Kitchen Wench

Every time Lee and I go out to eat Vietnamese food, the conversation invariably devolves into us lamenting that there are no Vietnamese restaurants in our neighborhood.  We always  imagine how much better our lives would be if we could get Vietnamese within walking distance.  We’re certain we’d eat there all the time and that we’d  surely be skinnier if we went on an all pho or all bun diet.

The closest place to us is Nam Viet in Cleveland Park, but it’s a pain to catch the H bus across Rock Creek Park, and driving there on the weekend always turns into a parking nightmare.  Plus their food still isn’t nearly as good at what you can get at Eden Center or at Pho 75 in Arlington.  So, Vietnamese has become a bit of a special treat for us.

We’ve even taken to stopping at this pho place in Harrisburg on  to see Lee’s family at Christmas time.  Every time I eat there, I think about or mention how I wish I could get some pho in Columbia Heights for Christmas.  You can therefore imagine my shock when last month I was walking home from the Metro and I spotted a giant sign on the side of a building that read, “Pho 14 Coming Soon.”

I stopped.  I stared.  And then I pulled out my cellphone and called Lee to announce my discovery.  Sure, I was less than 2 blocks from my apartment, but this news could not wait.

Now on my walks home from work, I peer into the window, trying to figure out how close they are.  For a long time, the windows were covered in brown kraft paper and I hadn’t been able to divine much except for the fact that they’d installed light fixtures in the ceiling. Around mid-February, purple bubble letters appeared on the window that read “Coming in Mid-March”.

Well, my friends, it is now mid-March.  The kraft paper has come down and I can confirm that there is a big flat screen tv, a tiki-themed bar area, and a very kitchy-looking fake stone fountain.  The decor might not be the greatest, but I don’t care as long as the food is good.  Apparently tonight was the soft opening, and Prince of Petworth gives it the thumbs up.  Pending final inspections, they will be opening on Thursday.  I will be there, ready and hungry.

Pho 14 Vietnamese Restaurant
1436 Park Rd Nw
Washington, DC

They are also selling duck breast (as well as duck legs, as previously mentioned), whole duckling, veal chops, and Australian lamb legs.  Today there was white asparagus and Brussels sprouts on the stalk.  And they doubled the number of express check-out lines and added self-check out lanes.

WHAT IS GOING ON?!

I mean, the customer service is still as surly as ever, but it’s like they’re actually trying to stop sucking so bad.  Did someone just read my mind and finally give me what I wanted after 2.5 years of torturous shopping experiences at that store?!

I feel like I just entered the bizarro world.

Warning: This has nothing to do with food whatsoever.  Something happened to me on my commute home today, and I feel the need to rant.

Like many people in the DC area, I take the train to work.  Unfortunately, this being the nation’s capital, a lot of tourists also take the train.  I think the Green line generally fares better than other lines because there are fewer attractions and hotels on it, but it is not immune to influx of often clueless tourists.  Today, something happened that symbolizes everything I hate about our modern, affluent society and the parents and children that it breeds.

In the middle of rush hour, I get on a crowded train car only to be immediately greeted by a pair of rambunctious children jumping around and climbing up/sliding down the main pole by the door.  I and my fellow commuters squeeze ourselves past and around them, since these kids have pretty much rendered the pole unusable by any one else on the train.  I look around for a minute, wondering where their parents are.

I then hear this voice behind me say, “I’m not going to tell them to sit down.”  I turn around and realize that it’s Dad standing behind me and he has just informed Mom that he is about to completely check out of this situation.  He doesn’t say another work for the rest of the time I’m on the train.  I look to my other side and see Mom, sitting 3 rows back from her children, her view almost completely obstructed by commuters.  “Okay,” she says.  She then feebly calls out to her children, “Stay still!”

Obviously, they do not stay still.  Instead, they proceed to poke, punch, growl, squeal at at each other and generally thrash around the entire ride.  The boy will punch his sister, prompting her to scream, “MOM!” very indignantly.  Mom will then poke her head up from her seat, try to crane her neck around 4 people, and asks  what he did to her.  The boy shrugs and gives her this incredulous look, like, “I don’t know!  She must have just punched herself! Crazy!”  Then the whole sequence starts all over again.

“Are we at Greenbelt yet?” the boy yells out.  Greenbelt!  That’s another 20 or 30 minutes on the train.  All I can think about is how bad I feel for the people who will have the displeasure of riding all the way out to Greenbelt with this family.  At one point both children lean in to look at the system map, sticking their little upturned noses just inches away from the faces of the people sitting in front of the map.  Both commuters frown and tilt their heads to the side to avoid having their faces touch.

No once does either parent make a move to get up, separate their children, or otherwise attempt to discipline them.  Every so often, Mom will weakly suggest that they, “Stay still” or “Be careful, people are getting off”, a call which goes unheeded since it’s obvious that she can’t actually see them.

PUBLIC TRANSIT IS NOT A PLAYGROUND FOR YOUR ILL-BEHAVED CHILDREN.  This is a public place and their behavior is making it difficult for people to get on, off, and otherwise stand comfortably on the train.  While these kids were clearly annoying, I don’t blame them for not knowing proper Metro etiquette.  But parents, PLEASE, control your kids!  I know they don’t always want to cooperate, but at least make an effort.  It doesn’t matter if you’ve never ridden the train before; this stuff is common sense!  What it implicitly says to me, as a casual bystander, is that you really don’t have any respect for the other people around you.  And you’re just passing that lack of respect on to your children.

I hate it when people cannot be bothered to think about how their simple actions affect others.  Don’t get me wrong, we do inconsiderate things at times.  But what gets me is when it’s an action that is totally preventable or a situation that is easily correctable, and the offender remains totally clueless.  These parents could have gotten up at the next stop, separated their quarreling kids, and put them in a seat.  Instead, they did nothing.

I am going to be the meanest mom ever.

Despite having lived in DC for two years, I hadn’t taken the requisite weekend trip to New York, until now.  For Labor Day weekend, I went to visit some friends who had recently relocated.  It was the perfect vacation, because all we did was eat, drink, shop, and walk around.  Here are some tasty highlights:

Ramen from Rai Rai Ken
Nestled on a quiet street in the East Village,  Rai Rai Ken is a little shoe box of a restaurant. There is an L-shaped bar that seats maybe 12 people, and chefs lowers steaming bowls of ramen over the edge of the counter.  Rai Rai Ken serves miso, shoyu, and curry ramen, along with a handful of other seasonal noodle dishes, appetizers, and yakitori.  This place kind of reminds me of the movie Tampopo and the protagonists’ quest for the perfect broth.  Rai Rai Ken’s is rich and multi-layered, and the egg noodles are fresh and wonderfully chewy.

Rai Rai Ken Japanese Restaurant
214 East 10th St, New York, NY 10003
(212) 477-7030

Chocolate Covered Bacon from Roni-Sue’s
Bacon + Chocolate?  How could we go wrong?  My friends and I saw this on Serious Eats and thought we’d make a stop at the Essex Street Market to give it a try. The first bite is all creamy chocolate, but then as you chew, all the salty, porky, bacon-ness starts to come out.  It’s very strange, fatty, and delicious.  Roni-Sue also make some great truffles.  Big ups on the coconut, pineapple, and toffee flavors.

Roni-Sue’s Chocolates
Essex Street Market #24, 20 Essex Street, New York NY 10002
(212) 260-0421

Read the rest of this entry �

During my first week at my current job, I noticed that the guy who sat next to me was making an awful lot of phone calls. He kept making restaurant reservations, then promptly canceling them in some sort of complex dining calculus designed to maximize his Restaurant Week experience. It all seemed a little intense to me, until I discovered that fine dining in DC is really freaking expensive.

Today, OpenTable published the list of restaurants participating Restaurant Week (August 11-17). I have already booked all my meals for the week. Like my old co-worker, I’ve become just as greedy about Restaurant Week. After all, it only comes but twice a year. So I save it all up and eat 7 (hopefully all) delicious meals for $35 each. Here’s where I’m going:

Monday: PS 7′s
Tuesday: Oyamel
Wednesday: Vidalia
Thursday: Cafe Atlantico, Rasika
Friday: DC Coast
Saturday: Acadiana
Sunday: Eating burgers and hot dogs at my boyfriend’s summer office party. Blech.

This could all change upon further research or contemplation. That’s the beauty of OpenTable–you can search, book, and cancel all online. I’ve eaten at PS 7′s, Acadiana, Vidalia, and Rasika before and expect that I will get a quality meal. Sadly, Corduroy is not doing RW anymore; you used to be able to get the full menu for $30 and it was faaaabulous. My guess is that the rent at their new location may make it prohibitively expensive. Oyamel, Cafe Atlantico, and DC Coast are a gamble, so if you’ve been there, please let me know what you thought.

I’ve never booked this early before, and I have to say, it’s nice. There’s no need to go into your second or third choice, eat at 10 pm, or check OpenTable constantly in the hope that someone will cancel and you can nab the spot. It kind of takes the thrill out of it, but I’m really looking forward to eating at 7 all week. So go get yourself a reservation early–you’ve got three weeks to save up the cash and/or drop a few pounds before treating yourself.

Anthony Bourdain is in DC this weekend to film an episode of “No Reservations.” As someone who regularly fantasizes about having Tony’s job instead of being chained to a cubicle, this is exciting stuff. I was even more titillated when I got a tip that he would be shooting at the Penn Quarter farmers’ market, a scant block from my office. And so, I began to plan.

Would Bourdain show up early, right when the market opened at 3? Would he come late, towards the end? Would he even spent time walking around with the commoners or would he rush directly into the welcoming arms of José Andrés, whose Café Atlantico and minibar are across the street? How often should I check the market? Every hour? Every half hour? Every 20 minutes? AHH!

Sadly, it was not to be. Instead of pretending that I needed to buy an iced tea from Teaism every 20 minutes, I ended up in a cold hotel conference room, listening to some men in suits yammer on for over an hour. I almost never have to leave my office to attend a conference, so this was a little soul crushing. I had even packed my digital camera and everything.

I got back to my office at 5; the Penn Quarter market closes at 7. Maybe I hadn’t missed him? I grabbed my camera and headed for the door, only to be greeted by a freak summer thunderstorm which dumped sheets of water all over downtown. When it finally let up around 6, the market was shutting down and Bourdain and Andrés were nowhere to be found. All I got was a discount on a pint of soggy black raspberries. (They were delicious, but still…)

According to a commenter at Penn Quarter Living, Bourdain was there, right when the market opened. Right when I was trapped at that conference. DCist captured a picture and José Andrés; according to the comments, he’s already hit Chadwicks in Georgetown and Busboys and Poets on U St. Next stop: Ben’s Chili Bowl, though I suspect I’ve already missed it if he was at Busboys this afternoon.

The thing is, it’s not that I haven’t seen Anthony Bourdain in person before; I went to his book talk at Olsson’s last year. I paid $36 and waited in a really long line for him to sign my book, only to get up there, utter a nervous, “Hi” and hand him a slip of paper with my name written on it. But I didn’t watch the show as much back then. I didn’t care as much/was totally distracted by all the DC toolbags that were at the book signing. It’s just that I was so close yesterday, or at least I thought I was. I guess I’ll just have to settle for watching him on tv.

Since moving here a year and a half ago, I’ve heard that H St NE (a small stretch of bars and clubs between 12^th and 14^th and H) is the next rapidly gentrifying hot spot. The two block strip, across from an Autozone and several fried chicken/subs/Chinese food/seafood carry out joints, is the baby of DC nightlife mogul, Joe Englert. You’ve probably gone all sloppy-faced at his joints and didn’t even know it (Lucky Bar, The Big Hunt, Pour House, DC9… the list goes on). For better or for worse, he knows what he’s doing.

My first trip to H St occurred several months ago in the form of dinner at Dr. Granville Moore’s and local band night at Rock and Roll Hotel. I’ll admit, I was kind of stressing out. I find that DC nightlife can be rather depressing due to certain breed of suburbanite that flocks to Georgetown and Adams Morgan on the weekend, acts like an obnoxious, then drives drunkenly home, thankful they don’t actually live in the scary city.

But I also keep reading about this mythical creature known as the DC hipster (or “hip-tard” by so-called suburban haters), mostly in the DCist comments threads. Since H St is still a little rough, I figured it might have just enough street cred to keep the striped shirt crew away. Like, there might actually be cool people there. People so cool, they would take one look at me and know that I wasn’t cool enough. I might walk into Granville Moore’s and encounter a sea of shrunken striped sweaters, unwashed hair, and Chuck Taylors. I obsessed that my poser status might be given away due to my lack of canvas messenger bag and 1970s ski vest.

It turns out that H St is cool. But not in the way I was expecting. Read the rest of this entry �

Despite living painfully nearby, I actively avoid shopping at the Columbia Heights Giant supermarket whenever possible. It’s always crowded, the service is poor, and the lines are horrible. But yesterday I forced myself to venture to Giant on my way home from work, mostly because I have become addicted to Special K (I swear it’s laced with coke) and was out of milk.

So, I’m standing in the “Express” line (haha), clutching a basket of eggs, milk, and spring greens mix and contemplating whether I should buy the February edition of Martha Stewart Living when I observe the following conversation:

Mother: [calling out to the lady at the end of my line] Hey, is anyone behind you? No? [walks over and sees the end of the line, then turns to her young daughter] Here, hold my things. Okay, now, stay here with this strange lady.

And then she proceeded to walk away and finish shopping while her daughter shared a very awkward moment with Strange Lady.

Wait, whaaat? Did that just happen? Did she just call that random woman strange to her face (even if it was true)? I never thought I’d see the day when parents would entrust their children to some weird-looking stranger just to hold a place in the check out line. So, if you were wondering if the lines at Giant were really that bad… well… yes, they are.

The first time I visited DC’s Chinatown, I thought I was going to cry. Or maybe puke. In either case, it was an adverse reaction. “Chinatown” is a joke–a bunch of chain stores and restaurants with Chinese characters tacked on their neon signage. Most of the translations are purely phonetic (Clyde’s Restaurant is “ke si lai”, etc.) and in traditional characters, probably because someone on a city planning committee thought it looked more “Chinese” than simplified characters. This, of course, does not bode well for the state of Chinese food in DC. This fact has been a source of major disappointment on multiple personal and gastronomic levels.

Commercialization aside, there are still a handful of Chinese restaurants in Chinatown, including the much fabled Eat First. For some reason, white people think “Eat First” is a funny or clever name. The cranky Sinophile in me would like to point out that it’s actually a very common thing to say in Chinese, a culture that is so food-centered that the common greeting is not “How are you?” but “Have you eaten yet?” But I digress. Last week, Lee and I decided to meet up after work to try Eat First, which has been consistently ranked on various best bargain and best ethnic restaurant lists around town. Read the rest of this entry �

A Guide by the Men of Park Road:

1. Hang out. All the time. You too can find yourself a working woman to support your loitering habit if you stand near a Metro station or bus stop during rush hour.
2. Chicks dig it when you say “Hola” without looking them in the face.
3. You must master the fine art of uttering pick up lines while riding your bicycle on an uneven sidewalk. Nearly falling off your bike while grinning lasciviously is so last summer.
4. The canned soup aisle in Giant is a great place to snag a Friday night date: “Hi sweetie, wanna come over for a bowl of Campbell’s Chunky clam chowder?”
5. Upgrading to a truck or car will allow you to slowly follow women down the street while blowing kisses at them out the window. This is not creepy at all.
6. Elevator eyes are gaining social acceptance these days. Also, as long as her back is turned, you are free bend over and peer critically at her ass.
7. Mumbling inappropriate phrases in Spanish is a perfectly acceptable conversation starter.
8. Unwashed hair = hotttt.