eunny jang

Soprano's Sunday night. For two: Garlic bread, made by me. Salad of watercress tossed in a delicious Caeser-ish dressing of lemon, olive oil, anchovy paste, and lots and lots of grated Parmigiano. Pureed some garlic with salt and pepper for last minute tossing, cutting board in my lap and mincing away, wholly absorbed in the show. Surprised that I managed to keep all my digits. stouffer's lasagna

This is so, so beautiful. Gorgeous little carrots - do you grow your own? Last night, I cobbled together dinner for my parents at their house: Fairly decent Korean-style sashimi (hwe) picked up from the local Asian market - big slabs of salmon and flounder bathed in sesame oil, tossed with julienned cucumber and dipped into dark, pungent chili paste before eating. I wrapped my pieces in lettuce with a dollop of the aforementioned chili paste and a sliver of raw garlic clove. Delicious radish kimchi my grandmother put up in jars a week ago. Not too ferment-y (which I hate); just lightly sour and almost fruity tasting.

I was so sorry I missed this. Sounds like a great time. I live right around the corner from Sette - will definitely check it out stat.

Crunchy? Or the big puffy ones that are like eating orange air? Embarassingly, the big poofy ones. I usually lick my fingers to get the orange gunk off, too. I'm twenty years old, going on four.

That brunch is where a restaurant tests out its most inexperienced cooks on the chef's day off; that hollandaise held for hours on station is a cesspool of bacteria (I believe that; that lukewarm temperature is just right for a swingin' bacteria key party). So says Anthony "Don't Eat Fish On Monday!!!!" Bourdain.

Try this thread. Other options in Rockville/Wheaton: Sam Woo Jung on Rockville Pike (decent), Ha Dong Oak on Viers Mill (not so great), Seoul Soondae on Viers Mill (GREAT but only serves soondae, Korean blood sausage), Woomi Garden in Wheaton (really pretty good).

cheetos. afternoon snack of champions.

Bah, just realized I've double-booked meself. Next time, perhaps.

Cheetos. The breakfast of champions.

Great idea. Me: Eunny, marketing and PR for a materials technology startup. A year of school left at Maryland. Have lived in the DC area all my life (Gaithersburg, MD for the first 16 years of my life, Dupont Circle for the last four). A young'un, but I'll behave myself. Here because eating is one of my favorite hobbies. Slamming oven doors, butchering chickens, and mashing garlic are my favorite ways to shake the day off. Adore eating out. How you'll recognize me: 5'2" (5'5" with my heels ), 110 lbs. Look for the Korean girl with the Sandra Dee ponytail wearing the white shirt and grey pants.

I think pcarpen wins the prize for gorgeous chicken skin. Beautiful photos. What blend of spices went on the chicken? Was it roasted in pieces? No cooking for me lately, unless you count unwrapping pieces of gum and lighting cigarettes as cooking.

I think very few of the tofu-averse actually object to the flavor of tofu (despite what they say). Any flavorful marinade or sauce should take care of that. Texture is the main obstacle, I would think. How about decidedly low-tech ways of prepping it to get over that block, like freezing/pressing to make a chewier, "meatier" substance, or deep-frying to make great, addictive little crispy pillows? By the way, does the eager vegan insist upon tofu/soy/etc in her quest for harmony at the dinner table? If the boyfriend is skittish, why not have dishes that don't incorporate "exotic" ingredients like these, and just let vegetables and grains stand alone?

I remember that Mexican restaurant being a quiet little gem of a place last time I was there (over two years ago, so take it with a grain of salt) with unassuming, friendly service and good food. I had a very pleasant fish dish with vinegared onions and peppers. I don't know if you have tried it, but I really disliked the pho restaurant there - underseasoned broth and nothing interesting in the meat selections. I didn't think the other Vietnamese selections were great either. For my money, I'll always go to Pho 75 up the Pike, by the carwash. Rockville Pike is full of interesting little strip malls containing places where you can count on your one or two favorites always being really excellent. Among my favorites: Il Pizzico (cross of Hungerford and Gude, in the Saah's Center): very decent tasting and well-made/cooked pasta, sauced properly. My favorite salad in the world, simple though it is, watercress with an absolutely pristine Caeser-ish dressing and perfect little croutons. Ba Le (across from Congressional Center, near that outdoor patio furniture place that displays plastic adirondack chairs year round): Vietnamese/French deli with great little sandwiches and lemongrass/caramel beef and pork. Lots more that have been mentioned numerous times on these boards.

cheese popcorn i found in our office kitchen. it was in a sealed Christmas gift-basket tin, but it tastes fine, which kind of concerns me.

That's really interesting - whenever I hear a steak referred to as "black and blue", it means Pittsburgh rare, charred black and crusty on the outside and cool and practically raw on the inside (my preferred temp for NY strips). It's the first time I've seen it used to refer to a steak with peppercorns and blue cheese. Cute. I guess Michael-not-Ray is quite the wordplay enthusiast.

Hi, is it too late to play? I would love to attend if newish-types are allowed.

It's a little out of the way - up off Muncaster. Specifics here and here.

I've lived in the DC area all my life - grew up in Gaithersburg and Rockville, and have lived in Dupont for the last four years or so. I know the city and the Maryland suburbs inside and out, but in all this time, I've barely even set foot in Northern Virginia, and have, I'm sure, subsequently been completely ignoring a substantial chunk of the DC food scene. My office is moving in a month to Shirlington - right by the Carlyle Grand, in fact. I know everyone on this board is better-informed than I - does anyone have pointers for lunch spots I shouldn't miss, places to meet friends for drinks after work, places to have dinner? I've been trying to glean information from the many NoVa threads, but since I barely have a working understanding of where Arlington is in relation to Alexandria, I'm not doing too well.

Funyuns. Last night, I purchased the most frightening little breadstick-ish things that were supposedly flavored like "buffalo wings and blue cheese." I don't know why I bought them. Even more frightening, they taste EXACTLY like every mediocre rendition of buffalo wings with blue cheese you've had at every mediocre bar you've ever been in. The bag is gone now.

Judy Rogers specifies a small-ish (3.5lb or smaller) chicken for roasting as a kind of guarantee of succulent flesh: a smaller chicken has a greater skin-to-flesh ratio, and therefore a greater fat-to-flesh ratio, giving you a bird that can literally be cooked in its own fat with no added lipids needed to preserve moistness. Her recipe doesn't call for any kind of butter or oil under or over the skin. Makes sense to me. I've cooked scores of chickens with her method (sometimes skipping the long salt-ahead process), always with great success.

I can dig on some Popeye's spicy, but only when the chicken is fresh. There's nothing worse than chicken that's been sitting under a heat lamp for half an hour, the breading flaking off and leaving yellow, greasy skin.

Rustic bread, toasted till a little charred, sprinkled with good olive oil, rubbed with a good, juicy and pulpy tomato. Lay a few really good salt packed anchovy fillets on top. More olive oil. More shameless idea-stealing here (under "Tapas Frias").

Ohhhhh, pretty. I seem to be out-of-sync: we hate gotten an early false-summer here (~70 and sunny this weekend!) but this is exactly the kind of thing I am still craving. However, we had a cookout Sunday night. Little burgers, mine with pickled jalepeno slices and lost of white American. Tostitos. Planned to do asparagus on the grill and a grilled corn and red onion salad with lots of basil and pepper, steaks, and chicken, but what started out as a minor clean-up-the-backyard project turned into a major landscaping ordeal. I cut a lime for my Corona after we finished and decided that would be the extent of my cooking for the day.

Has anyone been to the Nibbler out in Gaithersburg? Like your favorite Peruvian chicken place, but with a full menu and with beer - really excellent lomo saltado, carapulcra, and potatoes done in a million different permutations - llapingachos (pan-fried mashed potato cakes around cheese centers), boiled potatoes in a thick mustard-sharpened cheese sauce, etc. The fluffiest, least-stringy yucca fries ever. If you ask nice and order off the menu, they will bring out a big plate of chicharrones (sp?) for you - chicken cut up like you've never seen it butchered before, just clobbered up into rough chunks, bones and all, fried to a greaseless crisp, and accompanied by shockingly pink, spicy little rings of red onion pickle. Put liberal amounts of the sharply vinegared green sauce over everything. Send your side plate of white rice studded with peas and ho-hum beans swimming in it. Take plastic ziplocks and surreptitiously fill them with sauce under the table. It would be a great addition to a Bloody Mary. Come to think of it, I would probably drink it straight. Go to this restaurant. Yumm.

One glazed donut. Lady Grey tea (the Best. Tea. Ever.)