Sthitch

The wife and I could not decide where we wanted to go for dinner on Saturday, so we debated, and finally decided to give SoBe a try. When we sat down and were looking over the menu, I mentioned that we should go back to Del Meresi, and that neither of us ever remembers it when we are trying to figure out where to eat, and that it is too bad since our first meal there was so good. Here is what I wrote on e-Gullet on April 4, 2005 about my first (and so far only) visit:

I have bought some cheese from Jill, so I know that at least when it comes to formage I can trust her tastes. So my wife and I decided to try Del Meresi tonight. Being a homer for Bombay Curry Company I am quite familiar with its location, so I was not going to hold the drab, nee ugly exterior against them. The room itself is quite odd, but it is a victim of its location. It is wider than it is deep. They did there best to dress-up the place, and it was inviting. But who cares about the way it looks, we were there for the food.

We started off ordering the crab-artichoke-bacon dip. What we expected was the normal incepted version that you find at so many restaurants. I expected it to be nothing but cream that tastes of flour with a small piece of bacon, a few strands of crab, and one artichoke heart chopped up, served with warmed crappy bread, you know the type. Oh my, were we surprised. This dip was nothing like we expected. There was a nice crunchy top that hid a cup filled with baby artichokes, and lumps of crab. There was no physical evidence of bacon, but the taste permeated it. This dish has changed my perspective on what artichoke dip can be the same way that Corduroy did to my impression of spring rolls.

There are two different ways to order entrees. The first is to have what the chef has prepared, with the sauce and sides that he would match with the dish. The other is to order the type of meat (or a portabella) along with a sauce and two sides. We went with the later. I ordered a pork chop with blueberry compote, and sides of cheese grits, and southern style green beans. The pork was standard fare, nicely cooked, but a bit tough (what I would expect from the “Lean Generation” pork). The compote was nice, a bit too much allspice, and not as thick as I would make it, but matched well with the pork. My first impression of the grits is that they were too cheesy, but I soon became addicted to them, and while I am still full, I grave another dish of them. The green beans were cooked the way I like them, mushy. I know many people like them to have a snap, not me; I like them best when they have been cooked to hell and back. These are the type of green beans my mother never had to get at me to finish. They were flavored with pieces of sausage, and quite tasty.

My wife’s order the flat iron steak (medium rare), a blue cheese reduction, caramelized onion mashed potatoes and grilled asparagus. Her steak was cooked perfectly (if you like it that cooked), and the sauce was a beautiful complement to the meat. Many blue cheese sauces tend to be a bit oily and take on the astringent quality that lesser cheese have, not this one, it was creamy, and had a wonderful smooth taste. Her potatoes were not my favorite dish of the evening, they needed more fat, butter or cream (preferably both). We skipped desert, but the bread pudding perked my ears, maybe next time.

The service was lovely. The young lady who waited on us was attentive, and thankfully did not think of us as her new best friends. The two courses and the wine were paced perfectly. They have a very interesting wine by the glass menu. Missing were super market wines, and Trader Joe’s “Two Buck Chuck”. My white Cote’s du Rhone tasted as if the bottle had been opened too long, but the Syrah I had, and the Aussie blend (Grenache, Shiraz, and Mourverde) were quite nice. I did not look at the wine by the bottle list, but if the by the glass selection were any clue, it has to be somewhat appealing.

After tonight’s meal we hope to be back soon.

I was in the store on Saturday evening and could not figure out what the appeal of this store is. After browsing the very limited selection, I only found two bottles that I would have even considered buying (a CdP, and the Krug MV).

Hmm beer.

Since I have escaped from montgomery county, I rarely get to Rockville, where exactly is this place? I have heard that it is off of Twinbrook Parkway, but where?

It's funny just how often I end up recommending Zaytinya to people in various situations.  Even though I don't love the place, I end up sending people there all the time (and they always enjoy it, too).

Cheers,

Rocks.

Can you send me once so that I may finally enjoy it? On my three visits I have been less than impressed.

A few more wines I enjoy in this price range:

2004 Falanghina Di San Gregorio - This is a light white with a nice floral and pear aroma. We call this our artichoke wine, as it goes splendidly with a roasted artichoke dish that I make. If you wish to splurge, this same company makes a wonderful wine called Serpico.

2002 S.A. Prum Wehlener Sonnenuhr Riesling Kabinett (say that 3 times fast) - A wonderful off dry Riesling from Mosel-Saar-Ruwer with peach and lemon flavors. It is a great match for Thai food. S.A. Prum also makes a great wine called Slate that has the flavor of the regions slate.

2001 Hanenhof Blend - This mixture of cabernet sauvignon, merlot, and cabernet franc is a wonderful treat at the very bottom of this price range. It is not a fruit bomb like its other Australian brothers, but has a little more finesse. It is filled with red fruits, and chocolate. This wine is imported by Epicurean Wines out of Seattle. I love this organization, and am a big fan of David Forziati their national sales rep, even though he is the SOB who caused me to become enamored with Rhone wines, and my bank account has not recovered yet.

THe Muga Reserve that you mention is still very young and tight(get your mind out of the gutter). It probably wont start showing it's stuff for another 2-3 years.

I agree it is still young and tight, but after about two hours in a decanter it starts to show nicely. I wish I had room to keep a wine at this price around until it was properly aged, unfortunately I don't, so I have to help them along and drink them early.

I have been three times, and have never had a dish that I did not enjoy. The last time I went, I had the Kanom Jeep which was delightful. Most of the time when I see water chestnuts as an ingredient I fail to ever taste it, that was not the case in this dish. We followed it with Beef Massamun, Crispy Pork Belly & Chinese Broccoli , and the Pad Thai. The Beef Massamun was tender and with just the right amount of spice. I had to convince my wife that we should get the pork belly, but she was happy I did. The pork was cooked perfectly crispy, and it was a great matched with the brown sauce. The Pad Thai was not my favorite version. But it was servicable, and the noodles were cooked well, I just did not care that much for it. I will continue to go back when I have the craving for Thai food.

Summer=Champagne

Autumn=Champagne

Winter=Champagne

Spring=Champagne

Hmm, I guess this is why I drink too much champagne.

I think that I would rather lick the inside door handle of a porta-john than eat at Philip's, I can remember when it used to be the place to eat in Ocean City, but that was in 80's. By the time I spent the summer there while in college, it had already become a hole of culinary despair, and I understand it has only gotten worse.

I have not been to Ocean City since the weekend when Princess Diana died (can't remember the year, but has been a while) so some of my ideas are a bit dated, and were mostly centered around food you would eat while drunk, and short on money. Not sure they would be much help.

Selling after dinner drinks without presenting a menu is a scam.

While at a business dinner at a fairly nice restaurant in Portland the table was asked if we would like an after dinner drink. Several people opted for coffee, another a Jamesons, I asked what type of Ports they had. They waiter ran through the list. I picked a Dow's LBNV thinking it was not going to be too expensive. They charge $38 per glass I never heard the end of that. I tried to explain to my boss (he was a cheap bastard) that I ordered the cheapest port, and for $38 I could easily buy two bottles of it.

That was a scam.

PS - As an NC native, I LOVE your signature Stitch.

Dennis Rogers writes for the Raleigh News & Observer, and has proclaimed himself the "Oracle of the Holy Grub".

I should say that the best food I find is on the way to the beach when I stop in Ayden, or Goldsboro for some BBQ. Next year I hope to try B's in Greenville.

I have never driven down to Calabash so I cannot say. Like I mentioned before, I generally cook while I am there. I find that it is calming for me to spend a day in the kitchen while my screaming nieces and nephew are roaming the beach.

and for the person who thought the crab cake was all filler, please try another. That must have been an anomaly because we pride ourselves in our crab to other stuff ratio.

That would be me. I did not write that it was all filler, or even mostly filler, I wrote that there was too much, big difference. I will say that I thought that the corn meal was there as a binder, not as a "filler", my problem is less with the quantity than with the flavor. If the binder brought flavor to the crab cake I would have not written that, it just stood out on my palette as a glob of flavorless corn meal, not a very pleasing texture or taste. Those crab cakes that stand out in my mind as being great have a flavorful binder that is complimentary in taste and texture to the crab.

I look forward to trying your hush puppies, finding a decent version around these parts is even more difficult than finding respectable BBQ, or pastrami. I hope that you do not try to gussy them up with bell pepper and corn kernels, those are an abomination. Like I mentioned, I did enjoy your restaurant and hope to go back soon, we almost went again last night, but the call of Indian food was too great for us to pass on.

I second the Cafe Atlantico vote.

For some reason I remember having good guac at Andale, but I may have had too much to drink befoe eating.

I go to Topsail every year, and have found that for the most part I am best off cooking myself. I will need to give 22 North a try next summer.

You should take the time to get some shrimp right off the boat and cook them yourself. I find that if you create a flavorful pot of water, bring it to a boil, turn off the heat, and dump in the shrimp. It only takes about a minute to cook them through to be just turning opaque.

In fact, I'd bet that some tables order $200 bottles of wine and still drink tap, while some tables only share one water bottle.

I am one of those people. In most cases I could care less if I have water. I kind of look at it as my wife's late grandmother "water is only for washing, and putting out fires."

I first noticed this place after my last visit to Nectar. We were walking to the Four Seasons for drinks, and passed by what looked like a beautiful dinning room with most of the tables filled. The menu looked interesting, and not too pricey. But I had never heard anything about this restaurant, and still have not found any mention of it on this or other boards. I figured I would have heard something about it if it were either good, or horrible. So should I take the absence of any mention as being a sign that it is painfully mediocre?

Unaware in general, or within this group?

I have maybe 2-300 cookbooks, including a complete set of Time-Life Foods of the World with the wire bound recipe booklets, and a copy of the Joy of Cooking from 1943 with section on rationing recipes and preserving one's victory garden produce.

The one day I spent in Istanbul on a business trip my client insisted that we go to Tugra for some Ottoman food. It was a wonderful meal, and all of the dishes were unique (nothing you would find at a DC area Turkish, or Lebanesse restaurant), but they were filled with the flavors of the region. If I were to go back to Istanbul again, this would me a must for me.

My normal Saturday afternoon is to attend a wine tasting, at one of the better wine stores in the city. Sometimes while at the store, I get sidetracked into the warehouse where special bottles are opened for a few regulars. Today, after several years of fawning over a bottle of '83 Margaux, my friend Steve decided that it was time for me to stop talking about this wine and bought one for a few of us to enjoy. The owner of the store followed it up with a '01 Dead Arm. I thought that this was going to be the highlight of my weekend. While drinking these fine wines Robert Weidmaier called Steve and asked him to grab a bottle of wine and come by the restaurant to smoke cigars and have some appetizers.

Several of us arrived at Marcel's and expected that we would enjoy a very nice bottle of Pomerol, and have some light appetizers. While Robert was sitting with us and drinking a glass of the fine wine, he asked if anyone was allergic to anything. No one was. He said he would send out a few things for us to enjoy.

The first thing to arrive was a tomato appetizer. It was a stack of different heirloom tomatoes, topped with a mild goat cheese, shallots, and drizzled with a balsamic sauce. The dish also had lardoons of bacon, chopped shallots, pine nuts, mache, and toasted brioche bread crumbs. I like tomatoes, and I have had them many ways that have stopped me in my tracks, but nothing like this. This was a simple preparation that showed the highlighted the tomatoes like nothing else. It is my understanding that we were the guinea pigs for this dish, and because of our reaction it is going to be served this coming week.

That would have been more than enough for those at the table, but not for Chef Weidmaier. He sent out bowls filled with thimbles of sweet corn, bacon, and potatoes. A sweet corn soup was poured around this thimble. Everything that Charlie Palmer's corn soup was not, this soup was. It was rich, sweet, and filled with corn flavor. Only proper decorum and easy access to bread kept me from licking the bowl, I figured that this was going to be the end of our appetizers, and it was, but it was not the end of our food. The chef followed this with a buffalo strip steak au poive. This dish was served with a ragout of wild mushrooms, and heavenly mashed potatoes. The meat was perfectly cooked, and the sauce that accompanied it and the mushrooms brought the whole dish together.

The offer for desert was turned down by the entire table since almost everyone had other dinner plans (I was the only lucky one who did not). After this surprise meal we sat around and finished the wine and smoke contraband cigars. It was an afternoon to remember.

After hearing from a number of people who assured me that the service issues have been resolved at Leopold, the wife and I decided to give it another shot. It would not have taken much to improve our other experiences there.

We arrived and were promptly seated, with menus arriving as we sat down. OK, that was a dramatic change. The waitress came right over to greet us, and did not look as if she was doing us a favor by talking to us. OK, another big and positive change. The coffee not only arrived promptly, but also was hot. Things are certainly looking better. The pastry basket showed-up a minute after the coffee, sure beats the 15 minutes on other visits. The waitress actually came by the table several times to check on us. Holy crap, someone taught them how to serve their clientele.

Not only was the service drastically improved, but the quality of the pastries had as well. The pistachio filled croissant was orgasmic, only ever so slightly better than the marmalade and almond cream version. I am very happy to see that they have taken care of their problems because I always wanted to like this place, and if they keep this up I will begin to love it.

we will be returning soon for the amish chicken and spaghetti. i have never had any problem with this space, although i do have a problem with what's left of foggy bottom.

Should Foggy Bottom just be renamed The George Washington University Holding Corporation LLC?

You could always give Leopold in G'Town a try. I did not have luck with the service when I was there. Last weekend I had a conversation with one of the pastry chefs, and she told me that they have fired all of the service staff since then.

There is also the whole Sakura chain.

 
We went to the Olney location in June for my niece's 10th birthday (seemed like a theme in the restaurant that night). The food was certainly better than Benihana, however, the night was ruined for my wife when the chef started throwing pieces of shrimp at those gathered around the table, she waved him off, and he threw it anyway. She has issues with food being thrown at people.

... mini grilled cheese