Bart

It used to be bi-monthly (6 issues/per) but now it's quarterly.

Jacques Pepin says that the stems are the best part of the broccoli. Asparagus is another good one to peel. You can get a lot more "meat" out of an asparagus spear if you peel the woody, lower part of the stem. This is especially valuable if you grow your own

I'm surprised that no one has posted this, but here's a really long, but very interesting article on what it means to eat local. This article appears in the May 2013 issue of The Washingtonian.

Thanks! Coincidentally, my wife and I are doing one of their cellar tastings this weekend. I'm sure bottles will be purchased, in fact, it's almost time for us to re-up on our Case Club memebrship, so, many bottles may be purchased!

I have a Linden Petit Verdot from 2006 that I've been saving. Would you recommend the uncork > recork > wait 24 hours > drink regime for that one too?

Assholes yes, but also racist assholes. Or maybe bigoted assholes. I'm shocked that anyone who got this treatment would go to this place a second time. If this were a white guy doing the same thing to black people the outcry would be huge, and rightly so, but since it's a minority "sticking it to the man" many people seem to be taking it in stride. And I'm not some right winger on constant lookout for abuse of the White Male by society (I refuse to ever eat in a Chick Fill A because of their anti gay stance), but I must say that I'm a little surprised by the lack of outrage over this. Not one single person or post has provided an even opposing view of this place.

Yep, the wine list is very short and (I'm pretty sure) their only offerings are in those little one serving bottles that they serve on airplanes. Also, they have the buffet every day except Saturday, but it's a little different than a typical buffet. There is no buffet station. They bring out the dishes to the table and you just ask for more of whatever you want. Usually it's a choice of 3 soups, chicken wings, eggrolls, and 4 entree dishes. If you want more of any of it, you just ask and they'll bring it out.

Ha! The one complaint I have (sometimes) have is it can be inconsistent. Sometimes there seems to be a lot of duck per order (maybe 7 pancakes worth) other times there doesn't seem to be as much (maybe only 5 pancakes worth). Sometimes the dumplings come out so hot you can get burned if you go too fast, while others they come out warm, bordering on not warm. Maybe your place has similar issues? But I have to say the owners must me some of the hardest working people in the business (or maybe all family owned/non-celeb-chef places are run this way?). I've been coming to this place for 20 years and my wife and her family an additional 10 years and in all that time, the husband and wife who run the place have never taken any time off other than Mondays when they're closed. For over 30 years they've been in the restaurant 6 days a week! No shut downs in August, no random nights off, no nothing. I can't even fathom that type of work ethic or dedication.

Congrats! Maybe you can keep them on a better schedule. I was a little surprised that the recipies in this issue were mostly for winter foods (i.e. soups, root vegetable dishes) and nothing with asparagus or other spring crops. I also noticed that there were ads for events that had already taken place (a month or more ago). The date of the issue is "Late Winter/Early Spring" which explains a lot, but I wonder if they missed their mailing deadline by a month or two? I still love the magazine, but I wish I was reading about spring and summer happenings, not winter!

I disagree. I've stopped (years ago) getting the peking duck from Peking Gourment Inn (PGI) because it didn't come close to the version served at Peking Duck on Rt. 1. Your tastebuds my vary! Same goes for their dumplings. I don't think PGI comes close to the dumplings at Peking Duck. Besides the duck and dumplings another favorite of mine is their Chicken with Black Velvet. It's a chicken dish in a brown sauce served with a really wonderful, meaty (velvety) eggplant. You can get a vegeterian version too. Their sizzling platter dishes are very good too. Hell, I love damn near every dish at this place! It's a great neighborhood place. The service and decor can't compete with downtown DC, but for what it is, it's a hit.

My wife gets us carry out from here a couple times a month. I usually get the Drunken Noodles which are good but inconsistent. The chicken is often a little dry but the rest is good. Although she got an order for my son on friday and they were so hot he gave up after one bite. They weren't too hot for me, but they were definitely 2 or 3 times hotter than the last 10 orders we had. "Peking Duck" just a few miles north on Route 1 is our go to place for Chinese. For me, that's the best place for miles up and down Rt 1. Great dumplings, fantastic Peking Duck carved very quickly, table side, and served while the skin is still hot and crispy. (unlike Peking Gourmet Inn who carves so slow that the meat is cool and the skin is soggy by the time you take the first bite).

I look forward to that as I’d like to know what the “behind closed doors” talk is about regarding our local critics. Sometimes people drop veiled comments about Tom or Todd that I don’t really understand. Just as observation from the peanut gallery as a casual reader of DR: It seems when Tom S raves about a place that is one the DR.com darlings, like Ashby Inn, everyone agrees with him, and when he slams a place (or chef) that many people seem to have soured on, like Jose Andres/minibar/barmini, everyone agrees with him. But when he raves about a dish or a place that is deemed underserving by the mob, he’s a hack with a crappy pallet, or if he trashes a place that the insiders or local food community loves, he’s a megalomaniac with an axe to grind. I don’t know the guy, but from reading his stuff for years, that doesn’t seem to add up to me. It’s in his best interest to have DC become a premier food destination in the country/world, but raving about a place that doesn’t deserve it serves no one but the restaurant in question. Can you imagine if he raved about Suna (or any other place) and the food critic from the NYT checked it out and then savaged the same place, and DC as a whole, in the Times? I can see the review now: “If this is what DC considers a 4 star restaurant, plan your visit around the monuments and museums, not the restaurants.” And regarding all the conspiracy theories and wailing and gnashing of teeth about the Post running this article, I’m sure it wasn’t logistically or financially possible to pull the article. This is a huge embarrassment for them. I can see Fox News and Rush Limbaugh having a field day: “The Washington Post is so out of touch, they ran a review of a place that has been closed for over a week! If you can’t trust them to get a simple restaurant review correct, how can you believe anything they say!?!?” And then they could go on to bash the “liberal media” ad infinitum. Leaving it up on the website is probably something beyond Tom’s control too. They’ve invested a huge about of money and time into their website and there’s probably a policy that everything that appears in print gets published online (along with a ton of other stuff that doesn’t make the printed version). They’re a news organization first and foremost. It’s highly unlikely that Tom could bust into the editor or publisher’s office and demand major action over a lowly restaurant review. Reading this back, I think I may sound like a Tom apologist. I’m not, or at least I don’t think I am. There are plenty of things about him with which I disagree, but in this case I think it’s just as simple as bad timing of a bad review.

Thanks Darkstar! Just what I was looking for. This will be a birthday dinner for my wife so it will be just two of us. That's also why I wanted to sit at the counter.......dinner and a show!

Can anyone explain a little more about the seating/lack of reservation policy? How do you go about sitting at the bar on a weeknight (2 people)? My understanding is it's like Little Serow......no reservations, first come, first served. The difference is that all the seats in Little Serrow are basically the same (i.e. no bar area). If I showed up and there were no bar seats, could I wait for one? And is that even worth it? My wife and I generally like watching the "show" so I'm thinking about trying to snag bar seats, but maybe it's better to be upstairs? Can someone clue me in? Thanks!

Nothing! We were sort of having a converstaion so I decided to give your name a shoutout. I figured the "Darkstar" name was a Grateful Dead reference. The 2-13-70 show is considered by many to have the greatest Dark Star ever played. Me, I consider it to be the greatest piece of music ever played! You can get it on "Dick's Picks Vol. 4" from the Grateful Dead's website. If you're a fan of Dark Star or the Dead, this is mandatory listening!!

I'm totally confused. In the link in post #470, I don't see any mention of you eating the pizza. Certainly not in the first 3 paragraphs. The only place I see pizza mentioned is in paragraph 7 where you decide not to order it. I get the feeling we're talking two different reviews. Here's the one I read from the link in post #470: http://reviews.dcdining.com/2011/07/03/graffiato-chinatown/ Aw crap! I was just about to hit "post" when I looked at your review for probably the 10th time and only then did I realize that it continued below links for wine. I just assumed that was the end of the review since it was the end of your meal. I humbly apologize. A thousand pardons! And I agree with you, I had that calamari pizza too and didn't like it. After a bite or two I regretted trying something new and not sticking with the one I loved before. Sorry for the misunderstanding and feel freed to delete all my posts.

Hahahaa! I was just making the point that the Chef's tasting menu seemed like a great bargin. I loved the Ashby meal but it was quite pricey and quite small. Very, very good, but just small. And sadly, that's one of the first things that pops into my head when I think about the meal. Sure I remember the beautiful outdoor setting, the beautiful sunset on a warm late summer evening, the sweet staff, the unique dishes (cooking my steak on a molten rock, soup "flavored" with burning hay on the bottom of my plate - see my post for photos), but right behind all that is the feeling that I wasn't even close to full when we were done, and that we'd need more food that evening. At Graffiato on the other hand, we couldn't finish the last entree and only had a couple bites from the 3 desserts. And can I get a hand for 2-13-70?

Huh? You didn't order or taste the pizza?!? No wonder it didn't make your top 100 list! It's apparent that you have a major anti-Isabella bias, but to 'dis his pizza in at least two threads without ever tasting it seems a bit over the top. I'd suggest leaving your friend and his taste-calibrated eyeballs home and actually try the pizza there. Go for the "Countryman". They finish it at your table by spreading/mixing a nearly raw egg across the surface. I'd never seen that done before and it seemed a little weird, but man, the taste was great.

I haven't been to Dino, but I've had the Chef's Tasting menu at Graffiato a couple of times (upthread) and I've been floored for the amount and quality of the food that we got for 55 bucks. I've never just ordered a couple dishes off the regular menu so I can't comment on the value to price ratio, but for the Chef's menu, I think it's a great deal and a ton of food. My wife and I did the tasting menu at the Ashby Inn last summer and we loved it, but 3/4s of the way through the meal, I realized I was still going to be hungry when we left, and sure enough, I was raiding the refridgerator as soon as we got home. And that meal cost $99, nearly twice the price of the meal at Graffiato.

Good stuff! Even going to farmers markets you see the same few varieties over and over again. To get the really "weird" stuff you have to grow your own or know someone who does. Check out this list of apples from a guy I "know" (electronically) in Maryland: Apples **Abbondanza, Adams Pearmain, *Akane, Allens Everlasting, American Golden Russet, American Summer Pearmain, Apricot, Aromatic Russet, Ashmead's Kernel, ©Bedan, Belle Fille, Belle Fleur Rouge, Belle Fleur de France, Belle de Boskoop, Belle de Pontoise, Berner Rosen, Beverly Hills, ©Binet Blanc Dore, Black (Cherryville strain), *Blenheim Orange, Bonne Hotture, Bramley's Seedling, Brownlees Russet, ©C'Huero Ru Bienn, Calville Blanc d'Hiver, Calville Rouge, Calville Rouge d'Automne, Canada Red, Canada Reinette, Carmeliter Reinette, Cartigny, Catherine, Chenango Strawberry, Chestnut, Claygate Pearmain, ©Clozette, Cockle Pippin, Cornish Gilliflower, Court Pendu Gris, Court Pendu Plat, Cox's Orange Pippin, Crollon, De L'Estre, Doctor Mathews, Double Bon Pommier, ©Doux Normandie, Dutch Mignonne, Early Joe, *Egremont Russett, Ellisons Orange, Esopus Spitzerberg, Fall Pippin, Fameuse, ©Frequin Rouge, **Freyburg, ©**Fuero Rous, Fuji (Nagano), Garden Royal, Ginger Gold, Golden Noble, *Golden Nugget, Golden Russett, **Goldrush, *Gravenstein, Grimes Golden, Hampshire Red, ©Harrison, Hawaii, *Hewes Crab, Holstein, Honeycrisp, Horneburger Pfannkuchen, Hubbardston Nonesuch, Hudson's Golden Gem, Hunge, Ingrid Marie, Jefferis, Karmijn de Sonneville, Kerr, Kidd's Orange Red, King David, Lady Sweet, Lamb Abbey Pearmain, Laxtons Fortune, Magnum Bonum, Maigold, Margil, ©*Marie Menard, ©Marin Onfroy, ©Maunerbe, ©Medaille d'Or, Melon, Mettais, Missouri Pippin, Mother, ©Muscadet de Dieppe, Mutsu, My Jewel, Myers Royal Limbertwig, NY460 aka Millenium, Native Crab, *Newtown Pippin, Newtown Spitzenburg, October Gravenstein, *Old Nonpareil, Oliver, Orleans Reinette, Peck's Pleasant, Pigeonnet Rouge, *Pink Lady, Pitmaston Pineapple, Pomme Gris, Pomme Raisin, Pristine, Queen Cox, Rambour d'Automne, Rambour d'Hiver, Razor Russet, Red Berlepsch, **Reine des Reinettes, Reinette Clochard, Reinette Gris Parmentier, Reinette Gris du Canada, Reinette d'Armorique, Reinette de Cuzy, Reinette du Mans, Ribston Pippin, Roxbury Russett, Rubinette, *Rusty Coat, ©Saint Martin, Sam Young, Shizuka, Sierra Beauty, Signe Tillisch, Smokehouse, Spigold, St. Edmunds Pippin, Steele's Red, Summer Queen, Suncrest, Suncrisp, Sundowner, Suntan, Swaar, Swayzie, Swiss Orange, Tolman Sweet, Transcendent, Transparent Croncels, Tumanga, Tydemans Late Orange, Vanilla Pippin, Viking, Wagener, Waltana, Weisse Winter Tafel Apfel, Westfield SNF, **White Winter Pearmain, Whitney, *%Wickson, Williams Pride, Winesap, Worcester Pearmain, Yellow Bellflower, Young American, Zestar. The apples above prefixed by "©" are European cider apples; their original climate is more cool than mine and I have found that I get little of the needed tannins from them in my climate. Two cider apples which I have found produce good tannins in hotter climates are Fuero Rous and Marie Menard. Since there are so many apple varieties I am being very picky on recommended ones; many of the non-*'d ones are good but are not sure winners to me yet. Also a third or so have not yet fruited. This guy is just a back yard grower who has a real job and just does this for fun! He's into high density planting so his trees are only about a foot apart and are agressively pruned to keep them small.

Interesting and funny article about food shows on TV and the evolutions of the hosts and the genres. Don't miss the footnotes! (I couldn't copy them over for some reason) http://www.grantland.com/story/_/id/8965587/top-chef-taste-state-food-tv Eat Bray Love The corruption of Anthony Bourdain, the return of Emeril Lagasse, and the state of food television By Andy Greenwald on February 20, 2013 PRINTA decade ago Emeril Lagasse was omnipresent, sprinkling catchphrases and cayenne nightly in front of a live studio audience. A lumbering, rump roast of a man who cooked like Paul Prudhomme but talked like the Gorton's Fisherman, Emeril was the unlikely poster boy of the transformation of what had once quaintly been known as "cooking shows" into a more unwieldy behemoth: "food TV." Fueled by the insatiable advertising needs of the Food Network and a viewing public suddenly interested in distinguishing deglazing from deveining, the staid format established by Julia Child and Jacques Pepin was chucked into the garbage like spoiled milk. It was no longer enough to stand behind a stove top and instruct. The new goal was to entertain. Chefs were required to prep themselves right alongside their mise en place, to garnish their dishes not with parsley but with personality. And so, beginning in 1997, Emeril applied essence and kicked things up to varying notches. He employed a soft jazz band and . He made garlic an applause line and convinced untold millions of Americans to try their hand at something called Urky Lurky. The goal remained ostensibly the same, despite the extra volume: to make home cooking appear doable and fun. But the extra noise soon began to drown out the message. Emeril endorsed toothpaste and floor mats and allowed someone to talk him into starring in an NBC sitcom.1 Eventually, the demands of celebrity scraped Emeril's plate clean, and by the time Emeril Live's goose was finally cooked2 in 2007, he'd unwittingly set the table for an entire generation of still to come.With no way to serve us an actual steak, the Food Network rebranded itself in desperate search of sizzle. The hyperactive appetite of television — for youth, for spark, for drama more genetically modified than a tomato in December — is far more demanding than any mere gastronome. And so the TV part of the equation began to outweigh the food. Legit cooks like Mario Batali and Michael Chiarello also went out the door. The rise of the hubris-devouring succubus that is The Next Food Network Star3 — and the long-term cheap replacement labor it provided — meant that their expertise was expendable, easily sacrificed on the altar of accessibility. Cooking isn't all that difficult, but cooking well absolutely is. And so the second generation of Food Network shows focused on making everything as easy as humanly possible, an interchangeable cavalcade of shortcuts and time-savers and "healthy alternatives," an endless slate of chipper idiots demonstrating idiotproof ways to successfully make sandwiches. The rest of the schedule was given over to a series of increasingly ludicrous competitions: The honorable Japanese Iron Chef begat a tarnished American version. Cupcake Battles escalated into Halloween Wars. Newer shows promised to reveal — and humiliate — the Worst Cooks in America. There's the even more execrable Rachael vs. Guy Celebrity Cook-Off,4 which revels in subhuman incompetence. The schizophrenic network seemed committed to the idea of separating its viewership into either cartoony warriors or overmatched civilians, presenting the kitchen as either a battleground or a ticking time bomb. Food itself was either impossibly out of reach or beside the point, like fat floating on the surface of a broken sauce. Fermenting just beneath Emeril's rise, the sourdough to his bubbly yeast, was Anthony Bourdain. The acerbic former junkie turned professional raconteur talked more smack than he'd ever injected, particularly on the subject of chefs on TV. (Emeril, for example, was both an "Ewok" and a hack.5) Bourdain was a proud and snarly outsider, a thoroughly undistinguished line cook lifer suddenly handed a bullhorn on the back of a surprise bestseller. The chip on his shoulder was the size of a Yukon Gold. But, first on the Food Network and then on the Travel Channel, Bourdain proved himself to be a peerless ambassador for the extremes of cooking, high and low. He was never half the chef Emeril was — something he'd be the first to admit — but he was twice as good on camera. No Reservations, which recently ended a triumphant nine-year run, was consistently one of the best things on television, a gorgeously shot valentine to global food culture. Bourdain's snark was always as much of an affectation as the earring and cigarettes — both now mercifully discarded — and so I never found him off-putting. Rather, I found him brilliantly and persuasively respectful, making the case that eating a raw seal eyeball or a bowl full of deep-fried crickets6 aren't isolated acts of gross-out machismo but a way to connect with people and traditions that existed long before Cool Ranch Doritos Locos Tacos — and will hopefully survive long after that abomination is wiped from the earth. At its foul-mouthed best, Tony Bourdain's shtick is absolutely empowering, but not in the faux-populist manner of a Sandra Lee or Guy Fieri. What's made his voice so important is his steadfast refusal to coddle anything but eggs.7 Unlike most food shows, the central message of No Reservations was actually, no, you can't do this; you can't cook it, you can't re-create it, you can't dumb it down. Bourdain was a knight-errant of good taste, a champion of expertise and authenticity. Real food experiences, he argued, whether at a sushi counter in Tokyo or a hot dog stand in Chicago, are worth seeking out. Appreciation is just as important as enthusiasm. Which is precisely what makes his involvement in ABC's The Taste8 so disheartening. "This is a cooking competition unlike any other," Bourdain brayed at the start of the series last month. It was a lie. There have been plenty of terrible cooking competitions in the past, though maybe none as teeth-grindingly cringey as this one. Conceived as a glitzy, kitchen-oriented version of The Voice, here it's the judges who must repeatedly open their gobs, the better to shove in an unending conveyor belt of porcelain spoons. Every spoon arrives laden with a "perfect bite," each one cynically crafted by one of a well-groomed armada of knife-wielding fameballs. The idea, the show repeatedly tells us with all the subtlety of a Sriracha shooter, is that only through blind tastings and novelty flatwear can food actually be judged by its most important characteristic: The Tas — oh, I can't even bring myself to type it. Look, it's perfectly fine for Bourdain to cash in and try new things. He's spent a decade traversing the world, consuming calories as if they were frequent flyer miles, and collecting hangovers like snow globes. He's 56 years old, married, with a 5-year-old daughter. Everyone deserves a chance to experiment, and I've got nothing at all against selling out.9 But Bourdain's entire post–Kitchen Confidential career — embodying his bedrock belief that food cannot and should not be separated from the richness of experience that surrounds it — has been an eloquently stated and vibrantly lived refutation of everything The Taste stands for. Now he sits on a garishly lit soundstage, defanged like an aging circus lion, ginning up halfway constructive things to say to deluded Capoeira instructors who make "food for awesomeness" when the only reasonable response would be laughter. Slumming alongside Bourdain as judges/mentors are Ludo Lefebvre, an actually gifted French chef who operates a wildly popular pop-up restaurant in Los Angeles,10 Nigella Lawson, the endlessly charming doyenne of British domestica, and onetime Top Chef loser Brian Malarkey. OK, maybe only 75 percent of the panel is slumming: The impossibly plastic Malarkey is the most aptly named reality-TV personality in ages, a self-proclaimed fish cook whose actual specialty is ham. Bourdain's Rolodex is put to good use, too, as a dazzling assortment of legitimate geniuses, from Gabrielle Hamilton to David Kinch, parade shell-shocked through the sea of overmatched, yoga-bowing amateurs. But not even this can save the show from its central conceit. A blind taste test may be "pure," but it also makes for dull television, as the judges chew speculatively and toss out the occasional inaccurate noun ("Is that watermelon? And some kind of fruit?" "Lamb. I think it's lamb"). The rest of the hour is filled with the backstories and histrionics of the wildly uninteresting finalists, who range from moderately talented professional cooks to moderately talented home cooks. By trading on (false) Bourdain-ian orthodoxy,11The Taste has actually robbed itself of the unhealthy but delicious artificial flavoring that powers most reality-TV shows: personality. It's a bland, underseasoned mess. Courtesy of Bravo The main takeaway here is that amateurism just isn't all that interesting. There's an ugly, undeniable thrill to watching puffed-up losers flame out in the audition rounds of singing shows — how dare they not know how bad they are! — that's simply absent in food competitions. At worst, these clumsy home cooks are still struggling to prepare hot food for their families. A bland Chilean sea bass contributes more to society than a butchered . Cooking at a high level demands real ability and even realer dedication. A vocal savant could feasibly go from the American Idol stage to Radio City; the best contestant on The Taste would struggle to last five minutes in the kitchen of the restaurant on the corner of my street.12 I watch food shows for competence and excellence, and for the same reason I disdain college sports: I like seeing the best.Thankfully, there remain two cooking competitions mostly untouched by the ravages of reality TV. The first, rather surprisingly, is not only on the Food Network, it's become their signature series. Chopped is lean and unsentimental, a relentlessly rewatchable exercise in the sort of quick thinking and flexibility only possible in thoroughly Malcolm Gladwelled professionals. The contestants who do battle with baskets laden with fennel and fried egg candies — and each other — are culled from the swollen, mostly anonymous ranks of the people who actually cook our food. It's an entertaining mix of graying lifers and hungry stagiers looking for a way to pay off student loans, not fame. Not even Alex Guarnaschelli's affected death-stare can dampen the freewheeling vibe of loony inspiration. The recent Chopped: Champions' Tournament was the most entertaining television I've seen in 2013, marred only by the show's unavoidable original sin: It culminates in dessert. Forcing wildly creative savory chefs to break out the measuring cups and ratios in order to determine a winner strikes me as patently unfair, both to them and to us. It's like ending the Lincoln-Douglas debates with multiplication tables. Still, even at its best, Chopped is what happens after boiling and reducing the sumptuous master sauce that is Top Chef. In its 10th season, Bravo's flagship remains a well-oiled, overly sponsored13 juggernaut. Despite the deplorable lack of trademark spoonery, it's here that the Bourdainian ideal is best expressed: skilled, overly tattooed tradesmen (and women) competing solely on the strength of their cooking. The occasional backstabbing or head shaving or Grand Theft: Pea Puree serve as side dishes,14 never mains. The best seasons by far — Las Vegas, All-Stars — have been the ones with the most talent, not the most fights. As with the NFL, parity here is a better idea in theory than in practice. The Texas season wasn't dulled by Paul Qui's dominant brilliance, it was saved by it. The Seattle edition, which plods to its conclusion with the first of a two-part finale tonight, has been slowed by the creaks and groaners typical of an aging franchise; years of cherry-picking talent has resulted in a less dazzling cast, many with mouths bigger than their palates. And the addition of countless gimmicks to keep fan favorites in the game has been both confusing and exhausting.15 It helps, of course, that the judges — from Tom Colicchio, a Renaissance master of kindly bemusement, to Padma Lakshmi, that stoned and regal puma — remain rigorous and fair, as do the deep bench of prestigious guests willing to schlep from South Carolina to Alaska for the privilege of eating yet another "perfectly cooked" scallop. But mostly I remain a sucker for the marathon grind of the cooking and the hard-earned camaraderie it creates among the cheftestants; there's nothing better than the final episodes when the finalists share recipes, smokes, and thousand-yard stares; hardy survivors trapped in the same foxhole, cooking the same hens. Tonight I'm pulling for Brooke, the quietly confident cook from Los Angeles who's triumphed over unfried fried chicken and a crippling fear of both helicopters and cruise ships, to take the title over Sheldon, a genial hippie from Maui who, like all ukulele strummers, is constitutionally required to mention where he's from four times an hour. But the real breakout star of Top Chef Seattle isn't even in the competition. It's Emeril Lagasse. Now in his second season as an adjacent judge, the onetime garlic tosser is heavier and slower, a Wookiee in winter. Stripped of his catchphrases and his band, Emeril has revealed himself to be kind, patient and insightful, able to articulate the nuances of food we'll never taste with expert, understated flair. The best moment of the season came last week, when he cooked a meal alongside Roy Choi, hipster godhead and the man responsible, for good or ill, for the "food truck revolution" that already feels as dated as sun-dried tomatoes. Over plates of braised shortrib and cornbread, Choi explained how seeing an episode of Emeril Live at his lowest point transformed him from a "scumbag" into an acclaimed chef. "I was really in a bad place and this dude was on the TV, man," he said, fighting tears. "Emeril popped out the TV and just slapped me across the face." The story kicked everything up to a notch not even Emeril was prepared for. ("Wow," he said, simply. "That's really cool.") But it made for riveting viewing just the same. It was food and it was television, satisfying, sharp, and sweet. <a href="http://ad.Doubleclick.net/jump/espn.grantland.us.com/story;sz=145x50,1x1;" target="_blank"> <img src="http://ad.Doubleclick.net/ad/espn.grantland.us.com/story;sz=145x50,1x1;" border="0" alt=""> </a>

That's was my typo, not theirs. Can we get a spell check button!?!?!?!?

The competition is over and the USA didn't place. Is this an epic fail given all the prep and time and money and effort that went into it, or a BS contest where the fix was in? Thomas Keller was tweeting before during and after the event and while Keller always nice and professional, a lot of commenters replying to his posts said things like "big surprise, France won again" or "fixed" or sometinng along those lines. So is this thing a vanity project for France or a real competition?

Funny! I just picked it up but haven't really read much yet. For those playing along at home, the frist couple of sentences talk about how great Chef Eric Ziebold is, but a little further they say, "A recent dish of calf's-liver sashimi illustrates Monis's quest to challange himself and his diners" The obvious mistake is the chef's name swap from the Komi article, but should there be a hyphen in "calf's-liver"? I don't recall seeing something like that before.

KN - I'd love to hit up the Med Market with you sometime! My ancestors came from Aleppo and were also Christian. They ended up in upstate New York. What's your go-to place for stuffed squash? (Coosa squash stuffed with the grape leave filler). My mom calls is "mek-shi" but I found a recipe online that spells it "mihshi". I'm sure you know what I'm talking about!