Awesome Tofu, Bloody Simple

Tofu gets a bad rap. Worse yet, it also gets abused so frequently that one can understand why - tofu is not (a) a substitute for meat (b) a substitute for eggs, (c) a substitute for anything else, or (d) particularly forgiving. Treating tofu like the good little flavor-sponge it is can yield tasty results, but sometimes it's fun to take it in a different direction entirely. This ridiculously simple (but, alas, not very quick) recipe is great for any tofu you'd like to use as a meal on its own, or for incorporation into other dishes as a side, texture, or whatever. The sauce and egg steps are optional, but make a delicious meal.

What to do:

Cube a block of extra firm tofu (at room temperature), and dice a small shallot.

This will probably only work in a very well seasoned cast-iron pan, so get one heating on high. Fry the shallot (don't add any oil unless you absolutely can't avoid it). Now, reduce the heat to medium-low and add the tofu so that it all lays flat on the pan.

Leave that alone for about five minutes, and make sauce:

Add about 2 tbs. Bragg's (soy sauce might work too), some sriracha, a couple splashes of oil, and a quarter cup of water (or stock) to a glass. Grind in a bit of coriander and some mustard seed. Stir like hell.

Now, toss your tofu around so that it's all been flipped - what was on top is now touching the pan. Leave it another five minutes or so and repeat, except this time do a half-flip, so the sides get some heat. And, again. 4 of the cubes' eight sides should be nice and brown. Stir your sauce again, and toss it in, turning the heat back up to high. Stir the tofu around in the sauce, and let it reduce away (this shouldn't take very long at all).

Now, remove the tofu to a bowl, and add a bit more oil to the pan. Crack your egg and fry it up to your preferred texture (I suggest a runny yolk, it works nicely). Serve the tofu with pickled tindora and the egg. Delicious and healthy!!!

Caramelized Onion Quiche with Potato Crust

Here is an article from Guest Blogger: The Slapdash Sewist. The original entry is from February and is located here and includes step-by-step pictures. The lovely blogger in question and I were eating rice crispy treats in Teasm recently and she graciously offered us one of her recipes.

-JAY
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Quiche is an easy (though not quite quick because of the long cooking time) dish for a satisfying brunch, and you can make it in almost infinite variations. Here's one of them.

Caramelized Onion Quiche with Potato Crust

3-4 medium sized red potatoes
Medium onion
Swiss Cheese
Eggs
Cottage Cheese
Milk
Thyme
Ground Bay Leaf
Salt
Pepper
Cayenne Pepper

1. Slice the potatoes very thinly, about 1/8 inch. I use my mandoline for this. No need to peel. Place in cold water on the stove and when it comes to a boil set the timer for four minutes. This will parboil the potatoes to make sure they are not crunchy when the quiche comes out of the oven. Drain. When cool enough to handle, oil your pie pan and layer the potato slices to form a crust.

2. Thinly slice an onion. I used the 1/4" setting on my mandoline for this. Heat a pan over medium heat and when heated pour in some olive oil and add the onion. Saute until it turns golden almost to brown. Spread the caramelized onions over the potato crust.

3. Grate cheese over the onions. I like to use Swiss cheese because it has a strong flavor that stands up to the other ingredients.

4. Mix up the filling. For this 9 inch pie I used 3 eggs plus the white of an egg I had leftover from another recipe, about half the container of cottage cheese (1 cup), and about half a cup of milk. There's really no need to measure, just make it liquid but not soupy. Use herbs and spices to your liking. For this one I used thyme, ground bay leaf (it's Badia brand from the Hispanic foods section), salt, pepper, and cayenne pepper. I normally wouldn't add salt, but I accidentally bought no-salt-added cottage cheese. If I had made spinach quiche, I would have used basil and oregano. Mushroom would have been thyme and sage. Pour the filling over the crust, onions, and cheese. Don't get too ambitious in how much filling you make, because it will puff up during cooking and could overrun the pan if you've filled it to the very top.

5. Bake at 350 for 40-50 minutes, until it is firm in the center and the top is beginning to brown. The outer potatoes will be very dark and crispy (but not burnt). If you had any potato rounds leftover, toss them in olive oil, place on a baking sheet in a single layer, sprinkle with salt, and throw them in the oven with the quiche for some oven potato chips.

And you have a quiche! Serve warm, tepid, or cold. I prefer warm, but I don't like cold foods. I made this the night before and refrigerated when it was cooled. To serve, I cut two slices, grated a little extra cheese over the top, and heated in a 200 degree (Farenheit) toaster oven until warm. Yum!

Delicious Living

Delicious Living is a free magazine that is distributed at Teaism. The magazine's tagline is "Real food - Natural Health - Green Planet" and it features some good recipes.

This month, they have recipes for 5 exotic sounding rice dishes and a few winter salads.

Previously, they printed this recipe for spicy toasted almonds. You know this stuff is addictive...so expect the FDA to ban it soon. When I make these almonds, I use Hungarian sweet paprika and a combination of orange rind and mixed color peppercorns, which I grind in a peppermill.

The Five Paragraph Bitter Food Critic Needs Beta Blockers

Not even three weeks into the new year, and I already have a serious contender for the highly-uncoveted title of "Worst Restaurant Meal of 2009." If this meal had taken place in 2008, it would have won like Usain Bolt. If I'd had this meal in 2007, it would have won like Barbaro in the `06 Kentucky Derby. Only a couple of burnt hamburgers-slash-hockey pucks in Des Moines and a ridiculously spoiled swordfish fillet on undercooked linguine in Baltimore's Little Italy keep this debacle out of the "Worst Restaurant Meal of the Double-Aughts" status. And here's the kicker - it started off fine but, man, how it proceeded... nothing less than a sin against all that is holy and deep-fried. I shall explain.

A shopping trip in the Virginia `burbs with a friend ran much later than expected, and the Vietnamese place we wanted to try had long closed by the time we walked into the frigid air. Hungry and cold, we settled on a nearby local chain, Glory Days Grill, figuring a warm meal in a lively atmosphere would help lift our spirits. I've had decent salads from there before, so it seemed like a good idea. The menu is nothing fancy - standard bar grub but with a Chesapeake twist - Old Bay seasoned wings and real Maryland crab cakes are a nice touch - and with local professional and amateur sports teams' paraphernalia on the walls, proves that this is a restaurant based here and focusing on here.

Much like "Wedding Crashers," the meal began promisingly enough. A cup of clam chowder was filled with plenty of fresh seafood and seasoned correctly. But remember that breakfast scene with Vince Vaughn and Owen Wilson, and the movie seemed to lose a lot of steam? Well, the same thing happened with this meal, except much earlier in the film. The appetizer was the breakfast scene, with no Will Ferrell around to save the meal from disaster.

Now, as a rule, it's hard to botch fries. Les Pommes Frites are about as common and simple of a food as can be found. Cut the potato in to strips. Fry the potato strips. Drain. Serve. Boom. Done. If you're feeling zany, bake them. Bread them. Make them curly and season them. Bury them in gravy, or cheese, or go crazy like the Quebecois and use both and call it poutine. Just don't serve them how I got them Friday night - apparently marinated in salt, cooked in salt, coated in salt, and then, for good measure, add salt. I used to bartend at a margarita joint, and we had boxes of sea salt that we used to rim the glasses. A prankster co-worker poured about a cup of sea salt into my Starbucks one day, and that wasn't as salty as these fries. I now know what a deer feels like during hunting season. I have tasted the salt lick, now, where are the guys in camouflage jackets and bright orange hats?

Sadly, our entrees were equally salty. My friend's chili mac made her mouth pucker as the saline sucked the moisture from her skin. My chicken sandwich was ridiculously overseasoned, and I might be mistaken as the sodium-induced dehydration is affecting my short-term memory, but my side dish may very well have been the Bonneville Salt Flats. When the server asked if we wanted dessert, one thought permeated my mind - I normally love Teaism's delicious Salty Oat Cookies, but I had one right now, I would have an aneurysm. Seven hours later, and nearly half-a-gallon of water later, I still might. We skipped dessert, much like the arrhythmia is doing to my heartbeat.

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Glory Days gets 2 Whammies! out of a possible 8. The clam chowder was certainly acceptable, and the server was fairly snappy with refilling our water glasses. However, between the two of us, there are 8 chambers of our two hearts that now need replacing. No one should ever have this conversation after a meal - "My heart hurts." "Yeah, mine too. Know a good cardiologist?"
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Glory Days Grill
Lots of locations in the region, many of them conveniently located near emergency rooms and defibrillators.

Inauguration Day Survival Food

January 20th is less than a week away, and DC food bloggers are thinking about Inauguration Day food. Chowhound readers want breakfast and lunch, Metromix and Express Night Out anticipate ceremonial starvation, and many restaurants are offering specials on the four-day-long weekend holiday.

Nobody knows how many people will pack Washington, or how easy it will be to move around by Metro. No reputable forecasters are predicting the weather yet, but assume it will be cold. DC temperatures are normally between 25 and 45 degrees Fahrenheit (-4 and 7 Celsius) on Inauguration Day, but can get colder. Bear in mind that it snowed 10 inches during Taft's inauguration, and that was in March.

Our advice: Plan for cold and lots of walking; dress and eat accordingly. Wear hiking boots. Eat congee.

DC's Chinatown (or "China Block") is close to the Pennsylvania Avenue parade route and the Mall. Full Kee, while short on elegance, is expeditious and economical. As veterans of two decades of Washington's outdoor MLK Holiday events, we strongly recommend a traditional Chinese breakfast or brunch of Full Kee's congee to ward off January's chill.

Congee, or jook, is hot rice porridge with savory goodies added. Seen those videos of Chinese construction workers climbing swaying scaffolds of bamboo, carrying cinder blocks hundreds of high-rising feet in the air? This is what they had for breakfast. You'll need energy to get through Inauguration Day, too.

Full Kee is a DC institution, and is likely to be busy on the 20th. We hear that Jackey Cafe serves congee, but haven't been there ourselves. Noodle house Chinatown Express (which you know we love) and fave eatery Eat First are said to serve congee, but we usually nosh other goodies there. We'll list other Chinatown or downtown congee outlets here as our neighbors supply the information -- check back for updates. If you want to fortify yourself earlier, cook up congee or jook at home along these lines:

Allrecipes.com

Bitten

eatWashington

Epicurious

Saveur

Full Kee
509 H Street, NW
Washington, D.C. 20001
(202) 371.2233

Jackey Cafe
611 H St NW
Washington, DC 20001
(202) 408-8115

Chinatown Express
746 6th St NW
Washington, DC 20001
(202) 638-0424

Eat First Restaurant
609 H St NW
Washington, DC 20001
(202) 289-1703

The preceding post was submitted by guest blogger Mike Licht. His original entry may be found here. Image by Mike Licht. Download a copy here. Creative Commons license; credit Mike Licht, NotionsCapital.com

A Little History with Your New Year...

Early January is traditionally a time to pretend like we're going to improve ourselves, and that this year, this year! the diet will stick and we'll keep going to the gym. Not even a week into the new year, and I'm sitting here typing on the computer instead of working out, and pretty unapologetically sipping cheap champagne with my dinner of bacon-fat-fried kale and parsnips mashed with plenty of butter and salt. Oh, and listening to terrible cheezy techno too.

None of which actually relates to my point here, which is examining the origin of another thoroughly unhealthy delicacy - General Tso's Chicken. Well, except maybe learning from history...that's related. Known throughout the United States as that fried, sweet-but-otherwise-indescribable-tasting staple of Chinese carry-out, the dish is (perhaps unsurprisingly) completely unknown in its allegedly native China.

New York Times reporter Jennifer 8. Lee gave a talk at last year's TED Taste3 conference detailing her adventures tracking down the venerable General Tso and considers the commercial and social implications of the dish bearing his name. The talk is absolutely fascinating, and even if you're a vegan diabetic who hates flavor and only eats dried chick peas and broccoli, I highly recommend it.

You can watch the talk, for free, on this page.

(Image courtesy many wiki images and drunken Photoshop endeavors)

Brunch at Tallula

I have eaten brunch at Tallula Restaurant in Arlington twice recently. Their Brunch Menu includes ten items, ranging from $8 or $9 (French toast, biscuits and gravy, or Taylor Ham and egg sandwich) to $12 (for a burger). Additional sides are $4 and include applewood smoked bacon, buttermilk biscuits with gravy, home fries, toasted brioche bread, creamy cheddar grits, and French fries.

The service was good but a little too attentive on our first visit (2 weeks ago), and rushed and slightly inattentive last weekend, when we think they were really busy and understaffed. Both our waiter and the manager (JB) were very nice, and I enjoyed talking to them when they happened to be at our table.

The space is really nice, and there are stools and a kitchen side counter (although nobody was eating there). Last weekend they tried to seat us in the other room (Eatbar) but they were not offering us an appropriate table for a group of 6, so we waited for a table for 6 to become available in the main room.

The standout of the dishes I sampled was the sour dough french toast
Summerdean apple butter & Vermont maple syrup. The French toast was sweet and fluffy, the apple butter was good, and the three of us who tried the dish, raved about it. The side of applewood smoked bacon was tasty and crispy (stiff), and while it was not hot when served (we ordered it on our first visit when it was not as busy), it was still really enjoyable.

The Taylor Ham egg sandwich includes Taylor Ham, fried egg, cheddar cheese, lettuce, tomato, and comes with home fries. It was tasty. It fell apart while I ate it, but for that, I can take some of the blame. I need to practice eating gooey sandwiches stuff with fillings of a variety of textures. I don't feel like I have to run back for another order, like I do with the French toast, but it is still worth ordering. The description of the sandwich in the menu doesn't include ham, which is a humorous oversight.

The Biscuits and Gravy were buttermilk biscuits with smoked bacon & black pepper gravy. It would have been nice it there were chunks of sausage in the gravy, but it was still enjoyable.

The side of grits was a problem since they tasted burned. The kitchen must have burned the pot of grits. The Manager did remove the grits from the menu when we informed him.

They gave us some banana bread on both visits and it is really good, with good flavor and texture. This is another standout.

I definitely want to get back there soon for more French toast, bacon, and banana bread. Oh, and I'd like to try their buttermilk pancake. I realize that last weekend they were really busy, so I won't hold it against them, especially since some of their food is excellent. You are eating in a pricey restaurant but getting a great value by ordering off of the brunch menu.

Tallulah Restaurant
2761 Washington Boulevard, Arlington
(703) 778-5051