babka

I'm reading through the NYC dining threads and feeling quite overwhelmed and curious You have a fluency in talking about food and chefs that's quite foreign to me, a D.C. resident, and I'm struggling to understand its genesis. Yes, New York is a top dining city--but that seems to mean more than just multiplying the number of good restaurants. We've got several chefs here who could easily hold their own against New York's finest, but reading Fat Guy's posts on them, compared to his discussions here, is like reading in a foreign language. I get the words, but I know that I'm cold to their intended nuances. Apologies if you've already discussed--a forum search on new york dining culture was less than helpful, as you might imagine--but does anyone have any thoughts or pointers? What flows into the ether of New York City food culture?

many thanks to all! tho' there's a definite theme of haul your ass out to the suburbs going on here, of which I'm taking due note. I signed up for finewine's newsletters, and, in scouting for the embassy tastings, realized that Washingtonian maintains a pretty good list of wine tasting/food events: Washingtonian's Wine and Food Events also, off-topic, I stumbled across Mr. W's Firefly for the first time on Sunday evening--it was about four blocks off of my imagination, but stunningly beautiful through the windows!

impoverished writer here, so my home table habits run to under $10 a bottle, with special occasions leaping all the way up to $20...but I like to play! Shopping: Bell's been good to me; Pearson's is in the middle of nowhere but sends snappy emails; Whole Foods sometimes thrills and sometimes spills, and TJ's cheap but never yet remarkable. Where do you go? Drinking/learning: Thank you, Nectar--got to show off my new knowledge of a couple of lovely bottles at a friend's dinner last night. I know Citronelle will surpass all hopes, once I save up the bucks. Where do you go for interesting tastes? Tasting: The suburbs--grapeseed and whatchamacallit in Virginia, but I don't pull my passport out much for district line crossing. Anyone inside the boundaries?

dean & deluca's has 'em. didn't try 'em, don't know 'em.

in response to the whiners, though, he's getting quicker--and much funnier--on the draw. makes me less sympathetic and more admiring.

not-schmancy-but-damn-good: corduroy. 5 to 7 pm, $3 pints of guiness, and $4 appetizer specials. schmancy-funky-but-pricey-and-never-got-to-the-food: bar rouge, 16th just north of Mass. edited to say: not that corduroy's content isn't schmancy--it's just that the atmosphere makes me think a bit too strongly of...well, a hotel.

thanks Mark! ditto that alternative use of funds, hillvalley....

you're inspiring some seriously mixed feelings here, joe h....

I'm curious--has anybody gone to this in the past? can you learn much if you're a neophyte?

actually, mine were better at Atlantico--couldn't quite understand Hillvalley's rave about them until I ordered a plate on Friday night. Ah....the liquid conch filling is liquid!! it had somehow been left out of the one I had at the minibar. That's one of the things at Atlantico that I love most, though--they screw up, but the place feels so familial that the screw-ups largely endear it. Atlantico was my 'first' restaurant in D.C. My mother had stumbled onto it during a conference visit, and we went soon after I moved here. It was back in the day when they served gussied-up regional specialties. The food was lovely, the waitstaff were kind, and an ongoing love affair was formed. Birthdays? Atlantico. Best friend's parents visiting from rural Georgia, never having eaten anyplace fancier than Red Lobster? Atlantico. (As we sat down, her father nervously whispered that I'd have to show them how to eat in a restaurant like this....then our waiter arrived, his rabbit appeared, and all nervousness evaporated). Bad date? Atlantico mojito. Bad theatre show? Late Atlantico dinner. Watching their food get better and better and better over the years was just a wonderful bonus. Even when it's off--and my few experiences there at the tail end of the service periods have been largely off, with lukewarm food and harried waiters--it's comforting. There's some sort of alchemy between the kitchen, the food, and the staff that makes the place feel like my aunt's house might feel if she could cook anything other than fish balls. They do screw up, but they apologize quickly and sincerely. Our first try for a minibar reservation two weeks ago was thwarted when we arrived, on time, to be told that we were seated in the restaurant! The complimentary (and fantastic) glass of champagne during the rescheduled minibar session went a long way towards restitution. Our duck confit last week arrived with a very curious clear wrapping--after picking it out and weighing the likelihood of a deconstructed duck/spinach/cellophane dish, we told our waiter, who apologized and whisked it away and then sent the maitre'd to apologize and explain that a sheet of crisp gelatin had somehow fallen into a dish. They were so sincerely concerned that we couldn't quite figure out how to tell them that the gelatin worried us far less than the fact that we never received our second entree--and the familial magic thing worked so well that we felt quite awful when we received the bill and realized that they weren't charging us for dinner or dessert.

not to jump back on-topic, but oh joy! My mother and I went to Nectar Saturday evening, after seeing a concert at the Kennedy Center. I confused the locations of Nectar and Circle Bistro, which meant that we were well and frozen by the time we made it back into Nectar's warm embrace. Jared spooked me by recognizing my egullet self, and then proceeded to charm the hell out of my mother and I, giving us a tasting menu with absolutely lovely wines. highlights: Oysters. oh my. We're from Iowa--we don't get those often--and certaintly not ones that taste like the sea of stories and not the phosphate-drenched one nearby. They were enveloped in a cucumber puree that was lovely, tasty, and entirely superfluous to the pillows of briney goodness. Soup. We were given a bowl with three sweetbreads (I love these--the name suits the taste so well and the origin so poorly!) and a muddle of buffalo yogurt. Jared and our waiter then poured a stream of soft-orange pumpkin and sweet potato soup into the bowl, which curled with the yogurt into a gentle crimson explosion, accented by the sweetbread croutons. This is the dish I'm gonna dream of on the next sub-zero evening. Lobster. Poached lobster tail was okay, the lobster salad to the side was a bit too strong on the celery and mayonnaise for my tastes, but the lentils beneath the lobster were brilliant--absolutely brilliant. Made with a lobster stock and half the contents of the pantry, they had the texture of puys and the taste of baked beans and lobster, which is a much better combination than it sounds. Duck three ways. At this point, the wine had more than warmed us up, so please forgive my slipping memory. My favorite was a "sandwich" of a turnip disk, sauteed foie gras, and some miracle of duck atop. I fell in love with the first bite and, curious, took a small bite of each layer separately--was very impressed at how not-good the bitter/fatty/sweet layers tasted individually against the perfection of the sandwich. White Russian Milkshake. 'nuff said. Cheese course--aie--and we had much fun tasting the stinking varieties, and then sipping the wine, A. Mano Primetivo, and then tasting the stink again. desserts--baked alaska and an appley-thing with balsamic vinegar amidst a pastry sheet. This was our least favorite course, but desserts are so individual that it's likely that these just didn't hit our taste buds. The Alaska had a lovely play of flavors against the ginger brandy sauce, but the appley-thing just didn't quite do it. The wines throughout were great fun--we drank far more than we usually do, and enjoyed every glass, both in its own right and a result of Jared's sparkling stories (which got far more sparkling as the wine progressed, somehow.... ) Once home again, I looked up some of the labels and was stunned to recognize many of them. They've never tasted as good at my table! Am hereby inspired to play. The only jarring spot of the evening was in the backdoor of the main room. Everything else is so breathtakingly comforting--glowing orange and yellow walls, lovely Italian teardrops of lights--and then, at the back of the room, a leakage of warmth through the tall glass doors into the cold, cold, ugly parking lot of the hotel next door, which my mother was facing. Frosted glass? painted glass? anything to finish the little coccoon for those who've stumbled in to escape the ugly winter and are seated facing it?

yes.

if I'm doing a lot of them, I'll lop off the top and bottom, slice it in half and flatten it on a sheet pan (usually cutting it in half one more time to make it actually flat). then do a bunch of them under the broiler.

My mom's visiting from Iowa this weekend and I'm taking her to Nectar saturday night! It's also my first (highly-anticipated!) trip there. Have lots and lots of ideas on what to order based on comments from last summer, but, er.... anyone been there recently? anything (besides everything) knocked you off your chair? thanks!!!

sorry Mabelline--missed this. as-is. after 24 hours, there's no salt left on the outside of the chicken anyway--the skin looks desicated, and the salt's migrated throughout the meat.

not sure about WD-50, but the cafe atlantico minibar here slow-poaches at 147 degrees for an hour (I think)--by keeping the temp. so low, the white never coagulates, but everything cooks--it's _good_.

tea with licorice root does wonders for a sore throat--Traditional Medicines makes one, but you can also just buy licorice root and steep it for 10 minutes or so. yum. also, what do you'all eat/steam/breathe to start moving lung stuff around? I can't take decongestants--one 30 mg pill in the morning and I'm up all night long--which, needless to say, does great things for the progression of the cold. though it truly does great things for my productivity....first time that happened, I understood why some folks found cocaine so appealing.

truth be told, I've never made it the the extra quarter block to Penang...downtown, it's next door to a fantastic, cheap Malaysian restaurant, Malaysia Kopitiam.

zuni chicken--salt and mostly uncovered in the fridge for 36 hours. the recipe is brilliantly boring, and the chicken is brilliantly phantasmagoric. query though--I'm still fairly new to this meat-cooking thing, mostly out of concerns over wretched industrial farming, and have only tried to cook Bell & Evans chickens. Is there an actual taste difference between B&E, Purdue, and the assorted other supermarket chickens? Can you salt/brine an injected chicken?

I don't go there often, but I've loved every single visit. Duck that tastes like roast beef is my firmest, happiest memory. my usual tactic is to narrow options down to two or three and ask the server which he recommends--and, at Cashion's, that's never failed.

yes. even tried it out for breakfast a few minutes ago--and YES! but I started shaking a bit too early--fluffy covering around a lovely raw-egg-cheese custard. will try again for lunch-- thanks!

royal palace is next door to the, er, gentlemen's club on conn. and florida (?)--across the street, to the south, of rite-aid. jennyuptown is talking about the place a block south of there--across the street from Ruth's Chris--was supposed to be a schmancy beautiful-people brazilian place, I think--but never quite opened its doors.

great lesson! I've gone to the Smithsonians for the express purpose of watching Julia Child do the wrist-twist thing on omelets twice now--and I'm delighted that you apparently understand it, but I'm afraid I still don't. Could you please explain a little bit more around what what happens in the firm-shake/jerk-wrist stage of things? What's happening exactly to the omelet's orientation?

Thanks so much! We had a lovely time, with a couple of caveats, which we chalked up to the "Open for only Three Weeks!" syndrome, and a strong guess that the limited options of lunch make it their strongest point for now. It's very kind, warm, family-friendly place-- in other words, when I asked our waiter whether we might see some food sometime, as it had been half an hour since we'd ordered, and we had to leave for a show in another 40 minutes, he said he didn't know but he'd go check with his mother, who was cooking it. The appetizer platter was marvelous, particularly the fried banana chile something that was oh--my. I carefully cut it into five pieces and, after the first person bit & moaned, they were _snarfed_. Never saw a plate empty so fast. Half of the entrees were fantastic. There was something we'd never seen before, an eggplant, potato, and yellow pepper covered with a sticky-but-not-sweet sesame something paste--(Monica? Do you have any idea what this is or where it might be from??? We were running very, very late by the time we left and couldn't ask--but oh--there was a fight over the last smidgeon of seed paste). The red curry paneer was almost as good--held back only because the sesame was so sublime, and the other two dishes would have been marvelous if they hadn't gone through a flood of salt before exiting the kitchen--see above syndrome for our assumed explanation. also a fantastic mango lassi and a very interesting salty lassi-which will be very, very good on the fourth time I try it--and a liquor license arriving tomorrow. edited to add: I should have emphasized the friendliness more--my friends were running 10 minutes late, and everybody at the restaurant was exceedingly kind and friendly--there aren't many places in this town where I'm happy sitting alone for 10 minutes without a book, paper, or drink, but I was quite delighted to just sit and lap up the atmosphere. and my friend had a lovely time getting into a cab and asking him to please take her to nirvana....

Monica-- Do they have a buffet at dinner too? Do you have any memory of their prices? I'm trying to find a good place for 8 friends to meet before a concert tomorrow night, and that sounds perfect... thanks!