StephenB

To quote The List. Are you on it?, a churrascaria or rodizio is coming to DC proper.

Note: don't invite Waitman for it is a chain.

To clear up some Portuguese/Brazilian nuances:

Churrasco means barbecue. A place that serves it is a churrasqueira.

Rodizio is the style of serving the meat on spits. and these places are uniformly all-you-can-eat. It is possible to have barbecue that is not served on spits.

I have been to some churrasqueiras in the US that I enjoyed. But the cuts of meat are different. And there is even a more striking difference between American and Brazilian salad bars. In Brazil, the soups are richer, the variety of hors d'oeuvres is seemingly infinite. And they're the only displays in which I've seen pickled turnips. The breads are great and various. The idea is to make you fill up on interesting appetizers. Sometimes it's hard to resist.

Fogo de Chão means ground fire, or perhaps pit fire. I'm looking forward to trying the new DC place.

A deep red wine goes well. I also like a dark, thick beer from the Amazon called Xingú.

The best rodizio I have been to is A Jardineira in São Paulo.

I heard a rumor somewhere that red wine goes nicely with red meat.

I have some wonderful 86 Bordoreuxs in my cellar.......

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

If chosen, I'll bring a '53 or '55 Burgundy. No, I'm not kidding.

They don't take reservations, and suggest getting there by no later than 6:30pm for a group this big.  We may need to split it into two tables. Can some of you be there a bit earlier to hold the table(s)?  I will call them with the final tally so they know how many of us to expect.

I live nearby and would be happy to get there shortly after 6. Let me know how many places I should try to round up.

<<We'll be gathering on the evening of November 8th at Kotobuki. ??

What time, please?

Marked "Product of Canada". 16 ounces for $7.99. In the refrigerated produce room. They have to be farmed-- very little of the fruity aroma of wild chanterelles. I haven't tasted them yet. But, STILL...

Zora, how are you going to use them?

Scottee, it was the usual TemptAsian meal -- delicious and capacious. JohnB joined us, and we had everything on my list except the fish with spinach balls. The big hits were the first two courses -- won ton in chili oil and dan dan noodles. Chef Peter Chang was off that day, but whoever subbed for him had a generous hand. The three of us had such a good time that we agreed to do it again sometime soon, and we hope you will join us then. Stay tuned.

People who enjoyed "Eat Drink Man Woman" ought to check out this page -- recipes from the movie.

 

At Trader Joe's this afternoon, I witnessed a 3-year old boy tagging along after his mother, grabbing items from the display and putting them in his mouth. The items were vacuum packed, and his spittle did not penetrate the cellophane. But he certainly left some remnants on the packages. His mother said, "Henry! Henry! Henry!" and kept shopping. When I registered a (rather mild) protest, she ignored me. In an age of communicable disease, what is a responsible citizen to do? Perhaps I should have taken the items he slobbered on and given them to the manager.

To clarify:  We're talking dinner, not lunch.  Hope that helps!

In that case, I'm good for either date.

[ Nov. 1 or Nov. 8? Discuss!

I'm interested. But I can't get there until 12:45 on the 1st. No problem on the 8th.

I'm going to be at TemptAsian this Thursday, Oct 27, at 1 p.m. with a friend and we would welcome donrocker company. What I want to order is clearly too much for two people:

Dan Dan Noodles

Baby Wontons with Chili Oil

Shredded Pork with "Ferny" Vegetable

Spicy Emperor Duck

Prawn Squid Mélange

Fish with Spinach Dumplings

Photos of these dishes appear earlier in this thread. We had them all at one time or another during the JohnB feasts.

Please let me know if you plan to attend, but please attend even if you don't let me know.

When are we going to have a donrocks caravan to Ray's?

Don Rocks asked me to provide the names of the chefs at the prize-winning Joe's Noodle House. They are, as provided today by Audrey:

Pei, Jin

Lai, Yanchu

Both are from Szechuan province and have been at Joe's more than five years.

I also have a problem with automatic lights in my new-fangled auto. I go regularly to a place where the valet parkers turn my lights ON when they enter the garage. (If they'd wait a second, it would come on without any assistance.) Thus I am unaware of the power drainage during the day, and on two occasions have had to call the auto club to power me up. So I wrote a poem that I recite to the parkers, and it seems to have done the trick:

Por gracia jesús,

¡No toque la luz!

It's got to the point now where they shout it when they see me coming. Great poetry can move men to action (or inaction).

Here is an article from the NY Times that I found interesting:

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/21/dining/21chin.html

It's about the variations in Chinese food around the world. I don't think it's generally understood how important indigenous ingredients and cooking styles are to Chinese food.

I was particularly stuck by the assertion at the end that in Chinese food, rice is what you eat, everything else is a side dish. I know that's true in Japan, but what about China? Our recent wonderful meals at TemptAsian would argue otherwise.

There are some Indian-Chinese places in the DC area. What about Caribbean-Chinese? Or other combinations?

JohnB: What about a DR.COM exploration of hyphenated Chinese food?

I suspect this is one of those "industry association" deals where who you know counts most in determininng whether your place is listed

It would really surprise me if Audrey turned out to be a schmoozer and finagler. She's hardly the type.

As I have previously noted, all movies are about food to one extent or another, just as life is. For example, some people think The Godfather is about violence. Hardly! Consider the following key quotation from the film:

"Leave the gun. Take the canolli."

Do I make my point?

While my friend John and I were lunching at Joe's Noodle House (in Rockville) this afternoon, propietor Audrey came by our table and told us that Joe's had been selected as one of the 100 best restaurants in the United States by the Chinese Restaurant Association of America.

The banquet will take place and the awards will be formally announced in Los Angeles next month. She did not know if any other DC-area places had been so honored.

Audrey said that she has two main chefs, both Szechuanese, who have been with her for years. Each has one day off per week, so most of the time they're both on.

It will be interesting to see if China Star, TemptAsian, Mark's Duck House, etc., make the list, and particularly interesting to find out the criteria on which the prizes were based.

As a JNH regular, I am delighted for Audrey, and for the restaurant.

I just watched Tortilla Soup again on TV. What a great movie to wake up to. I love the food and cooking in this movie. The rest of it is good too.

But I found myself with major kitchen envy whilst drooling over the food scenes.

Any other favorite food movies?

Tortilla Soup is one of those rare films that is predicated on another film (Eat Drink Man Woman) and comes out well. I enjoy watching them back to back. Another example (though irrelevant here) is Criminal, which is a pretty good American version of the brilliant Argentine movie, Nueve Reonas.

Some random thoughts... I think Big Night is precious and overacted.

I absolutely recommend Mostly Martha, in German, which is a beautifully done document (not documentary) about a talented chef who learns to enjoy her own product through the human predicament she goes through.

Gosford Park, one of the great films of all time, I think, is largely about the British aristocracy's insensitivity to what they are eating. A valuable food film in a reverse way. Where else could you learn that upper class Brits use use two forks, not a knife and a fork, to eat fish? There. Now you know. And so what?

Julian Fellowes, who wrote Gosford Park, has a new movie, Separate Lies, which is kind of soap operatic. but there is an indelible scene in which Emily Watson fastidiously prepares a party platter. There is such precision and speed and anger with which she does it that you know something violent is coming. A great use of foreshadowing.

But hey, movies are no less about food than life is. I could go on and on, and so could you. The test is whether the vividness of the screen awakens your olfactory sense.

LETTING YOUR WORK GET TO YOU!

From this week's New Yorker (p. 84):

David Pasternak, the chef at an Italian seafood restaurant in NY called Esca ("Bait"), was interviewed on the Today Show. He said, "When we talk about oil, we talk only about extra-virgin olive oil. Because it's like the Japanese put the soy sauce, us Italians, we put the olive oil."

According to the article, "When he got home, his father, who had been watching, called and said, 'What's with this "us Italians" business? We're Jewish. Remember?"

ARE YOU KIDDING ME?

My husband can't go and it's too late for us to cancel so that's one space.  Maybe we could work something out?

I'd be happy to stand in for Heather's husband. Do I need to hear from Paypal?

Is there still room on Aug 28 for an avid turophile?

When I was there in the Spring, at the end of the meal my dining companion, Scott, asked the waiter for a doggy bag, saying, "I really do have dogs." The waiter nodded, and came back with a bag filled with eight juicy, fleshy bones. Scott's dogs had a helluva meal! And that gesture convinced us, though we hardly needed to be convinced, that Prime Rib likes to please its customers.

By all means, provide us your article.  And here I thought the best lowbrow steak deal was that never-ending special at Binion's!  Talk about gambler subsidized!  But isn't your strategy a bit dated, in the sense that LV has morphed quite a bit and now the really fine restaurants are profit centers?

John,

I'm afraid I don't have the article computerized. I can bring a hard copy when I see you later this week. Or I can fax it. Binion's is a good deal, but the quality of the beef doesn't match Circus Circus, believe it or not. The CC Steakhouse is a dress-up place in several senses. Finally, I have to admit that your point about outdated strategy is correct, or at least moving in that direction. My philosophy was formed during a different LV era. It's still workable, but barely.