philadining

Made another quick stop at Little Saigon for comforting favorites: I just can never resist their Springrolls: I needed a little spice to kick the final vestiges of a cold... Bun Bo Hue did the trick: Yeah, I know the picture looks like a pile of broccoli, but it's really a quite delicious pork with curry sauce, with plenty of slices of what seemed like tenderloin, a delicious sauce, and fresh, crunchy peanuts. Everything was excellent. Although we usually order more, mostly out of lack of self-control, tonight two of us split this, and left satisfied: $25

Sugo is just a term for sauce, usually used in reference to a meat sauce, so yeah, not so different from a ragu. At least that's what I've assumed from seeing it on a few menus, and eating a few, maybe it's more nuanced than that!

I don't think it's about those pastries in particular, Wegman's seems to have a general no-photography rule. I don't see any reference to a policy on their website, but I've heard of people being admonished about it. And in doing a quick google, I stumbled on this odd video. Not sure what that's all about. I've been in lots of the stores but never got around to trying any of those pastries, I might have to make a point of it. But in general, whether it's pastries, meats, cheeses, produce, or prepared foods, they might not reach the heights of dedicated small artisan shops, but Wegman's really raises the bar for what a large-scale, popular supermarket can provide.

Wow, a dish just called Spice Extreme... yikes!

I'm not complaining about the substance of the review, or with the idea of giving credit or blame to Thomas Keller for the construction of the menu. And BTW, it was a nice write-up, I liked the descriptions of the food and the overall experience, thanks for doing it u.e. really!But it's written like a play by play, Keller did this Keller did that, Keller slipped here, next he redeemed himself... Sure, this might be a common literary conceit, but it absolutely gives the impression that the specific person was doing these things in real time. And that's not a great crime, but it's easy enough to refer to "the kitchen" or Benno, or whomever, just for the sake of giving a more accurate picture of what happened. I can't speak for Vadouvan, but from his posts I read his point to be that we all ought to be more careful about such things. I agree with him. As we've seen, we as a group apparently disagree about how important it is to be literal in such accounts. And that's fine, but I'm not sure we need to mock the concept by implying that the suggestion was to credit sautée guy#3. (edited to clarify)

Are you guys really that mystified by the point Vadouvan was making? Of course it's a convention to refer to the general direction and style of a restaurant by the chef's name, but u.e. referred to some very specific execution issues, which the phrasing implied could be credited to, or blamed on, Keller himself. I think we might (maybe...) agree that it would be ludicrous to say that Keller left a big greasy thumbprint on the edge of the plate or to rave that the delicacy of a particular brunoise shows Keller's knife mastery, especially if one happens to know that Keller's not in the house. I don't know exactly where the line might be, but it strikes me that there's a certain point at which comments about a chef's cuisine in the general sense, and the specific thing that's on one's plate, need to be phrased differently, particularly in the case where one can be pretty sure that the chef didn't cook it. It's not exactly a huge crisis, but it's not such a crazy thing to suggest that one try to be accurate when it's easy.... Nobody's suggesting that you need to credit the busboys in a review, but don't blame Keller for not keeping your water glass full.

Are you suggesting that they are open? www.ckgarden.com

It wasn't open the last saturday I tried to go... noon-ish a couple weeks ago.

Hey Charlie, those seeded rolls did look great, but that's not what I got, probably because I ordered a small. Do they put the large Roast Pork on the better rolls?

So how does it compare to Tony Luke's? To put it in context... the boyfriend is in town this weekend because I finally have a day off (Good Friday) and he, of course, wants a roast pork Italian. We always hit up Tony Luke's, but since I'll be free on a day when John's is actually open...should we go there instead? Or should we do one sandwich at both places? ← It depends on what you want to accomplish. If it's getting him the best Pork Sandwich, I'd agree with Holly: start at DiNic's then go to John's if you want to have a comparison. But if you're thinking like me, which I think you are, you might just want to seize the opportunity to actually try John's when it might be open. Then again, it's Good Friday, they might take the day off too.... If you go to John's, you don't need to wait behind the folks ordering cheesesteaks, you can skip ahead of them and order a pork sandwich. But I think what you might really want to do is get one cheesesteak and one Pork Italian... As for how it compares to Tony Lukes: I liked the pork itself better at John's, and I liked the spinach a lot. But at Tony Luke's you can get rabe, and the roll might be a touch better... I think you owe it to yourself, and to your boyfriend, to spend your entire day off eating various roast pork sandwiches, and reporting back....

Small Roast Pork Italian from John's Roast Pork: Sharp Provelone, Garlicky Spinach, decent but ordinary Kaiser roll. I suspect the large sandwiches and all the steaks get the much better-looking seeded rolls. But even with this roll, it was an excellent sandwich: the pork was herby, juicy and tender, the cheese sharp enough to bite through, the greens largely a garlic carrier, but adding a nice flavor themselves. I know I'm going to get in trouble for saying this, but I sometimes prefer spinach to broccoli rabe, it sits in easier harmony with the other elements. This is a great sandwich, and the steaks looked good too. Next time...

Make-up binge for some who couldn't make the first extravaganza: This was somewhere around the fifth heap of meat of what seemed like about 25... Good marinades, a nice variety of meat, the flavor and heat of real charcoal make a big difference. Never hurts to add some Charm The place itself is a bit worn-looking, but the food is good and fresh, tasty, and CHEAP. Thanks to Shacke for getting this together, again!

Evan didn't even threaten any angry emails, but it certainly did seem like someone got the word to compensate for the smaller cups: That's a serious glacier of Anise on the left, some Mint peeking out from underneath, in the right-hand cup. Cashew and Dark Chocolate in the other one. The Anise was really quite bold, while being somehow restrained at the same time. Really nice. But the mint... yikes, that was actually tactile in its mintiness, one of those hallucination-inducing flavors that makes you wonder if this is really just gelato. The Goat Cheese flavor was doing that tonight too, sneaking around and tapping you on the opposite shoulder, then running off laughing. These flavors are getting scary.

If Capogiro's WIFI signal had been strong enough to get across the street, I could have fixed it mid-meal! A little googling over dessert turned-up a fix, but not in time for dinner....

It was indeed a ridgy cup, and now that I think back, it did feel smaller in the hand. But again maybe I got lucky and got a healthy mound, such that it didn't seem skimpy to me. I don't really begrudge them the $4.45 for a good product, but at that price it's stupid for them to get stingy with the portions. I agree that this bears further research....

Had a really nice dinner at Lolita tonight. Started with the octopus and squid, which was good, and an insanely big portion for an appetizer. Perhaps it was the combination of grilling and some ceviche-style citrus marination, but t was just a touch overdone, but really no tragedy, it was still shy of chewy, and tasted quite nice, especially the bites with chunks of pineapple and cucumbers. (right about here I had some camera trouble... so that's all for this meal!) The tamale with pork was excellent, the earthy cornmeal playing off the intense red mole and tender pork. Loved it. For entrees we had the Enchiladas Verdes, whcih were stuffed with Huitlacoche, cheese, and... I forget what else, topped with grilled shrimp and swimming in a soupy green sauce. The enchiladas were very tasty, I'm told the shrimp was excellent, with a distinct grill flavor and a bit of spice. The only problem I have with it is that it was a bit wet... it really had a lot of loose sauce, and the enchiladas broke up pretty quickly from soaking in it. Tasted great, but got a bit mucky. No such problems with the veal cheeks, which were pretty close to perfect. They were braised to that almost-falling-apart texture, and had absorbed plenty of flavors from a subtle tomato-chile-touched broth. Layers of root vegetables were stacked on top and grantinéed, then spaghetti squash was piled atop that, which was then in turn buried in fried tortilla strips. These additions were each subtle, but nicely supportive of the homey flavors beneath. It was a lot of food, but I couldn't stop eating it. Excellent. Too full for dessert, and plus, well, you know, look out the front door and a little to the right... but I had a very good cup of La Columbe coffee. Service was excellent, and the vibe was nice, although it was starting to get loud even though the place was only about half full. I could imagine that it must be deafening on a rocking weekend night. I still love the cheap little taquerias, and I even still enjoy El Vez on the other corner, but Lolita certainly fills a cool niche in the middle. I'll be back for sure.

hmmm... I had a piccolo at the 13th street store and it didn't feel smaller, the gelato was still heaped pretty high on it. Seemed like the right amount to me, but maybe that depends on who's scooping. But as evidence I can only offer this Ray Lichtenstein-esque response to the new cups: Oh, righ, the report: Turkish Coffee- hearty, intense, and a little chunky with a bit of that sludge at the bottom you end up drinking no matter how hard you try. Authentic! just colder... Cinnamon - because it seemed like a good match, and it was.

Sorry, matthewj, I'll have to disagree (and no insult taken, nor any intended in this response.) In dropping the "new" Django from 4 Bells to 2, LaBan didn't do a mea culpa and say that he came to the realization that a tiny BYOB could never really be worthy of 4 bells. When he granted that original highest-rating on Django he was making a statement that, by his rating standards, a restaurant did not need to be in that same tradition of LeBec Fin et al, that there were other paradigms that could achieve the most satisfying heights of the dining experience. One could argue that point all day, and that's been done to death. But in the sidebar to his recent 4-bells roundup, where he demoted Passion and Django, he didn't say "what was I smoking? They don't even have a wine program!!" He said that the food and service wasn't nearly as good. And even if 2-Bells is meant to indicate "very good" it certainly reads as a precipitous drop from its previous incarnation. And Im just saying, from one experience, that it's every bit as good as it was before. I liked it under Bryan and Aimee, I still like it under Greg and Ross. I'm not sure that either was/is operating in 4-Bell territory. That has nothing to do with the wine program, more to do with the space itself, and the style of service. I think 3 Bells is more appropriate for both incarnations. But that's not up to me. I'll reiterate the point from the first paragraph of my original post: "the impression given by dropping his rating from 4 to 2 gives entirely the wrong view of the current incarnation of Django."

Django 060407 OK, the short version: as reported by others upthread, LaBan got it wrong. I don’t want to get back into that old debate about whether the original deserved 4 bells, but the impression given by dropping his rating from 4 to 2 gives entirely the wrong view of the current incarnation of Django. I’ll admit it’s a little premature for me to make bold pronouncements after one visit, but my sense is that the restaurant is currently operating at as high a level as it ever has. I don’t accuse LaBan of any mean-spritedness, rather I think it was an unfortunate quirk of timing that he was writing about 4-Bell restaurants at a particular moment, and may have visited the new Django a little too early. I’m always skeptical about the idea of “too-early,” if the restaurant is open and charging customers to eat there, they ought to be up to speed, and it’s not as if this crew was brand-new to the restaurant scene. But I can imagine that it’s always gong to take a little while to get into the groove of a certain space, get the front and back of the house in sync, etc. But that’s the only explanation I can think of for LaBan’s disappointment and resulting demotion of the restaurant in his bell-ratings. Anyway, enough pompous philosophizing, here’s what we ate: (apologies to the food-porn addicts, in a rush to fight friday night traffic, I forgot the camera…) Amuse-bouche: a small shotglass of cold melon soup, dressed with a couple of drops of bright citrus-flavored oil. This was quite beautiful, and just as tasty, an excellent opening to a spring meal. If I have any criticism, it is that it was presented with no ceremony whatsoever. I’m not suggesting that they need a trumpet fanfare at announce their arrival, but it seemed more like an afterthought: here’s your wine, here are some glasses, oh, right, here’s an amuse… The signature flower-pot bread as better than I remembered it from before, still a little softer and spongier than my ideal, but actually quite good. It was perfect for soaking up some tasty sauces during the meal. And the ceramic bell of soft butter may be a small touch, but a welcome one. It’s always a good sign when we have a real problem narrowing down what to order, we wished we had enough people with us to order one of everything. We started with: Goat Cheese Gnocchi, House Smoked Salmon, First Crop Peas, Oven Dried Tomatoes, Vermont Crème Fraiche. This was walking a tightrope, with several bold flavors that could potentially clash, or just result in a dish that was too busy. But I’m happy to report that instead, the very fine ingredients all meshed beautifully, reinforcing one another to create one of the better dishes we’ve had lately. The tiny gnocchi were light and tender, soaking up the slightly tart sauce. The salmon leant a subtle saltiness, the perfect peas some sweetness, the tomatoes and crème fraiche some acidity. Excellent. Butter-Poached Escargots, Sweet Garlic, Oley Valley Mushrooms, House-Cured Pancetta, Puff Pasty Buttons. This was quite satisfying even if the result was ultimately a pretty conventional combination. No big surprises, just nicely tender escargots (no rubbery erasers here!) and hearty chunks of mushrooms in a rich, garlicky sauce. The little discrete nuggets of puff pastry were a good, and convenient, alternative to the more conventional blanket of crust, but I could have used a few more of them… With the apps, we had a bottle of Pierre Morey Meursault 2001, a current Chairman’s selection. We’d tried this at a recent Studio Kitchen dinner where it got steamrolled by truffle syrup, but we suspected it would be a good wine for a different context. And indeed, it was a lovely classic French white Burgundy that only got better as it aired-out a bit, and ended up being an excellent companion for both the starters, and for the cheese plate as well. Pan-Roasted Duck Breast, Citrus, Goat Cheese and Watercress Salad, Crispy Confit Cigar, Pomegranite Syrup. The duck breast was perfectly cooked, with great flavor and texture. The tart pomegranite sauce provided a simpatico foil, as did the watercress salad studded with chunks of… hmm… I’m not entirely sure, I’m thinking maybe blood orange? But in what seems like an admirable strength of this kitchen, the second attraction of the plate, the confit-stuffed crunchy “cigar” almost stole the show. I seem to recall that the goat cheese mentioned on the menu had migrated from the salad to the interior of the cigar, I swear I had some cheese oozing out of that tube. This accompaniment seemed to be every bit as well-thought-out as the duck breast, and provided a pleasing textural and flavor contrast. Each thing was good, but the gestalt of the plate truly was greater than the sum of its parts. Meadow Run Farms lamb T-Bones, Lamb Arancini, Broccoli Rabe Graninée, Lamb Demiglace. This entrée followed the same pattern: excellently executed main ingredient, accompanied by creative, complimentary components, not merely a starch and veg. The T-Bones themselves were very good, grilled with a nice crust, while remaining juicy and tender. Slices of this were especially nice dragged through the concentrated demi. But what stands out in my mind was the baseball-sized rice fritter, stuffed with shredded lamb. This had great crunch and a creamy interior, not to mention the prize of tasty lamb hidden inside. The lamb T-Bones were good, but hey, it’s grilled lamb… the Arancini was surprising and delicious. The broccoli rabe too was a welcome addition to the plate, giving a slight bitter bite, tempered by a crust of broiled breadcrumbs on top. With the entrees, we opened another Pierre Morey Burgundy, a red one this time, a Pommard Grand Epenots Premier Cru 2000. And this was a lovely Pinot Noir, one of my favorites of a lot of similar wines we’ve been drinking lately. It’s a little pricier than the Latour Beaune that was a Chairman’s Selection recently, but I think I like it better…. We indulged in the fabled cheese plate, and it maintains the general format: a large variety served in small samples, with very good accompaniments, covering a wide range of styles, origins and flavors. Try as we might, there was no way to keep track of all that cheese, I might suggest a print-out for folks that order this. Having it described as it’s delivered is very nice, but it’s just impossible to keep track of all those names, and we were saddened that we discovered a few that we really liked, but have no idea what they were…. Really, it’s the cost of a few shees of paper, I’ll bet people would like it, both to keep track while they’re eating it, and to take to the cheese shop later. And yes, the madelines were really nice... And being eGulleteers, we couldn’t resist dessert as well, Many looked good, but we went for the Warm Pineapple Upside-Down Cake, Meyer’s Rum Ice Cream, Dulce de Leche, Vanilla-Ginger Sauce. I liked this a lot, the pineapple mellowing and intensifying in the cake. I’m not sure I detected rum in the ice cream, but it tasted good with the cake, and dragging through the caramel-y sauce added another layer of decadence. Service was very polished, certainly aiming higher than most BYOBs in town, down to re-folding the napkin of a guest that had gotten up to use the restroom. We were left to pour our own wine, but I don't mind that, I might prefer it actually. We weren’t being ignored, water maintenance was exemplary! I like the décor better than before, especially the interesting modern art on the walls. It’s still a bit tight, but it’s a tiny place, there’s not much to be done about that unless they just eliminate half the tables. And it still gets pretty darn loud in there, especially if some of the parties are getting raucous. It’s not easy to control sound in a space like that, but I’d love to see some softer surfaces to knock some of those reflections down a bit, I’m not sure what I think about the stemware. The squat little stemless tasting glasses are fine, but I think I might prefer a conventional glass. When we moved to red we were provided with stemmed glasses, but they were rather small, and not especially elegant. In either case, they are WAY better than the old Django’s glasses, so it’s not much of a complaint. Overall, we left with a very favorable impression of the restaurant.The food was consistently good, often excellent, service was very good in a pleasantly casual way. And the prices are fair: two apps, two entrees, a cheese plate and a dessert added up to $100. I think Django is currently operating in the top level of BYOBs in the area, and I’m eager to go back and try more. So I certainly hope that diners ignore the LaBan demotion, and go see for themselves that it’s at least as good as it ever was.

Had an excellent meal at Alba in Malvern tonight. Complimentary demitasse cup of potato leek soup. Solid, maybe better suited for colder weather, but nice nonetheless. We shared their antipasto, which changes daily but usually has this kind of variety: Duck Confit with Fava Beans and Pimento up front, Crostini with Brandade the the left, Speck with Shaved Fennel on the right, Wood-Grilled Shrimp with Romesco Sauce in the middle, Tuna with Haricots Vertes blurred-out in the back. Everything was delicious, light, and spring-like. The duck in particular was amazing, the favas and peppers lightening and brightening it. The brandade was a little on the mild side, more potato than salt cod, but still a nice starter. Halibut with Purée of Spring Peas, Risotto-style Orzo, Fennel. The photo doesn't do justice to how lovely this dish was. And it tasted every bit as good as it looked: light, flaky fish with a golden crust, over a bank of sweet, fresh pea clouds. The orzo was creamy, like a risotto, and studded with more of those tender peas. Shaved fennel root and the delicate fronds gave a bit of a bite. Beautifully executed with great ingredients, can't ask for more than that. Grilled Breast of Duck, Confit Duck Salad, Kumquat, Chestnut Pancake. Once again, the photo doesn't quite communicate the attractiveness of the plating. (Sorry, the light was pretty low, this is largely illuminated by the candles on our table!) The breast was tender, juicy, and perfectly medium, as requested. The vivid kumquat sauce had a pleasing, slightly bitter edge that played nicely with the rich meat. Flavorful shreds of leg meat were mixed in with frisée, nuts, and a light vinaigrette to create a nicely contrasting texture, temperature and taste. The chestnut pancake was soft and pillowy, like an ideal breakfast pancake, but with a nutty undertone that complimented the duck breast and fruity sauce. Excellent. Sadly, too stuffed for dessert. Really. What?!?! That was a lot of food. We really didn't have dessert. Very good service, nice vibe overall, good music. Worth a trip. I'm sure they're jammed on weekends, but we slipped in on short notice on a weeknight.

Anybody know of Indian places that do buffets for dinner on weeknights? I know lots do lunch, an many do weekend dinner, but I'd like one, like, tonight. I'm selfishly interested in Chester County, but it would be good to know about any, anywhere... thanks!

that's deep, man...

very effective way for a writer to keep a low profile!

Holly's got the story.

On the streets adjacent to the H-Mart and Terminal Square, most spots are metered, and there's a large parking lot next to this block that charges a fee. But -- I'm sure the neighbors will hate us for saying this -- it's really easy to just drive back into the residential streets a block or two and find a free unmetered space.