JPW

Bigos

:)

Joe's, A&J, Amina Thai, Seasons 52, Sichuan pavilion...

Happy belated birthday to Edgy as she turned 3 on Sunday.

Happy birthday to Peanut who is 7 today.

The patio tavern at the Little Nell in Aspen.

Rotsa Ruck with that. I'm listening to "Hot Jazz Saturday Night" which has a whole list of rain/trouble songs from way back. Perfect.

I was off by 39 minutes. Power went out at 12:26. Bristol was shown on ESPN, so I was good there, as well. Power came back on at about 10:15 Sunday night. Preceded by a storm block party which is kind of becoming a tradition here given how often we lose power. I contributed a salad, some sauteed eggplant from my next door neighbor's garden topped with melted parm, and some grilled chicken marinated in olive oil, lime, fish sauce, garlic, and a couple of other things. We also had some shrimp kebabs, tomato salad, kimchee, among other things.

A good night for that pot of chili I made. Ready for the inevitable blackout that I'm predicting to happen at 11:47 - fresh batteries in the flashlights, lots of ice in the freezer, plenty of food and drink, etc.

But if Channel 7 makes me miss Bristol because of the round the clock hurricane coverage, I'm gonna be PISSED!

Alex made me one hell of a rye rickey last night @The Passenger.

Good good stuff.

Someone posted this on another forum.

Fun to play around with.

CLICK

Toasted rice powder?

I'd like to make laab gai for an ailing friend with a craving, and She Simmers (a great site recommended by Fish Innards) insists that laab isn't laab without toasted rice powder.

Also, are there any pomelos around town? My Giant doesn't have any, but I wasn't sure if that's because they're out of season or because my Giant sucks. (I know they're out of season and I know my Giant sucks, but I'm willing to pay for a pomelo that's travelled a few thousand miles if there's one to be had--carbon footprint be damned.)

Restrictions: I have no car and live in Columbia Heights and will probably not have time to schlep too far for just one or two ingredients.

Their takeout joint serves some excellent dishes. One of my favorite chicken kaprow to be found.

By following the trail of corporate ownership, it can be shown the 3.7% of Don's thoughts on wine are actually written by advertising copywriters.

This is actually a surprisingly low number, even less than the influence of the drip, drip, drip of wine opinion from the Robert Parker publicity stalactite directly above Don's head.

Yeah, that would be my call too.

A great time was had by all. I fell asleep on my chair about 10 minutes after getting home.

PS - the party supplies have taken up a temporary home in my basement. Tons of cups and plates left.

In other news, a building permit has been let for the construction of an O'Hare Airport-type "Happy Tunnel" directly from Medium Rare's bar/waiting area to the Loire Red section of Weygandt Wines.

Amirault!

Bourgueil!

Seve. I'll be toasting you from a parallel fairway.

Looking forward to raiding the wine list as soon as possible and expanding my limited knowledge of Italian wines.

However, the month of May is out for me.

Most restaurants, save some of the formal ones, are rather loud and bustling that I cannot believe a vibrating phone or a little light would be a major distraction or even noticed. And if someone talks on a cell phone in a regular, how is it different than talking with someone else at the table?

Because nothing is more annoying than only being able to eavesdrop on half of a conversation.

Words to Eat By: Some thoughts on Ron Tanaka's cooking at Cork Wine Bar: "From a Michel Richard protégé, there isn't so much a self-conscious attempt to include multiple textures in every bite, but flavorwise the current menu is loaded with items that knock it out of the park. Do not miss the morsels of turbot, served with a piquant horseradish crème fraiche, roasted baby beets, truffles, and tarragon." Yum. [DonRocks]

I always knew that Dave and Don were the same person. has anyone ever seen them in the same room together?

The new Whole Foods on Rockville Pike across from White Flint opened today. Some nice additions - bulk spices, a burger bar. The traffic (vehicular and pedestrian) has been amusingly insane.

Happy Birthday to one of my favorite people in the world - the irreplaceable Mark Slater!!!

If you compare the overall expense of most things in the MoCo stores to that of the Virginia ABCs, there's really nothing to complain about. MoCo's sales are good too, while VA's just get the price down to MSRP. On a good sale day. I make a point of heading into the MoCo stores when I am near one.

But at least the Virginians don't have to cross any borders for wine or beer.¹

1 Although I will admit that I've ignored the prices to patronize the wonderful Fenwick Beer and Wine in Silver Spring. I really want him to do well.

If I'm honest, one of the reasons why I'm grousing about this is because I have to listen to customer complaints about D.C. sales tax EVERY....SINGLE....DAY. Especially from the Virginia and Maryland customers who have a lower tax rate that they pay on alcohol. I usually brush it off by extolling the virtues of our clean, smoothly paved streets that these taxes surely pay for

Seriously? Ask the Monkey County people about the 25% "tax" they are paying by having to buy from the county.

It will certainly be enormously popular, because there's nothing in it's price range in that immediate area (south of Rockville, north of Bethesda) except for Addie's, and there are a lot of people and businesses in that area.

I caught one lunch and one dinner during the soft opening week. I think the food was good, service excellent, and reasonable for the price range, but nothing wowed me. I've been to one of the Orlando locations, and the food was much better there. I expect that this will improve as they settle in.

Pretty impressive (and reasonably priced) wine list for MoCo, and orders by the glass were poured at the table, but the red was *above* room temperature. If they don't figure out better storage fast they're going to cook their entire inventory.

Lastly, parking is going to be a clusterf*ck. Free valet parking, but there's no free self-parking next to the restaurant, and the single garage there is going to be overwhelmed when the Whole Foods opens.

Agree with Dan on all of the above points. Not to mention the annoying corporate required things -- the hostesses always referring to "we" ("Are we all here now?" "Are we ready to go to our table"), servers wanting to address you by name, etc.

Parking is only going to get worse as the condos start filling up and the other retail stores open.

That said, I'm glad to have a business meal destination by the office that is a step up from the pf chang and cheesecake factory in White FLint Mall.

PS - Whole Foods opens tomorrow. Interested to check out the "Burger Bar" they are installing. Stop by the one they are closing in Congressional plaza for the fire sale.

Finally made it to the Columbia Room last weekend. Great experience. The most civilized way to partake of a few cocktails. For the record, we had a Season Ticket (sherry based), a Perigee Moon (tequila based), and my drink of choice which ended up being a martini that was not a martini (Mrs JPW got a take on a gin fizz).

One thing that must be detailed is the value for what you get. I'm amused by the yelpers complaining how expensive it is. $64 for 3 cocktails (tax and tip included). Back it out and it's about $15-16 a drink. More than your typical cocktail? Yes. But for that price you get a quiet uncrowded spot, gracious service, a couple of nice bar snacks, excellent drinks, and a chance to learn from one of the best barkeeps around (not to mention his wonderful staff). Kudos to everyone involved.

Mrs JPW wants to make a standing reservation. I certainly would not be opposed.