Feeling Salty

I love salty, savory foods. And lately, anything with fleur de sel piques my interest. But there comes a point in your diet where you need to step off the salt lick--when you retain so much water that your face becomes puffy and your eyes get super squinty. I think that point came for me one day this week when I was walking down the street and some guy yells to me, "Wow! Do you know you look just like Lucy Liu?!"



I responded with, "Okay, that's not exactly a compliment."



Daaaaaaamn.

A good idea

Recently, I had the following email exchange with Hi-Po about an entry I was working on about Dinner Confidential, the Food Network show:

Roganista: ...so yeah, i saw my friend joe on dinner confidential when i was flipping channels the other night...i should write something in the blog about that...

Hi-Po: You should sign up for that show.

Roganista: um....you should! and make turkey burgers.

Hi-Po: How do I sing up for that?

Roganista: sing up for that? how about sing a ballad about turkey burgers.

Hi-Po: I can do that! I(t) will go something like this.. Burgers are the best in town and no one is ever going to bring them down….Turkey is the best in town and no one is ever going to bring them down….Turkey Burgers are at the best in town and no is ever going to bring them down… Then repeat….Thrice times

Roganista: that's nice. how about we take some polaroids of you singing that into a tape recorder while wearing a diaper in the stall of a tastee freez bathroom?

Hi-Po: ...Also before I am on the show – I will need to prepare a bunch of platitudes (like its all in a days work) and (you get what you pay for) maybe something about (too many cooks in a kitchen) to say on the show. I should also come prepared to talk about my wife and how she has a lot of clothes.

Roganista: yes.

Hi-Po: This is really going to work….

Biden and Ben (Part Deux): Still Clean and Articulate

This should be a Wednesdays' post, but the news is hot off the presses. Gawd, really? Joe Biden is Obama's running mate choice? That thinly veiled racist "clean and articulate" comment has clearly been forgiven. This gives me more heartburn than Ben's at 2 am. Related, Obama's favorite food to make is chili (according to the crack journalism at USAToday). Speaking of which, it's Ben's Chili Bowl 50th anniversary of navigating soft bigotry, racism, and urban decline! There's a loose Ben and Biden connection here vis a vis Obama. I wrote about it two years ago here. I guess it's somehow poetic that both Ben and Biden have survived this long and are both in the news this week...

San Pellegrino 6 Pack - That's it

I'm back after a long hiatus. Yes, I have a life to live (and part of that life is being lazy). Oh yeah, and Hong Kong, Pittsburgh, dinner parties for clients, obscure artist concerts, point to point races, looking at Lord Palumbo's acquisitions, ridiculous certification exams (no, I'm not in IT, thankfully--don't judge me), and leftovers for art friends are included in said life. So all I have to say right now is that all I got is: I really love the S. Pellegrino 6 pack of 8.5 oz bottles. They are the perfect size to fill a tumbler stylishly a third full with a round of lemon. Do it. You'll look cool. And Pellegrino is better than Perrier for the bigger bubbles and less sodium feel.

Talk to you later. Promise.

What Washington Eats Wednesdays: Eliot Spitzer

Oh, the bridge-and- tunnel scandalishousnous. This has been a bad week for the now-former New York governor. Eliot "I've been a Bad Hypocrite" Spitzer resigned yesterday over his involvement in a prostitution ring that included this woman:

Ashley Alexandra Dupre (real name Yelman?) is the $1000 an hour call girl (abused runaway from a broken home aspiring r&b singer) whom he brought from New York to DC for a tryst February 13th (and sometime in January as well). So nuts! Eliot, we have dirty, dirty, late-night New York style BIG slice pie here, too, ya know (with extra cheese, the way you apparently like it)! You didn't have to transport it!

Related: What brand of perverse is it to use the very same techniques yourself for your own sicktual enjoyment (with an abused, runaway, drug addicted jersey hookah who is not much older than your own daughters) that you tenaciously sniff (no pun intended) out to ruin other (hapless, less prosecutorially powerful) people? This is just whoreable behavior.

The Mess Hall Cook in Chef's Clothing

Hey, if you're gonna lie, do it big! Robert Irvine lied about cooking for the British Royal family, as well as some U.S. Presidents, on his resume. Wow! That's an amazing fabrication! Cooking for world leaders/royalty in not one, but two countries!

I would have toned it down myself: making bangers and mash for Fergie (of Dutchess of York, not Black Eye Peas, fame).

The host of Food Network's Dinner Impossible was fired by the network after revelations of his embellishments of his credentials surfaced. They will finish out the season by airing the remaining episodes while looking for a replacement.

I'm totally sad...not because they're losing Irvine, but because that stupid show will continue.

Thought of the Day: The Only Reason Sandra Lee Has a Show

...is her camel toe. Or somewhere in Lubbock, there's a housewife buying a lot of taco seasoning packets, gallons of Stoli and grape juice for "cocktails", and hot glue sticks for "tablescapes". The combination artifice and processed wretchedness of this show is....stunning. Okay, so perhaps it isn't just the "toe".

BLT Steak= B-etter L-ook T-o (others for) Steak

Dear Frank the Assistant Manager and the water/bread guy at BLT Steak:

I'd like to thank you for your efforts. You two were the only ones who attempted any semblance of service on our inauspicious visit a couple of months ago to your establishment. The prime rib for two was delicious and came sizzling hot and perfectly prepared. The ginormous popover with big sea salt shaker was kitschy and cute (and equally yummy). Even your country pate in mason jar was a pretty delightful gimick. And the wine list...surprisingly decent! I even applauded the Long Islandite next to us with the very large diamond encrusted watch who (pre-cut his entire hunk of meat before feeding--like I do for my dog) got a nice bottle of Opus One (the "label" he heard about once in an episode of Entourage, no doubt)--and the way he talked about it was as loud as his watch. But I digress.

I had nothing against him (other than his existence). I was more angered by the General Manager who hovered over Joey Buttafuoco VI and his henchmen, smelling the sweet aroma of conspicuous consumerism and, perhaps, the large well-exercised bowels all the better to digest the pedestrian decadence of a meaty sales dinner, while ignoring the other diners--including us--on a somewhat busy Saturday evening. But that was only the beginning of the bad service. (And when I say bad, I mean it oozed the sickening scent of that which attracts a certain species of beetle .) It's unfortunate for all the hard work produced by the back of the house when the front of the house just f*cked it all up. Let me just list the various nodes of the bowel movement that was our experience that night:

1. We made a reservation for 7; we were seated at 8.
2. We called ahead and inquired about corkage. "Thirty-five," said the 14-year old hostess. Upon seating, the GM makes a b-line towards us and barks, "You know there's a charge for that don't you? [Yes, it's 35.] Sorry, you're wrong, it's forty (so deal)," [real professional]
3. Our server took our order. Someone else dropped it off. No one checked to see if the order was a) correct or b) if we needed anything in the hour and a half interim (except when the water boy came around to pour us more tap and until we summoned you, dear Frank to complain).
4. No one touched the wine that we paid "it's forty bucks (so deal)" for someone to effing pour.
5. The GM, after circle jerking with the "gentlemen" from Long Island, (I kid you not) SITS DOWN TO EAT WITH HIS FRIENDS, not once checking on us or the other tables. WTF? [scales the heights of professionalism].
6. The music was turned up so loudly (to drown out the reverberating din of conversation due to bad acoustics) that it was uncomfortable.

Look, here's the deal, Frank and water/bread guy (and the kitchen staff): you should tell Laurent Tourondel that you love your jobs and you like the idea of the restaurant. But when your captain is sinking the ship, aiming it directly at the iceberg called incompetence, you kind of wanna jump. There are many, many, many, places to go in this city to get a great steak at various price points (and this one isn't at the low end), so what people want is good service and atmosphere to accompany their yummy piece of flesh. You know this. Maybe he should as well.

Anyway, this could have been a great experience, as the food was pretty good. But as it stands, I will never go back, as the poor service and deeply JV operation reminds me more of a chain and less of a celebrity chef outpost. For the latter, I'll go to Brasserie Beck, WestEnd Bistro, or even Charley Palmer's. And for the former, I'll go to...well, I don't do chain restaurants.

Warmly,

Roganista

Thought of the Day: Food Associations

They say that the olfactory sense (of smell) is the most powerful conjurer of memory. For me, in a similar way, food evokes wonderfully poignant associations.

1. mushrooms = cool autumnal woods and morning dew on blades of grass
2. brioche = cherubic babies and mother’s milk
3. steamed crabs = warm summer days and flip flops
4. soft ripened cheese = provincial village-towns and lambs in green fields
5. chicken = white cars and Basics cigarettes
6. Kraft products = screaming children and coupons
7. cream cheese = theme parties and PBR
8. casseroles = your grandmother’s green shag carpet
9. iceberg lettuce = e-coli and drive-throughs
10. salmon = Ruby Tuesday’s and the new “town center” in your ex-urb.

What are your food associations?

In The Office Kitchen Today...

an explanation of why 80% of my coworkers have a BMI of greater than or equal to 30. Note the requisite half-eaten "I'm saving my calories" doughnut left by *that* girl. You know her...the one who does egregious amounts of cardio and cries herself to sleep at night? That one. Also note that my colleagues favor the chocolate-covered variety of these law-enforcement friendly pastries (as evidenced by the brown gooey stains left in the box).

I, on the other hand, chose the healthier option of Danactive and Doritos for breakfast. Yum.

Floriana: No Fork For You! And a Rude Ass Beyouch of a Bartender

So the restaurants along 17th Street, Dupont aren't destinations, and especially not Floriana. They failed on so many fronts, and for the higher than usual price point for that part of the neighborhood, double thumbs down. But the most egregious of the offenses, which I will serve up first, was the b*tch-face bartender. Is it cause we're breeders, guy, that you ignored us when no one, NO ONE, was in the gross cellar bar, save for some fat, obnoxious slob whose jowls were hovered over his slop--looking up only to shout "shut the door" at us? Even when I approached the bar, sir mix-a-not was too busy watching the television and shaking up some green apple martinis.

So, that was the beginning of the sub-par experience. So we get seated, and were hopeful, as the menu looked pretty decent. In fact, we were walking by and stopped only because the menu looked so promising. We got a seat outside that beautiful evening after waiting for a bit in the dungeon of dolts. We wered greeted, thankfully, quite warmly by a young woman who seemed fairly knowledgeable and enthusiastic. But that was the only good about the experience. First came my starter, a salad of orange and fennel...what should have been a great combinationwas ruined by an overly-creamy dressing and listless fennel that had no taste and was more like biting into thinly sliced potatoes than the unctuous and liquorish bulb that I'm used to. So, after finishing (and when I say finish, I mean after four bites I put my fork and knife down), the table was cleared. BUT THEN, our server apologized and asked us to keep our utensils, handing me back my fork, as they ran out and couldn't replace them. No (new) fork for me. Grrr. I'm not that persnickety, but c'mon! The final straw was the sausage tortellini: too heavy, too bland, too chewy.

Oh, but I forgot the one minor bit of joy: a diner who sat behind us, brought along his two very large German shepherds, both with equally large personalities. Cute! (That is one good thing about this neighborhood, you can walk around with your dog and grab a bight to eat outside--but keep walking pass this place.)

I love fruitcake

Can I Have Four Beers?

Delirium Tremens blond beer (at Pizza Paradiso)

http://www.delirium.be/

Samuel Smith's Pure-Brewed Lager (at Lebanese Taverna)

http://www.merchantduvin.com/pages/5_breweries/samsmith_pure_brewed_lager.html

Asahi (at Tono Sushi)

http://www.asahibeer.co.uk/flash.html


Stella Artois (at Bistro du Coin)

www.stella-artois.com