reesek

spain is wonderful. i was lucky enough to spend a year there and get college credit...fools! i do suggest you pack a pear or something. this is a country that thinks jamon is a fruit. granted, i had an unusual experience (lived in a dorm - and most of my discretionary income was spent on consumables other than food) but the produce situation was pretty bad. i remember going to barcelona the first time (an 18 hour train ride from sevilla) and cheering at the sight of the fruit at the huge market on las ramblas. people in sevilla kept telling me there was a market there, but whenever i went it was just a collection of cracked glass, antique irons and rope. places i've been and can't be missed - sevilla, grenada, cadiz at carnival!, madrid, barcelona, salamanca, cordoba, places next on my list - zaragoza, toledo, the north! santiago de compostela to san sabastien. so many donkeys so little time.

i'm with you...i grew up in the district but in the area called chevy chase dc. my mom was always quick to name our sub-neighborhood...which no one had ever heard of (she might have even made it up) the best thing about my house was it's proximity to parkway. mmm potato pancakes and pickles...i think we ate there 2x a week when i was in high school.

oh morela - what a rotten story. the only swenson's i knew was in tenley - across from roy roger's. i know i was alive pre-mazza, but i wasn't aware of it not being there - only that when it opened i knew that whatever had been there before was much smaller - and that my dad never stopped calling it matza galleria. also - was there a ton of construction around that part of western/wisconsin before mazza opened? was it simultaneous with the metro? i feel like we never drove that way until mazza - and after - we were always stuck in traffic there. for some reason swenson's reminds me of shakey's - didn't there used to be one on wisconsin in bethesda - right by east west highway? or was that jerry's? i loved the tall booths at shakey's. what about mario's pizza - any memories? i think it was in a converted garage-adjunct to a gas station. i think it was on river road and bradley lane, but it must have closed in the early-mid 80's. it was my first pizza experience. pepperoni was too spicy for me and to this day my sister and i guiltily admit a certain fondness for canned mushrooms on our pizza.

for me it's cherry peppers or hot cherry pepper relish.

i saw the show where she did those absurd thumbprint cookies. i bet there are 1000 calories in each one. bet sandy doesn't eat them either. that woman is irredeemable. she's giving people this false hope that they can be martha stewart (but thinner!) without the effort. it's unconscionable - and not only does it demean people who actually care about food, but it's nutritionally barren and insulting to people who really do want to make things that are fun or pretty but don't have a lot of time. what she makes isn't even really food. a can of frosting, butter, nuts and crumbs?? i have a grease film in my mouth just thinking about that one. i grew up on fresh whipped cream by the way and always wished for those perfect dollops of cool whip...

Diane - i'll have to ask my dad about that...the name is so familiar. he fancied himself quite the man about town in those days and since every maitre d / hostess was a career person - he knew them all. dominique's was my favorite restaurant - i was really young though. and those potato souffles - i think we called them something else - but i swear they had them at the palm - they were either crisp or puffed. btw - i always thought the chips tasted funny at the palm...i bet they fried in lard. lyon d'or!! - my mom's image of high glamour. there's another one - it's a drive but not an I@LW type drive - just a scare the pants off the 8 year old when mommy's boyfriend drives like a maniac in the inky rain far. l'auberge chez francois?? something like that. i took spanish.

is that the ice cream shop off of wisconsin in bethesda? we used to switch between there and the one in glover park - steve's?? long gone i bet - i never remember where it was...

oh the american cafe! - wasn't that right upstairs from booeys? (Friendship) i thought i was the poshest thing around - eating my chicken tarragon on croissant. the neon lights were so very miami vice. did it really open in 1975?? i thought it was new when i went there - must have been 1983... the glass porch at booey's was great. we routinely had it to ourselves midweek and it seemed there was always someplace to sit. the most coveted spot though was the booth just on the right when you walked in - i think we fit 10 people in there once!

sounds like mine. i call it the graze. because my eyes are too big for my stomach... it's one of my more expensive meals, but i'll go to my lovely market get dried cherries, or a gorgeous fresh pear/peaches in the summer and match the cheese to the fruit or the fruit to the cheese - depending on the season. potato bread from a local bakery, olives, onion or pepper pickle if i've been creative, and if i'm feeling truly decadent, a hunk of smoked albacore. jenny - if you are interested in trying fish i suggest you go smoked first. the smoked albacore i get tastes exactly like bacon but with the texture of very dry chicken. it's awesome with fruit and cheese.

i'm hoping it's pasta with peas, but if it is - i think i know why people hassle you about it

OMG booey's! we'd get the cinnamon coffee too! back when i was a meat eating girl - there used to be something decadent with bacon and spinach and roast beef. i was addicted to that sandwich. i'd always con someone into splitting it with me. and then i'd smoke dozens of cigarettes... the good old days!

jenny, i've been wanting to commend you on your blog. i love that though your work is not related to food - you've related it back to us in a food context. the sally jenkins article was very touching. i'm rooting for kwame - i hope he doesn't have to lose all his innocence to gain some strength. my earliest complete food memory is visiting my paternal grandparents in miami. (though i don't really think it was miami - bar harbour?) we used to go to carino's - a bustling minestrone-or-salad with your veal picatta type of place. we went because of the delectable garlic rolls - thinking back - these were parker house rolls sprayed with margarine and garlic salt. we loved them. my grandmother, all 82 pounds of her, would always, without fail, send every cup of soup/coffee/tea served to her back because it wasn't "piping hot, dah-ling" grandma and her asbestos mouth rocked.

this is a very old post (but since i'm still kind of new here) i'm reviving it out of nostalgia parkway deli (where i still go when i'm back home). dr. brown's before you could get it everywhere, yummy egg creams, corned beef, free pickles and potato pancakes from the gods snider's market - my mom and i went every week - mel used to give me gum. is he still there? sandy hair - he was the manager for years. excellent onion rolls, corned beef and sometimes - sublime chicken salad posins - cinnamon sticks, meat knishes and pigs in blankets. tastee diner - bethesda & silver spring. i went to bethesda more in HS - right next to champion billiards - a haunt i frequented at 16. the food is definitely better in SS and parking is easier, but there was something about flying across the street by the bethesda locale. highs on brookville road. i used to get slush puppies there. it burned down when i was about 6. we came back from cape cod and it was just gone. shanghi egg rolls. this place is/was in silver spring - across the parking lot was another chinese-ish restaurant that always changed hands. the woman who owned and ran shanghi with her son knew us - the egg rolls were big and fat, laden with chunks of sweet pork and plump little shrimp. perfection. my dad used to buy $100 worth at a time and freeze them. i heard a daughter is running the show now and it's not the same. the rib pit...i think on 14th? insanely good ribs - bullet-proof glass money carousel only added to the fun. pheasant's eyes (chocolate thumbprint cookies) from the old old bakery in the bread and chocolate space on connecticut avenue. the gum/carpet/newpaper smell in higgars bagels that don't taste like shoes. having lunch with my dad as a little girl at the palm and having shrimp salad and chocolate mousse pie...showing my sister the bigger pieces of chocolate that were in my pie. the honeysuckle on my street. my first creme brulee with my dad at the mayflower. first time i'd ever had raspberries either. mama leona's (that's not right....mama something though - i think. owned by two italians sergio and etore - etore was also a barber... mama regina's?) a dark, dumb place that i loved because they gave me shirley temples and my dad drank sambucca and let me chew the coffee bean. i was always weird.

awesome topic fresh tomatoes, salt, olive oil parmesan, balsamic, zinfandel avocado, salt, lime egg yolk, lemon juice, butter (i love me some hollandaise) garlic, mushrooms, butter (amen to fist for that one) onions, thyme, olive oil focaccia, fontina, garlic (and pepper flakes)

ok - i'm still relatively new, and i feel odd about spouting - do i earn credibility at a month? two? i think the point should just be - what tastes good (to you) and why? whether it's food you eat out, food you cook or the way you shop - i don't think anyone should be made to feel unsophisticated if they do things differently. differences are often celebrated on this board, but i think offending or not is all in the approach. someone said something here (sorry i forget who) that resonated with me about reverse-snobbery and anyone making claims was kind of acting like the pot calling the kettle black. i think snobbery is snobbery. whether you're anti-tang, or anti-foie gras - for whatever reason - so what? am i more or less respectable if i don't like it, can't afford it, can't find it or disagree with the way it's cultivated? egullet is soo much better than the other boards i read - partly because it's completely open to all things food - from restaurants to cooking to planning...i think this post is super - at the very least, i think we'll all be a little more inclined to celebrate the contributions everyone offers rather than pick at the differences.

no salt! what IS it?? my mother claims to have a salt intolerance (i say claims because i think what she has is an MSG intolerance - she eats a lot of olives and seems just fine) nonetheless - ours was a household entirely without salt. she omitted it in baking and all cooking. fortunately she didn't cook with no salt, but it was the "table" salt. the only thing she cooked with salt was her "sweet and sour" i don't know what the derivations of this dish were - eastern european for sure, but it was horrid. baseball sized "meatballs" of hamburger seasoned with garlic powder and pepper were wrapped in cabbage leaves and cooked for approximately 6 months in a "broth" made of tomato juice, water and sour salt (a mysterious product - all i remember about it is that the brand we used was called rokeach). serve in large bowl - orangeish fatty liquid with grey meat inside fetid-smelling cabbage. dis-gusting.

thanks for clarifying girl chow - your account made me laugh. i don't know why i was so crushed by my treatment there...maybe it was just such a departure from the sweet lady who'd just fried me eggs at saigon gourmet. she spoke very minor english, but didn't make me feel like it was my fault. i've never been treated quite as rudely as i was by the woman at the deli - and have spent a pretty considerable amount of time in restaurants in the ID. she just kept looking at me with an undisguised mixture of disbelief and disgust. and yet - i will go back to try this #5 toasted. how could i not?

had the fried egg bahn mi today at 5th and king - i swear the sign said saigon gourmet - but i could be wrong. it was amazing - divine...hal - you're a prince. i'd go every day if i could. i should have left well enough alone but decided to gild the lily and seek out a sesame ball. ended up at "saigon deli" (though i have no idea if it's the same one - this one was east of 12th on jackson - almost to rainier) past the 7 stars pepper plaza on the same side of jackson. there was a tofu bahn mi on the board and a big steam table with fried tofu slabs hanging out in a soyish marinade so i don't know. there were also about 9 people working there - and none of them would speak to me. people who walked in several minutes after i did were helped first. when someone finally did acknowledge me, he told me that they had them - then walked away to talk to the mailman for a while. after i contemplated leaving for a while, a woman came over to see what i wanted, but was so mean i ended up leaving. (whatever they had wasn't what i wanted, but the way she was looking at me and talking to me while trying to figure it out was miserable.) i totally understand the misinterpretations a language barrier can effect but this was really awful. i hope it's not the same place with the good tofu sandwiches, because i'll never go in there again. ps - i got good sesame balls at seattle deli just north of 12th and jackson. big (unfortunately not hot, but yummy) filled with yellow paste. i've had red paste (very similiar) but the best i've had are filled with lotus root paste which is slightly creamier and aromatic - almost floral.

i haven't been but in my paloma research, i discovered that the owner left mezze in kirkland (which i think he'd opened with a partner). i loved paloma. i loved zedat - we chatted about zaytinya and the serious buzz surrounding it in DC and turkish food in the states...he was warm and gracious. our waitress (though slow due to a confusing and complex system there) was totally lovely and sweet...and the food was amazing. the menu was more limited than what i'd seen online, but there was still plenty to enjoy. winners - the peynir & meyva - i've never had cheese quite like that...and the pomegranate, red pepper and walnut spread. addictive. we felt high. the best kind of food experience. i can't believe i'm going to say this, but i wish i spent more time in pioneer square. i can envision all kinds of fun wandering in there for a coffee and baklava on a rainy afternoon.

the menu looks promising...very exciting. late happy hour w/b nice around there. the hours imply that the dinner menu is available until 10 - but there's a happy hour menu after 10. i look forward to the first reviews!

porksketti - that was day three. during a frugal period, my mom discovered pork roasts (shoulder i think) on special. the week went something like this: monday - pork roast - raw pork gets slathered with powdered garlic and ginger and nance's sharp mustard. (no salt - ever or pepper) bake until dry. serve with macaroni and cheese. tuesday lunch - cold pork sandwich (in one inch slab) on cold toast with more nance's mustard. no lettuce or tomato. tuesday dinner - pork stir fry - green peppers, onions and pork + garlic powder and low sodium soy sauce. serve with uncle ben's. wednesday - porksketti- shred (with electric knife - this was so tough all the way through my jaw hurt by the end of "dinner") pork, add to jar of classico (thank god) and serve with spaghetti. note - drain pasta for .03 seconds so that pool of water forms on plate. repeat the following week.

i much prefer to order lots of small plates - i'm very excited for paloma! is the WS place past the junction on the right as you head to fauntleroy? i have always wondered about that place - it always seems dead...i'll have to check it out now. have you been to mezze in kirkland? is it still there? if you're ever in DC - i can't recommend zaytinya enough - i posted a review on the DC page - i have a good friend who belly dances at mezze in cleveland park and she swears by the borek there.

tell us more about this fried egg bahn mi - are the eggs freshly cooked? soft fried or hard? i'm picturing warm oozy yolks with sharp fresh jalepenos...YUM!

i was in DC last week and had a meal at zaytinya - a turkish fusion place. i loved the food and am craving mezze...i'm meeting a friend for dinner tonight and i'm tempted by the charming website of cafe paloma. has anyone been? any advice for other/better mezze either traditional or fusion (but one with at least a tavern license) thanks! i'll report back tomorrow

i was at viet wah on sunday and was hoping they'd have those amazing sesame balls...no luck. i think they've got bean paste in them at viet wah, but i've had them someplace else (help!) on jackson filled with lotus paste. they are impossibly good - insanely rich for something without cream or chocolate. who has the best? i'm salivating for them but i'm very unversed in the ways of said delight. (um, what are they called?) are they ever filled with anything else? second - i've read a bunch of feedback on bahn mi - who has the best tofu one? i've only ever had them from saigon bistro in the food court at uwajimaya. i know that tofu is not the preference of many, but i don't eat meat...i think i've seen good feedback on seattle deli, but a friend said the tofu sandwich had pate on it - true? any others you might suggest to a veggie? i had the saigon bistro's old baguette again today - when they're good there - it's an ethereal experience, but when the baguette is a week old, it's heartbreak.