rlalasz

It does sound like a good story, but I'm otherwise engaged. And of course, when I was talking about backstory in the piece, I was talking about how the waitstaff describes it...

I don't know, and not exactly. I've been clear that the dishes were excellent, although monotonally rich. The other people at my table (all omnivores) got the same service, and reacted to it similarly. One is a professional food critic. There was no "thesis" to the piece. A few people are willfully misreading the article. It contained a personal history, mini-reviews of five restaurant experiences, more restaurants, and a coda. Obviously, during the trajectory of the piece, I find a couple of restaurants that do right by me; there's movement to my thinking. Did the majority disappoint me? Pretty much. Is Eve's tasting menu a sustainable option for a vegetarian over the course of several months? I didn't think so, but I'm willing to let others judge whether my description suits their tastes.

Nada on the valium. This has gone pretty much as I expected. But I expect you'll get another angry phone call from Mr. Kliman about your opinion that being published in Washingtonian is "languishing in obscurity."

The scope of the article wasn't to make change. Its publication might make change--who knows? The point of the piece, as many of us are tired of making, was not to pull out every stop to get the best possible meal. It was to take the temperature of the typical vegetarian's dining experience in DC. Something about that seems to bother a few people--perhaps the idea that such a diner should actually be given voice... Correct me if I'm wrong, but you've found exactly two "holes" (the matusake and the description of Eve), both of which I've parried above, both of which a reader not disposed to defend these chefs at all costs would have accepted as an accurate description of my experience.

Sorry, I actually had to work a full day with concentration and couldn't respond to the discussion until now. People are not reading carefully what I wrote about Eve. Eve represents that they have a meatless tasting menu--they assure you of that when you make a reservation. What they have is meatless options for every tasting menu course--not the same thing. My previous experiences of tasting menus is that they have a logic, a throughline. This menu didn't, perhaps because it wasn't really a menu, just a collection of options--I don't know, so I chose not to speculate on it in the piece. By contrast, 2941's light tasting menu courses commented on and led onto each other. So did Komi's veggie plate. They felt like journeys, or as I said in the piece, linked short stories. A far more pleasant experience. The presentation---its ceremoniousness, dare I say its officiousness--was a separate issue, although I certainly disliked that style and prefer service that doesn't take itself quite so solemnly. (CityZen and 2941 were far better on that score.) Details like that are fair game for such a piece which was, of course, not a brief devoted to one thesis as you seem to insist on wanting, but very personal in tone and therefore full of spiky detail. Hardly a hatchet job. Why does the failed matsutake speak more to my ability to taste and describe than to the kitchen's ability to plan and execute an interesting dish--simply because it was matsutake, and simply because a top-line chef made it? And why do you assume it would've been any better had I sent it back? The absurd conclusion of this logic is that, because very few of us have the abilities or sensitivities of Eric Ziebold, very few of us has the option of not enjoying a dish he prepares, and anyone who doesn't immediately doesn't know what he's talking about. Anonymity just doesn't count for the moment as a journalist, especially one who'd like to write about food in the future. Making a complaint post facto at some restaurants warrants scrutiny by a manager. Maybe they'd like to take a name, an address; maybe they look at a credit card receipt. I was on the job, and my job, as Waitman keeps pointing out very nicely, was to replicate and describe an average diner's experience. It was not to get the best possible experience so as to put the restaurant in the best possible light.

The thing I didn't include on my website (which is in the print version) is a sidebar of my survival guide, my places to get what I want. Zaytinya made it. Indique didn't, but could have. I don't have a file of the sidebar handy, so you'll have to read the piece. I probably live near you, because I frequent Layalina, Bangkok 54, Thai Square, Thai Noy, Restaurant Abi, and Myanmar, among many others in Arlington and Fairfax. So of course there are plenty of places that I enjoy. The pretext of the piece--the reason it got to run in a service-oriented magazine--was that there are two new veggie-friendly restaurants (Vegetate and Viridian) as well as some new vegetarian tasting menus around town (CityZen, Eve, 2941) that are used as selling points by these restaurants. These are not ethnic restaurants in the common sense of the word, although of course everything has its own ethnic markers. And the frame of the piece was: I don't want to eat Thai or Salvadoran or Vietnamese all the time. I'd like to eat well at some of the places--not all of them, I know that's impossible--but some of the places people are talking about all the time and that pubs such as Washingtonian praise. I can already eat at many of these places--there are often things on the menu, or an established tradition of a veg offering off-menu--but do the dishes I'm served stand up to the buzz and the critical discourse about the rest of the menu? Too often not. The issues at Atlantico were both service and the portabello, which was ordinary, which has always been ordinary in my experience there. My wife loves their scallops, so I'm happy to oblige: a situation quite common for vegetarians. A lot of people are getting the tone of the piece, but some are not. I had hoped it would be whimsical and wistful, but also rigorous in its food descriptions. It certainly wasn't intended as a strident call to arms. More like the request that some are saying I should make in person.

I'm sorry, but you're distorting what I wrote. I never wrote we should be "supplicating and submissive." I wrote that that's often the posture of people who don't have much on offer to them at these places--an understandable attitude. As I also posted earlier, I didn't just dine at a few top restaurants. I dined at close to 25 for the piece, and have been dining for a decade here. If the issue is veracity, I suggest you try your own suggestions for three months and report back on your results and satisfaction. The idea of speaking up more is not a bad one--and in fact, that's what the article just did, to over 100,000 people. But I have no illusions that a restaurant-by-restaurant crusade of one (or 100) will solve the issue.

You make some thoughtful points. But when I travel, I generally find more variety for me in other cities (NYC and SF and LA, of course, but also Chicago, Philly, Portland, Milwaukee--Milwaukee, for crying out loud) than I do here. As someone suggested earlier, perhaps it's the extreme expense account culture here that's holding things back.

We haven't established at all that good vegetarian entrees can be swapped in for the present mediocre ones only at great economic risk. I wish a restauranteur would attempt to demonstrate that during this discussion. For instance, Ceiba told me Jeff Tunks makes a point of changing their veg entree every season. They only have one on any single menu, but Tunks' attitude alone better disposes me and I'd suspect many other vegetarians toward Ceiba, regardless of what I think of their swiss chard relleno. (Not great, but not bad, for the record.) It's a nice gesture that builds goodwill (as well as the client base) and clearly won't break them. More restaurants should consider it. As for victimization. I was using a figure of speech. But the piece--I keep returning to the piece, probably because I wrote it, but also because it stands on its own as a document of experience, an experience that other veggies here and that I've talked with ratify emphatically. It is tiresome and disspiriting to be forced into the role of supplicant--which, let's face it, is what you are when you're always asking kitchens to make something special for you, or praying that the ravioli is somehow more interesting than the last 50 you've had. And it's especially tiresome when you encounter restaurants such as Komi, where your food is great, and you wonder why it can't be that way more often elsewhere. After almost 100 points on this topic, I'm still wondering.

You just fell right through the ice there, my friend.

I'd like to share your optimism that all we need to do is ask. Placing the onus completely on vegetarians, though, does smack of blaming the victim. Again, we're avoiding the obvious: Why would chefs with estimable reputations risk putting a mediocre dish on their menus just because it's meatless? Isn't it a bit of chicken and egg--the vegetarian meals are poor, so vegheads go elsewhere, or only to these places under duress? (Again, sorry for the mixed-animal metaphor.) I guess to eat well at the places everybody's buzzing about, we have to start a movement. And to think somebody was mocking me earlier when I talked about a right to dine. I was commenting on the recent boomlet in foie gras manifestations on area menus, not on foie gras as traditional fare. Sorry for the confusion. Perhaps I should stick to my team.

I was using "pacing" in another sense--that of variance, rhythm, and logic, one course leading into another. I expected to spend a long time at Eve. What I had hoped for was more of the sense of interplay that I got with Komi's vegetable plate. As I said in the piece.

No, it's not disingenuous at all. Criticism engages the object, not the creator--at least not on an interpersonal level. Perhaps complaining to the restaurant will get you a better meal. But why aren't the restaurants serving better vegetarian meals in the first place? One point about the piece was not to give the venues every opportunity to put their best foot forward, but to capture a typical experience, as well as my experience.

For the piece, I generally confined myself to places that had at least one (and, except in the case of 2941, had only one) veg entree already on menu. But I've previously been to many high-end restaurants here without veg menu entrees, so I felt I understood that experience well. I didn't want to play gotcha. For reasons I hope are understandable (to maintain my anonymity and to replicate a typical vegetarian's experience at these restaurants--i.e., supplicating and submissive), I didn't complain.

Isn't what other chefs are doing the real engine for culinary change (vide the miniburger), not consumer's verbal demands? (For example: the foie gras craze. Consumers didn't suddenly start asking their servers: "Hey, some foie gras next time, OK?") And if nobody's going to cook interesting veg dishes, how will people go crazy over them? Which brings up something else I touch on the piece: that interesting veg cooking is going on all over the country, but the example doesn't seem to be penetrating DC culinary consciousness. Why not? The miniburger faces none of the obstacles vegetarian food faces: a pervasive, creative indifference to and/or lack of training in creating meatless dishes, plus a fear of the unknown based in the industry's overall razor-thin profit margins. The miniburger (cute, fun, retro) was almost predestined to be a hit. Still, although I think your cascade scenario is optimistic, I'm willing to flap the butterfly's wings by mentioning seeking out chefs and mentioning my disappointment every single time I encounter a boring veg meal...sigh. I'll be doing it a lot.

You're assuming a great deal here, and mistakenly. For the piece, I actually went to far more restaurants than were mentioned even in passing--about 25. And because I'm married to a omnivore who loves to eat, I've dined at far more than that over my time in DC, although with difficulty as per the story. What you're doing is akin to assuming that the quotes in an article are the only things a subject said. Again, I have to caution that the piece was not a service piece, although there is a sidebar (not on my website) of places I go when I want what I want. It is representative of my decade-long experience eating high-end in this city and, based on responses in this thread, that of several other vegetarians who care about food. It's interesting that the discussion here (not unexpectedly) seems to have a strong anti-special pleading bent to it, as if the majority's average high-quality experience should be sufficient for a substantial minority (one that, as others here have pointed out, includes omnivores who occasionally want a break from meat). In effect, some people are arguing that chefs have the right to indifferently make a dish that they've already chosen to put on their menu--in effect, putting their signature to it-- simply because it's meatless. Fascinating. Thank God it's not your dish they've decided to punt on. Others have argued that if the demand is there, the market will respond. Clearly, restaurants are far from a perfect market. There is no market mechanism to register demand for something (a good vegetarian meal) that chefs or owners are too cautious or indifferent or hidebound to produce. We take what we can get, what's offered to us. And that the offerings are generally so disappointing in DC is due to culture, a constellation of chef's desires and training, or just bad luck...is something I hope someone can shed some light on here. It wasn't part of my ambit for the story.

I'd disagree that 5 percent is a tiny minority, as would Al Gore. I'd also disagree that I self-selected into a group that presupposes boring, monotonous dining. Certainly, most of the DC chefs quoted in the article's sidebar agree that veg eating can be interesting. Too bad their cooking often doesn't bear that out. The chicken-eating analogy is specious because (a) there's no recognized group like that (if there is, email me so I can pitch a feature on them to the New Yorker), and ( lacto-ovo vegetarians don't eat just one kind of vegetable. I take the chefs at their word: The majority have both the desire and the skill to do right by us. So do it!

I did the first, but not the second. If you read the piece, I think you'll see that.

I think we agree more than disagree. But I would disagree about lumping vegetarians in with vegans, fructarians, and other people who have self-selected themselves completely out of mainstream eating. Vegan offerings at the restaurants we're talking about are rare, whereas lacto-ovo veg dishes are fairly common. The limitation is by and large not on where we can eat, but in the execution and variety of the dishes served to us. I more respect a chef who says, no, I can't do that for you, it's outside my tradition, than I do one who says, yes, I can do something for you, and then it's a plate of vegetables in butter every single time.

Don, thanks for the kind words about the piece. To answer directly--no, I haven't had tried those tasting menus. In my defense, only one of those restaurant's websites (Maestro) advertises a vegetarian tasting menu. A vegetarian develops a cringing posture after years of not being fed well at high-end restaurants--you start not to look, to avoid yet more disappointment, yet another instance of exclusion. I regret not knowing about Maestro and look forward to enjoying their Colors of the Garden menu. On the other hand--speaking of sacrilege--one of the points I make in the piece is that tasting menus are not enough for people that don't have enough interesting things to eat on the regular menu. It's not sustainable and a bit unfair to ask people that you're not taking care of in the usual ways to pay a premium to eat at your establishment, often forcing everyone at your table to also choose a tasting menu. I also think that most tasting menus are inhumane in scale, but I realize that might be hotly disputed by foodies. Your argument about 5 percent of the population versus 10 percent of the menu seems apples and oranges (or pick your nonmeat metaphor) to me. The issues are threefold: 1) There's usually only one entree for me to eat; 2) It's almost always the same damn thing; and 3) It's not up to the artistic/culinary standards of the rest of the menu. The four dishes I encounter almost exclusively are: portobello mushrooms, pasta stuffed with baby food, the vegetable plate, and risotto. It's maddening. As Jonathan Krinn says in the piece, if you can't cook with vegetables, you suck. Well, there's a fair amount of, if not suckitude, mediocrity coming out of DC high-end kitchens for vegheads. Eating at Komi for the first time was a revelation. I understand there are economics involved in devoting two entrees to meatless dishes. In that case, chefs should change it up frequently with the one veg entree.

Yes, I'm taking my chances with the Church of Restaurant Eve. On the other hand, I'm effusive in my praise of Ray's portabello with spicy diablo sauce. (Michael told me in an interview that he serves about three a month.) I do verify--but always key in most waitstaff to my peculiar condition first, to which they usually respond helpfully. At Ceiba recently, they told me I could have the black bean soup without the ham croquette, which was appreciated. Unfortunately, the bowl still arrived with croquette, and I had to stop the waiter in mid-pour. (I almost didn't notice it, because of course they hold a napkin between you and the bowl to prevent splattering. That seemed like the closest I'll ever get to eating ortolan.)

My article on trying to eat vegetarian at high-end DC restaurants ("My Friend the Portabello") has just been published in the March issue of Washingtonian. It's also online at my website. At the end of the web version, I've also included the sidebar of quotes Washingtonian collected from DC chefs such as Gillian Clark, Frank Ruta, Eric Zeibold, and others, reacting to Anthony Bourdain's infamous Kitchen Confidential quote slamming vegheads as a "persistent irritant to any chef worth a damn." I'm interested in your thoughts, criticisms, empathy, and/or hostility. The piece is personal, with a tone of smiling through tears; it's neither an economic analysis nor an exhaustive survey. But my core argument is that DC's high-end chefs are well behind the national curve when it comes to serving vegetarians. In major urban centers such as DC, one out of every 20 people is a vegetarian, and many more would like interesting meatless options on occasion. But the sparse menu offerings for us here (when we're offered anything at all) are routine and unimaginative. Of course there are plenty of great ethnic restaurants for veggies to go to, but we're basically shut out of White Tablecloth Land and the artistry and venues this board often buzzes about. As I say in the piece, I no longer go to fancy DC restaurants (with the exception of Komi and Ray's the Steaks, of all places) for the food. My impressions of the meatless tasting menus at CityZen, Restaurant Eve, and 2941 as well as Vegetate and Viridian are included in the piece. Except for 2941, I was underwhelmed. Anyway, I'm eager to know what you think I got right and what I missed, and whether veggies should have a place at the big table (instead of the kids'). I doubt that you could top Gillian Clark's contempt for my kind, but I'm ready for that, too. Thanks, Bob Lalasz