Mark Dedrick
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Everything posted by Mark Dedrick
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Tom's in particular is illuminating, but it is still hard to get behind their decision. My wife is still angry about how things went down on that episode. -
I think you were seated right behind me @foodobsessed6. We also had a wonderful meal last night, our first time at Suna, and the overall experience means that we will definitely return.
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- Capitol Hill
- Eastern Market
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We stopped in on Friday night and really enjoyed the place. All of our cocktails were fantastic, which is pretty much what we were expecting. And the food was quite good, particularly for bar food. The standout for all of us was the spam musubi, which I could have eaten fifty pieces of.
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The walk from Union Market to Boundary Road or Le Grenier is not too bad, I've done it a few times, but your point is well taken. If there was a decent restaurant by the NoMa metro it would be a perfect start to a fun evening.
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The bar at Union Market is one of my favorite places to head for lunch on a weekend. The raw oysters are fantastic, and as a result I seldom make it past them and the clams on the menu. That said, I agree completely on the lambs and clams, which makes a wonderful lunch. The oyster chowder is smokey and delicious, and when they have scallops on special they are also wonderful. Pick up some bread or rolls from the bakery around the corner to really set the meal off. JP, formerly of Columbia Room, mixes up some delicious cocktails there, they have a nice, if small, selection of local draft beers. And they have Bodegas Hidalgo La Gitana Manzanilla sherry available by the glass, which pairs wonderfully with the oysters.
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To Whom Are You Drinking Right Now?
Mark Dedrick replied to starfish's topic in Beer, Wine, and Cocktails
(Last night at least) To the Fiesta Bowl champion Oregon Ducks. And, should this be his last game with us, to Chip Kelly for producing so many wonderful memories in the past four years. -
FWIW, on the phone they indicated that it sold out in a little over ten minutes.
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I would definitely rate Boundary Road above Smith Common at this point. In fact, I'd probably put Boundary Road behind only Toki, Atlas Room and Ethiopic among the H Street options.
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- Atlas District
- H Street
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I also love to cook and love to eat, and a few years ago tried to lose some weight (I lost approximately 60 pounds), and wasn't able to find a good cookbook along the lines of what you mention wanting. And pretty much for the same reasons. I had some luck using Cooking Light as an inspiration, and then adapting off of that. Also, unrelated, but in my case while healthier eating certainly played a role, I think increased and more regular exercise was as big of a component.
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My wife and I are on at 6:30. Very much looking forward to this.
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They've got a new chef starting apparently this month. http://frozentropics.blogspot.com/2013/01/queen-vic-welcomes-chef-michael-e-bonk.html
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I really, really love the look of the place. And I really like the idea of a true neighborhood place, that isn't part of some large strip of bars and restaurants. So I'm with you, I hope that the food once they re-open is good enough to bring me back.
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We made a return trip to El Chucho on Saturday night, and I now have a much improved opinion of the place. Our first time around we loved the vibe and the drinks, but were not big fans of the tacos. This time around, however, we stuck to the other parts of the menu and absolutely loved it. The pork posole was wonderful, and at $12 is large enough that you could make it your entire meal. The elote is also fantastic.
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We also stopped in this weekend (Saturday), and quite enjoyed it. They are having a few (understandable) service issues, and as a result we did not get exactly what we tried to order (disappointed I didn't get to try the house-made white wiz), but liked the sandwiches that we did get very much. I am a big fan of the bread, and feel that the ratio of meat to bread was pretty much spot on. One of our sandwiches mistakenly came with grilled peppers, and these were a nice addition, one that I might order on purpose next time around. The Taylor Balls (cheese fritters) were fine, but not something I'm likely to order again next time around. Like New Foodie, I really like the decor and layout. Since it is two blocks closer than Taylor, and since I can be quite lazy, I'm sure I'll be back.
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Loved the Mercado San Miguel (photos upthread) during our trip last month. We ate lunch there twice, and stopped in post-dinner one evening for a glass of wine. It is an absolute zoo on a weekend night, but much more manageable at lunch, and a must-visit. We enjoyed the Mercado San Anton as well, in particular the bar on the roof.
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While they do occasionally have a non-ramen daily special, typically it is noodles of some sort, which probably doesn't get to the root of the problem. I agree with Albert Yi, if you can't eat dumplings or ramen then your ability to pull together an entire meal is severely hampered.
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On the crowded factor, it is really hit or miss. We went last weekend on Saturday, and had no trouble getting seats at the oyster bar (oysters combined with La Gitana manzanilla sherry were fantastic), but on some other weekends you couldn't even navigate through the sea of people. More and more of the vendors are coming online, and I'm really thrilled that this place is relatively near my house.
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Quintessential Cocktail Book
Mark Dedrick replied to Choirgirl21's topic in Beer, Wine, and Cocktails
The more recent book I find myself using the most this year is the PDT Cocktail book. Covers a wide range of different cocktails, including pretty much all of the classics. -
You should absolutely hit up Martha Lou's Kitchen for lunch. Last time we were there we did Jestine's, Hominy Grill and Martha Lou's for our three lunches, and Martha Lou's was our favorite of the bunch.
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While we didn't make a concerted search, we actually had trouble finding an actual liquor store, or at least what we consider a proper liquor store, while over there. Because we likely would have picked up some sherry or other different sorts of booze had we found one. On the Bodegas Hidalgo front, I lobbed an e-mail in to their distributor, so hopefully I'll have some luck on that front.
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I have essentially no knowledge of Spanish gin, and the only one that I know I've tried was on this trip, at Bar Cock just north of Gran Via in Madrid (recommended to us by Katie Nelson). While there I had a martini (surprisingly not a gin and tonic) made with the bartender's recommended gin, Giro. The bartender recommended it by saying "This is a really nice Spanish, I'm sorry I can't call them that, a really nice Catalunyan gin." I was probably too many drinks in at that point to give you a really detailed and descriptive review, but it was a perfectly fine martini. On the topic of gin and tonics, good lord do the Spanish love their gin and tonics. In essentially every bar we were in gins outnumbered vodka by on average 10 to 1, and many bars had upwards of 40 or 50 different gins. Each different gin would have different tonics to match with it as well as specific garnishes (at the rooftop bar in the Mercado San Anton the Mobassa gin was matched with Pimiento Rojo tonic, red peppercorns and a lime peel while the Martin Miller gin was matched with a lavender tonic and apple slices). At Bar O'Clock in Sevilla the Junipero gin and tonicwas paired with halved blueberries, whole blackberries and lime peel. Only tangentially related because it involves booze, but the difference in the makeup of a typical Spanish bar compared to an American bar is rather large. Their top spirits were always gin, then scotch (or "malts", then rum. We seldom saw more than maybe a bottle of tequila, and the most bourbons, or bourbon-like spirits, we ever saw in a bar were five (at the aforementioned Bar Cock, which had Four Roses, Four Roses Single Barrel, Makers Mark, Jim Beam and Jack Daniels). Four Roses (yellow label) and Jack Daniels were by far the most common American whiskeys (or "Whisk-ays" as they call them) over there.
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Unfortunately the wine shop at Bodegas Hidalgo was closed for siesta when we finished our tour with Miguel, so we were unable to purchase any wine while in Sanlucar. As a result, currently my most pressing Spain question is where can I find examples of the wonderful wines we drank at the Bodega in the US? My limited searching in the past couple of days has yielded very little (my local stores don't list them on their websites, but haven't stopped in, and wine.com has only the oloroso among the dry sherries). Any help here would be greatly appreciated. This bodega visit, and the trip in general, was very eye-opening for us with regard to sherry. We had very little experience with this style of wine before going, yet drank manzanilla throughout the trip and loved it. The bodega visit and a couple of trips to a wonderful sherry bar, La Venencia, in Madrid, were fantastic as well.
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I'll write back in more detail soon once I've dug myself out at work, but having just returned from Spain yesterday I wanted to really thank Gerry for this chat, and the incredible advice he had for us. We had an amazing trip, and your recommendations and suggestions helped to make it so. In particular we loved Sanlucar, the salmorejo and berenjenas fritas at Taberna Juan Pena in Cordoba, and the crazy scene and food at the bar at La Castella in Madrid (the zamburinas there may have been the single best thing I ate during our entire trip). Thank you so much.
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Gerry, Thank you for all of your responses, you have been incredibly helpful. One more quick question for you for right now: 1. Do you have any must-visit recommendations for food in Sevilla? And at least one of the three nights we are there we would like to just bounce from place to place to really get a feel for the town. Is there a particular neighborhood/combination of spots that we should definitely hit up? Thanks, Mark
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Gerry, Thank you, this is extremely useful. As for day trips during our time in Seville, we were planning on one, although we had been thinking about Cordoba. Either Cadiz or Jerez sounds outstanding, however, so I've been looking into both of those this afternoon. Don, you'd asked about our hotel in Madrid, we are currently booked at Hotel Preciados, which appears to be just south of Calle Gran Villa. Thanks, Mark
