u-bet!

Thanks - don't mind if I did! I showed up yesterday around 4-ish, and sat at the bar. This was my first visit, and for some reason I thought the atmosphere would be a little more "upscale dining". To my pleasant surprise, there was more of a "neighborhood hangout" feel to the place. I came for the fried chicken, but the artichoke/goat cheese/tomato/asparagus/caramelized onion tart tempted me. I think it's pretty difficult to screw something up as long as goat cheese and caramelized onions are on the ingredient list, and this dish was excellent. The fried chicken came with a baby carrot side dish instead of the advertised green beans, in addition to the potato salad, a small slice of grilled corn on the cob, and pie for dessert. Although I am partial to deep fried vs. pan fried chicken, I thought Antonio's version was great. The meat was very moist, tender, and not greasy at all, with a sufficiently crisp crust. A couple of minor service hiccups, I believe due to some confusion caused by a shift change in bartenders, caused me to end up taking the dessert to go. It made a great late night snack. The whole experience made me want to go back and try some different things. It's probably just as well that Commonwealth isn't my local, or I would surely be a lot fatter, drunker, and poorer than I already am.

I would recommend the turkey chili I got from the On the Fly cart outside the Half Street gate last season, but I haven't seen it so far this year.

Is it appropriate to seek out Mark's advice when you're just going to have a couple of glasses, or only when at least a full bottle will be involved?

I understand it was late, but was there any interaction with a manager to express your concerns and try to see if things could be made right? I'm usually not one of those "I'm sending this back!" types, but I probably would have done so for the cold spinach and the improperly cooked steaks.

Have you tried the Boardwalk Fries stand? I have not, but I expect they would be a cut above the regular Levy-run concessions. OTOH, I was severely disappointed in the garlic fries I got at the Taste of the Majors stand. These were nothing more that the standard soggy limp fries with some (presumably jarred) minced garlic dumped on top. l was expecting some special care would be taken with the preparation to set them apart from the fries served at the regular concessions, since the theme of this stand is to offer specialty items imported from other ballparks around the league. Boy, was I mistaken!

Willard's in Chantilly. The burnt ends sandwich is very good.

Amphibian, apparently (Don mentions them in the second paragraph from the bottom).

Tried a new offering at last night's game: The Pit at the Red Loft, which offers fresh pit beef or turkey sandwiches. They pull the hunks of meat off the charcoal grill, slice it as you watch, and pile the thick slices (and I do mean PILE) on a kaiser roll (the roll was fresh enough, but nothing special; about what you might expect from somewhat upscale modern day ballpark fare). The beef is topped with horseradish sauce, and the turkey is served with some kind of aioli (I forgot exactly what they called it) plus lettuce and tomato. You can add BBQ sauce at the condiment bar if you want. Sandwich & bag o' chips combo is $11.00. I had the beef and it was tender, a little bit smoky, and flavorful. They do give you a lot; there was a good couple of inches of meat on that bun. P.S: Dogfish Head 90 Minute Ale has been rotated out of the draft beer selection at the Red Porch Bar.

Well, my mom is a big fan of Grey Poupon, so we always had it around the house when I was growing up. I remember taking a long time to learn to appreciate it; to my delicate unrefined childhood plate it had too much of a strong, "alcoholic" taste (not to be confused with my uncle Joe, who was also a strong alcoholic, but that's another story). I have had Maille, but it was a long time ago, and I don't know if it was fresh or not. I don't really remember what it tasted like. So much for being back on topic - it's turned into the mustard thread. Shit.

How about swerving this back on topic... Obama can be heard asking if they have a "spicy mustard" or a "Dijon mustard", something like that. But aren't those two different things? I don't think of Dijon mustard as "spicy"; I'm thinking he was after something more along the lines of Gulden's, which brands itself as "Spicy Brown Mustard". So... exactly what kind/brand of mustard did the pres get on his burger? If I had been to Hell Burger recently I guess I would know what they offer, but I haven't so I don't.

Yesterday I hit Pho 75 on 355 in Rockville for lunch, thus completing my head-to-head taste test of Pho Nam on Shady Grove Road vs. Pho 75. While Pho Nam was not bad at all, the flavor of the pho at Pho 75 is more refined; "smoother" tasting, if you will. The various flavors seem to meld better with each other, as if it's been simmering all day vs. just a couple of hours. Service was quicker, too. My comparison test also revealed that the unpleasant reaction I experienced soon after my last few visits to Pho Nam must be due to something in their recipe, and not some kind of allergy to pho itself. It almost felt like my blood pressure was being raised; sort of like hot flashes. I would not describe it as distressful, but it was quite unpleasant and lasted for at least an hour or two after eating at Pho Nam. Thankfully, I did not have the same reaction after eating at Pho 75. Does this happen to anyone else after eating pho? It's a very strange feeling... One last thing - I ordered the Vietnamese coffee at Pho 75, and was utterly perplexed by the presentation: the tall glass filled with ice with a spoon in it and the small drip coffee maker placed on top of the coffee mug, slowly dripping the coffee onto the off-white sugary/syrupy glob at the bottom of the mug. I ended up dumping the whole thing into the glass with ice. I was able to stir it after letting some of the ice melt and it was tasty, but I ended up making a terrible mess. So I'll look like less of an abject fool next time, can anyone enlighten me as to the correct way to assemble this beverage?

From the sight of the traffic cones blocking off all of the street parking as the motorcade pulled away, I would say there was advance notice.

chili?

This raises the point: Is food blog/message board posting to be considered word of mouth or informed criticism? I think most people realize that there's a pretty good chance that the average anonymous internet poster is likely to pretty frickin' uninformed, so I lean toward considering it as I would gossiping with your neighbor over the backyard fence. Sure, there's a chance that your neighbor might turn out to be Ruth Reichl wearing a Mardi Gras mask, but I think you should presume that it's more likely going to be the average Joe (no, I DO NOT mean Joe H) who's just prattling on. If I were running the show, I like to think that I would take a Laisssez-Faire attitude about the whole thing: let people post pretty much whatever the hell they damn well please, write counter-posts to your heart's content, and take it all with varying numbers of grains of salt.

Does anyone know if they are still open? I don't get into Adams Morgan very much any more. I remember the owner's son was an aspiring professional boxer. Wonder whatever happened to him... Many years ago, I remember hitting Dan's before going to a Blake Babies concert at the original 9:30 club. I couldn't take my eyes off a very attractive young lady who was sitting in a booth with some friends. I tried to work up the courage to go up and talk to her but, alas, my nerves got the better of me. So there I sat, admiring her from the bar. When I got to the club and the band took the stage, someone looked familiar. Sure enough, it was the girl from Dan's, Juliana Hatfield, then lead singer of the Blake Babies, and soon to go on to indie rock fame as a solo act. So, in my mind (at least in the early 90's), Dan's couldn't have been a hipper place.

I went to Evening Star on Tuesday evening, thinking the back bar would be a good place to watch game 7 while dining on food of decidedly higher quality than that at Cap City, Champps, Crystal City, or any of the other Shirlington-Pentagon-Del Ray area sports bars which came to mind. I grabbed a seat at a small table just behind the bar, near the corner with the big screen TV. There was only one bartender, and I didn't see anyone getting table service, so I ordered my first beer at the bar, paid for it, and brought it back to the table. The bartender noticed when I had finished it, and asked me from behind the bar if I would like another one. It was poured and left for me to come pick up at the bar. So, I figured this meant that there would be no table service; if I wanted anything, I would have to walk up to the bar and get it myself and then bring it back to the table. I dillied and dallied over the menu, having a hard time deciding what to order, and waiting for a good time to look away from the game. I eventually ordered the onion soup, and wondered if I would end up having to carry the hot bowl of soup from the bar to my table. To my relief, the soup was served directly to my table. The two pieces of French bread served on the side were crusty and fresh, but strangely lacking in flavor - nice texture, but they really didn't taste like much of anything to me. The two large croutons floating in the soup were understandably more flavorful, having picked up the flavors from the soup. The soup itself did not have the standard cheese cap; in fact, there was very little discernable cheese, but the broth presented a very interesting combination of flavors, so I'm not sure that a load of gooey cheese would have added much. I thought I might order something else, but ended up deciding to leave during the second intermission to get home in time to catch the third period. When I picked up my check at the bar, the bartender apologized for "taking too long" with the soup, and said he had comped it. I hadn't complained about it (or anything else) and I didn't notice that it had taken very long, since I spent so much time perusing the menu trying to decide what to order. So this ends up being a pretty long-winded review of a good bowl of onion soup, but the small gesture from the bartender indicated to me that he felt that he had not lived up to his own standards of service, even though I had not complained or felt as if I had received bad service. It really left an impression on me, and I thought I would pass it along.

The Reuben served at Whitlow's on Wilson is not bad at all.

Wow Deli on Gaither Road in Rockville/Gaithersburg does a nice job with their chicken and tuna salad wraps, using spinach tortillas. Their Italian Hoagie is nothing to sneeze at, either.

Those fries are worth whatever they want to charge for them, IMO.

So get the good stuff at the Porch and then stroll on upstairs to the Loft. No big whoop.

New Deal Cafe Never been, but heard good things. Unless its really tiny, I would think they could accommodate your group. ETA: Sorry, didn't notice the date of your original post - maybe next time!

There's a great special on the menu this week at Santa Fe Cafe - the "Porterhouse" Bone-In Pork Chop. The flame broiling made it taste like the best pork chop I ever cooked on my backyard grill - nice char, great smoky flavor, but not at all burnt. A dried cherry balsamic jalapeno glaze topped the chop with a dark coating of sweet-tart cherries well balanced by the heat of the jalapeno component. The accompanying mashed sweet potatoes were more of a puree consistency, and I noticed a touch of cinnamon. Grilled vegetables were thin pieces of onion, mushroom, and green pepper, with the same smoky flavor of the chop. Everything on the plate went really well together, with the exception of the chopped lettuce and tomato, which I treated like a garnish and did not eat. It's a sizable portion, but if you're like me, you might wish it was smaller, after gorging yourself on basket after basket of the complimentary chips and always top-notch homemade salsa. Price for this dish is $17.95, but it goes away after this week. Oh yeah, they have Dogfish Head 60 Minute Ale on tap by the glass or by the pitcher.

Five Guys must be praying that Levy doesn't introduce this item at Nationals Park.

I'm not sure, but it sounds like your last visit might have been prior to their renovation and division into two separate smoking and non-smoking areas which, if I read it correctly, makes them exempt from the new Va. smoking in restaurants law (which does not take effect until December, anyway). If you liked it back then, you might want to check it out again - new flat-screen TVs, you can still smoke (while the non-smokers enjoy themselves in the other half of the bar), and they actually have a decent selection of draft beers which are priced pretty cheaply for the area. The food, sadly, is another matter altogether...