Dangerous Dining Club

[Holly Moore]

There's a group of dedicated eaters in Philadelphia that goes by the name of the Dangerous Dining Club (DDC). They take over a restaurant for one dinner a month, work out a menu and chow down. Usually ethnic, always casual. They have their own discussion group on Yahoo. You have to register with Yahoo to join / read the messages. DDC Yahoo Group

Their next dinner is this Tuesday at Avalon in West Chester PA. Here's the info and menu.

Tuesday January 28, 2003 at 7:00 PM

$25.00/person (tax & gratuity inclusive)

Your choice of one from each category:

Appetizers

Soup du Jour

Frisée Salad with Lardons

Hard Cooked Egg and Warm Potatoes with Sherry-Wine Vinaigrette

Duck Carpaccio

Baby Arugula, Pommes Frites & Truffle Vinaigrette

Smoked Salmon

Served on Potato Blinis and garnished with Caviar

Entrées

Oven Roasted Venison

Roast Winter Vegetables, Broccoli Rabe, Juniper Berry Sauce

Potato Crusted Halibut

French Beans, Baby Carrots & Tomato-Saffron Emulsion

Sautéed European Chicken Breast

Served with Crispy Polenta Cake, Natural Au Jus

Dessert

Chef’s Choice Assorted Sorbet

Crème Brûlée

or for your $25 you could go to New York and get half a hamburger.

[Fat Guy]

Who's in charge of this group? We should invite them to come over here and be a part of our site.

[Mottmott]

And how do you know they're not here already?

[Rich Pawlak]

Well, Fat Guy, some of us have been here already, lazily lurking, but, I suspect, no more. You'll surely be hearing from a lot of us, epecially with those of us who are finally tired of the shenanigans at Chowwhatever.

DDC was something I started back in the late 80's until it fizzled from inertia in the early 90's.. In those days we used to dine monthly for $20pp or less! Now the price has climbed only to $25 pp, and we have experienced some extraordinary dinners at places like Tierra Columbiana, Penang, Paloma, Pho Xe Lua, Independence Brewpub, Sultan Indian in Lansdale, a string of roadside BBQ joints in deep South jersey (thanks to tips we got from Holly), Georgian Russian at Yonnys in Center City Philly (now closed!) and Central American food at Ramona's in Haddonfield, NJ (also RIP). The idea for starting the DDC back up actually came from an innocent post on Chowblech some 18 months ago---I guess they were good for something-----, and off we went, and the mailing list now is almost 200 strong!

Great food and really, really nice people, to the very last one.

Hope you'll join us over on Yahoo some times, and across the table from us all very very soon!

Rich Pawlak

Edited January 24, 2003 by Rich Pawlak (log)

[cabrales]

Welcome

May I ask how your club handles wine? Do you seek places that allow BYO or does the $25 price level include wine purchased from restaurants?

[herbacidal]

Welcome 

May I ask how your club handles wine?  Do you seek places that allow BYO or does the $25 price level include wine purchased from restaurants?

most of the time we happen to be at byobs.

on the occasion that we are not, we work out alcoholic drink payments separately.

[Fat Guy]

Rich: I'll surely come down to PA for a dining adventure; especially if you keep us posted as to what's going on. I think groups such as yours are the logical partners and extensions of online communities such as the one we have here. You're certainly welcome to post about your events on eGullet. We have similar -- if perhaps not quite so organized -- groups planning events all over the world all the time. Pretty much all we ask is that a distinction in language be made between user-organized events and official eGullet events, and that events touted on our boards be open to all on a first-come-first-served or other non-judgmental basis. And we like to see follow-up reports, preferably with pictures!

[herbacidal]

And we like to see follow-up reports, preferably with pictures!

Holly Moore posted some pictures on a Studiokitchen dinner that was organized by me through the site,

i.e.

selection of date, then recruitment of dining companions through the site.

Not quite as many pictures as your Otto adventure, but we had less capable camera. :-)

and less of a photographer's eye.

[Holly Moore]

Holly Moore posted some pictures on a Studiokitchen dinner ...  Not quite as many pictures as your Otto adventure, but we had less capable camera.  :-)

and less of a photographer's eye.

Yo!!!!!

[fresh_a]

Speaking of great PA restaurants , I still remember my parents taking me to a restaurant, where, although it was part of a chain of family-oriented eateries, and the dark-lit dining room's Victorian-dressed, busty waitresses were certainly pleasant to my pre-adolescent gaze, the name still escapes me... Red Baron? My first taste of lobster and hot butter sauce. And those waitresses!

[herbacidal]

Holly Moore posted some pictures on a Studiokitchen dinner ...  Not quite as many pictures as your Otto adventure, but we had less capable camera.  :-)

and less of a photographer's eye.

Yo!!!!!

Holly, I'm just saying your eye ain't the same as Shapiro's.

I figure she does more of them/has done more since she does get paid for it.

The pics were really good, way better than any I could do.

You can punch me out next time you see me.

[Rich Pawlak]

Welcome 

May I ask how your club handles wine?  Do you seek places that allow BYO or does the $25 price level include wine purchased from restaurants?

Our price range per person doesnt include beverages, simply because some people drink alcohol, and some dont. We just run a separate tab when we are in a restaurant that has a liquor license.

[cabrales]

Rich & herblau -- Thanks for your responses Whatever method of communicating on eGullet your reactions to restaurants your dining group samples would be appreciated.

May I further ask how restaurants are chosen? For example, are there coordinators of your dining group who make the choices? Are the coordinators the people who work out menu choices with the chosen restaurant?

How many people attend your typical dinner event? Are there never lunch events? Are events usually on weekends or weekdays?

Edited January 27, 2003 by cabrales (log)

[Rich Pawlak]

Rich & herblau -- Thanks for your responses  Whatever method of communicating on eGullet your reactions to restaurants your dining group samples would be appreciated. 

May I further ask how restaurants are chosen?  For example, are there coordinators of your dining group who make the choices?  Are the coordinators the people who work out menu choices with the chosen restaurant?

How many people attend your typical dinner event?  Are there never lunch events? Are events usually on weekends or weekdays?

So far, the organization of the DDC has remained nice and loose. We chat about our ideas for the next dinner while we're enjoying the current dinner; someone rises to the occasion, and we let them run with it. Sometimes we've discussed it on Chowblech (which caused those doofs to ask us to move somewhere else....) and then planned a dinner.

We have a Excel file of names and e-mail addresses, and all someone has to do is WANT to host a dinner, plan the event with the particular restaurant (early weeknights so far, for ease of acceptance), design an invitation, and off they go.

And I hope it stays that casual and simple.

RP

[herbacidal]

Rich & herblau -- Thanks for your responses  Whatever method of communicating on eGullet your reactions to restaurants your dining group samples would be appreciated. 

May I further ask how restaurants are chosen?  For example, are there coordinators of your dining group who make the choices?  Are the coordinators the people who work out menu choices with the chosen restaurant?

How many people attend your typical dinner event?  Are there never lunch events? Are events usually on weekends or weekdays?

i expect that posting reviews of the monthly meals should not be that much of a problem.

pictures, also probably not a problem, now that we have more willing photographers.

we typically have 40-60 attendees. every one thus far has been a monday/tuesday dinner i believe, with the exception of the rib run in south jersey, which was a saturday afternoon.

[Rich Pawlak]

Rich & herblau -- Thanks for your responses  Whatever method of communicating on eGullet your reactions to restaurants your dining group samples would be appreciated. 

May I further ask how restaurants are chosen?  For example, are there coordinators of your dining group who make the choices?  Are the coordinators the people who work out menu choices with the chosen restaurant?

How many people attend your typical dinner event?  Are there never lunch events? Are events usually on weekends or weekdays?

To add to this thread, here are the tentative plans for future DDC events:

A Chinese New Year banquet, to be scheduled sometime in mid-February, in Philadelphia's Chinatown, priced slightly higher than our usual dinners, but not much more so. Details will be posted here as they unfold.

A Rodizio get-together/road trip to a place in Perth Amboy, NJ, scheduled for March 1, 2003, 2-6PM, a Saturday. Tons and tons of food----and drink----for $25 per person inclusive.

Anyone wanting to be added to our e-mail list, hit me up at esterrick@aol.com.

I have no affiliations worth discussing, but, I did start up the whole DDC silliness back in the late 80's, and with the help of a few brave and trusting souls, started it back up again about 18 months ago.

RP

[Steve Klc]

Have many of you have actually been to Perth Amboy? I spent a lot of time there over the years. Your group's moniker is well-deserved. I'll be e-mailing you to be added to your list, and if I can be in New Jersey for this, I'd like to come. There is safety in numbers.

[Rich Pawlak]

Have many of you have actually been to Perth Amboy?  I spent a lot of time there over the years.  Your group's moniker is well-deserved.  I'll be e-mailing you to be added to your list, and if I can be in New Jersey for this, I'd like to come.  There is safety in numbers.

In my book, the more dangerous the better. But Perth Amboy aint so bad.

[Kim WB]

This is a dumb question, I suppose, but I have never joined or done anything with Yahoo...I went through the sign in, then joined the CCD, but how do I access the messages? None of the links work...oh, I remember how I needed Jason to help me register for e-gullet. I really need to improve my computer skills.

[Holly Moore]

Hi Kim

Sounds like you did everything right. All you need do now is "Sign In" and select clubs. You should see your clubs listed to the left hand side of your screen. If there are no clubs listed, you may not have joined properly.

Once you get to the Dangerous Dining Club home page you will see the most recent messages. If you click on messages to the left of the screen you will be able to see summaries for all of the messages.