Ambrosia Grille

A family run, Greek restaurant in Rockville, which I chose as a sort of ironic joke (I live in Astoria, but I'm having Greek food here - ahem). Appetizers were a little disappointing, though huge - somewhat insipid taramasalata, and tzatziki with too little garlic. But the herby lemon chicken was terrific, and the inevitable accompanying potatoes would find themselves welcome back home. A very good rendition of mousaka was also on the menu.

Bonus tip: There is a frozen custard stand nearby called "Splurge". It was not the best frozen custard I have ever had (there's a good argument that frozen custard is better than either frozen yogurt or soft serve), but it was good. My choice of peanut butter was especially flavorful.

Afghan Grill

I had dinner with a friend last night at Afghan Grill, in Adams Morgan.

Pros: The surprising pumpkin with meat sauce (yes, yes, I know, it's summer. The pumpkin was good anyway). Terrific meat dumplings in yogurt, which were fully the match of Armenian/Lebanese manti, though much bigger. Tasty, highly spiced, rice, and a delicous ground beef kebab. Friendly service.

Cons: Indifferent bread, puzzlingly sliced into nibbles (how could you not take advantage of the drama of a whole Afghan bread arriving at the table?) Very high pricing ($16 for a platter? Really?). A home made baklava which betrayed its home-madeness by the paucity of its syrup. Parsimonious portions (it's a kebab place. Two skewers at least, please, especially for $16). And also, though it doesn't bother me much, we were seated in the darkest recesses of the corner next to the kitchen - I didn't think I looked quite that disreputable.

Moby Dick

When I first began eating at Moby Dick, it was a very small chain of fairly ramshakle kebab restaurants in suburban Virginia and Maryland. And it was super good - great bread, amazing kebab. Now, it's expanded, and it's gleaming, and shiny, and could be mistaken for a Mcdonald's, except that the "#1" is a kebab rather than a Big Mac.

The kebabs are still good, but the bread has suffered, and one worries that the expansion has taken a bit of the soul out of the place. These days, I prefer Duke Kebab. On the other hand, one needs not have that long a memory to recall when excellent kebabs weren't strewn around the DC landscape. In that context, overloud complaints seem a little bit spoiled.

Mama's Dumplings

A tiny whole in the wall famed for its pork dumplings. I was laughed at by the entirely Chinese clientele when I put one of the newly steamed dumplings in my mouth, burning everything it touched, but I think they warmed up to me when I chewed through regardless. The dough is a little less delicate than at the best New York "soup" dumpling houses (though that may be intentional - I'll have to eat more of this genre of dumpling), but my pork and celery dumplings were excellent. I also had a scallion pancake, but from all indications, one ought to skip anything on the menu that isn't a dumpling.

Business Trip

As might be guessed from my silence, I'm on a business trip. I find that when I'm forced to eat out all the time, my inspiration for writing dries up. Cooking is my lubricant.

Nonetheless, I'll be posting little capsule reviews of the DC dining scene, to the extent I experience it.

Is that ok?

Just walking around New York today eavesdropping, and I overheard someone ask whether their dining companion liked fish. What struck me is the changing patters of which foods I ask that question about. For example, it still seems clear to me that politeness requires asking whether your companion likes sushi. Same, probably, with Korean and Thai, but I'm not sure I would ask about chinese. Certainly Indian food, I'd ask. But not pizza or pasta, and not "mexican" or steak (oddly, since for a non-steak lover, a steak house is every bit as exclusive as a sushi bar). I suppose, in the end, that this is all a complicated matrix of social expectations and relationships, that foods enter the realm of presumed acceptability over time. I wouldn't be surprised if sushi were firmly planted in that world, in New York at least, in the next ten years. But what's next? I'm not sure.

Peasant

On Friday night we had the chance to dine at Peasant, a wood burning Italian restaurant that's been a chef's favorite in New York for years now. I present my thoughts in the form of a vignette.

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We settle down, at a cramped table for two in full view of the open kitchen, wood fire burning satisfyingly. Two older gentlemen (TOG 1 and TOG 2) are to our right, sopping up the last bits of their ricotta spread with warm bread from the fire.

TOG 1: There are some big gays over at that table, no? (loudly)

We looked at our menus, to find everything in Italian (as I had been warned). The waitress shimmies over to explain. After a couple of iterations (I cannot remember menus in different languages, or long lists of specials) we order a razor clam appetizer, roasted baby pig, and pasta with bottarga.

TOG 2's roasted quail arrives. He begins sawing at it ineffectually.

TOG 1: Let me do it, let me do it. You can't do nothin'. He hacks manfully at the quail, tearing it asunder. Small pieces of quail now litter TOG 2's large (ceramic?) plate.

TOG 2: What you doin'? Stop. I can cut my own chicken.

TOG 1: That's how you do chicken (gesturing at the hacked quail). I used to cook da chickens, you know.

My girlfriend and I dive into the fresh razor clams, which taste of the sea, sopping up the sharp wine sauce with the fantastic bread. The wine is pleasing and fruity. If these people would just stop acting the fool, all would be well with the world.

TOG 1: I got 5 million dollars last night, you hear?

TOG 2: Five million? That'll change your life.

TOG 1: Eh, I'm only getting a hundred grand. It's an inheritance you see. And other people are getting more.

TOG 2: So why you tell me you gettin' five million for?

TOG 1: Just eat your chicken.

Main courses arrive. The roasted pig is rich, succulent. A crispy rind adorns the plate, which, though delicious, is very wintry, with buttery potatoes (not mentioned on the menu) only making things heavier. I prefer the pasta, the salt of the bottarga cutting through the butter and cream sauce. But aren't those shells a little too al dente, my girlfriend says? I nibble, and agree. It's not that they're too al dente. It's that they're uneven. This one is well cooked. That one isn't.

TOG 2: I wouldn't get this again. It's just a chicken. I had some diver scallops at Jake's (?) in Jersey, and they gave me three vegetables. I don't see no vegetables here.

TOG 1: Makes me sick. 25 bucks for a chicken.

We finish, and debate dessert. The wood baked peach tart with hazelnut ice cream (priced at an attractive, for Manhattan, $8) is extremely tempting. We decide to share one, and put in the order.

TOG 1, now working on a fruit plate: This here is a fig. You know figs?

TOG 2: Of course I know figs. They're like dates.

TOG 1: They're not dates. They're figs. Sure, they're both sweet, but that's where the similarity ends.

To Waitress: These figs are amazing. I usually have them in, you know, newtons. But here, they're not like dates at all.

Waitress: Er, yes, sir, these are fresh.

TOG 1: So are the dates I eat. Fresh!

The tart is brought to our table literally two minutes after we order. Alarm bells ring. When, precisely, was this thing wood baked? I taste. Parts of the crust are tasty, fresh tasting. Most of it tastes exactly of having sat on a counter all night, already baked and suffering (or maybe in the fridge?) Why can't they simply have prebaked the bottom, topped it freshly, and thrown it in the oven for a couple of minutes? Just to humor me? A terribly disappointing end to our meal. Sloppy, thrown together. Was it bad objectively? No. But it costs $8 at a famous, among people who matter, restaurant. In that context, what is only a pleasant mediocre suddenly becomes appalling.

TOG 1: I can't believe it. A hundred bucks for a chicken and some figs.

TOG 2: Jake's is a better deal. Three vegetables, you get (turning) At least the gays left.

TOG 1, to waitress, loudly: You make this night really, really special. So special.

Exit.

Involtini of swordish

I wanted something comforting and simple this weekend, so I decided on a sort of rolled fish dish, stolen from Mario Batali. I made a quick tomato sauce with canned tomatoes, onions, garlic and basil, and added toasted pine nuts, olives and raisins. Then the swordfish, cut into thin slices and then pounded in between plastic wrap and stuffed with bread crumbs, olive oil, and basil chiffonade. The fish goes on top of the tomato sauce, and then into the oven for about 15 minutes. I added some cooked and cooled polenta to give some body to the meal.

Five Napkin Burger

5 Napkin Burger, a new haute burger restaurant on the west side, has been getting a lot of press early in its life here in New York (see here and here for a round-up). Short story is that the titular "5 Napkin Burger" used to be on the menu elsewhere, and was thought compelling enough to deserve a spin-off into its own restaurant.

There is nothing bad to say about the burger. Deep chuck-y flavor, perfectly cooked at medium rare, caremlized onions, a rosemary aioli. All delicious, though overwhelming - I ate only half and brought half home to nibble on tomorrow (why not have a six ounce burger on the menu, rather than only the 10 oz monster?). The fries, on the other hand, were a bit embarassing. In fact, had I known about the crunchy little nuggets of broken up potato I was going to get, I'd just have run up the street to the Mcdonald's a few blocks away. No matter, in any case. The burger is fantastic.

The rest of the menu, incidentally, is a total puzzle, and most especially the sushi that the waiter was aggresively pushing to me. I'm there for burger. Sushi is the enemy of burger. What gives?

Duke Kebab

I have nothing but good things to say about Duke Kebab, in Alexandria VA. Properly charred, flavorful meat (I recommend the spicy chicken thighs), wonderful afghan bread, and a super spicey green sauce. Tyler Cowen likes it too.

Pork

I love pork. I do. But I really am getting very sick of the bacon/pork fetish that has been sweeping both the New York and the international food scene in the past several years. Latest exhibit? Salon's "bacon week". What's especially funny is that unless you eat great piles of it, bacon's not even that bad for you. Eaten as italians might eat it, as a flavoring, it's positively healthy, transforming a bit of pasta into a tasty, meaty, mess without needing to bother with a lot of meat. But the food fashion police have apparently all decided that it's a sort of rebellious splurge - decadence personified. The result? Trendy models eating bacon ironically in trendy New York restaurants. Eh.

Bits and Bobs

I'm leaving shortly to visit Washington for the weekend. We have a slap up barbecue tomorrow with family, for which I'm going to make crumble, probably peach.

Also, I realize I haven't yet posted about this, but we are going to France for much of August, with Paris and somewhere obscure on the Riviera on the agenda. Great mounds of food will be consumed. The tricky bit will be to balance restaurant eating (Gagnaire, for sure, L'Astrance maybe, but how about flying to Barcelona on a budget airline and sitting desperately outside El Bulli? Or to London and then "training" out to the countryside for the Fat Duck? Or trying to get into Mugaritz? And how extraordinary is it exactly that I'm thinking of punctuating a visit to France with trips to Spain or England (England?!?) to eat?) with cooking at home. I am, of course, renting apartments rather than staying at hotels, as I mean to cuisiner up a storm. I don't know if poulets de Bresse have a season, but they had better be around - I'm still haunted by a leg I had six years ago. And rillettes. And cheese. Cheese! Bread. Pastries. Arghflagh.

Chef's Ripert's "focus" on seasoning

Eric Ripert of Le Bernardin has been faithfully continuing his excellent series on cooking with a toaster oven. Though I recommend watching, I'm really interested by what is clearly something of a bugbear for Ripert - being properly "focused" when seasoning. The snippets below, from each of his episodes other than the one involving a mango dessert, illustrate the point. The questions they raise are clear - is focused salting that important to food of the quality that Ripert produces in his restaurant? And second, is it as significant a question for the home cook as Ripert suggests?

My experience is that salting enough is extremely important, but that patchiness in salting across a piece of fish or meat is less so. In the pantheon of home cooking problems, I would put inconsistent salting across surfaces somewhere below inadequate seasoning, failure to brown, and cooking to just done (and not overdone) as the most significant cook's "craft" problems faced by the home cook. But I wonder if people disagree. (I'll see if I can get the Chef himself to address this through a comment, but barring that, I'll ask the question here).

Broiled Red Snapper Fillet: 1:12 "You can see the way I'm seasoning. I'm not too far, I'm not too close to the fish. I'm maybe five inches on top of the fish, and I'm very focused on it."

Salt and Pepper: (a written post only): To season, hold your hands six to eight inches above the food and sprinkle a fine coating of salt and pepper all over the surface before cooking. Be methodical about seasoning evenly–if you have uneven fillets, use more salt and pepper on the thicker portions.

Parmesan Zucchini with Balsamic: 1:38 Then some fine sea salt, and I make sure I'm very focused when I'm doing the seasoning, because the zucchini is so thin, if you are not concentrated in putting the salt and pepper, you may have something extremely spicy or extremely salty.

Herb Roasted Chicken Tenders: 1:00 Making sure at all times to have your fingers very dry, so that way you can season very precisely.

The sugar buy-out

I recently read that Florida was going to purchase all the assets of Florida's largest sugarcane producer. The decision was haled as a major environmental victory, returning near 200,000 acres to the Everglades. I have no reason to doubt this justification for the deal, but I have to wonder whether this has something to do with the sugar lobby in Florida, which explains the lack of sugar in American Coca-Cola, for example.

Ko Auction

An auction for a reservation at Momofuku Ko has closed at $2,870. Over at eGullet, there has been some suggestion following the recent price hike from $85 for the tasting menu (when we had our meal) to $100, how high the ceiling of Ko pricing might be. My guess is that the auction is, in some ways, an extremely clever way to figure that out. I suspect, of course, that there's a little fluff in the price, because people are motivated to give to charity, but I'd also guess that pricing near the astronomical level of Masa (1200-1600 for a full meal for two with wine) would fill the 12 seats.

2007 Dominique Roger (Domaine de Carrou)

We had a splendid Sancerre from Bue over the weekend, a 2007 Dominique Roger (Domaine de Carrou), which I wanted to briefly write about today. We were able to detect some wonderful fruit aromas, and the wine tasted delicately of what I think of as pear in the mouth. The tiniest bit sweeter than the kinds of austere Alsatian wines I usually prefer on the white side, the wine was a delightful choice with the artichoke and shrimp dish I prepared.

It blinks reality

From the Supreme Court's decision in the campaign finance case, I found this interesting phrasing I have never seen before. Doing a quick google search, it seems fairly common, but I am surprised nonetheless:

"It blinks reality to contend that the millionaire candidate is situated identically to a nonmillionaire opponent".

I'll have to look up the background of this at some point. Huh.

UPDATE: I've had a couple of thoughts about the gun case, as well. As others much smarter than me have observed, Scalia's opinion is remarkably narrow and circumspect. Not only is it fairly moderate, but it leaves much to be decided; the standard of review, the applicability (or not) of the Second Amendment to the states, the reasons why particular restrictions on gun rights are permissible, and others are not, which gun restrictions might be ok in the future. This does not strike me as typical for Scalia, who, to my mind at least, prefers to write broader opinions. I wonder whether the narrowness of his ruling, in the context, had anything to do with Chief Justice Roberts and his commitment to deciding cases on the narrowest basis. While this is entirely speculation, it strikes me that a Scalia-n opinion on the Second Amendment under Chief Justice Rehnquist might well have been a more strident document, or at least one that left less for the "inferior" courts to gnaw at.

Kennedy v. Louisiana

The Supreme Court today strikes down the death penalty for the rape of a child that was not meant to nor resulted in death.

I've read the opinions quickly. I'm obviously not the person to give real expert opinion, but I'm writing to note that PG's recent praise of Justice Alito is fully borne out in his dissent today. As I noted briefly on the Volokh blog comments, I think the newest Justice's dissent does serious damage to what I think is an unprincipled majority opinion. I suspect in its calm disection of the majority, it will have greater long term resonance than would a more fiery opinion by someone else.

Japanese Food is French food, really

Tyler Cowen, an economist whose thinking I respect very much, has been making the argument for some time that Japan (and specifically Tokyo) is the best food destination in the world. Most strikingly, he recently said;

"That Tokyo is the best food city in the world? That's by an order of magnitude; Paris and others aren't close. At this point my best guess is that Osaka is number two."

But that claim is almost matched by the idea that "Japan has arguably the world's best baked desserts." And just yesterday, I listened to Professor Cowen say, in a Bloggingheads video with Will Wilkinson, (approximately, since I'm transcribing quickly),

"What they've done in French and Italian food is what Toyota did to General Motors twenty years ago, so that food of many different kinds is much better in Japan than anywhere else in the world".

To be frank, I really don't believe him, or at least as I understand his claim (that French and Italian food in Japan is better than French or Italian food in France or Italy, respectively - the claim that the Japanese have the most number of cuisines at the highest level in one city is much more plausible to me, especially since New York is probably its closest rival). I particularly don't believe his claim as to desserts, when dealing with a culture that traditionally did not rely on dairy products, but I don't believe him as to savory foods either. And if he was right, would not Japanese style French food be slowly defeating French style french food, especially in neutral battlegrounds like New York, much like Toyota defeated General Motors?

I haven't been to Japan, so I'm in a weak position to judge, really. But I'd love to hear (a) what exactly Cowen's claim is as to Japan and (b) why he thinks what he thinks, as I'm deeply unconvinced.

Astoria-Ditmars

I moved to Astoria Ditmars for personal reasons, but having lived here for a while, I should have moved anyway. For the reasons, read this largely on-point New York Times article. (HT: Phoebe)