2010 November

A Tweet Dinner at Full Key

November 27, 2010 By Lori 2 Comments

I love Twitter. I follow close to 200 tweeters and more than 50 people follow me.
Many of my friends don’t get it. The comment I often hear is “I don’t care to know how often so and so goes to the bathroom, or the gym, or shopping.” That’s not what it’s about people.

Twitteris a great way to get snippets of information rather than going to multiple websites. You can then link to the stories you want more information about. It’s really a time saver rather than a time waster. I guess that only applies to people who spend a lot of time surfing the web.

Twitteralso gives you unique insight into your favorite celebrities. Again, I realize that not everyone cares about the random thoughts of celebrities, as I do. Take for example Busy Phillips (@Busyphilipps25) from Cougar Town. Her latest tweet: “OMG!You guys!! I just got the super sexual pat down at airport security! It was crazy and I couldn’t stop laughing! They REALLY get in there!” She’s very amusing. I also follow @GStephanopoulos and @davidgregory, mostly so I don’t appear totally vapid.

Most recently I have moved away from following celebrities to following restaurants, food critics, chefs, etc. These include: @mariobatali, @chefsymon, @nytimesdining, @seriouseats, @tastepost, @komitomarvin. You get the idea.

When I recently saw a tweet from Jose Andres (@chefjoseandres) acclaimed chef and owner of Jaleo, Cafe Atlantico, Zaytina, Oyamel, etc. etc. stating “Full Key Restaurant – Wheaton, MD favorite Chinese in the DC area!” I was atwitter!

Wheaton is just down the road from where I live, and is host to a number of some pretty top-notch ethnic restaurants. I haven’t tried Full Key, which resides in the same shopping center strip as Max’s Kosher Cafe. If Jose Andres says that this is his favorite Chinese in the DC area, well then I am right on it.
It felt a little strange to park in the lot where Max’s is and walk right past it to the low key Full Key. Max’s shwarma is one of my very favorite things to eat in the universe,bar none. But we scurry past Max’s and into Full Key where we are the only non-Asians in the place. I take this as a good sign.

The only problem with following a tweet that doesn’t link anywhere, is that it doesn’t give you much information. When it comes to ordering, we are pretty much on our own, although I had jotted down a few notes from some online postings on Chowhound.com and Washingtonian Cheap eats.

I order a small portion of roast duck, having read recommendations for it in several places. I am informed that there isn’t enough duck to fill my order, but I am encouraged to try the roasted duck noodle soup instead, because it takes less duck I am on my own in eating this dish, as my companions are my vegetarian son and pescaterian husband. I am surprised by the huge serving that is delivered steaming to my table, particularly at a cost of $7.95. The plentiful duck pieces fall off the bone and the generous helping of noodles, while a little difficult to eat daintily, are delicious.

We order three additional vegetarian dishes, knowing it was going to be too much food, but unable to resist the variety of vegetarian dishes at such reasonable costs. No harm in leftovers.

My son declares the kung pow bean curd, the best bean curd ever, describing it as exceptionally “juicy ”
The eggplant with hot garlic sauce, a dish that I sometimes love and sometimes don’t depending on the texture, falls into the love category. It could have been a touch spicier but the sauce has a nice tang to it.

The vegetable chow foon falls short. I am a fan of the wide chow foon noodle. The noodles are fine but the brown sauce has nothing to distinguish the flavors, and the vegetables are not as plentiful as they could be. The dish is also a bit gloppy. One mediocre dish out of four isn’t so bad, and we leave with our expectations met.

Jose Andre’s tweet brought us to Full Kee. I found the food to be solidly good and worth further exploration of some of the meat dishes. I need to return with meat-eating friends. This isn’t a place to come for the atmosphere, which is somewhat non-existent. But that’s what is to be expected of a bargain restaurant and not at all a deterrent. When I get home I tweet a reply to Jose Andres.

@chefjoseandres ate at Full Key in Wheaton based on your tweet. great recommendation. kung pao tofu made the vegetarians very happy!

He doesn’t respond.

That’s ok. I still love Twitter. Those @ signs can definitely get confusing. On the other hand if it weren’t for Twitter I might never have made the quick trip up the road to Full Key, which is certainly a worthy destination for a quick Sunday night Chinese food fix.

I would be remiss if I didn’t end with this: follow me @foodobsessed6.

Full Kee, 2227 University Boulevard W. ,Silver Spring/Takoma Park, MD 20902

My rating (on a 1-5 scale): 3.9
Zagat rating: 21

Washingtonian Cheap Eats review

Filed Under: Full Key, MD Dining

Decisions on Dining in Bethesda

November 21, 2010 By Lori 3 Comments

There are nearly 200 restaurants in Bethesda, according to www.downtownbethesda.com. That’s a lot of potential. I just wish there were more restaurants that I was actually excited about.

I find myself dining in Bethesda fairly often. We go before or after movies at Bethesda Row or Roundhouse Theater, and sometimes just because it is a convenient place to meet friends. But when I’m asked what are my favorite spots in Bethesda, honestly I am stumped.

Don’t get me wrong. There are plenty of decent places to dine that are worth the twenty minute drive it takes us to get there. Mia’s Pizza, Green Papaya, Nest Cafe, Persimmon, Raku are all pleasant options. And, I must admit there are a number of restaurants that I haven’t been for quite some time that are worth checking out again. Jaleo, Grapeseed, Assagi Mozzarella Bar.

I’ve been to the new American Tap Room and I like it just fine. I’m ready to try it again with my Capitol Dish coupon. I have to admit though, that I was much more energized by the light-up menu and bill, than I was by the food. But for what it is and where it is, it’s a really good option.

I am excited about a number of new places in Bethesda that I have yet to try: Food Wine & Co., Uptown Deli, Taylor Gourmet, Yamas Mediterranean Grill. I am skipping Mussel Bar. I don’t like mussels. I don’t like beer. I don’t like noise.

I recently needed to plan a dinner in Bethesda with a group of ten. I find myself under added pressure these days. People actually think that I know what I’m talking about when it comes time to choose a dining destination.

I wanted to know if I was missing something, so I decided to seek some help by posting a message on www.donrockwell.com. If you’re not familiar with Don Rockwell, there was a fascinating article about him recently in The Washington Post. My request for suggestions on a Bethesda spot suitable for ten on a Saturday night came back with the following recommendations: Redwood, Grapeseed, Passage to India, Cesco, Jaleo, Mon Abi Gai, Guapos (?), and Guardado’s. The only aha moment here was Guardado’s, a tapas restaurant referred to as “a hidden gem” in Bethesda Magazine. I’ll have to check it out.

It turns out that I won’t be in town for the above-mentioned dinner for ten. But I did want to report briefly on my recent dinner at Passage to India, since it was on the list of recommendations I received..
First of all, I haven’t met an Indian restaurant that I don’t like. Nothing is as flavorful or as interesting to me as Indian food.

Passage to India is #83 on the Washingtonian’s 100 Very Best Restaurants. I’m a sucker for lists like these. It absolutely adds credibility to a restaurant, at least in my opinion. So I start off with a positive outlook.

I like that they bring papadam to the table with three different dipping sauces. (Papadam can be compared to very thin cracker.) My favorite sauce is a sweet, tangy chutney. We order two appetizers but because of a bit of indecision on my part, I confuse the server and we end up with only one. Sev Murmura Chaat is “an exotic combination of puffed rice, cilantro, vermicelli, dates and tamarind.” I’ve had this dish at other places, and it is as tasty here as anywhere. There’s a nice combination of textures with the puffed rice, fruit and spices. We’re really fine without a second appetizer.

Sev Murmura Chat

The entrees are chosen among groupings from the various regions in India.My husband orders the South Indian dish Kumbalanga Payar Olan, which is black-eye beans, white & red pumpkin in a cumin and coconut sauce. He finds it “flavorful, filling, and a fitting finish to this fine feast.” (This is my husband’s idea of a funny quote).

Kumbalanga Payar Olan

My dish is West Indian, Chutney Ni Murgi,which is chicken cooked in a spicy cilantro sauce. The chicken is tender and the sauce has just the right amount of spice. It’s a satisfying dish, if not terribly interesting or different.

Chutney Ni Murgi,

Onion kulcha bread is required eating when I have Indian food. Passage to India’s version is so thick it reminds me of pizza. That’s not necessarily a bad thing. It’s a generous portion, which we can’t finish.

I’m happy with our dinner, and even happier that after we apply our What’s the Deal coupon, our bill comes to seventy cents. Gotta love these coupons that are proliferating every time I open my email inbox!

Dining decisions can be tough. Bethesda could use an infusion of some more interesting options to make those decisions easier. In the meantime, I’ll be on the lookout for somewhere in Bethesda where the food gets my heart racing. I still have at least 140 restaurants left to try.

Passage to India, 4931 Cordell Avenue, Bethesda

My rating (on a 1-5 scale): 3.8

Washington Post review

Filed Under: Bethesda, MD Dining, Passage to India

Judge-ing Carmines

November 15, 2010 By Lori 4 Comments

Carmine’s DC

There is one thing that I find even more exhilarating than dining out at a great restaurant. Coming face-to-face with a celebrity is pretty much at the top of my list. My celebrity interactions have come in several forms. There is the occasional street sighting (Paul McCartney, Tobey McGuire, Adam Sandler, Martha Stewart, Rob Lowe). There is the autograph session after a Broadway show (Taye Diggs, Idina Menzel, Harvey Fierstein, and Hunter Parrish…cute older son on Weeds). Then there are the more aggressive interactions such as the time I literally followed Harrison Ford down Fifth Avenue for blocks, until I finally got the nerve to ask for his autograph. Take note: Harrison Ford is not so friendly when accosted by a stranger on a NY city street- even if the stranger is accompanied by two adorable kids.

There have even been a few genuine encounters such as an opportunity to chat with Katherine Heigl on the set of Grey’s Anatomy and an entire day spent with Lee Horsley (aka Matt Houston) as he filmed a public service announcement for my employer at the time.

Political figures, however, are another matter. I am not quite as comfortable going up to a Supreme Court Justice or the U.S. Attorney General and chatting them up, as I am for example interrupting a General Hospital actor as he exited a bathroom in a restaurant in LA.

I have a friend who has no such boundary issues. During her 40th birthday dinner at Cafe Atlantico, we were seated near then-Attorney General Janet Reno. My friend interrupted Ms. Reno’s dinner to request that the Attorney General pose for a picture with her. She kindly obliged.

This past Saturday night, shortly after our party of ten was seated in the rear of Carmine’s in DC, we noticed a familiar face surrounded by a group of young professionals. It was Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor, out for an evening with her law clerks. My friend bounded up out of her seat before we could stop her and returned seconds later with the Supreme Court Justice ready to join us for a photo opp.

It was by far the highlight of our evening at Carmine’s. I’m breaking my rule of not posting photos of my friends or myself on my blog. There are exceptions to every rule.

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For a moment there, I forgot I was writing a restaurant review. So here we go: Dinner at Carmine’s requires a group, as the dishes are designed to be shared by somewhere between three and five people each. Our group was advised to order approximately five to seven dishes. This makes it difficult to agree on what to order, particularly because one person doesn’t eat meat, one doesn’t like spicy food, etc. etc. I have trouble because not much on the menu even appeals to me. Red-sauce Italian food is not really my thing. I try to stay positive as choices are made, but frankly I don’t really care if the veal is parmigiana or marsala.

We settle on three appetizers: baked clams, stuffed artichokes, and caesar salad. The salad is plentiful. The clams not so much, but only half the table wants them, which is a good thing. The artichoke is quite nice. It’s smothered in breadcrumbs, butter and parmesan cheese and the portion is generous.

stuffed artichoke

The bread basket is a little ordinary, although there is a crunchy sesame breadstick that I like. The bread would be better if it were served warm.

We barely finish our appetizers when our entrees are brought out, which elicits a collective groan from our group. Too much, too soon.

manicotti

Our entrees are manicotti, veal scaloppine marsala, shrimp scampi, and a side of eggplant parmigiana. We also get an extra dish of plain pasta.

One person declares the eggplant the best he’s ever had. I think its good, but not remarkable. None of the dishes are standout. The manicotti in particular is a disappointment. It’s oddly thin and sauced sparingly. There is not a lot of seasoning in the dish. The veal is tender but there is nothing that distinguishes the flavor. The shrimp is well prepared but not very plentiful. We actually could have used another dish, which is surprising given the projections from the staff.

Just as we finish our meals, the server reappears with a full basket of bread. This would have been greatly appreciated earlier in the meal.

When it comes to dessert we over order. Tiramisu, strawberry shortcake, and a smaller version of what they call the Titanic, but retitled the Tugboat, which is essentially a banana split. The desserts are fine. The tiramisu lovers (of which I am not) are satisfied. The sundae is a little heavy on the whipped cream.

Tugboat

One barometer that I use to “judge” a restaurant is whether my fellow diners and I would go back. We considered the food (fair), the service (spotty), and the atmosphere (hard to tell from the back of the restaurant. At least it wasn’t too loud back there). The final consensus among the group is “no.” Been there, done that.

Of course if I hear that there’s going to be a celebrity dining at Carmine’s I would reconsider. I’m always up for some harmless stalking.

Carmines, 425 7th Street, NW

My rating (on a 1-5 scale): 2.9
Washington Post review

Filed Under: Carmine's, DC dining

Destination Dining at Trummer’s on Main

November 9, 2010 By Lori 1 Comment

There are restaurants that fit the bill because they are five minutes away and the food is good. There are restaurants that are an hour’s drive and worth it. Volt comes to mind.

Recognizing this, Todd Kliman of Washingtonian, has been rating restaurants according to how far he would drive to eat there in his online Tuesday chats. Here’s an excerpt from his October 26 chat:

In my book, I would drive an hour-and-twenty minutes to dine at Komi. Nooshi, on the other hand, I would consider a 6-minute restaurant. The Source: a 45-minute restaurant. Sonoma: a 15-minute restaurant. 2 Amys: a 40-minute restaurant. Dino: a 20-minute restaurant.

How great is that as a ratings system!!

This past weekend, my husband and I took a Sunday evening drive to Trummer’s on Main in Clifton, Virginia. Clifton is a bit of a shlep. It is incomprehensible to me that there can be so muchtraffic on Route 66 at 5:30 on a Sunday night. My husband asks if I will remember our route for the ride home (I usually drive at night because he gets sleepy). I assure him that there is no way, as I am directionally challenged. He knows this, so I am puzzled by the question. We are not a great pair when it comes to driving places.

We arrive in Clifton nearly an hour later. Despite the long drive, the stars were aligned for a great dining experience. First of all, I hadn’t dined out in over a week, which for me is an eternity, so I was really looking forward to it. Second Trummer’s credentials are pretty stellar. The chef, Clayton Miller, was named by “Food and Wine Magazine” as one of the best new chefs of 2010. Trummer’s on Main ranked 58 in Washingtonian‘s 100 Very Best Restaurants of 2010, which is quite admirable, considering they opened in 2009. Third, we had a Living Social discount, which gave us $30 off the dinner.

We arrive with 15 minutes to spare before our reservation. There’s a lovely bar on the first floor of this renovated 200 year old building, but we were ready to dine. No time to waste at the bar. The dining room is fairly sparse at 6:15 on a Sunday night but it is quite lovely. Airy and woodsy and elegant at the same time.

The server presents us with the menu and we are in for a surprise. Trummer’s on Main features a Sunday night dinner special: three courses for $38. This is almost as good as Restaurant Week, so I am delighted, although I fear they won’t accept our coupon. We are assured that the coupon is valid. The not so great news is that the menu is limited to four starters, four entrees, and two desserts. My husband does not eat red meat and only eats poultry if it’s kosher. He eats fish (not shellfish). The entree choices are shrimp and grits (which appeals to me immediately), a beef dish, a roasted pork shoulder, and roasted red snapper with duck confit and oysters. Uh oh.We ask if they can modify the snapper and are told yes, they will omit the duck and oysters and substitute mushrooms and brussel sprouts. Crisis averted.

The server has another surprise for us and explains their “bucket list” of wine. Trummer’s is busy on Saturday nights, less so on Sunday nights, and closed on Mondays. They take their open bottles of wine, put them in two buckets, one for whites and one for reds. You select a wine from the bucket and a glass of wine is just $5. This is brilliant! I wish more restaurants would/could do this rather than toss out the remains of open bottles.

I was liking Trummer’s more by the minute, and I hadn’t yet had a bite of food.

frisee salad

The good news is that the food met and maybe even surpassed my expectations. I choose a starter of frisee lettuce with pistachios, bacon, and pomegranate vinaigrette. The frisee salad has a beautiful presentation and flavors to match. It is a fairly simple dish with lettuce, bacon, pistachios and dressing. The ingredients work well together and the portion size is ample. My husband’s only choice for a starter is the white corn soup, with cornbread, corn pudding, and parsley. The soup has a wonderful creamy texture and complex flavor.

Our wines are delicious, particularly the red Chateau O’Brien, a Virginia wine normally sold for $15 a glass. I indulged myself in a glass, after finishing my first choice of a sauvignon blanc.

shrimp and grits

red snapper

The shrimp and grits presentation takes my breath away. The crispy bits of cheese blend perfectly with the shrimp and grits which features corn, spinach, and bacon. (Could I possibly manage to eat any more bacon during this meal?) I savor every bite and am grateful that the portion size is just right. My husband’s snapper is cooked perfectly. The substituted vegetables are fresh and delicious, and the sauce compliments the fish while not overwhelming it.

pistachio parfait

Dessert is a bit of a disappointment. I had read about the pastry chef, who came from Chikalicious in New York. I was looking forward to dessert. There were two choices in addition to the cheese course, which didn’t appeal to me. Both featured nuts prominently, and I am simply not nuts about nuts. The pumpkin dessert included walnuts, which I cannot tolerate. So, I ordered the pistachio parfait with ground oreo and bittersweet chocolate sorbet, despite the fact that my starter had pistachios. My husband got to enjoy most of the desserts. I will say that they looked beautiful, and I am certain that most people would be quite pleased with the desserts.

This ending to a meal usually would have left a bad taste in my mouth (so to speak) about the whole experience, but I was not deterred. I really, really liked Trummer’s on Main. In fact, I would have driven a good hour and ten minutes to get there. The good news is that it only took us 45 minutes to get home. The bad news for my husband was that he had to drive…that extra glass of red wine had rendered me useless.

Trummer’s on Main, 7134 Main St
Clifton, VA 20124

My rating (on a 1-5 scale): 4.5
Washington Post Review
Washingtonian Review

Filed Under: Trummer's on Main, VA Dining

Food Tour to Restore Sanity

November 2, 2010 By Lori Leave a Comment

The invitation read “Mystery to Restore Sanity.” The artwork from Saturday’s rally was brilliantly converted, switching out Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert‘s faces with George Washington wearing a mask. When you clicked on the mask you got directions to a meeting spot.

I’ve been in a Mystery Club for 20 years. Two couples plan an activity for the rest of the group of 13 couples. They send out an invitation with clues and directions. The mystery is the activity. We’ve had dance lessons, karate lessons, and art lessons. We’ve cooked, acted, driven race cars, had scavenger hunts, bike tours, and walking tours. Every event includes food, sometimes at a restaurant and sometimes catered.
For this particular event, we gathered at the fountain in Old Town Alexandria. When I was told the activity was a food tour of Old Town, I literally jumped up and down. Juvenile, I know. But when it comes to food, that’s how I am. Before arriving I had wondered if the event would be bloggable, and once I knew it was, words started racing through my brain before we even started the tour.

Our food tour included three restaurant stops with some history lessons of the area thrown in along the way. Our first stop was Union Street Public House, housed in a historic townhouse and billing itself as a “neighborhood tap and grill.” Most of the group had chosen not to eat shellfish, but those of us who did started our eating adventure with a crab and lobster cake served with a salad, while the rest of the group dined on trout.

crab and lobster cake

While we ate we played a game, created by our Mystery group’s organizers, where we had to correctly identify twelve different spices. I’ve seen this done on “Top Chef.” I had no idea how difficult it was going to be for me. I am clearly a better diner than I am a chef.

We departed from the first stop and walked for a few blocks while our tour guide shared a couple of stories about the architecture in the neighborhood.. Our next stop was Bilbo Baggins. The meat eaters had smoked chicken quesadillas with a mango black bean salsa and an Asian spring roll. The veggie eaters had a portabella mushroom with tomatoes, pesto, and brie.

portabella mushroom

Again our organizers had a game for us to play, a quiz having to do with The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings.

Our final stop was at Overwood, Woodfired American Kitchen. Our dishes here included a toasted pasta with a tomato sauce and a tower of crispy green tomatoes with cheese and jalapeno aioli with shrimp on top for those who so desired. Men and women sat separately at this location, and our task was to create a poem or song using a selection of candy (and prunes). For the record, the women’s song was infinitely better than what the guys came up with.

tower of crispy green tomatoes

Our meal concluded with a traditional Alexandria dessert, a jelly cake from Bittersweet Bakery. I grew up near Alexandria and had no idea there was such a thing. I liked it!

As food tours go, this one was just ok. It was nice to get a taste (literally) of a few Old Town Alexandria restaurants, which I would probably otherwise never experience. But the tour guide and the tour itself were fairly weak, and the meal didn’t feature any standout dishes. I couldn’t help but compare the food tour to others I have enjoyed in New York City, which featured terrific food and memorable tour guides. Although I admit, it is hard to compete when you’ve had a tour guide who was an Emmy-winning investigative journalist who had been imprisoned in Afghanistan.

I lost a little sleep as I tried to figure out what I was going to write about the evening, as I had already committed myself to doing so. I worried about insulting the evening’s planners if I wrote negative comments about the food or the tour.

But in the middle of the night I woke with a start and thought about the “Rally to Restore Sanity/and or Fear,” an event which I must admit I ended up experiencing from the comfort of my couch. (I have had a fear of crowds since an unfortunate experience at Preakness when someone threw a full beer can up in the air and it hit me on the head. So what if it was 30 years ago…it hurt!)

The rally was creative, humorous, and effective in bringing people together. My Mystery Club event was all of those things and more. We got to go to restaurants!

The more I write about dining out, the more I realize that rarely is a meal perfect. Regardless, gathering with friends for an entertaining night out is priceless. I don’t know about you, but my sanity pretty much depends on it.

Union Street Public House, 121 South Union Street, Alexandria, VA
Bilbo Baggins, 121 South Union Street, Alexandria, VA
Overwood, 220 North Lee Street, Alexandria, VA

DC Metro Food Tours

My rating (on a 1-5 scale): 3