Tweaked

Mark and Christa at the Cap Lounge and Jerry at the 18th Amendment.

Hi Terry, thanks for joining us on DR.com.

As you can see, DR is filled with a bunch of wine freaks. However, there are many of us on the board (like myself) where the idea of a wine pairing is "white with chicken and fish, red with meat"...I look at a restaurant wine list but most of it's all greek to me. Fortunately there are restaurants in DC where I'm completely comfortable in place my wine choices in the staff's hands, Komi, Firefly, Palena, and Corduroy immediately jump to mind.

However, for the wino neophytes around here, can you give us advice on books, classes around DC, or other general tips about how to expand our wine knowledge. I'm guessing part of your answer will be drink more wine!

Also can you expand on how you personally "got into" wine and developed your knowledge.

Thanks

I am convinced that the key to a good braise is a long rest between initial braising and finishing, which gives the meat time to suck the juices back in.

From my experince all dishes that cook over multiple hours, braises, stews, etc greatly benefit from a long rest, even over night. My experience with making chicken curry, which I let slowly bubbly away over low heat for a couple hours, is it tastes great after resting but tastes fantastic the next day. My roommate and I call it the Second Day Curry.

Pacific Cafe is the sort of restaurant you hope will survive, aren't sure how they survive, and wish the cooking was just a little better. The sort of place were you know a handful of reliable dishes and that's what you always order.

Located on a lonely stretch of Pennsylvania Ave, SE (at the corner of 12th Street), many Friday and Saturday evenings the dining room is mostly empty, though I have noticed an uptick in patrons. They do a pretty decent take out business, but frankly I have no idea how this place has managed to stay open...maybe they do a rip roaring lunch business.

It's a place I order out from at least once a week, the cooking is fresh, and while by no means the best Vietnamese around, the fried spring rolls are tasty, they do a passable pho and I love the grilled lemon chicken with vermicilli noddle.

However, I recently stummbled across two dishes that are now on my rotation. The Roast Duck Pho is a winner, comes with a whole roast duck leg, mushrooms, and baby bok choy. I also like the beef shank pho with thin slice of meat which is much tastier than their original beef pho.

Hillians, the next time you want a warm refreshing meal on the cheap, definitely check out the roast duck pho at Pacific Cafe.

One thing that surprised me was the veal dish.  I generally do not like celery (especially when raw), but I had a piece of the dish without it, and found its flavor to be flat.  With the crispy celery the flavor perked-up.

That's funny because I had the same conversation with Camille-Beau, I can't stand celery but just using the celery leaves added a nice flavor.

I agree that the pasta on the crawfish dish didn't really give any sense that one was chocolate and the other chestnut, but I also found the ginger sauce to bit too sharp, the ginger flavor need to be mellowed...perhaps add some more butter!

This was my fourth dinner at The Lab, the first time on a date (lucky girl), the rest as part of Joe H's Blowouts. Obviously the first time the meal was a "standard" Lab dinner menu, the first Joe H dinner I felt drew pretty much from the same playbook as a "standard" night at the Lab, a fabulous meal, that I would judge slightly better than the first meal because of a couple more bells and whistles. At the second Joe H dinner it was obvious that Chef Donna knew the audience would go for more and comparison of the menu shows that the dishes were much more complex the second time around. Friday night Chef certainly dug deep, I'm sure a stew of duck organs would be a hard sell on a regular Friday night!

My only two critiques were with the Risotto, which I felt was just a tad undercooked, a bit too al dente, it had not reached the complex creaminess that last year's risotto soared to. I also felt that the crawfish ravioli fell flat, the ginger broth to sharp and overpowering of the pasta and delicate flavor of the crawfish.

Otherwise each dish was a culinary adventure. Much has already been said about the winning dishes. but the highlights for me were the black truffle dip (the waiter laughed when I downed the left overs in the shot glass), duck stew, the virtual caviar, the souffle, and the trio of rabbit, and fennel soup...and of course the bomboloni!

Thanks again, Joe, Chef Donna, and his staff.

I tried the Chocolate Donut Stout at a beer tasting, what a fascinating beer...they even put sprinkles on the rim of the glass!

I'm going to have to check out the Growlers at Shenandoah...one of my favorite brew places is in Seattle where you can walk into the bar and fill up your growler, but don't step onto the carpeted dining area (literally 5 feet from the bar) because then you will be breaking the law. Silly beer laws.

Don, your suspicion is correct, the brewers at Gordon Biersch brew their beer following the offical company recipe and only have small leeway to improvise.

Per the dude at the other end of the phone line...Cap Lounge is indeed open for business today at 4pm.

It's a Holiday Season Miracle

I don't know why I have this reputation as being a lush

However I will swing by the Lounge around 8pm or so to check out these rumors and IF the Lounge is open make sure the Bass line is free of any soot.

The Mark Center Clyde's (down 395) is a decent place to go with the "meat and potato middle America" vistors...nice atmosphere, usually friendly service...certainly better than hitting up Red Lobster or Outback.

Mom's Christmas Pudding set on fire with brandy served with a large scoop of vanilla ice cream.

I'll have to second the Scallops at Corduroy, that's a blockbuster dish.

Second Place

Pork Belly at Restaurant Eve

Third Place

house cured duck leg with veal tongue, chorizo, and summer beans at Palena

Honorable mentions go to:

Komi Tasting Menu (the whole thing)

Lamb Shoulder dish at Firefly

Line stretched to the back dining room but moved quickly...Pork shoulder, onions, peppers, green sauce, red sauce, broccoli rabe, provolone cheese...and cannoli for dessert...

Capital Lounge

seriously drinking on the Hill hasn't been the same since the Lounge burned down.

obviously the above is broken down in more detail, but here is how Cathal broke it down during the DR chat.

Labor cost is about 30% of gross, cost of goods is about 30% of gross, rent is about 5% of gross. So of the 35% that's left we pay china, glass, silver, linen, gas, electricity, water, trash removal, linen, insurance, public relations/advertising, repairs and maintenance, payroll taxes, credit card processing fees, flowers, interest on our bank loan, permits and licences etc., etc., etc.

If we try really hard and don't have any surprises, like the toilet overflowing on Friday night causing us to call an emergency plumber at $1500, we might hit around 5 or 6% net. Bear that in mind, when your bill is $600 for 4 people usually a restaurant of our calibre will net $30.00-$40.00.

I'm not sure how they'll do in Clarendon. 

Are you kidding, a bunch of "trendy" 20s/30s somethings all living in boring high rise apartment buildings spending their time sipping Starbucks, browsing at Barnes and Noble, and spending their weekends at the Container Store, he's going to make a killing

you can browse through the L'Academie de Cuisine class schedule...they offer a variety of classes.

http://www.lacademie.com/Recreational/Clas...kingclasses.asp

(Rocks feel free to delete this thread after tomorrow or move it to another forum if you deem necessary)

From the Dogfish Head Brewery e-mail list:

Tune into the History Channel tomorrow (Wednesday) night at 10:00 p.m.

(ET) to watch Modern Marvels ? the whole episode is about the history

of brewing - and it features Dogfish Head!!!!

The History Channel, Modern Marvels

Brewing

Airs on Wednesday, November 16 at 10:00pm ET

It's one of the world's oldest and most beloved beverages--revered by

Pharaohs and brewed by America's Founding Fathers. Today, brewing the

bitter elixir is a multi-billion-dollar global industry. Join us for an

invigorating look at brewing's history from prehistoric times to today's

cutting-edge craft breweries, focusing on its gradually evolving

technologies and breakthroughs. We'll find the earliest known traces of

brewing, which sprang up independently in such far-flung places as ancient

Sumeria, China, and Finland; examine the surprising importance that beer

held in the daily and ceremonial life of ancient Egypt; and at

Delaware's Dogfish Head Craft Brewery, an adventurous anthropologist and a

cutting-edge brewer show us the beer they've concocted based on

2,700-year-old DNA found in drinking vessels from the funerary of the legendary

King Midas. TVPG

This could be an interesting book and the basis for last week's article in the NY Times food section on how to make your own bacon. I'm sure it will be on many foodies x-mas wish list.

Charcuterie: The Craft of Salting, Smoking, and Curing

I could not agree more.  I have found Trotter's to feel tired, and the food to be reaching for something that it never achieves. 

After eating at Trotter's last year and having had tasting menu dinners here in DC, I'd have to agree that Trotter's is not worth the money...at Trotter's price point I'd rather eat at Maestro...well below Trotter's price point I'd rather spend my money on tasting menus at Komi or Eve or Corduroy. They may not be the "temples of cuisine" that Trotter's strives to be, but you'll have a much better meal!

Zaytinya and Sietsema always gives a shout out to Johnny's Half Shell

is it me or did the washington Post Food Section particularly suck today? I'm talking Twinkie article suck

I've been there a couple times for tapas, the fried calamari was nice, tender inside crispy, crunchy batter outside, little grease...the manchego cheese platter thing had rubbery cheese that was no better than a Kraft single. I think they have Stella on tap.