Kitchen Wench

Sorry for the hiatus, folks. I’ve been super busy this month, between visiting Ithaca for a wedding and eating myself retarded during Restaurant Week. I’ve also started writing for DCist (squee!), so you can read a number of my Restaurant Week reviews there (PS7′s, Oyamel, Vidalia).

I didn’t review my last two meals, Rasika and DC Coast. I’ve eaten at Rasika three times and it has yet to disappoint. However, you might as well go whenever and order off the full menu, because the cost is roughly the same as ordering during Restaurant Week. DC Coast had the full menu for entrees only. My tower of crab (crab cake, soft shell crab, and sweet corn succotash) was lovely; the appetizers and desserts were just okay.

There, I just did it. I wrote a really boring, crappy recap of my meal. This is about on par with a Yelp review. I will just have to satisfy myself with the fact that I can do better (even if I’m not right now). Plus, I really need to lose my Restaurant Week pudge before I start eating out again.

Photo by casey.a.lee

Last year, I knew my rapidly gentrifying neighborhood (Columbia Heights) had truly arrived with the opening of its first chain restaurant, Ruby Tuesday. Ruby Tuesday is aggressively trying to make over its image, but I still think of it as mediocre suburban strip mall food, about on par with Applebee’s or Chili’s. If I wanted to eat at Ruby Tuesday, I certainly would not be living in the city. So it is with a sort of sick glee that I relish this latest futile attempt to refashion the chain into a legitimate dining destination: Ruby Tuesday will be blowing up a restaurant live, online, tomorrow afternoon at 3 pm EST. And a new Ruby Tuesday will be born out of the ashes!!! Riiiiight. I smell desperation, or is that just the scent of the recently shuttered Bennigans? Whatever, I just want to watch the Tiffany lamps exploding.