Spiral Stairs

It's been a while since I've been there, but my experience has been unobjectionable, if not noteworthy. (They actually have a takeout menu -- and delivery within Union Station -- for those who work nearby.) The room is beautiful, for sure. It's also one of the more integrated dining rooms in the city.

Region A's barbecue : Region B's barbecue :: Region A's sports teams : Region B's sports teams. (Go Royals!)

I celebrated my actual birthday yesterday with an actual birthday cake as part of an actual Lickity Split Lunch. It was my first Eve birthday cake experience; I was surprised, based only on past photos and descriptions, that the birthday cake was not a slice but a small round cake of its own, trimmed beautifully with some absurdly tasty frosting. (And a candle!)

I don't know if I've ever had a dining experience more like a sporting event than the tasting menu at Komi. Just when you've caught your breath after entering and sitting, the food starts flying. Fried cheese balls here ... Cured meats there ... What? You ordered the wine pairing? Bottomless glass of prosecco, coming straight atcha! Feint right, lunge left, consume oysters. Drat, outflanked by the cuttlefish! Take evasive action, prepare to launch mascarpone-stuffed dates ... NOW. I think ten things were served to us as the "first course." We sort of lost track, what with having to change clothes several times and run out back for dousings of Gatorade. Then we settled into what I imagine miles 5 through 20 of a marathon must feel like. Steady, steady, keep pace. Eat your pasta, you need the carbs. Savor your meat, more slowly but maintaining momentum. Stay hydrated. (Why am I continuing to eat these house-made crackers as though they were conveyed by motorized belt directly into my mouth? How can I ever finish?) Cheese? This must be mile 25. Never forget your goal: the euphoria of the finish line. A broken tape? No -- doughnuts! Like an epic sporting event, it isn't something I'm prepared to do often. (I should add these two very important facts: (i) my wife has a tiny appetite, and (ii) I cannot bear to leave any food uneaten on any plate within the reach of my arms, as aided by my feet.) But, wow, I'll take this over the Boston marathon any day.

I liked it too. If I had to put it on a menu, I would call it, "Chocolate? Ooh, mommy!"

I got an e-mail from Opentable today offering OT members $200 VIP tickets for $75. Unfortunately, I already bought my cheapskate $75 tix. Go here, click on "Buy Tickets", then click on the Opentable promotion linkage.

So what happened last night? There doesn't seem to be any announcement or news anywhere about the DC honoree. (If you search for "best new chefs" in Google News, however, you will find that most of the other honorees got immediate coverage in their local papers.) Do I have to wait for the TomChat to find out?

My wife and I had the Lickity Split lunch yesterday, for the first time. I second (or third, or fourth) all those who have praised its incredible value. For $13.50, I had a bacon, egg & cheese salad and an Irish BLT, both of which were delicious. That was a hell of a lot of food. (Especially considering the bread I kept stuffing in my face.) My wife had the market salad and risotto. Then I had half her risotto. And some of her bread. Finished up by licking crumbs off the edge of the bar and groveling on the floor for stray drops of salad dressing. We're going to go back for a Lickity Split on my birthday, and I will have the birthday cake. I'm salivating already.

This confusion is under discussion here, where a couple people say they've heard it is an expansion, not a relocation. I think the only way to settle this is to have dinner there, tout de suite, and demand answers.

Here's a disaster for Capitol Hill: See here.

Per today's TomChat: Droooool ...

We were there too, on the late end. I really think Majestic's brunch is a terrific deal, considering the quality of food and service. My wife's huge plate of sasuage gravy and biscuits was less than $10. It is when she orders something like that that I look to the sky and thank God for giving her a tiny appetite and me a capacious stomach. The service was ultra-quick -- I mean, fast-food-quick -- because by the time we got there, the rest of the clientele was digesting and coffee'ing. The kitchen staff was relaxed and laughing (probably at my bed-head). I enjoyed watching them whirl into action when we placed our order.

Do: Go to Bryant's. Don't: Go to the Bryant's at the airport, or in a casino, or anywhere other than the Brooklyn Ave. location, where the ancient, filthy, blackened pit guarantees luxurious meats. Unlike JG, I do like Gates. Had a delicious burnt ends sandwich there a couple months ago. I have not been to Jess & Jim's, but have eaten at its townmate, Smokestack, more times than I can count. My grandparents took me there for my birthday for ten years running, and it's where I brought my fiancee to meet the fam. We usually now go to its -- by barbecue standards -- ridiculously upscale sibling Jack Stack, near Union Station. One thing I like about KC barbecue is that it is less hidebound than in other cities. There are a variety of sauces, and proper respect is accorded both beef and pork. Another landmark worth trying is Stroud's, for fried chicken. They just moved out of their old building, and I haven't been to the new place, but 9 out of 10 Kansas Citians would say it's the best fried chicken in the city. The other is a vegetarian.

I agree, except that I sat next to Dennis Kucinich once there, and that was a very exciting moment for me. You could also head north, to 3d & Mass. White Tiger is a decent Indian restaurant there. (Closer than the Tandoori place on 8th St.)

Maybe I missed something in scanning that thread, but I did not see where you said it was newly opened when you described your experience. It turned out to be a newly opened restaurant, once the truth came out, but the people who wanted you to name names did not know that. It is quite possible that those people would not have clamored for the name if you had said it was a newly opened restaurant and that's why you didn't want to name it. No one thinks it is off-limits to criticize a well-established place.

After looking at the list of participating restaurants, and learning that Chef Armstrong is the chair, how could I pass this up? My wife and I will be there, with open gullets.

Gee, I wish my employer would do that for me. Anyway... My question is: When did 15% become 20%? I've always tipped 20%. But it used to be that 15% was the standard, and my 20% was generous. At some point, 20% became the standard, and 15% became a punishment. Not that it makes a big difference in my life, but now I have to tip 25% to be the same old generous fellow I used to be.

Spring is in the air (at least for the next 10 hours or so, per the weather forecast). What are your favorite places for outdoor dining? Key criteria for me: Elbow room; pleasing view; comfortable seating; food befitting the pleasant environs. Truthfully, DC doesn't seem to have too many spots that satisfy all of those criteria. (The Les Halles discussion deserves a link here.)

Komi website. And what a website it is.

It is a vast oversimplification to say that a restaurateur (or any other employed person) does it either "for love" or "for the money." Like all of us, restaurant owners must balance their need for money and their desire to have a job they love. Maybe some restaurateurs have struck a balance weighted more heavily "for love" than some other people, but that doesn't mean they're not in it "for the money" too. Likewise, a restaurateur who wants to have two seatings per night because he or she has a mortgage payment to make has not abandoned all "love" in favor of profit. A restaurateur who does it solely "for love" could, for instance, decide to abandon all profit margin above a bare living wage. Just like I could tell my employer, "I appreciate your offer to pay me this fat salary, but I only need half of this to live on, and I'm not doing it for the money, so you can keep the other half, thank you very much." But I don't do that, and restaurateurs seek to increase their profit margins, because we all share a material world in which money matters. In other threads, people have argued that financial success in the restaurant industry is so difficult to achieve, and so meager in potential scope, that the only rational reason to enter it is "for love." Both positions are romanticizations of decisions that regular people -- like restaurateurs -- make every day.

My wife and I recently returned from two weeks in India. For archival purposes, I thought I would post some notes on where we ate. I thought ahead enough to write down the names of most of the places at which we ate, but the details are largely subject to the vicissitudes of my memory, addled by jet lag and culture shock. (Throughout, I will be largely unable to describe the locations of these restaurants, as all Indian cities are, by law, impossibly confusing and chaotically organized. If you find yourself in one of these cities, though, I'm sure you could be directed to any of these places.) (I can't remember many of the things we ate. But almost all meals were accompanied by naan (often garlic naan) and/or chapatis, and dal (lentils). Most meals ended with kulfi (dense ice cream) and/or gulab jamun (fried balls of dough in a very sugary syrup).) Delhi We spent six days in Delhi, escorted by my wife's cousin, a local. Thankfully, this permitted us to eat several meals outside the compounds of hotels and in truly local establishments. Foreigners are usually advised to beware of street food and restaurants that may use unfiltered water, so we appreciated having a guide sensitive to the needs of our delicate digestive tracts. We had one dinner at Terrace at the Top, an outdoor restaurant perched at the top of a relatively new and stylish shopping complex. There were seven of us, with three vegetarians, and we ate a large number of things family-style. I can't for the life of me remember anything specific though. It was here, however, that I learned that no one in India (or at least in Delhi) has ever heard of Taj Mahal beer, a mainstay of American Indian restaurants. So it was Kingfisher for me. As in many Indian restaurants, there was live music (sitar and keyboard). A small, cute boy danced around the place for tips. The next day, for lunch, we ate at Basil & Thyme, a "continental" (i.e., non-Indian) restaurant in a spendy but cute shopping district. I had an okay mushroom risotto, but was mainly left with the impression that I should focus on Indian food. Here I had my first "fresh lime soda," which is lime juice, soda water, and sugar syrup. Very tasty, and it became a staple of the remainder of our trip. Chinese food is very big in India, and I was told by those in the know that I would find it far superior to Chinese food in the U.S. Our first (but not last) Chinese experience in India was at Taipan, on the top floor of the Oberoi hotel. This time there were ten of us, and we caused some friction in our relationship with the hostess when we showed up unannounced and somehow misunderstood their ability to seat us. (Suffice it to say I was not handling these negotiations.) Eventually, though, we were seated a huge, round table with a lazy susan. Two appetizers that were new to me stand out as exceptional: Lotus stem and crispy spinach. The crispy spinach was an airy, light mass of thin spinach strands, like they had been dried and then fried. The main courses were excellent too. Our next meal was the outdoor buffet at the Imperial Hotel, called 1911. It was a very beautiful space, abutting a quiet and lovely garden. The buffet was extensive and accompanied by a main course from the menu. I had saag paneer (cottage cheese), which was delicious. Desserts were arrayed on a long table for self-service, and I have rarely seen such an extensive and pretty spread. Our next couple of meals were outside hotel environs and in more truly local places. We had lunch at a South Indian place called Sagar, where I had my first exposure to idli, little solid discs of white rice consumed with various gravies. My wife and I split a gigantic potato-stuffed dosa as well, which stands out as one of the best dosas I've had -- crisp and light, not overly greasy. For dinner, we found ourselves at Pindi, a North Indian place with a menu similar to what you would find at an Indian restaurant here. I remember the butter chicken as exceptional. (Let me flag one regret: We did not eat at Bukhara, in the Maurya Sheraton Hotel. It is considered a true destination restaurant. Someone named it one of the top 50 restaurants in the world, and someone else called it the best restaurant in Asia. You are compelled at Bukhara to eat with your hands -- they literally do not stock silverware (or so I have been told). We had plans to eat dinner there, but they fell through due to the some scheduling difficulties.) Agra We spent most of one day in Agra, site of the Taj Mahal. (Which, by the way, absolutely demolished my expectations. I was prepared to look at it and say, "Eh, doesn't quite live up to centuries of hype." But it did.) We only had one meal, at a local restaurant called Priya, recommended by our tour guide. All I remember is that we had Indian food and the (large) place was virtually empty. Udaipur After Delhi and Agra, we spent a day and night in Udaipur, a smaller city known for its magnificent palaces perched on hills around a beautiful lake. Let me advise this: If you find yourself in the vicinity, and if money is no object, treat yourself to a stay at the Oberoi Udaivilas, which I now classify as the nicest hotel in which I have ever stayed. (You will pay very dearly for this experience though; thus, only one night for us.) Because our stay was short and we lacked a local escort, the only special meal we had was at one of the restaurants at the Oberoi Udaivilas: I think it is called Chandni. We ate outside on a terrace under a tent, by candelight and to the sitar strains of local Rajasthani musicians. We were also treated to some impressive Rajasthani dancers. I had a very spicy lamb dish whose name I can't recall, but whose taste I do. (It was similar to, and may have been, roganjosh, but I think it was called something else.) Delicious kulfi for dessert. As is true elsewhere at the Udaivilas, the restaurant had service and all details down pat. Goa Next up, two days in Goa, a small state on the Arabian Sea known for its beautiful beaches. Now, I need to explain something. My wife is Indian by descent. I am not Indian, but I am well-accustomed to Indian food. We were accompanied on the whole trip by my wife's father and sister, both of whom are Indian by descent. Despite the protections one might expect as a result of genetics and culinary habit, we were all experiencing some digestive distress (in varying degrees) by this time. Add to this the fact that my wife is just emerging from the first trimester of pregnancy, which has been a period of great physical trial and tribulation. I say all of that by way of justification: I and my wife ate like rabbits in Goa. Which is quite unfortunate, because Goa is well-known for its spicy seafood dishes, which is right up my alley under normal circumstances. We had only one meal at a Goan restaurant, at which I limited myself to a couple fried fritters (with contents I can't recall) and a Portuguese soup. (Goa was, until I think 1961, a Portuguese territory or protectorate or something.) Now that we had ventured toward the South of India, however, vindaloo entered the picture. My wife's sister ordered lamb vindaloo, which was the worst mistake she made on the trip. Not because it was bad -- she said it was very good, and I don't doubt her. But it was, apparently, brutally hot. Her digestive system, already pretty irked by what it was being subjected to, rebelled and never fully recovered. Bombay Ah, Bombay (aka Mumbai). By far the most "American" of the cities we visited. Fewer cows on the road; taller buildings; sidewalks on which people actually walked. I had stopped noting even the names of restaurants we visited by this time, but I can recall a couple. Our first dinner was at a seafood restaurant called Trishna. Trishna is apparently known as one of the best seafood restaurants in Bombay and is frequented by Bollywood celebrities and the like. So I was prepared for a hoity-toity or uber-hip experience. Not so. It was a charming and small, but packed. (I guess some locals bemoan the increased "touristiness" of Trishna, but it was locals who brought us there, and primarily locals we saw around us.) Six of us, plus a toddler, jammed into a booth. (Sidenote: In India, it is apparently acceptable to let your toddler run around a restaurant unaccompanied by an adult. The toddler with us did that. He even found himself behind the bar at one point. The staff just squeezed his cheeks and smiled.) The standout dish was a peppery fried pomfret (a local fish that was new to me). We had a lunch at Status, a vegetarian restaurant not far from Nariman Point and the Gateway to India (popular, touristy areas you would likely visit). The door to Status is a big sleek metal contraption that led me to believe I would be entering a super-stylish club-type scene. But it was low-key and casual on the inside. It was my first experience ordering "thali"-style. We were each given a big metal platter with six small bowls on arrayed on its perimeter. The waiter put a stack of chapatis in the middle and filled the bowls with various gravies and curries. When the level in any bowl grows low, the waiter magically appears to refill it. It took me a while to figure out that I would gorge myself to death unless I actively told them to stop. Unfortunately, after I had nearly reached the point of engorgement, I learned that the chapati stage was only the first stage, and the rice course came next. The rice course repeated the same general pattern, but with rice instead of chapatis. I was utterly and uncomfortably stuffed when we emerged. That is, however, my habit when presented with unending supplies of delicious food. We had a few meals at the homes of relatives, which were interesting. Indians adopted the British love for ketchup, it appears. One cousin served us little toasts with a creamed corn concoction on top -- and then offered to dump ketchup all over them. She had learned that I am Italian by descent, and thought she was offering me Italian food. I declined the ketchup, but the toasts with corn were good. Hope some of the above helps a future traveller navigate through Indian dining.

The market for vegetarian menu items is greater than the 5% of Americans who identify themselves as vegetarians. As suggested by Lackadaisi's post above, many meat-eating diners look for but don't find appealing vegetarian options. The Post recently covered the growth of "flexitarianism," or the practice of consuming at least 80% of one's calories from vegetable matter. A friend of mine recently identified himself as a flexitarian. I thought he had made it up and I wanted to slap him silly. I would not be nearly as quick as many on this thread to assume that the restaurant industry has accurately identified and satisfied the demand for vegetarian food.

Wow. I had no idea that Adam Smith and Ayn Rand had so many screen names here. The article is just a comment on what it is like to belong to a -- yes, self-selected -- minority. But, to Adam Smith, I say that I would not classify the restaurant market as a particularly efficient one. In any event, I don't think the author was arguing that the fine dining restaurant market should be regulated into submission. I took the question about "deserving" a seat at the table as more of a cultural question, not a question about compelling private enterprise to do something it doesn't want to. And to Ayn Rand, I say that the fact that someone has made his or her bed doesn't make it uninteresting or unimportant to learn about the experience of lying in it. It is okay to express frustration about one's lot, even if it resulted from choice. It is, for instance, okay to bemoan the industry's unfriendliness to children that you chose to have. It is okay to discuss the fact that your preferred dessert is chocolate but your favorite restaurant didn't serve it last night. It is okay to complain about the fact that the suburb in which you chose to live has no decent restaurants. I don't know why this expression of frustration is any different.

You appear to have said something less than idolatrous about Restaurant Eve. Blasphemer! Your sentence: Banishment to the innermost circle of Hell -- perpetual hold on the Ray's reservations line. I enjoyed the piece. I have a mechanical question about your approach to eating out. Do you verify that apparently vegetarian dishes not explicitly labeled as such do not include animal products, such as chicken stock, lard, or the like? I know some vegetarians who, um, eat first and ask questions later in such (presumably recurring and vexing) situations. (To answer the question you pose: Of course vegetarians deserve a place at the big table. My wife and I recently took a trip to India, where vegetarians not only receive a place at the big table: They often constitute the entire table. When it's part of the culture, inconvenienced chefs somehow adjust.)

Having not yet tried for a reservation at Ray's, could someone post what the "policy" is? (The Ray's thread itself doesn't help me that much -- it mostly just refers to the "policy," or similar. I feel like the one guy who doesn't grasp the situation.)