On the road: Narita Hilton

There are only two ethnicities present in the 7 am crowd eating breakfast at the Hilton Narita’s lobby restaurant: Delicate Japanese stewardesses with their efficient suitcases leaning up against the table leg, and hearty Texas business men, obese and guffawing over a heaping plate of bacon. Yes, bacon. Despite the lack of ethnic diversity, the narita Hilton is prepared to feed guffawing businessmen from anywhere.

There’s a huge sideboard with pork, scrambled eggs, overly-squishy sausage, and, as if that wasn’t enough, a little guy who’ll make exquisitely yellow omelets. If you’re a large white male of a more European persuasion, there’s a table next to him with chocolate croissants, yoghurt, and the usual fruits.

But, what if fried fish and grated turnip covered with soy sauce is more your breakfast preference? The Hilton has got you covered. Miso soup? Check. Industrial sized sticky-rice maker? Check. Sweet vegetable curry? Check. Awesome salty rice porridge stuff covered with sesame seeds and crunchy bits? Check. Fifteen types of pickle, including a large dish of ‘Breakfast Kimchi’? Indeed.

And just in case you’ve flown in form a Middle Eastern country sand somehow made it to breakfast through the extremely thorough Narita customs agents, there’s a huge salad bar with organic baby tomatoes and seaweed. Little signs next to the Thousand Island Dressing warn religious eaters of alcohol as an ingredient.

It’s 7 am and everyone in the lobby of the Narita Hilton is munching on forkfuls of his or her culturally appropriate breakfast. Except the Texas businessmen who are attempting to use chopsticks.

Crummy but Oh-So-Good

The Vienna Inn is one of those places that doesn't look like much from the outside, and when you step inside it still isn't much to look at. No design consultant has ever swooped into the building and mandated mood lighting and art deco furniture. Instead, photos of local sports teams and beer paraphernalia pepper the walls. It's the kind of brik-a-brak that places like T.G.I. Friday's, Applebee's and Ruby Tuesday aspire to, but they fail miserably because they don't have customers that personally hand-color letters in crayon for them. It's that kind of place -- a throwback to times before "community" was overwhelmed by the relentless sprawl of the suburbs and it seems the menu prices still reflect that as well. You can eat like a king for $10.

And at these prices, don't expect service. You fill your own drink order at the soda fountain, may be asked multiple times if you've ordered and you won't receive a check at the end of your meal. Payments are taken through the honor system at the counter. On the other side of the restaurant, you might find some creaky-looking regulars perched at the bar, quietly disappearing their drafts from frost-rimmed mugs and commenting on the game playing on one of several TVs.

I sampled three items from a surprisingly extensive menu that included a breakfast menu with your standard diner favorites to sandwiches and other bar munchie staples. First the cheese fries, thin and crisp, were dusted with salt seasoning and given a generous pour of gooey cheddar cheese. If you're sharing these, eat all the extra-cheesy fries first or someone else will eat them for you. Next the Fried Red Chili Peppers, nugget-sized rounds filled, not with poisonous Cheese Wiz-like filling, but soft cream cheese cradled on top of a red pepper, all contained in a wonderfully fried coating with a firm crunch. Dip one of these endearing little bites into the habanero plum sauce and you are in heaven. The habanero sauce looks deceptively like jelly, but adds a sweet heat to the creamy crunch of the popper. Lastly, there were the chili dogs. I ordered mine "loaded" and it arrived on a small paper tray. The dog was tucked into a soft bun, coated with a slick of chili and hot melted cheese, and counter-pointed by crunchy bits of white onion and the tang of spicy brown mustard. Like all good chili dogs it requires two hands, a big mouth and plenty of napkins.

If you like your servers surly, your atmosphere no-nonsense and your food down-home good, make the trip to the Vienna Inn. You can even start at the Eastern end of the W&OD trail and bike your way to the Vienna Inn for a refreshing pit stop, or if you choose to drive, rent a keg or two on your way out. I'll be there with one hand in the habanero sauce and chili-cheese dripping down my chin.

Vienna Inn
123 Maple Avenue East
Vienna, VA 22180

Weird Ingredient

Some years ago I was introduced to this strange Chinese product - barbecue sauce. It isn't sweet or acid, its made of fish! I have never really understood why it was called Barbecue Sauce - Hoisin sauce is the closest Chinese sauce to what we think of as BBQ sauce and it does a fine job sweetening up a lot of my favorite dishes

Bruce Cost, in his invaluable book Asian Ingredients (a must own if your're interested in understanding Asian products) says," Not your everyday barbecue sauce, this intriguing oily paste called sha zha jiang consists of ground dried fish, chili peppers, shallots, garlic, dried shrimp, spices including coriander seeds, star anise and Sichuan peppercorns and sometimes peanuts" (though not in my favorite brand).

It's hard to know exactly what to do with this stuff. He says smear it on meat before broiling it (he gives a recipe that I haven't tried) or throw it into stir fried dishes. It is delicious and actually not at all fishy - hard to describe but actually addictive and the main ingredient in my most requested shrimp dish which I am called on to prepare several times a month.

My favorite brand is Bulls Head Barbecue Sauce by Haw-Di-I Foods from Taiwan, in a small jar or big can. Bruce Cost also recommends Lan Chi Brand Sa Cha Chaing, or Sze Chuan Foods T.F. Brand. There's an inch or so of oil at the top of the jar - DON'T mix it in, pour it off and then scrape up the paste. When done add some back to reserve the top so it doesn't dry out (so I was taught).

If anyone out there has used this and has any other ideas for what to do with this stuff I'd love to hear about it.

Spicy Shrimp

This recipe requires 1 lb large shrimp, cleaned and deveined (25-30 count) and salt whisked. To salt whisk: Place cleaned shrimp in a large bowl with 1 tsp kosher salt, Stir, allow to sit for a few minutes, rinse with cold water and drain. Blot. This can be repeated one more time, optional. BLOT DRY . They are now ready to use. This makes the shrimp more firm and crunchy.

1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp sugar
1 TB canola oil
1 tsp Asian chili garlic paste
1 clove garlic minced
1 tsp shaoxing wine
1 TB cornstarch
3 TB generous Chinese BBQ sauce

• Salt whisk and dry shrimp well. Mix remained of ingredients together being careful when measuring the BBQ sauce to only take the paste. Add shrimp, stir to coat well and marinate for 1/2 - 1 hour.

  
  

• Add 1 TB oil of a flat heavy frying pan. Spread shrimp flat on the fish for a couple of minutes - 3-4, without moving them, then turn to the other side and do the same until bright orange - they should be a little crunchy. Serve immediately.

• Or: Thread onto soaked bamboo skewers. Grill over medium on the broiler or outside grill.

-MHF, guest Blogger

(Note: You can buy it here -zaf)

runnin' up that hill

Clearly, the problem with America's growing waistline was that the government's guidelines were just too simple. Where's the fun in that? In an effort to combat this thoughtcrime, Chef Big Brother presents the ominous-sounding Food Guidance System. And it turns out vertical is the new horizontal. And while our forebearers had to make do with a mere single pyramid, citizens can now choose between... twelve?

Confused yet? I didn't even mention the colors and the symbols. We live in interesting times. Read some overviews at the Washington Post, or CBS. Or, if you are feeling brave, let the USDA take you inside the pyramid...

At this time, there has been no comment from the Puppet Formerly Known as Cookie Monster.

Conetastic

April 19: The day Joan of Arc was declared a saint. The 1995 Oklahoma City bombings. The death of Charles Darwin. My friend Margeau’s birthday.

But as far as DcFud readers are concerned, April 19 is special because it’s Freeeeeeee Cone Day over at Ben & Jerry’s from 12-8 p.m. today. So if your office or apartment’s in close proximity to a location, or if you just feel like taking an afternoon field trip, go enjoy a cone! Over at the CityPlace branch in Silver Spring, the lines were long, but the conditions were Soup-Nazi-esque, so things moved rather quickly.

So go on – brighten your day with a little Cherry Garcia. You know you want to.

Get Gluttonous

Having a buffet lunch is always a dubious process. After a mid-afternoon feast, it’s easy to return to work stuffed and lethargic, unable to do anything productive for the rest of the afternoon. Note: they’re perfect for Fridays.

Next door to each other at Georgia Avenue and Thayer Avenue in Silver Spring, there’s Bombay Gaylord Indian Restaurant (8401 Georgia) and Tian Jin Palace, a Chinese joint, next door. Both buffets are cheap ($6.95 for all-you-can-eat at Bombay Gaylord, and $5.95 for a crammed plate at Tian Jin). But while one is fine as an unremarkable, stuff-yourself-sick option, the other is truly a bargain for the quality of food served.

Bombay Gaylord presents a nice balance of Indian dishes from which you can choose. When I visited, options included a Chicken tandoori, chicken tikka masala, a spinach and potato mixture, curried chickpeas, rice, salad and naan. The dark meat of the chicken tandori was moist, though the masala option offered more of a kick. The potatoes are an unusual and hearty choice, while sopping up the chickpea curry with some fresh naan is heavenly. With fresh versions of each dish being replaced frequently, and attentive waiters to assist you despite the buffet-style set-up, Bombay Gaylord is a relaxing lunchtime treat.

Over at Tian Jin, you’re given a choice of four items from an array of Chinese dishes, though most are your usual standbys. Popular options are a schezwan tofu, triple delight, sweet and sour chicken, chicken with mushrooms, egg rolls, and kung pao beef or chicken. I don’t think any dish stands out as particularly remarkable, and many are quite heavy, but if you’re looking for generic, quick and cheap Chinese, it satiates the craving. Not only do they give you four dishes, but the buffet is served with white or fried rice, and a choice of hot and sour or egg drop soup (the hot and sour is tasty, the egg drop rather bland). No matter how hearty your appetite, you won’t fit into your pants as well when you’re exiting Tian Jin. I’ve rarely ventured from the buffet at this place, but their shrimp toast is a greasy guilty pleasure.

If getting gratefully gorged is your goal, Silver Spring has quite the plethora of lunchtime options nearly piled up on top of each other. Next time, I’ll experiment even further and walk…one door over to sample the buffet at Langano Ethiopian Restaurant. I’ll let you know how it goes.

Countdown to bacteria!

Countdown: amg and zaf are one week away from going all 'roving reporter' on you.

Starting next Monday the restaurant-review-writing staff at FUD will be decreased by two. Instead, you will find new descriptions of deadly food poisoning in Thailand, Japan, Australia, Vietnam, Malaysia, and Cambodia, and other wild crazy places where they don’t speak a word of the local language. Alright, they probably won't find death via tastiness in Japan. And they should be able to master the dialect in Australia with the help of intensive classes.

Nevertheless! This leaves us with an important order of business- what they will eat on the way over there! Thankfully there is a website devoted to just such a topic, There is no excuse for not checking out Airline Meals.

With vintage airline catering advertisements, clandestine pictures, menus, notes about those 'special meals' offered by each airline, and crew meal listings, this site manages to make you both nauseous and hungry at the same time. Sort of how I feel thinking about yummy Bangkok fish and their free side serving of intestinal parasites.

T is for Trauma (it's good enough for me)

As part of a new 'Healthy Habits for life' push of Sesame Street, Cookie Monster will be giving up his chocolate chip habit in favor of advocating vegetables. No, I swear to god I'm not joking. When I stumbled onto this tidbit from the Courtney Knapp blog I assumed it was a prank.

And then I saw cookie monster's new song: “A Cookie Is a Sometimes Food”

Now, maybe it's just my old fashioned sense of rhythm, but seeing as how I still occasionally belt out 'C is for cookie' in the shower, I just can't understand how this is supposed to improve national good looks. You know, birds actually never grow more than four or five feet at most- we're ruining our children's bird-identification skills by having a Big Bird character. And Oscar the Grouch promotes bad hygiene and advocates homelessness. /rant

Anyway, new characters will include talking eggplants and carrots- like that will help people with the moral dilemma of what it's alright to eat. At least the cookies never asked to be eaten. This is like some bizarre remake of that scene in Restaurant at the End of the Universe where the cow suggests everyone munch on his thigh.

CF Folks are nice

'Hello! How ya doing? What can I get ya today?' booms the grey-haired guy behind the counter. I immediately assume that my lunch partner amg is a frequent customer and good acquaintance. But one delectable ham, turkey, and Swiss with Russian dressing on pumpernickel later it becomes obvious that this enthusiastic greeting is standard treatment for all customers. I’m reminded of a small chalet in Grindelwald, where after a day of hiking with a heavy pack you stumble into a pub to hear from the rubicund bartender, in good English no less, 'Welcome Home!"

It's taken three attempts to get into CF Folks in Farragut North- it's always been too full with the line snaking into the overheated plastic porch. But this time, thanks to an early appointment across the street for scary vaccines, we happened to be there in time to beat the famished crowds.

The menu is a mix of hearty sandwiches and salads, with a specials menu of curry and other ethnic food you wouldn’t expect at what looks like a small 1950's blue collar lunch counter. It's front wall is heavy with awards and laminated articles touting the food as 'shockingly good'. Eat outside on the sidewalk, pay inside when you're done. If there was such a category as Dive restaurant, this would be #1, with Tastee Diner in Bethesda perhaps taking the #2 slot.

Sushispeak Deciphered

I was recently at a Japanese restaurant with a huge menu of sushi (in Florida, so no use making a recommendation here). They nicely provided a separate translation for the some of the sushi ingredients on the menu. There were several that I'd never seen before written with their Japanese names. So...just in case you ever run into an incomprehensible sushi menu here's their list.

Tamago - egg

Inari - Sweet fried tofu

Kani - Crab

Saba - Japanese mackerel

Tai - Japanese red snapper

Ikura - Salmon egg

Masago - Smelt egg

Hotate - Scallop

Unagi - Smoked eel

Sake - Salmon

Tako - Octopus

Magura - Tuna

Anago - Smoked sea eel

Tobiko - Japanese caviar

Buri - Young yellowtail tuna

Uni - Sea urchin

Ama Ebi - Sweet shrimp

Ika - Squid

-MHF, guest Blogger

Playing on the cheap

It was a time of financial instability the likes of which this country has never seen. Analysts jumping from the rooftops, dogs running barefoot through the streets. That's right, it was…the late 80's. And if your mom was like mine she wasn't letting you play with a Flutter Pony when you had to stay inside due to all the raining analysts. No, instead, she was making you Homemade Playdough.

Yep, she would cook you your own playdough. A little more grainy and loose-feeling than the real stuff, but still cheap and useful as an emergency food-source if necessary.

Homemade Playdough like mom used to make

• Mix together 1 cup flour, 1/2 cup salt, 1 cup of water, two teaspoons cream of tarter, and a teaspoon of vegetable oil. Make sure your kid can't see you so he'll think he's getting the real thing.

• Cook over low heat until it becomes dough-y. About three minutes

• Add food coloring. This is the only way that the homemade stuff is better- make weird-ass colors. Like awesome puky brownish green. Gross out your richer friends.

Incidentally, another cheap kid food fun thing? Cornstarch baths. Man, I used to love those things. I think I was that kid.

Most Loathsome Restaurateur?

Fellow DCFUD-blogger rj3, who regularly blogs over at Smorgasblog partner DCSOB has posted the list of Washington DC's 28 Most Loathsome People. Coming in at #17 is the Jeff Tunks, owner of Ceiba, TenPenh, and DC Coast. RJ3 has this to say:

17. Restaurateur Jeff Tunks: Have you ever wondered why downtown eating sucks so much? Blame Jeffy, owner/partner of the fusion trifecta of Ceiba, TenPenh and DC Coast. Each of these joints are one carefully-planned degree from the traditional Washington power steakhouse, calibrated for expense-account lawyers and lobbyists to have a good meal at a posh setting without having to deal with any of those scary New York/LA restaurant trends (sitting on the floor, raw food, Lindsay Lohan puking in your soup, etc.). So take your Malpeque oysters and your cr*p on a stick (sorry, skewers) -- I'll be at Ben's.

Recent Wine List

Wine is probably my favorite drink in the world, but it wasn’t always. I was pretty much indifferent to wine until I went to Strasbourg, and really learned about the wines of Alsace.

Of the seven main varietals in Alsace, six are white, and this post isn’t about them. A future one may be, but in the meantime if you want a great wine to go with fish or chicken in a cream sauce, try Lucien Albrecht’s Sylvaner (or Pinot Blanc)…watch the vintage – you probably don’t want older than 3 years or so from Alsace.

I’ve had a few red wines worth mentioning recently, so that’s the topic of the day. The least impressive was Jed Steele’s Shooting Star 2002 Pinot Noir. Now, unlike certain other bloggers, Pinot Noir is one of my favorite reds, but this one left much to be desired. A good cherry flavor starts this wine off, and lingers throughout, but is more or less flying solo: no other flavors really jump out to support it. A touch of spiciness, inherent to the Pinot, comes through, and perhaps some smoke. Not great, but just fine as an aside to my seared ahi tuna. Not worth the restaurant price though!

On nearly the opposite end of the spectrum, we find the Signorello 2001 Napa Valley Zinfandel. My parents have recently been getting really into wines (particularly the Napa ones), which may or may not be a brilliant scheme to get me to come to dinner more often. Should that be the case, I’m perfectly OK with it. A good wine snob, I tend to look upon the zinfandel with some suspicion, in addition to just generally not liking them. But one sniff of this
rich, deep red wine effectively opened my mind. Powerful and spicy, the dominant flavor for me was currant, with perhaps a shade of eucalyptus. It’s unfiltered, but the wine made me happily overlook the sediment. Expensive, but worth it.
At another dinner chez parents, we had the winner of the three: the Edge 2002 Cabernet-Sauvignon. Beginning with a gorgeous nose, full of currant and sharp with something that might be green apple, the wine itself is relatively light, but full of flavor. The strong currant nose yields to a cherry flavor, with currant to the side, and again a sharp flavor I couldn’t identify. This is a damn good wine.

Lastly, a guilty pleasure. I love port: it’s sweet, cheap, satisfying, and can be really good. The one I keep in my bar at home is Clocktower, from Australia…it’s a fairly basic port, but with a nice chocolatey flavor and enough depth not to make me feel cheap. But I am cheap, so Clocktower’s $10 price tag adds greatly to its appeal.

Snobby scalloped potatoes

Certain foods reach down into our central nervous system and trigger the reaction 'hey, I'm all sophisticated and shit'. Martinis do it because of the James Bond connection. Omelet's do it because of the 'leisurely brunch' connection. And anything French does it because somehow our subconscious mind is convinced that the French are classy people and not the street-spitting, drunken footballers that you might witness in Paris.

Well, outdated labels can work for you, as every chick who has ever innocently told a guy that no, she had no idea that he was into her, will know. Serve this very French peasant food the next time you wish to sprinkle some stereotypical class over your table.

Snobby scalloped potatoes

• Peel and thinly slice about 8 Yukon Gold potatoes. Grate a serious chunk of gruyere cheese and then grate extra- you'll definitely run out.

• Sprinkle the bottom of a casserole dish with salt and pepper Place a layer of potato slices 1 slice thick over it.

• Sprinkle with salt, pepper, flour, and grated cheese. Place another layer of potatoes over. Complete until the dish is ¾ full.

• Pour light cream over everything until the dish is halfway full. The top layer or two should be above the cream.

• Cover with a final layer of salt, pepper, flour, and cheese. Cover with tin foil and place in an oven preheated to 375.

• This always take s longer to cook than you think. Once everything is bubbling away (say 45 mins to an hour), test if its done by pushing a fork through it. It should go easily like melted butter. Remove the tin foil and let it cook another five minutes to crisp everything up

• Laugh evilly at everyone's happy class-hysteria.

A hot night on the Hill

Most of the DCFÜD crew went out last night for an evening of medical emergencies, unbearable heat and violating open-container laws. It was like July... in April.

"Would you like some onions with your HUMAN LIVER?"

The extremely accomodating (and extremely Irish) server Gerry at the Cap brought a bowl of ice and some napkins to keep amg and zaf's anti-typhoid vaccines cool, and later even agreed to store the medicine in the bar's refrigerator. This was a good thing, as the Cap Lounge was experiencing a climate-control malfunction which caused overwhelming heat to blast from the ceiling vents. It was like happy hour in a tandoori oven - not pleasant.

Several men who looked like they could speak authouritatively about things like ducts and vents came around to tinker with the thermostat, each announcing that the problem had been solved. It only got hotter. When we protested the furnace-like state, the bar manager offered free shots if we stuck it out until the thermometer registered 100 degrees.

As it turns out, the thermometer didn't display more than two digits, but when it finally rolled over to "00", the manager honored his promise and brought a round of whiskey, although not without hassling the three Wilson SHS graduates at the table (snh, wrc and ejg if you must know) about their D.C.P.S. high school.

I think the line was, "I'm from Ward 8, I know what I'm talking about."

No free drinks	Free drinks

Our three exuberant ladies, filled with the energy of youth and many full mugs of cheap beer, decided that while Zack's doesn't have an outdoor patio, that should serve as no hinderance to taking a few beers outside and dancing in the rain on Pennsylvania Avenue.

Thirty seconds later, the bartender went to the door and asked them to kindly come back inside the bar, explaining how a liqour license is a good thing for a bar to have.

We went home, secure from typhoid and sobriety.

-Written by snh, edited and crossposted by DCSOB-er rj3

This looks like a job for... Superfood!

The word of the day is "superfood." As reported by CBS News, these are foods which are out to make you healthier. According to a survey taken by the Food Marketing Institute, the majority of shoppers choose their food based on health or nutritional claims. But, uh, looking around on the Metro, I'm not entirely convinced.

Can this be the new movement that will turn our society away from our wicked ways of fast food and preservatives? The piece of mistletoe that pierces the heart of the Burger King? Or is this all more smoke and mirrors dreamed up by some shadowy marketing department, miles away from the American heartland, rolling in their bank vaults full of money?

Is Senomyx the new Splenda?

Remember when how food tasted relied mainly on, well, how the food actually tasted? So last century!

The latest bombshell in the flavor-enhancement industry is Senomyx. Today's New York Times article talks up high hopes for its upcoming salt substitute.

From the official website, Senomyx is "a biotechnology company using proprietary taste receptor-based assays and screening technologies to discover and develop novel flavors and flavor enhancers for the packaged food and beverage industry."

Well, I don't care what they say, they just don't make proprietary taste receptor-based assays like my grandmother used to make.

Turning Japanese

Aah, Hawaii. This DCFuder just returned from Oahu and she can still picture the azure waves... The gently swaying palm trees... The amazing numbers of Japanese tourists! And there wasn't an obese one among them. I was so boggled by this lack of body fat that I consumed record amounts of Japanese food while I was in Hawaii just to see what the deal was and wanted to continue eating it FOREVER once I returned home.

Thus inspired, I signed up for the Japanese Sushi class through Arlington's Continuing Education program. On two consecutive Tuesdays, I huddled in the kitchen classroom at the Clarendon Education Center with a dozen other students. It's a simple kitchen, but outfitted with all the essential equipment and a long table for the group to sit around. Mary Moore, youthful beyond her years and soon to be a great grandmother, led us through the basics of making sushi, Japanese dining etiquette and shopping. She is of Taiwanese descent, married an American serviceman and learned about Japanese food and culture during Japan's occupation of Taiwan. Now she teaches people how to make sushi and is a Tupperware consultant (Fate is a funny thing, huh?).

The first Tuesday was devoted to the introduction of ingredients, how to make rice and making our own maki sushi (sushi rolls). She guided us through ingredients (types and brands of rice, vinegar, nori, etc.), how to choose fresh fish, and how to find everything at the grocery store. She was excellent about circulating around the room, giving pointers and answering questions as she went. One caveat: She loves chatting so much that sometimes things got left on the back burner, literally. Luckily some of my classmates were sharp enough to save our sushi seasoning and shepherd the rice to its happy, fluffy conclusion without many hitches. From there we learned the basic techniques of spreading the rice on our nori (the seaweed wrapper), filling it with ingredients, rolling everything up and slicing the roll into correctly proportioned pieces. I made one batch of classic vegetable rolls and one batch of simple tuna rolls, but I could have made more. When you receive your prep list for class and it says to bring a container for leftovers -- bring a big one! There were plenty of ingredients to go around and lots of rolls to be made.

But, the second class was where the real fun happened. Don't miss this class. There were noticeably fewer people in attendance for this class, which meant more sushi for everyone! Don't be the lazy one that skips this class and misses out on the really good stuff. Everyone pitched in to prep ingredients and we started off with California rolls, which are messy but fun. Then we progressed to nigiri (tuna, salmon, eel, egg, imitation crab, mackerel, shrimp) and tamaki (hand rolls). I made my tamaki with the spicy tuna mixture Mary whipped up and thought I made it look like a spicy tuna ice cream cone, but I can’t resist spicy tuna anything (if you want to know a secret about spicy tuna rolls, ask me). Overall the goal of the class is to familiarize you with the very basics and to have fun. So you want to make a roll with mayo, tuna, asparagus and that leftover cheese in your refrigerator? After the class you'll know the basics, so go for it. No one's guaranteeing it will taste any good, though (see below).

I was so excited by the class I decided to make a full sushi spread at home the very next weekend. but without classmates and an instructor to go grocery shopping; help prep the veggies; cook, fan and season the rice; slice the fish; make the wasabi; slice up oranges as an in-between-chore snack; and make tea (i.e. Do all the work), sushi making turned out to be a tiring production. The proportions of my rice to seasoning went disastrously wrong and I was left with a gelatinous, over-seasoned glump. I frantically mixed in plain rice, but ultimately ended up with hard little bullets of starch topped with thick and flabby fish slices. I was exhausted, covered in rice and vinegar, and left with endless amounts of barely edible sushi. My sushi had the texture you might experience when chewing gummy bears and squishy roasted red pepper slices at the same time, and just about as tasty.

Look to your left to see the offending sushi and note how the salmon slices could pass as mini steaks, and that is just platter #1. It was not the “bounty of the sea” feast that I envisioned and I realized that if the Mary Moore's class taught me one thing, it is to appreciate your sushi chef. To quickly and skillfully bring a platter of evenly sliced, attractively arranged, correctly seasoned sushi to your table is HARD. Don’t be fooled by the simplicity of sushi because if you underestimate it, it will kick your ass, karate style.

If you want to take the class:
Arlington County Adult Education
Look in the .pdf course catalog for the Japanese Sushi class.
Arlington Residents -- $72
Arlington Seniors -- $59 (lucky bastards)
Non-Residents -- $89
Non-Resident Seniors -- $72

Bring a chef's knife, towel, small cutting board, bamboo sushi mat and a large container for your leftovers. Parking is validated after 6:15PM in the Clarendon Common parking garage (enter on N. Fillmore Street).

If you prefer to have a sushi chef make it for you (a very short, sushi short list):
Sushi Ko
2309 Wisconsin Ave NW
Washington, DC 20007
202-333-4187

Kaz Sushi Bistro
1915 Eye Street NW
Washington, DC 20036
202-530-5500

Milk is infact milk

If antidisestablishmentarianism is opposition to the withdrawal of state support from a church, then surely unantilactaidconsumerism is the purpose of The Milk is Milk Website and Blog.

As children of the eighties we grew up with ‘Milk: It does the Body Good’ and white mustached celebrities. Then, about five years ago came the dire warning of milk hormones causing cancer in women and the touting of soymilk, rice milk and other things that taste like cereal.

Well, The tug of war for consumer’s hearts and wallets continues and this means it must be the milk industry’s turn again. This is a really decent website for righteous indignation over all things milk slandering. They can use a phrase like “Sadly, activists and unscrupulous for-profit marketing groups have been attacking this important productivity tool” and actually mean it.

My brother's lab experiment

When a lab rat discovers that he can receive a tasty food pellet by pressing a certain pattern of buttons, he'll continue pressing those same buttons even when the food pellets start being distributed at random. Or he'll do cute little paw motions depending on what he thinks might have worked in the past. This is superstition at its finest and it is the key to understanding why I keep on going back to My Bothers Place in Capitol Hill. Like our lab rats, I return each time with hope renewed despite objective criteria.

My conditioning process was complete and thorough. I had three good meals there back to back last year- a great burger, some fabulously tangy chicken wings piled high, and a sandwich of some delectable description. The beer and the service were good, the décor fun to hang out with.

Then, about two months ago, part 2 of the experiment cut in. Suddenly, the fries were soggy, the sandwiches sparse and everything took 45 minutes to arrive. A recent chicken salad contained: five iceberg lettuce leaves, some dry almond slivers, a few slices of dry, tasteless chicken, and two chunks of overripe apple. It was the kind of thing you might scavenge from your brother's refrigerator if you didn’t feel like making too much effort. And every time I went I was seated in the long-forgotten and antiseptic attic area where apparently, servers fear to tread.

Why do I go back? Well, its close, which is a big plus. But I know those food pellets will get good again if I can just press the right buttons. Or do the correct little foot motions.

The world has changed, old man

Chicken magnate Frank Perdue has gone to that great concentrated feedlot operation in the sky. The first person to sell brand-name chicken, Frank was part of a strange phenomenon in American culture until his retirement in 1991: The old man as innocuous corporate mascot.

Right alongside the Brooke Shieldses and Cindy Crawfords and Fabios of yesteryear stood the geezer-barons of food commerce: Perdue, Orville Redenbacher, Dave Thomas of Wendy's and the Bartyles and James wine cooler guys. Sure, they represented big, evil corporations that sold chemically-processed tripe we wouldn't get near if we had any idea how it was made (except maybe for the popcorn) but they did it in such an amiable, doddering way that one had to fight off the urge to buy the product simply to humor them.

But alas, the food spokesmen of today are a different breed entirely: The Arby's oven mitt and the annoying Quizno's baby show a culture now obsessed with condescending to youth instead of condescending to the elderly. Where did we go astray?

Pasta Shape Ratings

	Rigatoni Rigatoni is by far the superior pasta shape for hearty sauces. A meat sauce is great because you can scoop up the sauce into the pasta. Very simple tubular design, so it's aesthetics are pleasing to the minimalist. Perfect to snack on as well. San Giorgio has many small grooves along the pasta, making its texture much more pleasant than the Barilla brand with the wide grooves. A+
	Rotini Second only to rigatoni, rotini's spiral shape makes it an ideal sauce conveyor as well. The absence of the scooping factor makes it slightly inferior, but again it is easy and fun to snack on. Rotini is good for cream sauces and pasta salads in a way that rigatoni is not, because it won't cause the sauce to bubble out unexpectedly. Its design is fun, but a bit too complex to be regarded entirely as food. B+
	Angel Hair One of the weakest pasta choices. The chunky tomato sauces that I prefer don't stick to it well, and unless cooked precisely right it becomes a sticky mass of ugly noodles. It looks like intestines. C -
	Macaroni The poor white trash of the pasta family. Does it get any more boring than macaroni? Yankee Doodle was the best use of this pasta. Sure the ubiquitous cheese can be served just fine with this pasta, but other than being a college pantry staple, macaroni is a disgrace to the pasta family. D+
	Farfelle Vulgarized as "bow ties" this pasta is the most attractive to the eye. Who can resist a pasta salad made with farfelle? These butterflies are great in a chunky sauce with sausage. B

Reposted by MF, guest Blogger