Joe H

Santarpio's in the WEST End (that's "West" End Not the North End) for pizza and bbq. Serious. Better pizza than anywhere in D. C., annually considered the best of Boston. The only real challenger is the original Pizzaria Regina which has a coal fired oven dating to the '20's. Santarpio's once had a coal oven also but replaced it in the '60's with a German oven that turns out great crust. The bbq'd lamb is up to Roberto's standards! A real neighborhood place with 75 years of history and feeling. (Roberto has been to Santarpio's, too!) VERY easy to find: when you come out of the tunnel driving to the airport take your very FIRST right hand turn. Santarpio's is one block down on the right. Roadfood has some excellent photos of Santarpio's including their pizza and bbq: http://www.roadfood.com/Reviews/Overview.aspx?RefID=409 Most important point is that Santarpio's is an experience unavailable in D. C., matched by only a few places in America. Of course if you have time and a rental car there is New Haven.... And, for the North End, Mamma Maria's is considered by most to be the best restaurant. The North End is about ambience and feeling that you are in Firenze-not the U. S. Great cannoli there, too. Toscanini's near Harvard Square for ice cream.

Steve, thank you for taking the time to report on WD-50 and Bouley. I sincerely appreciate your thoughts.

For those that are reading this thread, Chez Panisse (the restaurant) is almost as difficult a reservation as the French Laundry. It is not an afterthought but a very real destination that many people on the West Coast and elsewhere build trips around. Quite literally this is Mecca for many who care about the emergence of America and the ascension of a serious cuisine from a country that was once thought of as having good fried chicken and decent charcoal grilled steak. For all that I may have raved about Danko (and the bar if you go at the last minute and arrive BEFORE THEY OPEN!) Chez Panisse is the Holy Grail of American restaurants. It is to America as Troisgros and Robuchon are to France and Santimaria and Adria are to Spain. In the late '70's and early '80's Alice Waters' place was a temple that born again foodies from Vermont to Georgia to New Mexico crossed a country to visit. When they returned to their hometowns America was never the same. What we eat today has much to do with what was started then. And there.

his has an entirely different meaning than you're saying that the place was only half full. That creates the impression that over the course of the several hours you were there-most people will assume it was earlier-that the restaurant was not successfully booked on what could be the single busiest day of the year. Now we've gone to the 9:30 seating and the possibility that it was 2/3 full. For this seating-which probably lasts past midnight, I am certain they stagger reservations so the other 1/3 would have left from an earlier seating. Citronelle is an enormously popular restaurant that has historically been a VERY difficult reservation on Valentine's Day. To be honest I am not a fan of dining out anywhere on Valentine's Day. But I do think you need to be fair to the restaurant. I thought Sietsema's recommendation of Elevation Burger was a really good one actually.

Serious? Citronelle was only half full on Valentine's Day?

The first time we went to the Lab was a Smithsonian dinner which had a total of eight courses. I thought THAT was fantastic! We had two or three Smithsonian dinners there over a year or so and Roberto once asked me if I had been to his "regular" Laboratorio dinner? I didn't really understand him and he told me that it was 12 courses. Whoa! Anyway, over the years we've had a number of 12 course Lab dinners and they have all been extraordinary. We've also left sated after everyone!!! The three Lab dinners I've arranged there ('03, '04, '05) were all efforts to do absolute blowouts that stretched the limits of what a person could experience. It's also dinners like this which will see multiple truffle courses, "duck stew", "caviar", etc. He knows that he has an appreciative, deranged audience that lives for each new taste he can create. Still, some people have told me that 14-18 courses are just TOO much! I've just never understood restraint, though. This fall......

I probably will agree with you but for authenticity she grows her own saffron and raises her own chickens. When I parked my rental car in Dal Pescatore's lot on a summer afternoon I left the window cracked about two inches or so. When I returned three hours later there were chicken feathers all over the interior!

This city is indeed fortunate to have what I sincerely believe are the two best Italian chefs in America, Roberto and Fabio. For that matter I will put dinner at Maestro or Roberto's Laboratorio on par with anything I have experienced at the three Michelin star Le Calandre (outside of Padua and similar to Maestro in style) and the three Michelin star (and John Mariani "best restaurant in the world") Dal Pescatore near Mantova. As much of a rave as these comments are the world is becoming more aware of each of them with every passing day. As their fame grows so does the international acceptance of Washington as a great restaurant town. Add Citronelle to these two along with the Inn at Little Washington and you have four restaurants the equal of any four restaurants in any North American city. Factor in Roberto's appearances on the Today show this week and the upcoming rematch with Morimoto on Iron Chef America and our city receives even more attention. I would also suggest that Roberto's infamous "Fear Factor" duck stew is perhaps the single most intense and challenging dish I have ever had anywhere. Even today, almost three months later, I still remember the exclamation at my table at the Lab when a wife moaned that she never knew a male could taste so good... A by now legendary photo of a Lab dinner: http://share.dell.shutterfly.com/action/sl...d=1139976443919

http://www.lagrandeepicerie.fr/index_en.asp A commentary about it: http://www.metropoleparis.com/1999/439/439bouff.html

Le Relais du Parc in late November started a "best of" menu faturing four dishes each from both Ducasse and Robuchon in their first collaboration. Gayot gives the "old" restaurant 15/20. Has anyone been to this since the addition of these dishes? www.gayot.com/restaurants/features/relaisduparc.html Curiously, I had no difficulty booking a table for this Saturday, a night when seemingly ever place that I tried was closed.

Berlin; Schwarzwald (Black Forest); Munich Both Berlin and Prague are beautiful cities, well worth exploring. There is also an area of Germany known as the Schwarzwald ("Black Forest") that includes several of the country's and one of the world's best restaurants, Schwarzwaldstube at Traube Tonbach. This is their website: http://www.traube-tonbach.de/traube_1024/t...l/home/home.htm Schwarzwaldstube has three Michelin stars and is considered the best restaurant in Germany. It IS on par with anything in Paris (yes, I've eaten at Paris' best) and has almost a one year wait to get in. It is worth the wait. This is a post of mine from another board about dinner there: http://www.chowhound.com/boards/intl/messages/32412.html Nearby is another extraordinary restaurant, the two Michelin star, Bareiss: http://www.bareiss.com/engl/philo/index.htm I would add that most Americans have absolutely no idea what really good German food tastes like; or for that matter, is. While Bareiss and Schwarzwaldstube are more "French" than German in many ways, the better German restaurants are far superior to any imitation of them on this side of the Atlantic. For instance the spargel season starts in a month or so. German white asparagus is one of the great vegetables/dishes of the world. Sweeter than the white asparagus available in America; just a delicious and traditional dish that lends itself to festivals and celebrations, most of which include multiple ways in which it is prepared. As for the Schwarzwald, it is easily among the most beautiful countryside on earth, comparable to anything in Austria or nearby Switzerland. I cannot rave enough about this part of Germany; perhaps for natural beauty the equal of anywhere on earth. It is truly beautiful, perhaps storybook like and almost undiscovered by Americans-a fantasyland worth building the trip of a lifetime around. Go to Munich: for dinner go to Tantris and reserve at least a month or more in advance. This is their website: http://www.tantris.de/englisch/aufbau.htm Go to Berlin, perhaps also Lubeck, Nurenberg, Meissen, Heibelberg and Baden. But the most beautiful part of Germany or any European country is the Schwarzwald. Go to it and stay at Bareiss or Traube Tonbach. Just know that this is heaven for most Germans and the lifetime ambition to visit for many of them. Prague, Vienna, Salzburg-there are so many extraordinary places to visit in this part of Europe. For me, perhaps jaded from so many years of travel in so many countries, the Schwarzwald is equal or superior to all of them.

As I scroll through this thread I am listening to Wolfman Jack on XM with the Diamonds crooning The Stoll, a song that I first heard over forty years ago when a girl friend drank Cold Duck and I swilled Blue Nun at the Queens Chapel Drive In. Seventeen years later I danced to The Stroll at Jukebox Saturday Night then, a new club in Chicago's Old Town, returning to a table where my date and I shared a bottle of House Red that was only a small improvement on the Cold Duck. Tonight, I sit at my computer listening to satellite radio and remembering when I first heard Wolfman Jack when he was alive and broadcast live. An hour ago I opened a bottle of Clio from the Jumilla region of Spain. I've come a long way from the Cold Duck of 16. Still, it tasted awfully good then, just as the House Red did in '80 in Chicago. In '06 it just doesn't seem like the Cold Duck or the House Red were that long ago....

I do the same driving trip every year for business. Each year I end up staying at a Marriott in front of the Mall of America, having dinner at one of the restaurants in the Mall. Over time I've tried most of them and usually end up sitting at the bar at the Napa Valley Grille, a mini chain of sorts whose original in Marina Del Rey, CA (Cafe Del Rey) is actually quite good. I've made several stops at Byerly's which is one of the better supermarkets anywhere. Still, I've often thought that I am missing a great deal by not going into downtown Minneapolis like I did many years ago when I first started doing this. It's a beautiful area with warm, friendly people who have a great deal of pride in where they live. There used to be a great night club-one of the best anywhere-called Ruppert's that I would look forward to stopping at. But this was years ago, in the late '80's. More than likely, today, Ruppert's has probably been converted to a big box store of sorts and its 25 piece house band is long gone-probably grandmothers and grandfathers all. Still, I have friends there who survive winters by looking forward to long summers on their boats on one of the area's lakes. Minneapolis is a great American city that doesn't receive the applause that it justly deserves.

Once upon a time I was 15 years old, six feet tall and looked older; I had my first job as a waiter at the Hot Shoppes at Wisconsin and Van Ness. (Today WUSA is there.) A girl who was 19 had started a few weeks earlier having recently dropped out of the University of Miami and returned to D. C. to live with a friend. She didn't know I was 15. One January night there was heavy snow and although the restaurant stayed open there were only several customers sitting at counter seats. She and I sat in the empty back dining room looking out at the snow. Talking. For hours. I had never had a date before meeting her, had never really been in a situation like this. The more that I talked to her the more I felt that I could not tell her my age. Our conversation had begun to change a bit and as the snow accumulated she began to touch my hand as we talked. I only saw her at the restaurant, never working up the courage to ask her out; never figuring out how-if she said yes-I would "take her out." Eventually, a month or so later, she left and returned to Florida. Before leaving I told her my age and asked her to sign my 10th grade yearbook from Montgomery Blair. After a half dozen sentences she wrote, "PS Too bad you're not older." That was a long time ago....

http://www.chowhound.com/boards/intl5/messages/19460.html is the link to my comments about L'atalier about three weeks after it first opened in 1983. Although they now accept reservations for only the first seating it is a very real advantage that with one's willingness to wait you can still get in. I also understand that on weeknights now, often there will not be a line. I would note in my comments above from 2003 that the kitchen staff is dressed in black. Today, Maestro's kitchen staff (Fabio excepted) is dressed in black. A statement and a presence.

His cookbook is still in print and sold at the restaurant. I've made about 15 or more dishes out of it and all have been outstanding. Included are about a half dozen risotto recipes.

I'm actually going to be in Paris at the end of next week. For the third year in a row I have been trying to get into L'astrance and, once again, have not been able to get a reservation. Part of the problem is my lack of flexibility-I am committed to several business meetings and do not have the option of lunch or a night different than when I am there. Still, this is a restaurant that I would like to have tried. Curiously, as the years have gone by and their fame has spread, their prices have also risen. Dramatically. More than likely I'll end up at L'atalier du Robuchon which I've been to before or his new "casual" restaurant.

I still prefer the Wegman's in Sterling although the original Central Market gives it a real run. The "County Line on the hill" is an outstanding experience for a visitor with good ribs and good sides. I also think the original is better than any of their outposts in other cities in Texas and the Southwest. Having said this Mel Gold has given you the best advice of anyone: rent a car and drive to the Luling City Market which I believe has the best bbq'd beef brisket in the world. Serious. Over the years I've been to almost all of the "best" Texas pits from Cooper's to Clark's Outpost to Kreuz (original owners) to the Salt Lick, etc. (I've driven and crisscrossed all of TX a number of times for business.) The City Market is the best of all. It is an experience you will not find anywhere else; I'd also put their "marbled" brisket up with about any steak anywhere. There are some good photos of it in this link: http://homepage.mac.com/ravnhaus/BBQ/joint...ingcitymkt.html For Tex Mex while there are better, locally the most popular or easiest to find (on side of Interstate) may be Papasito's which is part of a Houston based mini chain. It's similar to Rio Grande Cafe here (which is called Uncle Julio's in Dallas and elsewhere) but, I think, better.

Mark, Drei Husaren is still there. http://www.drei-husaren.at/indexENG.html?r...geschichte.html We went to the opera on Friday night ("Fidelio") and sat in the first row of the third balcony, two boxes back from the stage. Neither of us could see more than two thirds of the stage because the balconies are curved or progressively recessed slightly leading away from the stage. (if this makes sense) For anyone reading this and planning on going do not sit on the side within four or five boxes of the stage. Near the center on any balcony will afford a full view. The opera was outstanding. The experience-view not withstanding-was incredible more than worth it even with a partial view! Vienna is also one of the most beautiful cities in the world as is Salzburg which is almost "magical" with the castle on top of the hill. Prices in Vienna for food, for hotels, are half or less of what they are in, say, Paris or London. Taxis are through the roof however, as is parking. Hotel parking at the Marriott was Euro 40 a day (about $49). Note that the hotel room was Euro 151 for two with taxes INCLUDED. On Sunday, starting at 9:00PM the Marriott hosted what they billed as the largest Super Bowl Party in Europe with 1,800 people. It lasted until 4:00AM. I think every SUV in Europe was there-almost all Americans! We didn't go, feeling a bit uneasy about it. Still, it was fortunately uneventful.

I just returned from a week in Vienna and Salzburg with the signature dinner at Vienna's Walter Bauer, arguably the city's best restaurant (now that Steinereck has been reduced to one star). A small, intimate chef owned restaurant with eight tables and remarkable E59 and E89 prix fixe prices for 5 and 9 course dinners with less than a 50% markup on wine-this is directly comparable to, say, Citronelle in D. C., da Fiore (Venice), Violon d'Ingris (Paris) for ambience and quality of presentation. A wonderful experience that my wife and I will look forward to returning to; an absolute must for anyone travelling to Vienna. Also, near Stevensphaltz (the 12th Century Cathedral), is the city's pre-eminent grocery store, Julius Meinl. I spent almost two hours in it one day and returned yesterday morning for another hour. From Gallo Grand Reserva carneroli 2003 arborio to the best Sprossenbrezen I have ever tasted to 2002 Kracher #11 this is the best indulgence in a city of many indulgences of excess. Both Germany and Austria are famous for bread that is unavailable in the U. S. Julius Meinl is the home of what may be the best bread in all of Austria. Sprossenbrezen is, for lack of a better description, a multiple seeded inch thick soft pretzel with four or five different kinds of seeds and a crispy, buttery crust encasing this that is just not found on this side of the Atlantic. Other seeded breads and rolls, some dark and some light, run the gamut of fantastic expectations: we must have purchased eight or nine different heavily seeded rolls in an attempt to sample as much as we could. The Sprossenbrezen ranks with any baked good I have ever had anywhere in my life! Serious. It is THAT good! For arborio the Gallo Grand Rserva is almost impossible to find, whether in Vienna or in Panzano or Verona or Alba. Meinl had four one kilo boxes and I bought two. For cheese Meinl's shop must rival most Parisian shops with at least seven to eight hundred square feet of space including at least three staffed counters of specialties, a number of which I have not seen in France or Italy. The wine shop and cellar are extensive, notably displaying Alois Kracher's fantastic and sometimes ambrosial dessert wines including his 99 point (Parker) 2002 #11 and 98 point #10 and #12. All were E 60 or less; in America you can double these prices but this is really meaningless since you won't find them, especially the 10, 11 and 12. (With Kracher the higher the number the sweeter the wine) The #12 is 4% alcohol and doesn't actually qualify as a wine. I opened a bottle and shared it with some friends in our hotel: this may actually compare to the '90 Avignonesi Vin Santo which the WS and Parker both gave 100 points to. Pure thick, syrupy orgasmic nectar. And it has not spent as much time in the bottle as it really should have to age properly! I brought back five more bottles (all that they had)and will not open the first for at least several years. This compares to the best Hungarian Essencia ('93?), Dal Forno's '97 Recioto and the Avignonesi mentioned above. (These are all VERY different dessert wines but they represent the best of their style; Kracher's #11 and #12 compare favorably in their own "style.") I've had many other Kracher tbas and other sweet wines; this is his best. In fact one of my goals is to be able to open this wine a few years from now along side of an Avignonesi Vin Santo and a Dal Forno Recioto, all representing what I think would be an ultimate orgasmic blowout of sugary excess, each in their own styles. I should also mention that Vienna and Salzburg were both cold this year. Very cold. The high on Sunday was about 16 F. In Salzburg there was about 50 cm of snow on the ground. That's two feet. With two feet of snow and below freezing temperatures even the most beautiful of cities can be less than inviting. It is good to be home.

For info on Earthquake and their wines: http://www.lodivineyards.com/wineseqk2.htm I like the Shotfire Ridge shiraz also. I like the 2003 Altos de Luzon from the Jumilla region of Spain more in the same price range. Paul Bros. on Wisconsin in Chevy Chase has it for $13.99 which is a great price. For cough syrup there is no better than Marquis Phillips although I don't like the '04's as much as the '03 Shiraz.

I'm not certain how you interpreted my comment. I simply meant that the ambience of Guajillo is very similar to that of a cantina in parts of Mexico. I used "border" alliteratively since frequently people living north of the border in say, El Paso, Laredo or San Diego, will cross into Mexico for dinner and then cross the border to return home. Guajillo, to me, feels very much like one of these "border" cafes. Again, I personally believe it is overall the best Mexican restaurant in the D. C. area. Well worth a drive from Reston or from across "the Potomac River."

I have long been partial to some Washington state wines. I have brought Leonetti Merlot ('94) to Christian Constant and Santi Santimaria as well as many, manyclients/friends who I do business with in Europe. A bottle or two of American wine is a gift that I have given for over 20 years there. Both Constant (formerly 2 Michelin stars in Paris) and Santimaria (3 star El Raco de Can FAbes) asked where they could buy more after drinking a glass. My experience is that many Europeans know CA cab and that only names like Mondavi, BV, Beringer, perhaps Caymus. Still, I am partial to some Washington state wines, in part for value. 2002 Columbia Crest Walter Clore Private Reserve Red Blend is a particularly good wine. http://www.columbia-crest.com/ is the Wine Spectator's opinion on it. Regardless of their opinion I should note-I have bought this wine for a number of years because I like it. Coincidentally this particular wine is their #33 wine of the year and was given 93 points. (For others reading this: again, I have been buying and drinking it for three or four years before I ever saw a review-so please let's not get into the stuff about ratings which are only one of many sources for me. I note this for a kind of credibility for someone who may not be familiar with it and has no opportunity to taste it to be able to judge for herself.) Wegman's in Sterling had it a couple of weeks ago for about $32. Most years there are only a handful of six bottle cases that come into D. C. If you can find it I would bring that. It will speak for itself.

2003 was a nightmarishly bad year for wine in much of Europe. Incredible, stifling, extreme heat approaching 40 Celsius played cruel and unanticipated tricks with a lot of wine. Near Verona, in Cellore, the reds were almost unapproachably sweet. Valpolicella, amarone-disappointments abounded from all producers. Yet, one wine-the greatest sweet wine I have ever tasted, is the 2003 Dal Forno Recioto from the barrel. In early December Romano agreed that this is his best ever. In five or so years when it is released it may be the most difficult, the most storied of all to find anywhere. As many hope there will never be another summer like that, there may never be another Recioto like this. It is also the only wine that he makes that his wife drinks.

On Friday evening I will be at a wine bar in Vienna. At this same wine bar a year ago I tasted a cheap Austrian red called "Goldberg's." It was about ten Euros a bottle. I had never had a decent Austrian red before. White, dessert, etc. yes. Most definitely, but never a red. I drank two, maybe three glasses while quietly watching the owner make a tomato based pasta sauce from scratch behind the counter, occasionally pouring a glass or two of wine for a customer. Peaceful, a respite from a business trip I really liked that Austrian red. At least at that moment. I brought six bottles back and drank my last a week ago thinking about the upcoming trip. I probably wouldn't buy it if it were sold here (for $20?). But in Vienna with a foot of snow outside on a cold, quiet night in a warm room it was damn good.