Chef Shogun

These are relatively common? I had a bottle of "Post Road Pumpkin Ale" when I was home in CT last year, and liked it, but haven't been able to find any others. I know there's a bottle left, and I'll be back up there in a week or two...have to drink it and give notes (Assuming it's still good). Don't remember it being overly watery, however.

Eagerly awaiting! Unless...somebody has a good 'intro' dessert wine they'd like to suggest in the meantime! I like sweeter wines (As well as dry)...does that make me a bad person??

Sauteed in black bean sauce with chili flakes and garlic! Ideally, the sliced garlic becomes kind of crispy. Let the garlic go for a bit, then toss in the beans. Thanks, [DC Asian tapas place] Raku! Also great: Sauteed with sweet corn with a little garlic. Also great with asparagus. Credit to mom for that one!

Woohoo! Mine too! I'm still going, however, because...when do I ever do anything for my birthday. Still sounds good, but I need to finalize when I'm going back to CT for a long weekend. I don't think it's that weekend, but need to be sure.

In the interest of full disclosure, it was only *approaching* fifteen percent....

Let me start off by saying that I consider myself a good tipper. It takes a lot to really negatively affect a tip from me, and very little extra to raise it. I base at around 18% and work from there. But last night I went to a diner for some after-movie food with some friends and only tipped....fifteen. Barely. Service started out well. The waiter seemed nice enough, too. I went the 'coffee and pie' route. Decaf, even...as much as I consider it an affront to all good and decent coffee, it was pushing midnight and I wanted to sleep at some point. So, long story short, service levels dropped quickly. No coffee refil until we got to ask for the check, which in itself was an agonizingly long process, followed by being ignored once again with the cash on the table. Our waiter, mind you, was standing no more than 20 feet away, chatting with other waiters in the basically deserted and nearly-closed diner. I know waitrons aren't mind readers, but come on...pay attention a little! These things work both ways. So, when the time came, I tipped badly, and it hurt! By the time I got back to the car, I was well into "What have I DONE??" Maybe because I had to had the reciept back to him, in person, rather than leaving it on the table and running, the obvious stiffing was all the more personal. Anybody else get this, for over- or under-tipping, or am I just insane?

Sounds good!

Wait a minute, wait a minute....we have taco trucks, right here in DC?!

Yeah, I just remembered I'm going home right around Columbus Day, for the Celebration Of The Dozen or So October Birthdays of the Shogun family (Ahem, mine included). Barring that, I'm still in! -- C.S. Why yes, we DO have pretty cold winters in CT. Why do you ask?

Might have to take you up on that! Are you there late afternoons, or this weekend? So you don't have to blow your cover, I'll just ask the first person I see for the one known as ScooterPie! So, Jaleo is open tonight? I totally spaced on the day, but my boss just said he is going tonight. I advised him to call first and see what the situation is. Anybody else going? I live down the street, so I may still end up dropping by for a plate or two at the bar.

Sign me up!

Ooh, I see now, too....so maybe it's going to be a posse-building for the 'weekend after next weekend', then. Still though, it WILL happen sometime!

Good point; I hadden't thought of that aspect. I origonally meant more of a "I'm going to Rays for the first time, and I don't want to go alone...who's in?" sort of thing! Still, reservations would have to be made, so that's taken into account as well.

I think the way to approach this is the way I've heard people suggest as a similar path to wine 'beginners'. That is, try something from the major 'food groups'. So really the subquestion, and perhaps sub-thread is: what are the 'representative' beers of each major category? I imagine that the list would be composed mainly of beer that you would have no undue difficulty finding, or at least should be, for the purpose of your education! In this way, you'll not only find beer that you (hopefully) like, but also gain some insight into what kinds of beer you like. Really, it's not enough to say "Go out and try foo...it's good! " without knowing what it is you are drinking, so you can seek out more like it if you wish! Now, as for an actual answer I don't presume to be knowledgable enough to be able to list The Beer Of Record for the categories, so I'll leave that to the regulars, and think about some suggestions for a bit and report back!

That sounds like a thing of beauty.... I really need to get over there one of these days. How much notice would I have to give to get a posse together to make a trip?

Wow, cool! Why not? Because the line-up of the dishes stays mostly constant over time, except for the occasional new course? Good, but not amazing? One of these days I'm going to get over there, but I think I need to hit a few other places first. Minibar kind of strikes me as something you need to build up to!

I second the entire slate as nominated! Might trade you a Sam Adam's Seasonals line for the Stella, though. Maybe I get a bad batch more than a good, but it doesn't usually do much for me. Not that I wont' steal one if I see one in the veggie crisper and nobody is around, however.

I don't know, I like the Sam Adam's Seasonal lineup (With regard to 'the beer itself' aspect of the thread, as opposed to the brewpub, which I've never been to and indeed didn't know about until this thread)! As long as you don't get a bad bottle, which happens occasionally, they're pretty tasty, and generally availible as a happy hour special (Thursdays at Froggy!), so they're relatively cost-effective. Picked up the first Oktoberfest of the season the other night! Was non-trivially exciting!

What's the protocol for cleaning stuff you buy on eBay that you intend to drink out of? I'm no neat-freak or germaphobe, but the thought of a container sitting god-knows-where for half a century or more is kind of off-putting without some serious cleaning, even if it looks basically ok! So, what...dishwasher? Dilute bleach solution? Rinse in some sort of lesser alcohol?? I'm looking at you, Extreme Vodka!

'So this one night Steve, Chet, Crazy Joe, and yours truely were at this party, right? And Steve was like, "We're doing beer bongs, right? What if, and follow me here, we had an actual bong filled with beer??'", and I was like "Dude...that would be HOT...but it would have to be unnessesarily, almost impractically large..."' .....and thus, the Long Neck Beer Tower was born.

I'm right there with you! Where should we be, exactly? "Put honey and water into bucket"?

I definately like the idea, and hope it takes off! Derricks mentioned the wine aroma wheel, and there is also the Scotch Tasting Wheel, so there is a body of experiance to use as models, if nothing else. One question is how quantitative should we go with notes? If numbers can be located, should figures for gravity, bitterness, color, and ABV be given? I'm never sure what to do with these, exactly, aside from a comparitive standpoint, but maybe somebody would find them useful. Can get even MORE pedantic and see if the brewer lists the yeasts, hops, and malts used! Cdh, maybe you should start us off with tasting notes of your homebrew. I'm curious about this "Beer that nobody was supposed to like, but then did!" -- C.S. Geek is not a four letter word!

Erm....that's over behind the mall, on the Borders/Best Buy side of the street, right? The *trailer* is still there, if I'm thinking of the place, but it didn't strike me as an actual operating business. Then again, you never know.

Alright, I forgot about the reserve list. I've seen a few of those on websites of high-end establishments, and it makes sense not to give them to everybody. Veritas' alone begins on page 10 of the 60 page wine list PDF on their site, so printing and binding for each table would be silly vs. how much is ordered off it on a daily basis (Not that the occasional $25,000 magnum ever hurts). I guess the 'regular' vs. 'tourist' thing sent me in a more fun, sinister direction. Still though, there may be something to these secret wine lists.... -- C.S. P.S. There is no lumber cabal.

Is there a third list for the Illuminati? Can't decide if this is a good practice or not (Ok, it's probably not, but it's at least interesting). How would you know to ask for the 'Special' menu? Will you ever be able to go to a restaurant again without wondering if there is another wine list lurking somewhere just out of reach? Soon, there will be secret signs on the menu, and secret rings with those symbols to alert the server to your enlightened status. Then there will be secret reservation lines to go with the already-existing 'real' emergency numbers, and the guy in the bathroom will fill you in on not only the scores from last nights game, but also developments in the geopolitics of the timber trade. "Ok, that guy at three. He's been here a few times, and doesn't hit the Kendall-Jackson too hard. I think he has proven himself worth enough to learn the truth." -- Server A "I concur, but the girl he's with...can SHE be trusted?" -- Server B I don't know, a place would have to have some serious cajones to try this, and I mean that they're probably also trying to revive the finger bowl in contempo-casual dining. A few special bottles tucked away, off list, that the chef or sommelier might offer to you as something you may be interested in, by virtue of a pre-existing relationship, fine, but a secret list...they'd never get away with it. A reviewer would get wind of it and blow their cover, and regulars and locals who 'have been dining there for years' but never knew of the list would be offended. Does this even make good business sense? Keeping a product around, eating up space and loading your fridge system, that only a percentage of your customers would even have the opportunity to know about ordering, and even then may not? -- Chef Fnord