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The Hersch

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  1. The Hersch
    A definition of "Western Hemisphere" that includes the great majority of the U.K., all of Ireland, a good bit of France, almost all of Spain, and absolutely all of Portugal does not enjoy wide popular currency, at least not in the English-speaking world.
  2. The Hersch
    The stuff is expensive wherever you go. The price at Calvert Woodley in DC is $55, but there's 10% sales tax on top of that. I don't know what tax you pay in ABC stores in Virginia. I remember back in the old, old days, the Va ABC didn't charge sales tax (since they had a built-in profit), but I know that has changed.
  3. The Hersch
    I, for one, was already very familiar with the name of John Dehner, whose television work I loved when I was a kid. I didn't know he was an animator or a pianist, though. For some reason, one line he spoke still lingers in my memory. It was in a western (he did a lot of those), and he played a suave crook who may have been a banker or may only have been masquerading as one (hard to say after 50-some years). The line was "If you can't trust your banker, who can you trust?" It may have been on "Maverick", or possibly "The Wild, Wild West". John Dehner appeared in seven episodes of "The Virginian"!
  4. The Hersch
    Actually, the dark bits were tarragon leaves. I posted a sort-of recipe in the Dinner thread at the time (August 2014).
  5. The Hersch
    I agree that the prospective viewer of "The Man in the Funny Suit" should have already seen "Requiem for a Heavyweight"--the Playhouse 90 original. I'm so glad you enjoyed it, Don. I think I saw it on some PBS station twenty-five years ago, maybe more, and the discussion of "Requiem" here prompted me to seek it out, and watch it anew. YouTube can be a wonderful thing. I'm afraid I never cared much for Red Skelton. I rarely watched his weekly show back when it was on, but for some reason I remember one sketch that featured Amanda Blake (Miss Kitty on "Gunsmoke"). She kept breaking up laughing while delivering lines that weren't funny at all (at least to me). I found it baffling.
  6. The Hersch
    I'd go with a savory custard, not pudding, with no sugar and no flour. Just eggs, milk, a little cream, corn kernels (you might want to puree half of them and leave half whole), grated cheese, salt. Bake in buttered vessels of whatever size in a water bath. It's rich, but keep the serving size small and it's non-lethal. It's easy to make, and it's also really easy to do a trial run or two using one small custard cup to get the proportions perfect. I did a similar one (which I think I posted before somewhere) here: I don't recall what the dark bits were. Obviously you won't find tomatoes like that in November.
  7. The Hersch
    Was Kimball as annoying in person as he is on television?
  8. The Hersch
    Do you really think the Chinese Communist government cares much about non-Chinese statues of Buddha?
  9. The Hersch
    I haven't been yet, but I must say I dislike the new exterior signage. Not sympathetic to the building.
  10. The Hersch
    It occurs to me that I may have conveyed a misleading impression of "The Man in the Funny Suit". It's not a documentary. It's a television play about the making of "Requiem for a Heavyweight", focusing on the casting and rehearsal of Ed Wynn, who was not an actor at the time, in the traditional sense, but a vaudeville clown. The play was written and directed by Ralph Nelson, who directed the original "Requiem". Nelson, Ed Wynn, Keenan Wynn, and Rod Serling, among others, play themselves. I've always assumed that it was heavily fictionalized, and still assume that. It's pretty much unlike anything I've ever seen, and though not nearly as great a work as "Requiem" itself, it's pretty great. I suggest you follow the link I gave above to YouTube, and watch it. "The Man in the Funny Suit" reveals, among other things, that Rod Serling wasn't much of an actor, and was really, really, short, which you'd never know from his elegant appearances in front of "Twilight Zone" episodes. (I love "The Twilight Zone" for many things, and Rod Serling's introductions are certainly among those things.)
  11. The Hersch
    I think there is a whole lot of myth-making involved in the story of how Ed Wynn blew everything in every rehearsal and then miraculously gave one of the most affecting performances of all time when they did "Requiem for a Heavyweight" live; the story seems unlikely, as just about anyone who ever performed in front of an audience can attest. Nonetheless, "The Man in the Funny Suit," the institutionalization of the myth that ran on Westinghouse Desilu Playhouse in 1960, with the full participation of both Wynns and Rod Serling, among others, is totally worth watching. I commend it to your attention:
  12. The Hersch
    I endorse Don's recommendation of the original TV version of "Requiem for a Heavyweight". Some of the best television of all time.
  13. The Hersch
    I'm not very hopeful. I fully expect to see in my lifetime a nuclear attack on a major city by a non-state actor. In fact, I'm kind of surprised that it hasn't happened already, given, oh, Pakistan and some of the people who hang out there. I'm afraid it might be my own city. The actions of the U.S. government over the last twenty years have made it more rather than less likely.
  14. The Hersch
    Nils Lofgren has always been hot in almost every sense of the word that you can think of. Talk about hot: Everything you could want in a rock guitar player. Everything.
  15. The Hersch
    Absolutely the best sauerkraut I've ever found in an American market is Bubbie's, which they carry at my Whole Foods. It's in jars in a refrigerator case. With Bubbie's or any other sauerkraut, in order to be good, it must be prepared; just heating it up isn't sufficient. I usually chop up some kind of cured, fatty pork product, with an unsmoked variety preferred, such as pancetta. Render it out in a big saucepan, possibly drain some of the fat if it's excessive, but you want a good bit of fat in sauerkraut, then sautee chopped onion with the rendered pork product and its fat, until fairly soft. Then add the sauerkraut, and if it's Bubbie's I don't drain it first, 10 or 12 partly crushed juniper berries, a little white wine or vermouth, and possibly a bit of water if it's not very wet. Bring to a simmer, partially cover, and cook for at least two hours. Check now and then to make sure it's not boiling dry, and add liquid if needed. My ideal of sauerkraut is what I've eaten in Germany, and it should be very soft, almost approaching, distantly, the consistency of applesauce. Juniper is almost mandatory; caraway is generally a grave error.
  16. The Hersch
    Note: This is a correction to Scott Ham of the Bronx View, and not to our own Kibbee Nayee. There are at least two errors in this origin-story for the Yankees' interlocking NY logo. It wasn't created by "Louis B. Tiffany", as I don't think any such person existed. It was created by Tiffany & Co., but the individual designer is not known. It may have been, but probably wasn't, Louis C. (Comfort) Tiffany, who is not much known for this type of thing. So that might count as two errors rather than one. The other error, which should be kind of obvious, is that a medal awarded in 1877 would be for the first New York City police officer shot in the line of duty. See this NYT article by Richard Morgan, especially the correction at the end. One interesting nugget I stumbled on in my perfunctory research for this post is that Louis Comfort Tiffany was the great-grandfather of supply-side evangelist George Gilder.
  17. The Hersch
    Yes, but it doesn't even seem to be in a very good location for a tourist trap, neither near the monumental core of the city, nor in Georgetown, nor near the mega-hotels in Woodley Park. Why would tourists walk into this particular trap?
  18. The Hersch
    I happened to walk by La Perla recently, stopping to look at their menu displayed outside, and also to stop by their website, and I was astonished at the prices. I don't think they were quite so high when I was looking at their menu a few months back. You can see their menu here, although I should warn you that on Firefox I could not get the website to show me anything but the lunch menu. On IE, I could see the dinner menu as well. Their oysters on the half-shell cost more than Fiola Mare's ($20 to $18). They have no antipasto less than $13, with many well north of $20. Spaghetti alle vongole is $27. Mushroom risotto (with porcini and parmigiano) is $32. A sirloin steak is $55. If you believe, as I do, that La Perla is in Foggy Bottom and Marcel's is in the West End, then La Perla is easily the most expensive restaurant in Foggy Bottom, and it would indeed be easy enough, looking at the menu, to spend more on dinner at La Perla than dinner at Marcel's. I really don't think I'm going to dine at La Perla, no, not even for the team. It can't possibly be worth those prices.
  19. The Hersch
    I had the oysters and caviar dish you mention, and though my party was hardly treated like royalty, the dish itself was the best thing I tasted there, and easily ranks as one of the best dishes I've had this year.
  20. The Hersch
    Mark, I'm sure your intentions are noble, but thanks, I'll pass.
  21. The Hersch
    But Fridays isn't Cheesecake Factory. I was aware that people waited to get into CF (puzzled by it, but aware), but TGIF inhabits a plane of dreariness unlike practically any other of these chain places, going beyond even (shudder) Ruby Tuesday or Chili's. Do people wait to get into those places too? I know they wait in some godawful hellholes to get into Cracker Barrel, but also Applebee's? One has to wonder if euthanasia isn't called for in some of these cases, and if that's elitist and French, then let me be damned for it.
  22. The Hersch
    I think I mentioned this somewhere way up above, but the one time I ate at Bangkok Golden, I took a look at the very dreary buffet and immediately decided to order off the menu. People have been saying it's been disappointing of late, but I don't think the buffet was ever the way to go here. You might want to give it another chance and order off the menu. The dish I had, pork orm from the Lao menu, was remarkably delicious. I ordered it "Thai hot", which is less hot than "Lao hot", and it was plenty hot.
  23. The Hersch
    I started streaming this series from Amazon, starting with the first season, about three weeks ago. I'm now into the first part of season three. This is some of the best television I've ever seen, up there, in modern times, with "The Wire". I loved "Deadwood", but this is better, and Timothy Olyphant somehow managed to get even better looking. The dialogue crackles, the violence is brilliantly executed, as it were, the photography glows, the actors all turn in solid and often stunning performances. There are some incredibly horrible characters portrayed, but they're all interesting, and most of them get killed on screen! This series is solid thrills, and I can hardly express how much I love it.
  24. The Hersch
    It's really true that people wait in line to get into Fridays? Why, oh Lord, why? I mean, Lauriol Plaza is puzzling, but Fridays? Does it involve cheap pickups, or is it the sophisticated food and gracious service? Oddly enough, I've actually eaten at the Macaroni Grill in Columbia MD. Wasn't my idea. I was up there for work with a couple of colleagues, to do a disaster-recovery test. We had to start the test at some unholy hour, on a Friday, like 5 pm, and so we went for an extremely early dinner at Macaroni Grill, which was one of the choices of nearby chain restaurants, which is all there was (this would have been in 1999, I think). Obviously there would have been no line at that hour, although as I recall the restaurant was kind of busy. I don't remember what I had, but remember being surprised that it was not awful. Not awful is a pretty low bar, but one never cleared by Fridays.
  25. The Hersch
    Regarding a capon for Thanksgiving, I've ordered one online from D'Artagnan. Not cheap, but it wasn't going to be cheap wherever I got it. I'll comment on it once I've received, cooked, and eaten it.
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