Cooking Revelation

It's true that the biggest revelation is the simplest. J and I went to Eastern Market one day to make a summery meal. So we bought basil, heirloom tomatoes and fresh pasta. We also bought 15 lemons, as we now find ever more excuses to use our electric citrus juicer. Many mojitos and mimosas have been made using the FRESH citrus juice; this along with lemon cakes, hummus and guacamole (all dishes that require fresh citrus).

So of course we wanted to make lemonade in honor of the summer bounty. After juicing a whole bunch of lemons, we didn't feel like making simple syrup. "If only we had superfine sugar!" we whined. And upon further thought, we realized that we DID have superfine sugar. Unprocessed superfine sugar (read: granulated). If superfine sugar is simply finely ground sugar, why can't we throw batch in the food processor. Doesn't a food processor grind things?

I'm happy to say that our theory was correct. We made out first, very large batch of superfine sugar and it dissolved into our lemonade wonderfully. We are still drinking our way through the huge pitcher of lemonade, but are looking forward to making individual glasses with the superfine sugar. Individual glasses work better with superfine sugar, since it just seems silly to simmer 1/2 cup of water with 1/2 cup of sugar.

Welcome To Arlington; Try The Spaghetti

Editor's Note: This story originally read to say Chef Roberto Donna owns Il Radicchio. According to Roberto Donna's PR department, Donna founded the group of restaurants, but has since sold the venture.

Sure, for some of us, All-You-Can-Eat Spaghetti is kind of an unnecessary concept, whether it be on account of our fear of carbohydrates or a lack of capacity to polish off more than a helping or two of the dish.

That being said, naysayers shouldn't be turned off by Il Radicchio's bottomless bowl of the classic pasta. The "spaghetteria" with locations in Arlington, Fairfax and DC, is an inexpensively-priced venture founded by Galieo restauranteur Roberto Donna, and one branch is conveniently within walking distance from my new home in Courthouse.

The place has specials, salads, panini, appetizers and a wide array of gourmet pizzas from which to choose, but my family, who was in town for the weekend, went straight for the spaghetti. For $6.50, you get all the pasta you can eat, and can choose from a variety of 8 oz servings of sauce, ranging in price from around $2-4. The menu I found online was different from the one I had in the restaurant, but still gives a general idea of the place's selection.

My family sampled three sauces: a mascarpone-based cream sauce, a marinara with artichokes and shrimp and a gorgonzola-pistachio offering. The mascarpone was only adequate; it had a sourness I wasn't expecting and was a bit runny on the texture. But the other two were delicious, particularly the pistachio. If none of our choices sound appealing, there are over 15 more that should suit your fancy; a friend of mine enjoys mixing pesto with a red pepper sauce, creating an Italian-flag worthy plate.

Other notes: bruscetta is generously piled with tangy tomatoes and drizzled with balsamic. Service at lunchtime was attentive, but not intrusive, offering us complimentary cappucinos when our waiter heard I was new to the area. All in all, the meal was a perfect welcome to Arlington for this former Silver Spring resident.

Il Radicchio
1801 Clarendon Blvd
Arlington, Va
703-276-2627

Greek in odd places

Coober Pedy. In the local Aboriginal dialect it means ‘White man’s hole in the ground’. And there's a reason for that: the 2700 miners who call ‘the Opal capital of the world’ their home reside on top of, around, and often underneath the conical mountains of white waste-soil from earlier generations. This means that million dollar finds are often attributed to hollowing out a bedroom.

But while it’s easy to spot the toothless old-timers noodleing in the piles of dust at the side of the road, the open mine shafts in the middle of town, and the many 4-wheel drives rushing explosives to hidden claims out in the ruined dessert, it’s a little more difficult to spot a more basic cultural phenomenon: Almost everyone in Coober Pedy seems to be Greek.

In a town large enough to support four restaurants, two are greek, one is Serbian, and the other one is a pizza place that also serves Greek food.

Zaf and amg had just trudged in from a hard day excavating in the mines with pickaxes and an animal-hide bucket*. They craved a big chunk of cow, or at least kangaroo. There was only one place to go: Tom and Mary’s Greek Taverna, noteworthy both for its inexpensive meals and for the fact that the road to it is paved.

I’m not sure who Tom and Mary were but the actual owners are Anastasios and Maria Klosses. They’ve been cooking in one location or another since they arrived for the second opal rush 15 years ago, and unlike most of the town, this incarnation of the taverna is built above ground. Huge feta and olive salads, fabulously aromatic lamb, and grizzled old men with beards down to their belts and steel-toed workboots knocking back unlabeled beer like they don’t want to live, all combine to give the dining room a really cosy feel.

We tried the all-meat platter and smelled it even before it came out of the kitchen. There were patties of spicy ground meat patties, huge lamb chops, huger pork chops, a steak, and an unbelievably juicy lamb kabob. Non-meat additions included tzatziki, another olive salad to ward off scurvy, and a mass of boiled potatoes bigger than the Devils Marbles formation just 1000 K up the highway.

Tom and Mary’s is a welcome retreat from the dusty scrub-desert where more dentally-challenged locals wait to buy or sell you opal. Its also one of the few places in town not covered in warning signs never to walk backwards when taking a picture. We were even given an entire pitcher of free water which is apparently something of a luxury out here. The whole meal was inhaled with serious gusto. Mining** can do that to a person.

*Driving around in a rental car being tourists
**More driving

Thai Tales

During the past year or so that I've lived in DC, my Thai restaurant experiences largely have been mediocre. From Tara Thai to Sala Thai to some-place-in-a-Falls-Church- shopping-center-I-can't-remember-the-name-of, no restaurant has stood out in my mind as one deserving a repeat visit.

And while my recent trip to Benjarong in Rockville, my second trip in about 8 months, wasn't flawless, the restaurant still justifiably has earned my repeat business. Despite the uber-suburban setting, the place delivers tasty Thai food at reasonable prices in a pleasant atmosphere.

I've chronicled before that pineapple fried rice is one of my favorite dishes, and Benjarong delivers a juicy, flavorful version bursting with fruit, cashews, chicken, and even bits of ham (though I confess I could do without the ham). Another standout dish is the roast duck with asparagus, its skin crisp and the meat not too fatty. Lao Dang, a deep fried beef dish in a red wine sauce, tasted a bit more BBQ-sauce-esque than I'd expected, though my companion enjoyed the tangy entree. Soups are the usual fare - both Tohm Yum and the coconut milk-based Tohm Kha were fine, but unremarkable.

All in all, I enjoyed Benjarong, but I've yet to find a Thai restaurant in the area to best my favorite New York offering or even a recent Pittsburgh discovery. Thai fans, where should I be looking?

Benjarong Thai Restaurant, Wintergreen Plaza
885 Rockville Pike (Rt. 355)
Rockville, MD 20852
(301) 424-5533

The votes are in!

The results are in from the Washington Post's Best Bets Readers' Choice awards. Thousands of people from across the metropolitan area voted in such diverse categories as bakeries to romantic restaurants.

Your mission, should you decide to accept it, is decide of the voting populace is just on crack, or even go through the list and find a couple keen locations for yourself.

In Praise of Curry Paste

So J and I were at the Eden Center stocking up on all of the Asian ingredients we can't access from Whole Foods or Safeway and we start talking about our need for a good curry paste. We're looking for a curry paste with a deeper flavor than Thai Kitchen and less heat. And this little old Laotian lady comes up to us and tells us to get the Thai Mae Ploy Mussaman curry paste. It appears that she thinks the picture of the Thai lady on the jar is trustworthy. She tells us that she uses this at home. As I am used to following the orders of little ladies from Southeast Asia (Thank's Mom!), I do what I'm told.

And of course the little old Lao lady is right. It's a great curry paste, with a strong flavor of both chili pepper and lemongrass. I use it for everything now. One of my fav dishes using this key ingredient is Satay chicken. This has a been a reliable party item as it can be served room temperature and can be made ahead of time.

Satay Chicken
1/4 cup nuoc mam
2 tablespoons lime juice
1 tablespoon honey
1/4 cup Thai Mae Ploy Massaman Curry paste
1 teaspoon sesame oil
2 pounds of those chicken tenderloins (that you use for making chicken strips), cut in half

Throw all of the ingredients into a large ziploc bag and marinate at least an hour and preferably overnight. You can even freeze the bag and thaw for later use. In a nonstick skillet, pour a thin layer of oil and let it get hot. Sear the chicken on both sides. Place chicken on a foil covered cookie sheet. Bake at 400 degrees for about 10 minutes. Cover with a top layer of foil until cool. Place chicken pieces on skewers. Serve with peanut sauce.

Peanut Sauce
1 can of coconut milk
3 tablespoons Thai Curry paste
1 tablespoon nuoc mam
1 tablespoon honey or maple syrup

Throw everything into a saucepan. Simmer until thickens and combined. This is just a guideline. Adjust flavors as needed.

Bella Luna!

Speaking of Sangiovese...

I wasn't able to go to my "company picnic" this summer, because I work in a restaurant and someone had to be there to feed the hungry people. The next morning, my manager handed me a bottle of wine. Apparently, I had been entered in a raffle and won the wine in absentia. Never being one to turn down free...anything...I took the wine more than happily.

I opened it the other day, and experienced something completely different from the last Sangiovese I had (the Il Turchino Chianti). Luna Vineyards's 1999 Sangiovese was a much better sipping wine than the Il Turchino would have been. It was incredibly smooth, with low acidity and tannins, and hints of black pepper, almonds, and tobacco. For a meal, I'd pair this wine with a roast chicken, but it was so good to drink on its own, I think I'd like it with a simple cheese plate with apples, walnuts, and hard cheeses.

We didn't finish the bottle that first night, and I thought I'd drink it with dinner the next night to keep it fresh. Unfortunately, we had pizza for dinner. The wine was still good, the pizza was good, but the combination of the two was...less than good. I do not reccommend drinking this wine with pizza! It was not pretty.

This wine retails for around $19.99. The Luna 1999 Sangiovese Reserve retails for $40.

Experimental Slaw

Summer is coming to an end, and considering the awful humidity and the fact that it no longer means vacation for me, I am thrilled.

Except, of course, that it means the days of cookouts and picnics will soon end as well, and I do love me some barbeque. A staple of the American cookout or picnic is cole slaw - a dish I must admit I really love.

The best I ever had was, confusingly, at a restau cafe shack on the island of Anegada in the
BVI's. I remember it being a bit spicy, and loving it.

Earlier this summer, I was preparing to go to a barbeque, and had decided to make cole slaw - something I had not previously attempted. I bought pre-shredded cabbage (as I'm lazy), and followed the recipie on the bag. Borrrrrrinnnggg. I rummaged around my kitchen, and found a few things that seemed like they might be good additions: serrano peppers and caraway seeds. I edited my slaw, and headed to the party. I thought it was really good, but then, I like things spicy; others thought it was too much.

Some consideration and weeks later, I found myself again making cole slaw for a barbeque, and again with only the dull back-of-bag recipie. This time, I went in a different direction - letting summer in the
Carribbean color my imaginings. This time, I used cherry peppers (not as hot as serrano), vidalia onion instead of white, allspice, white pepper, and much less caraway. The result tasted good to me, and seemed to be a hit (or at least quickly consumed) at the party.

The two recipies are below, with estimates of what I used (I guess that makes them 'guidelines' as opposed to 'recipies,' whatever):

1 lb. bag of Fresh Express 3-color coleslaw (green cabbage, carrots, red cabbage)
1/2 white onion, minced in food processor
4 Serrano peppers, minced (I used a food processor)
.75 tbs. caraway seeds – bruised but not ground with pestle
3 tbs. lemon juice
3 tbs. mayonnaise
2 tbs. red wine vinegar
1 tbs. salt
3.5 tbs. pepper
1 tbs. garlic salt

----------------------

1 lb. bag of Fresh Express 3-color coleslaw (green cabbage, carrots, red cabbage)
3 hot cherry peppers, minced (I used a food processor)
1/2 vidalia onion, minced in food processor
1 tsp. caraway seeds – bruised but not ground with pestle
2 tbs allspice seeds, crushed with mortar and pestle
3 tbs. lemon juice
3 tbs. mayonnaise
3 tbs. red wine vinegar
1 tbs. salt
2 tbs. white pepper

Putting a damper on things

No one but the phlegmatic English could have invented something as obnoxiously bland as Yorkshire pudding, and tapas could only come from a culture that needed to support the late-night Spanish drinking habit. No early Japanese foody would ever tolerate a cuisine less obsessively anal than sushi.

Which is why it’s unsurprising that the few truly authentic Australian foods all require beer. After all, they are all invented by Australians, a bunch of lanky crocodile wrestlers who nightly drink me under the table with Carleton Draft, Toohey’s New, and Victoria Bitter. That’s not true actually; some of them wrestle emus instead.

While camping in Kings Canyon (of 'Priscilla, Queen of the Desert’ fame) our bushman guide started with a bowl gripped between his knees, filled with flour. No, wait, first he got a stubby out of the esky and knocked back half of it. There was a hose with running water, so that got sprayed into the bowl for a bit, as did all the remaining beer. He kneaded it a few times, formed it into a round shape, stuck it in a black cast-iron pot, and buried it under the coals of our camp fire with a big-assed shovel.

About forty five minutes later we had a really decent loaf of heavy, crusty bread to go with our dinner of beer, more beer, and a different type of beer.

Here’s a slightly less authentic recipe.

Australian Cattleman’s Damper Bread
Preheat the oven to 350. Stir together 3 cups of all-purpose flour, 3 teaspoons of double acting baking powder, a teaspoon of salt, and 2 teaspoons of sugar. Then mix in 24 ounces of beer. That’s important.

Spoon the whole thing into a greased pan, smooth the top (and maybe dust with some flour if you’re feeling posh). Bake it for an hour until the top looks golden brown. Rip off chunks and shove in mouth.

Mango Wine - Better Than The Real Thing

Who the hell would rollerblade across the Australian red center? The Swiss, that’s who. And when they blow out a tire four hours north of Alice Springs, their only choice is to hitchhike with whatever crazy Americans happen to drive by on a food tour down the Stuart Highway.

We were on our way to Red Centre Farms when we picked up our underage rollerblader. I was eating Nutella out of the jar with my fingers. Amg was singing loudly to a punk cover of Mama Mia and banging on the dashboard. It wasn’t exactly a situation to inspire confidence, so when we turned off onto a small dirt track into the bush he probably assumed that he would never return to the fondue of his home again.

Red Centre Farms is just south of Ti-Tree, and their tagline is ‘A tin shed in the bush, not a castle in France’. Their prime export? Grapes and Mangoes. The entire area of dusty desert floats on a lake of water half the size of Sydney harbor if you dig down a meter, and dig they have. Perfectly geometrical rows of vines reach out into the hot hazy distance on one side, and an orchard of 1700 trees sprawls on the other.

The headquarters, a, yes, corrugated tin shack, instructed us to ring the bell if no one was in. Eventually a small weathered lady bustled around the side of the building, took one look at us, and declared, ‘we’ll have a tasting’. In no time we were herded to a plywood table with an alarming number of bottles. The lady gripped them between her knees to work out the corks while we slapped at the flies and sweated in the heat.

There was a uninspiring cabernet and shiraz mix, and a Riesling so dry that it could have been used for salad dressing. But that didn’t matter because Red Center Farm’s real export is Mango wines.

Oh yes, oh yes. All the nuance and delicate flavors of an excellent wine- and not a dessert wine either-but from a mango. We happily quaffed our way through a ‘Mango Magic’ (good with chicken or seafood) Mango Moonshine (a fortified liquor) and Mango Mist, a champagne better then anything I’ve ever had from grapes. The Swiss guy tucked right in, probably deciding that if he was about to die he might as well go happy.

There was much debate over mango chutney, marinade, topping, and jam, but in the end I bought only some champagne and our hitchhiker was persuaded to some mango sundae. Swaying from happy fumes, I had to ask: why don’t we get this stuff in the US? The answer was a shrug as she rang up our purchases- apparently almost their entire output each year goes to Japan. This gives me just one more reason, along with Pocky and tentacle porn, why it is imperative to invade right away.

Cravings For Life

All right, so it's not that I'm exactly on a diet. But my friends Kevin and Jess started the Body For Life exercise and eating plan a couple of weeks ago. Within one evening, I went from mocking them heavily to flirting with the idea of trying it myself.

And now, even though I'm not nearly as hardcore as they are (and if I ever go up to you in an earnest voice and tell you that you should "shoot for progress, not perfection", just shoot ME), I have been trying to balance my carbs and proteins, eat smaller meals, and exercise every day. I've always been anti-diet, so I'm even skeptical of myself here, and if I start hating my body or food in the process, I'm quitting promptly.

In the meantime, the fact that I'm cutting back at ALL has caused my body to shoot straight into Craving Mode. Doesn't matter if I wasn't eating that badly before - now all of a sudden junk food haunts my days and my dreams. These are the top 10 foods I've been missing these past two and a half weeks:

Nachos Bellgrande: Dude, I've been to Taco Bell maybe once in the past three years. I haven't been a fan since high school, and usually am all about its various nicknames, from Toxic Hell to Taco Smell...but for some reason (perhaps a late-night commerical?), I lie awake at night thinking about that liquid cheese. It's kind of pathetic.

Reduced Fat Pringles: If they're reduced fat, they must be permissible, right? Not if you're like me, and take their "Once you pop, you can't stop!" slogan to heart, devouring them by the can. I prefer the reduced fat ones to the original because of their lighter, crispier quality. I just wish I could treat them with self-control.

Ramen Noodles. For being someone who cooks reasonably well, invests a decent amount of money on groceries, and doesn't let a busy schedule interfere with her time in the kitchen, I eat a lot of Ramen noodles. I can't help it! They're cheap, they're salty, and I love making dishes like "I Can't Believe It's Just Ramen", where I jazz them up with dark-meat chicken, mushrooms and spices. But the sodium content's ridiculous, the carbs are junk ones and one packet actually supposedly holds two servings (what?). Alas, they must be cut down.

Pineapple Fried Rice: So it's not as commonplace as, say, cheese or chocolate, but it nearly killed me to go into a Thai restaurant and pass this old standard by. It's the unbeatable combination of sweet and savory.

Pizza: We can all get snobby and say our favorite foods are paella or crab (I know I do), but do we really enjoy anything as much as we do pizza? And if you're from the Midwest, you grow up thinking pepperoni is the ONLY suitable topping – not exactly the best choice for those avoiding fat.

Chick-Fil-A Nuggets: I worship at the altar of Chick-Fil-A and its pressure-cooked goodness. Kevin and I used to have a ritual where we'd pick some up before fencing class each week, and scarf them down before bouting (such an inspired idea). Those days are gone.

Duck, Thai-style: All right, so the list is a little Asian-influenced. I spend all my time at Thai/Vietnamese/Chinese restaurants, and you can only have so much steamed shrimp
and broccoli. Duck has the double-whammy of usually being fried (I've tried it steamed; it's not the same) AND being quite a fatty little creature. But oh, that glistening, crispy skin...

Sour Candy: I'm a lucky woman - I don't like sweet stuff, so this list is relatively candy/cookie/chocolate-free, and I'm none the worse for it. But sour candy is the only thing that can consistently get my sweet tooth. Ice-Breakers and their sugar-free sour drops are somewhat saving me here, but they still don't hold a candle to Sour Patch Kids. Or Sour Skittles. Or anything by the Warhead/Crybaby Tears brand. Or Sour Straws...

Garlic Bread: Yeah, yeah. I could probably justify eating some bastardized version, with whole wheat bread and fake butter. But wouldn't that just be blasphemy? Garlic Bread would definitely be served at my last meal before execution, no matter what it would be accompanying.

Those disgusting 7-Eleven breakfast concoctions: All right, I've probably had one of their cheddar/sausage english muffins a total of five times in my life. But that doesn't mean that after stopping in the convenience store this morning to buy skim milk, I didn't think about the greasy, almost-liquid-white-castle-meat combos during my entire 45 minute commute...

I certainly am not giving up any of these foods forever; in fact, the plan lets me eat whatever I want at least one day a week. I didn't even mention That Ingredient Which Shall Not Be Named, which will always be a part of my life. But regardless, wish me luck in my 12-week struggle.

Eggplant: The New Chicken?

My friend Margeau, much to our amusement, is always saying that lobster is the new chicken. My friend Margeau also, fortunately, has a wealthy boyfriend that keeps her lobster cravings satiated.

For those of us on a budget, we can’t upscale our diets quite so easily. But my weekend experiences with a particular plant have led me to believe that maybe, just maybe…eggplant is the new chicken?

First it was the stir fry. The little wedges of the purple plant that I sliced up and threw into my mixture of pork and endamame were a delightful, hearty accompaniment. I had some eggplant leftover by Sunday, so I decided to make quick-eggplant Parm with the rest. Since I’m on a pseudo-diet, I had to lighten the recipe a little, but it still was satisfying. And still is today, as I scarf down the leftovers for lunch.

Quick Eggplant Stir-fry

1/2 red onion
a couple cloves garlic
a handful chopped pork tenderloin or 1 boneless pork chop, sliced into small pieces
handful of basil leaves, chopped
soy sauce
1 cup chicken broth
corn starch
some mushrooms, sliced
1/2 cup endamame, frozen (avaiable at Trader Joe's)
red pepper flakes
some broccoli florettes
ginger, peeled and diced (or powdered works)
salt and pepper
sesame oil

Heat oil in skillet or wok. Sautee onion and garlic until onion is transluscent. Season pork and mushrooms with salt, pepper, red pepper and ginger. Add to stir fry along with eggplant and sautee until cooked through.

Add some soy sauce into the mix, to taste - cook for two more minutes.

Add one cup chicken broth, as well as the broccoli and endamame. Bring to boil; cover with lid for five minutes.

Make a paste with cornstarch and a little water. Add to sauce to thicken. Serve over chow mein noodles.

Quicker Eggplant Parmesan

1 eggplant, peeled and cut into round disks
1-2 egg whites
bread crumbs
some homemade tomato sauce from the freezer (or from a jar, for the less ambitious)
some part-skim mozzarella cheese, slimmed
Pam
Italian seasoning, or your own mix of basil, oregano, and the usual suspects
milk
salt and pepper

(As I said, this dish has been "healthified" to suit my resolution. Those not watching their calories should feel free to not skimp on the cheese, use olive oil and egg yolks, and do all those other calorie-adding steps that make it taste even better.)

Preheat oven to 400. Beat egg whites with a bit of milk, briefly, to make a wash. Coat skillet with cooking spray. Dip eggplant circles first in egg wash, then coat each side lightly with bread crumbs. Season with salt and seasonings and add to skillet. Brown on each side.

Start layering eggplant in baking dish. Put down a layer of eggplant, then two spoonfulls of sauce on each piece, then a sprinkling of mozzarella. Repeat.

Bake in oven for 20 minutes or until eggplant is golden and tender.

Cannoli

I love cannoli. It might be my favorite dessert, except I don't get it often enough to tell. You only ever get it at Italian restaurants, and even they often only have 'ice cream cannoli' or somesuch nonsense, or none at all. My memories of cannoli are easily traced back to the dearly departed Floriana Ristorante, where Matisse is now. Floriana may have made the perfect cannoli, or it could be over-idealized in my memory.

So, you can imagine my excitmglee when I saw the big stack of cannoli on the counter today at the Galileo Grill. For those who don't know, the Galileo Grill is, when open, the Best Thing to Do For Lunch in DC. Superstar chef Roberto Donna himself stands behind a counter, between it and the grill itself, making your sandwiches and scooping your soup and handing you your pizza, meatballs, or ribs.

Today I had the pork shoulder sandwich with provolone, broccoli rabe and green sauce, a selection always praised by Mr. Donna as his favorite. It was very tasty, but it was a little greasier than would be ideal, and one of my co-workers found she couldn't get her mouth around the thickly-stacked sandwich (I did not have that problem).

And I had a cannoli. The best cannoli, in my mind, do not involve chocolate; the textural necessities of the pastry, I believe, generally make the chocolate mousse too light for my taste. Galileo's has a 'light side' and a 'chocolate side' the former of which I much preferred. It had a delicious, creamy ricotta filling, topped with pistachios and hiding little bits of candied fruit in the very center. The chocolate side, unfortunately, did fall in line with other cannolis, being a bit too light and fluffy and not enough CHOCOLATE for my tastes. This is not at all to say I didn't thoroughly enjoy it, and won't be getting it again ASAP. The light, crispy shell was perfect, and it fell apart in the last few bites, leaving me to lick the last gooey bits of filling from my fingers. Dignified I was not - luckily my office has a door!

At $8 for the sandwich (rabe and provolone extra), $2.50 for the cannoli - a very good deal!

The Galileo Grill
1110 21st St. NW
Washington, DC 20036
202.293.7191

Resaturant Week Review: Wine Edition

Yes, yes, I went to Ceiba for lunch on Friday for Restaurant Week. And it was excellent. But I am here to write about wine, and I didn’t drink any wine at Ceiba, due to the fact that it was the middle of the early afternoon, and I was broke from dining out twice already last week. I graciously defer to MJF’s awesome review. I did go to two other restaurants, though, and since it was normal dinner time, and since I was not-so-broke, I tried some excellent wines.

Tuesday night at Galileo, not only were the Restaurant Week food prices discounted, their wine list was equally—if not more—economical. The restaurant’s actual list is, according to their website, "too long to post on [their] website". I assume it is rather extensive, probably changing quite often as management and the sommelier see fit, and probably very pricey. For Restaurant Week, Galileo featured two wines, a red and a white, priced at $5/glass, or $18/bottle. My friends and I opted for a bottle of the red. I usually get to choose the wine; I was having beef for dinner, and $18 for a bottle of wine at a nice restaurant really can’t be beat. The waiter brought a bottle of Il Turchino Chianti to the table. This Chianti, like many, was made from the Sangiovese grape. The wine was dry but light; it paired really nicely with my chilled tomato soup (with almonds! But this isn’t a food review), and was quite tasty with my beef dish, although a more robust Chianti Classico would have made a better match. This wine might have gone better with pasta or roast chicken, but I enjoyed it a lot. Il Turchino retails for $5.99/bottle, and will be much better with food than as a sipping wine. If you can find this wine, buy and drink it, especially at this low price.

Thursday night took me and my girls to Butterfield 9. The atmosphere was decidedly less stuffy than at Galileo, but they featured a full wine list (at full prices). Since I was having fish, (Tasmanian steelhead trout), I wanted a white wine, and I chose the Barnard Griffin Fumé Blanc, priced at $8/glass. I liked this wine a lot, and Fumé Blanc goes very well with fish. Technically, "fumé blanc" is just an American synonym for "sauvignon blanc," and the grapes share a lot of the same characteristics. The Barnard Griffin was very uncomplicated: crisp and fruity, pairing equally well with my appetizer of seared Day Boat scallops. This wine retails for $10/bottle.

Restaurant Week is worth the effort not only for the low-priced meals (and my meals were GOOD!), but also for the wines you can now afford to pair with your food. I find myself more willing to go out on a limb with my wine, and maybe splurge a bit, if I’m not paying an arm and a leg for my food. Both restaurants were absolutely wonderful—the food was inspiring, and the company was fantastic. Can’t wait for six months from now, and our next Restaurant Week!

Cakelove meets Food Network

Kanishka over at DCist points out something we missed. Washington, DC's Warren Brown, owner of Cakelove and Love Cafe, will be getting his own 13-episode show on Food Network entitled "Sugar Rush".

Unlike DCist, we're big fans of Cakelove and Love Cafe, and we've been known to enjoy a cupcake, a coffee, and a bit of free wireless while waiting for a show to start down the road at the 9:30 Club.

So to Mr. Brown, a great congratulations! We're looking forward to see the series.

Read more in the Washington Post article.

Hard Times Cafe: An Uneducated Opinion

It's the ultimate "nature vs nurture" question - how much are our palates defined by our upbringing?

Will no food truly taste as good as mom used to make? Is the pizza you're raised on the pizza you will always love best?

I'm not sure where I fall in this argument. On the one hand, I was raised in Cleveland, and the pizza of my youth was thick-crust, deep-dish, almost fast-food-like in quality. I never lost my inbred notion that pepperoni is the superior pizza topping, but once I moved to NYC for college, I knew I'd found the place that does pizza best.

On the other hand, no Chinese restaurant will ever hold a candle to Dragon Gate, the place 10 minutes down the road that still remembers my order when I'm home visiting my parents. On the one hand, some of the appeal lies in the fact it's the only Chinese-restaurant-ice-cream-parlor-driving-range-mini-golf-course I'm aware of, but I've never found a won ton soup, egg roll or Hong Kong Chicken to top it. Meanwhile, when I eagerly bring friends from different regions to sample the place's cuisine, they deem it mediocre at best.

Chili's one of those foods that seems to have quite a few regional advocates who profess their city's concoction is the greatest. Ohio had its own claim to the crown - the chili-on-spaghetti which Cincinnati made famous. Growing up, I only got the chance to sample this style from the chain restaurant Skyline Chili and my sister and I quickly pronounced it as "sick." So much for regional pride.

Then again, I don't think I'm much of a chili connoisseur. Chili in my house consisted of a can of tomato sauce, ground beef, onions and kidney beans - the only thing it really had going for it was the fact it was always served Halloween night, pre-Trick-or-Treating. My favorite chili recipe now is less-than-authentic, and certainly not grounded in Ohio pride - it's one I've adapted from the queen of cooking shortcuts, Rachael Ray.

So with all these caveats, you can decide how much stock to place on my opinion when I tell you about the chili at Hard Times Cafe in Springfield, Va.

The place seems to enjoy a reputation as one of the top chili haunts in the area, alongside the much-touted Ben's Chili Bowl downtown. Though I was attempting that day to save room for a Restaurant Week dinner at Ceiba, I decided to give the place's signature dish a shot.

I ordered the Chili Bubba, which allows you to pick two of the restaurant's chili styles. Both are smothered with cheese, tomatoes, onions and sour cream, and layered on top two hunks of cornbread.

I went with the traditional Texas style, and decided to "represent" and choose the Cincinnati chili as well. The verdict? Well, I couldn't distinguish much between the two. The Cincinnati style had faint tones of cinnamon and was noticably sweeter, but the recipes didn't veer far from each other.

That said, the meal was hearty and delicious, and the cornbread was a savory compliment, though filling enough to not allow me to finish the dish. I could have used a little more heat, but it's all about personal preference.

I also could have used better service - our waitress took an excrutiatingly long time with the beverages and meals, and made her share of errors, including ignoring all of a companion's South-Beach-motivated requests for her salad, and neglecting to leave off the sour cream on my dish, as I'd asked. It didn't sour the meal for me, but might try the patience of those in a hurry.

That said, the place has an abundant selection of chili options (even that old "On Top Of Spaghetti" standby is there), as well as a fun bar and a number of pool tables. I may not have much of a basis of comparison to rate their chili (other chili fan readers, feel free to weigh in!), but they gave me a good meal and a fun afternoon, so I can't fault them for that.

Devonshire Tea in the Australian Outback

Editor's note: As you may have noticed, zaf and amg are out of "jellyfish-for-breakfast" and "don't drink the water" territory and have moved on to even less hospitable places -- like the Australian outback, where you can drives for hundreds of miles without seeing another living person. Unless, of course, you know where to stop.

Like a mirage in the Australian outback desert, Fran’s Devonshire Tea House appears on the side of the Stuart Highway as you hit the town of Larrimah. It’s about 180km south of Katherine and about 500km north of Tennant Creek, the nearest towns of any size.

“Help yourself to tea and coffee,” Fran says when we arrive. It takes a minute to realize that the lady speaking to us is Fran and not hired help. In fact, there is no hired help. Fran’s Tea House seems to consist of Fran, several grandkids, and Fran’s daughter Michelle, who gets roped into doing some of the cooking, cleaning, money handling, and just about everything else.

Fran must be in her late 60s. She's a matronly woman who spends her days cooking meat pies and scones to feed to travelers driving down the long road between Darwin and Alice Springs.

“I’ve just pulled a buffalo chili and cheese pie out of the oven.” says Fran. We are told, matter of fact, that we should have a pie and a scone so we could try both.

“And while you wait, you can get to know these nice folks,” prompts Fran.

These nice folks are Sue & Les, a retired couple spending two years caravanning around Australia. The back of their camper is emblazoned with “Buggawork” and “Sue & Les.” They’ve stopped in for a scone and a coffee at Fran’s on the recommendation of one of the guidebooks. Fran’s is, by now, in all the guidebooks.

"Is that the camel?" asks Sue when our meat pie arrives seconds later.

It isn’t, but it easily could be. Fran sells camel, buffalo, beef and fruit pies; cornish pasties; scones; waffles; and sandwhiches.

The buffalo pie is fantastic. It's a flaky pie crust filled with buffalo meat simmered in chili and covered in melted cheese. I briefly consider my chances of survival 200km from the nearest Internet connection (and my heart’s chances of surviving more of her pies) and flirt with asking Fran if I could move in and have her cook for me every day.

As we eat, Fran’s grandchildren run around the yard between the tea house and the various other buildings. One building must be the old police station, although we’re too enthralled with the pie and scone to explore any further.

"There’s no drugs, no swearing around the kids out here," Fran says. Fran’s grandkids study via a correspondence school.

We’re some of Fran’s earlier guests, having arrived at about 9 in the morning. Based on the number of pies Fran has cooked up, she’ll get a steady stream of hungry visitors well into the early evening when traffic on the highway dies down and Larrimah is returned to its proper residents.

Larrimah's official population is 20. It's unofficial population, best I can tell, is Fran, her husband, her daughter, and her grandkids. There's little else around beside's the Tea House, but Fran’s is more than enough to warrant an entire township.

Located on the site of the Larrimah Old Police Station and Museum, Fran’s is the official tourist information from the area, beckoning cars off the highway with the generic blue and white “i” sign -- the universal symbol for “tourist help” -- and with even more appealing hand-written signs offering buffalo and beef pies, fresh pastries, and drinks. Larrimah is significantly much better known for Fran’s cooking than for anything else.

As we’re preparing to leave, we peak our heads into Fran’s kitchen, savoring the smell of freshly-baked meat pies, and ask Fran if we can take her picture. Her daughter, Michelle, grumbles, "I still have a hangover," as she and her Mom pose before fresh racks of camel, buffalo, and beef pies.

Fran has been cooking for 33 years and running her Devonshire Tea House for the last 22. They talked about moving south at some point, but decided against it. "Where else can I have all this?" asks Fran.

Fran's Devonshire Tea House | Larrimah, NT, Australia
(no street address necessary)

Hard Times at the Crowne Plaza

There are three ways of getting an extra star for your hotel’s rating, and only one of them involves nice facilities and good service. Of the remaining two, the only legal choice is to add on extra restaurants, pools, and other random-assed stuff ‘til the judges just cave in from embarrassment. It doesn’t matter if you’ve converted the janitor’s closet into a computer center by storing the fax machine there; that line in your brochure means an automatic extra star for you.

This seems to be the tact taken by the Alice Springs Crowne Plaza. Yes, it’s in the middle of the desert. Yes, it’s staffed by locals - and, yes, you don’t get much more local than the Australian outback. Yes, it has to truck all the food and materials 1500km. But Las Vegas has to do all that stuff too and somehow they seem to have gotten the hang of this crazy hotel thing without too much difficulty.

Zaf and Amg are driving down through Australia’s Northern Territory into the Red Center. Natural hazards include suicidal wallabies, local rodeos, rancid fish n’ chips, and if that wasn’t enough, a big-assed scary desert with rocks in. So when you’ve spent all day dodging road trains in an three year old Nissan Pulsar, filled with contraband produce and an underaged Swiss hitchhiker, you start hoping that Alice Springs means a return to civilization.

Well, it doesn’t, but we didn’t know that. We booked in at the four-star Crowne Plaza, shed our hitchhiker, and drove through town in search of the revered logo. It was constructed from corrugated aluminum, the kind familiar to us from the infrequent cattle-processing stations along the highway. Inside was a little nicer - definitely up to Econo-Lodge or Days' Inn level.

The bloke at the desk was courteous, right up until he noticed that we’d booked through an online retailer. You could see his face go ‘Ohhh…’ as he made a few extra notes on the computer. The room contained a stained carpet, ripped wallpaper, bare mattresses, and a weird smell. The single forlorn picture on the wall subscribed to the ever popular 'Art By the Pound' school of design. And the lock on the balcony was broken, something you really care about when you’re on the ground floor in a town famous for its substance abuse and you're traveling with a sizable amount of electronics. We waited about 45 minutes for them to decide on another room scruffy enough for us.

It was downhill from there. The maintenance guys next door decided to have a drilling competition. We were asked to close our door so they could chuck a huge mound of trash off the roof onto our balcony. At our Indian dinner they gave us the wrong bill... twice. The lunchtime salad contained shredded credit card; exhaustive investigation proved that it was, in fact, slices of fossilized parmesan.

Now, if I don’t check in once in a while, work is sure to realize that I’m not at my desk anymore. We’d booked because they claimed to have some sort of in-room internet. What did this mean? They offer a phone jack. Not a separate one, but the bloke at the desk gave us full permission to unplug the phone and use its cord to ‘try to dial up AOL or whatever’.

I appreciate that four stars is not actually that great. But there’s an important lesson in this for all the ‘Silver Pines Motor Lodge With Color TV’s of the world. That extra star doesn’t require anything but a spare pool and desperate clientele. Yep, we’re staying. Why? Because there’s nothing but rocks and dingoes from here to Adelaide - where I hear they have a Hyatt Regency.

zaf: yeah, this one isnt strictly about food, but we were getting too much good press.

15 Ria - Why Do You Exist?

You expect a restaurant that's been around a while, and has gotten fairly good reviews, would be at least moderately good. Especially at $9 a sandwich. 15 Ria raises a few questions here.

Some time back, the Doubletree hotel folks were out in Dupont Circle, dressed as cookies, handing out cookies and coupons for free dessert with an entrée at 15 Ria, the Rhode Island Avenue Doubletree’s trendy restaurant. Doing what summer interns do best – scavenging and Xeroxing – our interns collected their cookies and coupons, and made copies for everyone in the office.

Fast forward a few weeks, and it’s time to redeem these coupons. Friday was intern T’s last day, so five of us joined T and the other intern, G, at 15 Ria for a farewell lunch. Six of us arrived time for our noon reservation, and were seated immediately in the almost-empty dining room, with one straggler arriving maybe fifteen minutes late. After sitting, we were asked at least five times if our seventh guest was indeed coming. Our straggler, Coworker L, arrived, and 15 Ria is still not crowded; I wonder why they were so concerned over Coworker L’s tardiness.

The restaurant is very pretty, with warm yellow and ochre, and the chairs are arranged around the tables, alternating one big-ish comfy chair and one more traditional dining chair. Some tables had couches. This I like. I do not, however, like whoever is butchering “Somewhere over the Rainbow” on the restaurant’s sound system.

We ordered drinks and bread arrived. The breads were a basic French bread and a very nice fig and pignolia bread. The bread was tasty, but I was a bit disappointed that they never offered more: the seven of us polished off the two small (5 or so slices each) quickly, and more would have been nice while we considered the menu. A good portion of the menu is available on the Restaurant Week special, but none of us want that much food, so we refrain. The food came, and trouble began.

Coworker S had a grilled veggie wrap, which she described as basic and boring. On this alone I would mark 15 Ria down several notches: grilled vegetables are possibly the easiest thing in the universe to do well – all you need is good veggies and a grill, plus maybe some salt. The choice of eggplant, squash, and peppers is not a great combination – all three starchy, two subtly flavored – and will not make a good sandwich; a chef should know that, or at least spice them creatively to make up.

Coworkers D and B each had the crab cakes, which looked very pretty, all golden-brown and drizzled with some sort of red dressing (not, I would wager, enough to taste). D and B said they were good, but neither seemed especially impressed. I was sitting at the other end of the table so I didn’t get a good look, and neither D nor B was especially talkative, so it’s hard to say more.

Coworker C had a roasted duck, which sounded really good, and she allowed me a taste. The duck itself was a good quality cut, cooked just right, but it was too salty, and with an overwhelming smoky flavor that masked the duck entirely. We agreed that it was Way Too Much.

I ordered a “Grilled Chicken Club,” which resembled a club sandwich only in that it had a toothpick through the middle: a toasted not very sourdough-y bun enclosed about 8 grilled chicken strips (think fajitas), a couple slices of avocado and tomato, and some lettuce. And a completely unremarkable “basil mayonnaise.” It came with a side salad - a nice selection of red and green lettuce doused in creamy vinaigrette. Coworker L had a bowl of tomato soup and half of the same chicken sandwich. She said the soup was “definitely tomato” – not unlike pureed tomato in a bowl.

Interns T and G both had grilled salmon, which looked OK, if a bit dry, and came with a grit cake, the idea of which fascinates me. They said it tasted like grits in the middle and hashbrowns on the outside, so I may have to attempt them at home. They were not particularly impressed by the salmon.

Next came dessert, for which there was really only one choice, as far as most of us were concerned: the “Dessert Flight,” small portions of the crème brulée, blueberry cobbler, and molten chocolate, served in shot glasses. A few of our umber just ordered full portions of the crème brulée. Let it first be said that small desserts in shot glasses is a fun idea, but 15 Ria should really invest in some small spoons. Eating out of a shot glass with full-sized flatware is an unnecessary challenge.

The molten chocolate is fantastic. Hot, gooey, dark, and not too sweet – a clear winner. The blueberry cobbler, similar to the tomato soup, tasted like cooked blueberries with a bit of cake on top. Borrrrrrrriiiiiing. The crème brulée is the real disappointment though: the menu advertises it as having a “hint of mint,” but this hint is more of an overpowering flavor of raw mint stems. The crème is a bit runny too. I love mint, but this is no good.

So: 15 Ria gets one thumb down. S got very ill later in the afternoon, and thinks it might have been from the food. 15 Ria gets two thumbs down. Oh well.

15 Ria
1515 Rhode Island Avenue, NW
Washington DC, 20005
202-742-0015

More Love For Fud

First The Washingtonian, this week, On Tap Magazine. The guide to relieving boredom offers a shoutout to Fud, Fun Things To Do In DC, DCist, The DCeiver and Wonkette, calling us "Blogs We Love."

Why are we so special? According to the article, Fud "teaches even the most hopeless of us where and how to eat." We also get some appreciation for refusing to look down on bar food and snacks. There's even a picture of us!

Apparently a lack of snobbery can get you major props in this town. At least occasionally.

Sometimes your past catches up to you

Weight Watchers recipe cards, circa 1974 are something that you just need to experience on your own.

More Restaurant Week: Belga Cafe

The chef at Belga Cafe is pretty accomplished. Lots of noteworthy "palmares" to use a cycling term. It's advertised as a Belgian restaurant complete with a proper Vlaamse chef. Having spent some time living in that part of the world, I am always anxious to eat at a place that is properly European. They offered a limited selection for Restaurant Week (RW):

Lunch

Red & Green--Tomato confit stuffed with baby grey shrimps and Salade Roulade with goat cheese and fresh herbs

Mussels--Mussels with Rodenbach beer, asparagus and bacon

or

Steak--Grilled hanger steak with béarnaise-beer sauce, farm vegetables and Belgian fries

Red Fruit Soup--Cherry and peach beer soup with fresh berry’s, home made vanilla ice cream

Dinner

Tomato, Sushi & Cigaar--Tomato gelee with seafood and curry-creme, a Chinese salad with Belga’s Cigaar and ‘Belgian Endive Sushi’

Rabbit and Crawfish--Rabbit fillet and sausage with sautéed Girolle mushrooms and crawfish tails, accompanied by a lobster and béarnaise sauce

The Belga Dessert Sampler--Belgian chocolate, summer fruit, home-made ice cream and Belgian Waffle

Nothing particularly struck a fancy with me, plus I wanted some good Belgian mussels, so I forewent the RW menu and went straight for the normal menu. I had:

Lauwe Aspargesalade: a baked asparagus salad with frisee tossed in a simple vinegarette topped with slightly cooked pieces of salmon. I have to note here that they totally forgot I ordered this. As I reminded them after one of my dining companions had already finished her salad and they were setting down the flatware for the next course, they finally brought it to me. Time was about 40 minutes after we sat down at the table. I'll revisit this issue later. The salad itself was perfectly done otherwise. The salmon was fresh and just the right combination of seared on the outside and pretty much raw on the inside.

Mussels with Rodenbach Ale, bacon, and asparagus: Nothing really to say except this was exactly what I was looking for. Served with Vlaamse frites, this really hit the spot. Not a bad thing to say about this and you get exactly what you think it is. The mussels themselves were perfectly done.

Ice cream with waffles and chocolate sauce: Simple, exactly what the name of it is. The waffles were soft and tasty, the chocolate sauce was the consistency of Nutella, but good nonetheless. It reminded me of getting waffles at this corner pastry shop on the Leidsestraat in Amsterdam. Not Belgian, I know, but they were good waffles.

So I have to mention that the service was flat out bad. Between them forgetting my salad, LONG delays in service, I was really ready to hate this place. I really wanted to hate the aspargesalade but, damn, it was good. I just couldn't get myself to do it. The place was packed, and we even had to wait quite a while to get our seat even though we had a reservation. The staff was trying though, and I think RW just really pushed the limits of the small space and the small staff. I'm not quite sure I could hold that against them in good conscience. I definitely would like to go back when it's not RW and see how different things are then. I'm definitely going back for the mussels.

Belga Cafe
514 8th St SE
Washington, DC 20003
(202) 544-0100

Restaurant Week Reflection: Ceiba

Yeah, yeah, DcFud has done its share of talking about Ceiba, but we feel it's a moral imperative for us to share any and all of our Restaurant Week experiences, so we feel we're on at least moderately solid ground here.

The popular restaurant from the Ten Penh, DC Coast family doesn't skimp when it comes to Restaurant Week. Though appetizers and dessert selections are partially limited (offering only one of their famous ceviches along with all their soups or salad, and three dessert choices), the restaurant allows patrons to choose any entree off the restaurant's extensive menu for the $30.05 deal (there's a justifiable $7 surcharge for the Ribeye steak).

My best decision for the evening: the golden tomato gazpacho, served over a crab ceviche with a tomato gourmet. This was a delightful surprise; I'd ordered it after wavering between this and the ceviche, and seeking our friendly waiter's advice. The delicate flakes of crab added a richness to the cool broth, and the real treat was the sorbet - tomato sounds like a less than appealing flavor, but it added a lovely sweetness to the dish.

For dinner, it was crab two ways - a crabcake over avocado, and a lightly-fried softshell crab over a shredded jicama salad. The salad wasn't my favorite part of the meal, though I enjoyed the crisp jicama, but the crabcake was hearty and tasty. This was my first softshell experience, and I'm sure it won't be my last.

Not much of a dessert person, none of the three selections interested me too much. I went with the key lime panna cotta, served with what was either papaya or mango. The overall effect was too sweet for my palate, though I enjoyed the dish's creaminess.

With dinner, inspired by a recent Dcist post, I had a Spanish rose, which was an appropriately light accompaniment (I couldn't tell you the label, though, and it seems inaccessible on the website). A friend had less success with her choice of a Riesling.

Companions were pleased with halibut, black bean soup and scallops, though a friend's salmon dish had a strangely sour purple-colored sauce that none of us found particularly impressive.

Sure, we ate at 9 p.m., but the restaurant still deserves credit for giving us attentive, unrushed service during this busy time. As we were celebrating a birthday, they added nice touches like personalized menus and a candle in the birthday girl's dessert. We also were given a beautiful table near the window.

Our incessant promotion aside, Ceiba's a great bargain when RW comes around.

Fiddlin' with the cobbler

For those of you who don't know me, I'm a control freak. I do need to do things MY way. This ends up being true with recipes. I change them to fit my quirks and idiosyncrasies all the time.

So one night, some of J's co-workers are coming over for dinner. They are bringing a fabulous salad and we'll be tossing some homemade pesto (that I made and froze) with some pasta. Salad and entrée done. I simply cannot have a dinner party (such that it is) without dessert.

I look for a cobbler recipe since they are fairly easy to assemble. Being the control freak I am, I don't want just any old cobbler, I want the cakey kind. There are two kinds of cobbler, the biscuit kind that has what is essentially a scone dough floating on top of the fruit, and the cakey kind where the cakelike batter oozes down into the fruit and marries it into a fruit cakey mess of goodness. I find the following recipe on Epicurious.

For filling
1 stick butter
1 teaspoon lemon juice
4 cups fresh blueberries, rinsed and drained
1 cup sugar

For topping
1 cup self-rising flour
1 cup sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla flavoring
1/2 cup of milk
Accompaniment: Fresh whipped cream or vanilla ice cream

To prepare the filling:
Preheat oven to 375°F. Place the butter in an 8 x 8-inch square glass baking dish (no substitutes), and melt the butter in the microwave. In a mixing bowl, combine lemon juice and blueberries. Add the sugar and mix well. Add the blueberry mixture to the baking dish with the melted butter. Do not stir.

Make topping:
Combine all of the topping ingredients in a small bowl. Pour this mixture over the blueberries and bake 45 minutes, or until brown. This recipe is also good for apples, blackberries, and peaches.

A STICK of butter? A CUP of sugar in the fruit? The poor fruit will be doing the backstroke in a pool of sugary butter? I promptly cut the amount of butter and sugar in the fruit by half and cut the sugar in the topping by a third. Along with the lemon juice in the filling, I add a dash of REAL vanilla. I also add a half a teaspoon of cinnamon in the topping batter for added flavor.

I crossed my fingers about this because I changed the recipe fairly radically. It turned out wonderfully. Tasting a piece of the topping without the fruit, I actually thought I could have cut the amount of sugar in half, not just by a third. While it's not always advisable to play with recipes when it comes to baking, my control freak mind can't help but tinker with a recipe.

The learning is cheap (but the malaria pills cost a bit)

When people claim to be self-taught on a certain subject, most often they actually mean one of two things: 1) ‘Yeah, I went to school for it but it doesn’t count ‘cause they didn’t really teach me anything; or 2) ‘I have huge gaps in my knowledge base.’ Zaf is guilty of both answers, and with her current hand-to-mouth-ism she isn’t getting to the culinary institute of NY any time soon. There was only one thing to do- learn it on the cheap in Vietnam.

This is a roundabout way of saying that a few weeks ago found me cruising around the provincial village of Hoi An, about five hours south from the DMZ. I was looking for one of the fabled cooking schools, but finding one was tougher than getting a Ha Noi bookseller to give correct change. Why? Because every single store was pushing cheap silk knockoffs of last years J Crew catalog, made while you wait. So when I say ‘finding one was tough’, what I actually mean was ‘I deeply regret that I was forced to stop and buy a silk shirt every five feet.’

So it was through blind luck that I finally found a small sign in Hai Scout Cafe where I stopped for a bowl of the local noodle dish, Cao lau. The Red Bridge Cooking School: a full half day’s lesson in traditional Central Vietnamese food was 14 dollars US and it was still the most I’d spent on anything, including hotels, since I’d arrived in the country.

The next morning started with the required walk-through of the local market. We established the medicinal uses of turmeric (stick it on zits), how to choose a good squid (flesh should be white and stiff) and what’s up with all that unripe papaya they eat (you have to use a special peeler-thing). All the while getting pushed, cursed at, and stepped on by tiny ladies with yolks of soup and peanuts slung over their shoulders and baskets of lettuces and fish and kids stacked high on their heads.

Then we all scooted onto a boat and put-putted towards the school, up the muddy stream that flows through the village. A whole bunch of fisherman in wooden canoes and conical hats were throwing their nets into the water, and further up there were huge nets the size of tennis courts lining both banks on bamboo poles. Apparently at night they shine a light in the center and then scoop out all the stuff that it attracts. Like tourists.

The school turned out to be a restaurant with an extra big gazebo out in front overhanging the river. For Vietnam, land of the impromptu and jerry-rigged, it was surprisingly well done. We each had our own stove, all utensils were provided, and there was no lack of demonstrators, dish washers, people to make sure we didn’t light ourselves on fire, and a translator to explain it all.

The menu was a warm squid salad, roasted fish, eggplant stew in clay pots, yellow vegetable pancakes, and finally, homemade rice wrappers to use for spring rolls. These last things were so damn hard that not a single one of us got the bamboo flippy-motion the first time around; mess ups and waste water were thrown directly into river.

Anyway, I only found out later that the Red Bridge School is the most famous cooking school for English-speakers in Vietnam, with a recent cover article in the NY Times. Who knew. I’d just stopped for a bowl of noodles.