jpschust

the menu at sola looks very good to me, and the seafood influence would definately be appealing to my mother in law. have also heard good things about schwa, north pond, and spring. are you able to compare or speak to the relative advantages or shortcomings of these?

TRU's web site lists its tasting menu as $145. Komi's is $104. This is less than a 40 percent difference and not four humdred percent.

One way that TRU and Trotter's differ is in the ambiance. They have plush decor and walls decorated with art. Komi is rather spare in the decor.

I was trying to come with a similar experience and not match dollar for dollar.

I finally made it to Komi last night when a friend who claimed she wanted to pump money into the local economy treated me for my birthday. We ordered the tasting menu and three glasses of wine apiece and had a fine old time with the various tastes including what we were told was goat. One thing that really helps is not worrying about what is being served and just enjoy the various tastes. The service, both food and wine, was fantastic. It reminds me of my two favorite restaurants in Chicago, TRU and Charlie Trotter's, although slightly less expensive. I do appreciate that people don't have to dress up to eat there. It was a relaxed 2 1/2 hours of pleasure.

Sort of like people who say "The only opera I've ever heard is "Phantom of the Opera". Uhhhh, no.

Heading back to NOLA for the first time in about two years ... can those of you who've been there more recently than I help a girl out? I'm looking for one meal that shows a Yankee what New Orleans cooking is (at any level of casual-ness to fancy-ness), and one nice meal (think Cuvee, August, etc.). Not necessarily mutually exclusive. Also, any can't-misses for drinks, music, people-watching, etc. I'm afraid my New Orleans knowledge has become dated

For someplace a little less formal than blackbird, but a menu that's just great in my opinion- what about Sola? www.sola-restaurant.com. I've got a few other places, but let me know if that menu looks appealing to you.

Anyone else see the comments about the food slipping at Vidalia in Tom's chat today? I have a hard time believing that with RJ at the helm...

Haha. We have ways to get our 75¢ back many times over.

Telluride is possibly my favorite place to visit in the country outside of New Orleans and New York. The scenery, the people, the music - all excellent!

I don't know about n/a beer specifically, but i'd think that at PX the bartender can make something awesome without alcohol

Click here to see the baseball card of your last World Series MVP (NB - born in 1876. Still living at that time: Frederick Douglass, Louis Pasteur, Herman Melville, Jesse James, Fransz Liszt, and Sitting Bull).

Price report from someone who attended Saturday's game:

Hot dogs=$4.50

kosher dogs = $5.50

Ben's Half Smoke = $6.25

Pizza = $8

Sodas $4.50/$5.50;

Beer=$7

Margarita = $10

Cracker Jacks, Pretzels, seeds=$4

Congrats to chef for his 2008 Beard Award nomination!

Congrats to Central for getting a 2008 Beard Award nomination for best new restaurant!

FYI, Sauce Périgueux is truffles added to veal stock. Sauce Périgourdine is made by adding puréed foie gras to veal glace, garnished with truffles. Some sort of clumsy dissection of everything in between is Prétentieux sauce.

last night, pappy 23 on the rocks. last of my bottle. so long good friend.

My dad's coming to town in a couple weeks and I'll be happily indulging his special request that we dine at RTS. In the past, we've employed the Don Rockwell Blue Hair Dinner Strategy and eaten really early in order to avoid the crowds. However, thanks to a confluence of circumstances, it looks like we'll be a party of four entering the belly of the beast at 8PM on a Saturday.

Any experience with throwing caution to the wind like this? I'm scared. Will we be sloshed on two hours worth of Guajillo margaritas and stuffed with chips and salsa by the time we're seated? (The babysitter has a vested interest in knowing the answer to this question.)

The Governor Flip (No. 9) (a riff on the Millionare Cocktail and a gin flip)

2 oz Plymouth Gin

1/2 oz dry vermouth

1 tsp maraschino

whole egg

2 tsp cream

Shake all ingredients with ice and strain into a champagne glass

Price: 5 diamonds.

Friday- cafe boulud in new york

Saturday- eleven madison park in new york (who it seems lost their single star and feels like it might be starting to slip)

Sunday- vintage wine bar in chicago

Monday- at home with my lovely fiancee cooking something healthy

Tuesday- back to vintage wine bar in chicago because it was close and it's reliably good

Wednesday- tonight- dinner at home, bottle of 98 Corison to open.

How old are you, again?

Cafe Boulud

My fiancee and I were flying in to NYC to celebrate my father's 70th birthday. Our plane was hopelessly late, and we ended up not getting to the restaurant until 10:30. On the dot, once we sat they told us the kitchen was closing soon, but they wanted us to be able to eat. We ordered quickly, and knowing me, I picked the stuff that's a total pain in the ass to fix. I can't review other's food as I didn't taste it.

I started with the "Biscuit and gravy". It's described as pork, foie gras, black truffle, creamed spinach and sauce pergourdine. First off, this is the sign that I eat out at high end restaurants far too much- I was able to disect just about every spice and flavor in this dish and explain to other people at the table how their sauce was made once I saw it. FYI, pergourdine sauces are those made with black truffles normally, and also normally with stock of some sort- in this case possibly the best veal stock I've ever tasted in my life. The pork was mixed with the foie to make a sausage like texture with black truffles mixed in, all set above a bed of creamed spinach on a homemade brioche biscuit. Absolutely incredible. This leads me to the question- honey, can you make me this for breakfast?

For my main I wasn't famished, so I had an appetizer portion of their wild mushroom ravioli with chive batons and parmesan froth. With black truffles. Stunning ravioli. Perfectly light with the flavor of the mushrooms coming right through. The froth allowed for the perfect amount of salt seasoning while keeping the ravioli moist. The chive batons didn't add much to the plate other than colorful garnish, but they looked great on the plate.

For dessert I had a degustation of artisnal cheeses which franky I didn't get too much of as my table went for them They were great though with a focus on domestic cheeses, a lot of raw cow and goat milk cheeses.

All in all, this is one of my favorite places to eat in the country.

But Dino isn't open for lunch, as the original poster requested. Maybe someplace closer to downtown. Central (on Penn Ave) maybe?

we also have a 1 strike rule on expensive restaurants, and if it;s a bad enough experience that the mgr onsite doesn't handle to our satisfaction, we write to the GM. received a $200 GC from Mortons that way once- but haven't been back since we used the GC. Ruth Chris is just too much better to bother going back to Mortons...

Dino? Where is that?

Want to give a $100 gift certificate to a client for dinner or few quality lunches. Anyone have any suggestions for a nice place in NW DC or something close by? I'm not familiar with the area. Something tasty and reasonable?[/font]