More Food Blogging

If you are looking for some bistro style French food, the place to go is Bistrot Du Coin.  The ambience is terrific and the food is great.  The rabbit stew is delicious.  My old favorite Montsouris has unfortunately closed.  Do not, DO NOT under any circumstances go to Brasserie Beck unless somebody else is paying.  Even then, suggest an alternative.  It tries to be too many things at once, a fine dining establishment and a yuppy watering hole.  These two things are not mutually exclusive but it is difficult to manage and Brasserie Beck does not pull it off.  It's a great place to get a drink in the company of attractive people, but the food leaves quite a bit to be desired.

New Tyler Cowen Ethnic Dining Guide

Tyler Cowen, he of Marginal Revolution and he who should be the next NY Times columnist, has updated his dining guide and has created an html based guide to complement his blog based guide.  

I've been to a couple of Tyler Cowen's "SOME PLACES YOU MUST TRY" list:

Hong Kong Palace- this place is incredible. Always packed.  Get the lamb with cumin.

Horace & Dickie’s Seafood Carryout- I don't share Cowen's enthusiasm for Horace & Dickie's but then again I am not such a fried fish fan.  The Macaroni is mediocre, the Collard Greens are average.  It definitely has character, though. Surprisingly, D.C. does not have a good offering of reasonably priced soul food.  Georgia Brown's, which is a good deal more expensive is supposed to be quite good.  Though Georgia Brown's is really a higher end low country cuisine place.  I have also heard good things about the Florida Avenue Grill.

Shamshiry- This place always hits the spot.  Persian food is simple and a bit bland, but tasty nonetheless.

Fogo de Chao- Don't eat for days in anticipation.  Fogo de Chao is a massive meat orgy.  The salad bar alone is worth it.  This place is simply excellent.

Top Chef Blogging

So I am watching Top Chef (how did I live without a DVR for so long), anyhow I never noticed this but Jeff is the chef of the Dilido Beach Club if I read it correctly. You ask why is this significant? It's not but it would be if it were the Dildo Beach Club and all the food served was cooked in a phallic mold.

Scrapple

Scrapple is the nastiest shit ever, but it is also delicious. I had some this morning.  It is one of my guilty pleasures. Here is the wikipedia page for scrapple. Here is a brief excerpt:

"Scrapple is typically made of hog offal, such as the head, heart, liver, and other scraps, which are boiled with any bones attached (often the entire head), to make a broth. Once cooked, bones and fat are discarded, the meat is reserved, and (dry) cornmeal is boiled in the broth to make a mush. The meat, finely minced, is returned, and seasonings, typically sage, thyme,savory, and others are added. The mush is cast into loaves and allowed to cool thoroughly until gelled. The proportions and seasoning are very much a matter of the region and the cook's taste."

 Go out and try some.  

Dining

Here is Tyler Cowen's Ethnic Dining Blog, a must for D.C. area residents.  Recently checked out Bamian, a very nice Afghan place. In general, for D.C., the way to go is Vietnamese (the Eden Center is always the way to go), Central American, Ethiopian, Indian, Afghan, and Bolivian.

A Day of Mourning

Two men, manly men, the type that build bridges and move mountains, passed: Herb Peterson and Al Copeland...or in this case the creator of the McMuffin and founder of Popeyes respectively. Is there another passing where two men, so great, of such significance and a linked significance at that, pass on the same day? The only other instance I can conjure up is of Thomas Jefferson and John Adams.

Note: For any naysayers out there that think the popeyes founder doesn't stand atop the same peak of fast food history as the creator, nay, inventor of the McMuffin, is a dolt. Popeyes chicken is the shit!

Anthony Bourdain's New Blog

Anthony Bourdain, author of "Kitchen Confidential" and "A Cook's Tour", has a new blog that is eminently worthwhile if you are a foodie. Bourdain style, a mixture heavy on self-indulgence and semi-witty snark and disdain for all things bourgeois (notably for the Food Network), lends itself quite well to the blogging. This is one of the problems with his books, is they give the appearance that he did most of the editing himself, i.e. none. But they do accurately convey his personality. And frankly I can't get over his aversion to the Food Network, besides the campiness of some of the shows I think the Food Network is doing a great service in elevating the level of American cuisine. Anyhow, he does have some really insightful comments and I would suspect he provides a fairly accurate lens into the Restaurant industry. Now if you really want a good foodie book you should read Bill Buford's "Heat" which was written by writer for the New Yorker who ditched his career to basically be a glorified intern to Mario Batali. Anyhow, fascinating and the writing was great.

Iron Chef Blogging

Mario Batali is facing off against Jamie Oliver tonight at 10pm Eastern. I fully expect Mario to destroy his British opponent. I am pulling for an exotic secret agreement like tamarind.

Suggested Weekend Jaunt for Those in D.C.

Apparently there is a scotch distillery in Sperryville, VA, the Copper Fox Distillery. I knew that you could get shine aplenty once you drove a decent distance out of the city but I had no idea you could find a scotch distillery. It's like Christmas in September. It's about 1.5 hours from D.C./NOVA. I've been to Sperryville, it's a cute little town with an emphasis on little. It's nestled at the foothills of the Appalachias around the Shenandoah National Park. Also, I would heartily recommend the Virginia Wine Country (especially the vineyards around Charlottesville- try the Viognier or Cabernet Francs).