returning to Van der Heyden, but would love a couple of other small producer suggestions. Thanks!

We spent a couple of days in Sonoma on our honeymoon last summer -- my favorite small winery was Christopher Creek, in the Russian River Valley; Preston of Dry Creek also stands out in my mind. (Preston also sells some food of the bread/cheese/olive variety if you want to picnic.)

I wish I'd seen this thread before trying Sticky Rice a couple nights ago. I think its the first time I've been angry about a restaurant meal the next morning. On the upside, our waitress was friendly enough, though the service was incredibly slow (I got the impression this was mostly the fault of the kitchen). As others have mentioned, food came out in a haphazard order, with some people getting food long after others for no apparent reason. A spicy tuna roll and a couple vegetarian rolls were basically inoffensive; yellowtail sashimi was bland. Rice and/or noodle dishes: were cooked within an inch of their lives; the noodles they call "soba" definitely aren't; the sauce was gloppy and too sweet; and the shrimp and vegetable add-ins clearly came frozen out of a bag -- I think we would have been better off with $1.99 frozen noodle bowls from Trader Joe's. Also, another table ordered sake bombs that were delivered with a loud bang of a gong, which pretty much made us jump out of our skins. I cannot imagine this place gets repeat business.

This may not be the kind of thing you're looking for, but there is an Open Table app that can come in handy.

Had extended-Restaurant Week lunch here today -- the space was disturbingly quiet (by the time I left at about 1:30, the front room was more than half full, but the rest was empty), but the food was very tasty. I had the smoked salmon salad appetizer, the seafood soup (which was a thai-style thick broth with crispy udon noodles, some sort of white fish (can't remember - maybe snapper?), and shellfish, on top of a noodle cake), and the cheesecake. The dessert was especially good -- attractively presented with raspberry sauce, fresh pineapple, and pickled grapes (the grapes were not my thing, but were easily ignored) -- and the brule-ed sugar on the top of the cheesecake was a stroke of genius. If anyone is looking for something to do tomorrow for lunch, I highly recommend taking advantage of the last day of the deal!

Carla "the tortise" is a great foil to Stefan "the hare". She's also fun to watch. They say she is from DC and she talks about eating in DC. But just out of curiousity, has anyone on this board ever eaten her food or heard of her work before she got on the show? How do we get her to start cooking for us?

I think Bravo has previously identified her as the owner of a catering company. She's also mentioned that she is classically trained - perhaps at L'Academie de Cuisine?

That website doesn't have any details about the case, but it does appear to be some type of landlord-tenant issue, since the plaintiff is the owner of the building.

Cheers,

Rocks.

P.S. Asking in purely general terms, and having nothing to do with this particular situation, is there legal precedent for employees seeking compensation when a restaurant is shuttered on short notice? At the minimum, it seems "abrupt" for management to give workers zero notice when they know in advance a restaurant will be closing.

There's the WARN Act, but LH probably isn't big enough for it to apply.

In response to Rocks's post, I just thought I'd mention that Vegetate has some good happy-hour specials (including, if I recall correctly, half-off several of the small plates). I think it runs from 5-7, but don't quote me on that.

I went for lunch last week - hits included the deviled eggs and the grilled cheese with tomato soup (the latter was easily big enough to be lunch for two). The biggest miss was the flatbread with tomato jam and parmesan cheese - it was actually sliced baguette (not a problem, though I imagined "flatbread" would be a pizza crust or focaccia, not just bread that happened to be cut flat), spread with sugary tomato jam, olive oil, halved cherry tomatoes, and the cheese. Maybe it is a matter of individual taste, but I really reacted negatively to the sweet jam with the rest of the ingredients. The 17-veggie salad seemed uninspired - the 17 vegetables (of which some were actually fruits) just weren't that interesting, and the dressing lacked salt and acidity.

How is Mai Thai on 19th near M (they have a branch in Old Town Alexandria too)?

I haven't been in a while, but it was virtually identical to Thaiphoon (which is to say, serviceable, but not fantastic). As compared to Pasara, I'd say that Pasara used fresher ingredients and probably less oil, but Mai Thai/Thaiphoon has stronger/more spicy flavors.

Zaytinya has a private or semi-private room. Actually, I may be wrong about this, but I believe there is one "special events" person for all of the Jose Andres restaurants, so maybe you could find out about Oyamel at the same time. (When I looked into rehearsal dinner spaces, I got her number off the Zaytinya website.)

Finally, it would be out of the way for you, but for what its worth, I ended up having my rehearsal dinner (also for 20 people) at Dino, and it was fabulous.

Why does AB's stovetop recipe use a mixing bowl and foil?

I pop mine on the stovetop in a saucepan with a tight fitting lid.

Interesting - I'd always heard that you should leave the lid slightly open because the air would make the popcorn more crispy. I'll have to experiment and report back.

I went with two friends on the early side (like 6:00) last Saturday and there was no wait for either inside or patio. I can't say what it would be like at a more typical dinner hour. We enjoyed the puttanesca pizza -- it is on the saucier side, which my group preferred, and the mussels and capers added good flavor. Conversely, we were not particularly enamored of the funghi pizza - it was too heavy on cheese (with no sauce to counterbalance) and too light on mushrooms.

I had a sudden desire for salmon diablo, so we went to Ray's the Classics for the bar menu (an amazing, fantastic deal). I always love this, but last night's was particularly tasty - an especially nice piece of fish, I think. It also came with surprise sides of the grapes and sauce that are on the standard grilled salmon at Ray's. Also took home a piece of cheesecake (imported from NY - I think the Carnegie Deli, though I don't quite remember) for tonight.

I second BrettAshley - not only does it get really busy, the fact that food is made-to-order means that it is pretty slow (especially if you order something with a hot ingredient). Even if you were getting take-out, I wouldn't be surprised if that large a group ended up standing around for half an hour (in a relatively small space) before everyone had his or her food.

Saturday dinner - Hong Kong Palace. Four of us split the dried beef appetizer, tea smoked duck, eggplant with spicy garlic sauce, ma po tofu, dumplings, and fish with bean curd with spicy sauce. It was a serious over-order, resulting in several days of leftovers (no complaints there!). Being a pescatarian, I tried only a few of the dishes, but they were all excellent. The tea-smoked duck seemed to be a particular hit with the table.

Sunday dinner - Dukem. Split the special holiday vegetarian plate with a friend, which included 20-odd different items. I particularly enjoyed one of the cold salads (not sure what was in it, but it was crunchy and citrusy), and the potato in spicy sauce (again, I'm sure there's a more accurate name for this). Could have done without the yellow peas, which, despite being a staple of the menu, seem a bit bland and have an unexciting texture (and I guess just aren't really my thing - obviously your mileage may vary). It was a huge amount of food for a great value - something like $24.00 total for food, and it could have easily fed a third person (or 4 not-starving people).

Kotobuki last night - the fish was up to its usual Tuesday-night excellence--maybe it's psychosomatic, but I always find Kotobuki better on a Tuesday than, say, a Sunday. I particularly love the salmon and the yellowtail. Chef Abe may have been getting tired by the time we arrived (we showed up at 9:30), as some of the sushi was slightly irregular in form (e.g., some oddly-shaped rice).

I think the Juice Joint, which is on Vermont just south of L, has pretty good (and generally healthy) fare.

1) New Green Bo: A hole in the wall/dive Chinese restaurant in Chinatown that is off the beaten track. They do not pass the carts because there is no room to pass the carts. They are known for their soup dumplings and rightfully so. The dumplings were firm and full of yummy broth with a nice pork and crab stuffing. The vegetarian duck is an incredibly complex dish in that it tastes just like Peking Duck yet is tofu and mushrooms. Our tablemates included many native Chinese speakers. (they treat the big tables as communal which works well)

Oh, I love New Green Bo - I've been looking for identical dumplings in DC since I moved here, to no avail. I particularly loved the seafood dumplings, as well as the seafood rice cakes. Also, the dumplings seem to improve (to the extent possible) after sitting in the fridge overnight.

Thank you for your response. I'm very excited about this so hopefully it works out well. Maybe I should be looking for someone who wants to split a full share because there is a definite cost benefit to that. Anyone interested? I have a feeling trying to eat all of those vegetables from a half share may prevent me from spending money on eating out. That's always a good thing. Plus vegetables are so healthy how can you go wrong?

This is my first time to this website so I'm still learning the ins and outs. I noticed that there was a CSA thread where everyone gave ideas on how to cook the different vegetables. That would be a very helpful thing to do again for this season. I'm sure I'm going to get things that I have never even heard of.

I had a one-person share with Bull Run last year and agree with some of the comments up-thread about variety and the difficulty in using small amounts of vegetables (or really, the difficulty in finding the motivation to do so). Because it was a particularly dry summer, we missed out on some of the more "popular" veggies that had been planted (e.g. it was a very short tomato season, and we never got corn at all), and sometimes the veggies we got were on the bitter side because of lack of water (e.g. the lettuce/salad greens). However, the latest email from the owner of Bull Run indicates that he will be posting a list of the veggies that were given out in 2007 in the next couple of days.

I'm in, +3

Holy cow! Beck is serving brunch starting this Sunday.

MENU ADDITIONS FOR BRUNCH:

Scrambled Eggs with Smoked Salmon, Crème Fraiche & Scallions

Poached Eggs on Pepper Brioche with Parma Ham,

Sabayon Sauce, Tomatoes & Chives

Gruyere Cheese and Spinach Omelet

Belgian waffles with Fresh Berry Compote & Whipped Cream

All are priced at $14, plus tax and gratuity

I am curious to see just how Belgian these Belgian waffles are...

Two friends and I tried the brunch today -- we arrived at about 11:30, and they weren't quite ready to seat customers yet, so we had a coffee at the bar. The coffee service was quite elaborate -- they brought out a french press (the coffee was excellent), along with rock candy, various sugar packets, some loose raw sugar, and two pitchers of milk or cream, and were careful to make sure we knew how a french press worked. The press (which served two of us two cups each) was $3.50, which we thought was a great value. A less-great value was the mimosa that the third member of our group ordered -- $10 seemed a bit steep.

Once we sat down, our server recited the brunch menu, which included the items enumerated above (they also gave us the lunch menu, which did not list the brunch items). Between us, we ordered the poached eggs, a croque monsieur, and and the scrambled eggs with smoked salmon. I really enjoyed the scrambled eggs, which came with a couple of thin slices of toasted, buttered baguette. There were plenty of chives mixed in, which I thought really added to the dish. The poached eggs were pronounced not as hot as they might have been, but they did disappear nonetheless. The croque monsieur was reported to be incredibly rich (not a bad thing).

Service was friendly and extremely attentive (even to the point of seeming a bit anxious -- someone definitely had announced that under no circumstances were customers to bring their own coffee from bar to table). All in all, a very good addition to our list of brunch options.

Gus...I really apologize for that. We had a sewer issue. Our building was built in 1911 and the old pipes were not built right. In some parts of northwest DC the sanitary sewer and storm sewer are on the same line. So when it rains like on Friday night, a lot of debris from the storm drains and sewers backs up into our pipes and we had it all stopped up and coming back up. The only thing to do is not wash dishes and not let anyone use the bathroom. The health department unfortunately does not let you do that. Trust me Robin and I weren't having a good time Sunday either. All of that water coming up had to be taken out of the retaurant in five gallon buckets that the two of us carted out. And it is not clean water. We would have loved to stay open. Believe me. I had fried up 25 pounds of fried chicken and had a mess of grits. It is never an easy decision to close but one we had to make for everyone's safety. I would hate to have someone in the bathroom and have sewage back up on them. Today while I was doing the Washingtonian chat, Robin was in there with the plumber getting it taken care of. If anyone was turned away Sunday let me know, I've got a chocolate donut with your name on it should you decide to try us again. Again, my deepest regrets that you were disappointed.

I'm sorry to hear that - and definitely sympathetic about plumbing issues! Thanks for the explanation - we'll definitely be back.