Pas de deux

The sous-chef is Austrian, so I'll give him all the credit* for my favorite entree in 2010, making this the 2nd in an occasional series, as Pipón guest blogger Julia Oliver likes to say. I'm speaking, of course, of the "Duet of Duck" ($27) at Foti's, in downtown Culpeper, Va., by Shenandoah National Park, an inspired pairing of vinegar and juniper marinated crispy skinned Long Island duck breast, served smoothly rare and uninterrupted, alongside a complexly spiced duck and cabbage sausage, atop a caramelized onion, potato and bacon sautee, down there soaking up all that duck jus but somehow staying crunchy, set off by a bright blueberry gastrique and local green bean medley.

I lead with Foti's because visitors to Washington, Va., do not all make it to nearby Culpeper, whilst I can't imagine anyone would miss breakfast at the Foster Harris House, a 4-course extravaganza that today included out-of-the-oven currant and chocolate scones; fresh fruit in yogurt and homemade granola; pastrami smoked salmon with tzatziki; custard scrambled eggs, garnished with an Hawaiian volcanic sea salt; a pleasantly daintily fried zucchini fritter; and a short stack of miniature pancakes with shaved chocolate above and maple butter syrup below.

*Foti's chef and owner, Foteos “Frank” Maragos, a Johnson and Wales grad and the former executive sous chef at the Inn at Little Washington, Laura Bush's old haunt, probably deserves some credit, too.

New Jack Hustler

To clean up a sizable Pipón backlog, I say a few more Darts & Laurels (h/t to CJR) are in order.

Laurels:

The salmon tartare at Poste (555 8th St. NW), served in an ice cream cone, over crème fraiche, is so inventive and refreshing (and the Summer Selection of Farmstead Cheese, with thinly cut raisin-walnut toast is so lovingly assembled) that I have forgotten all about the whole mustard-ice-cream-in-the-gazpacho incident.

The remarkable beer list, scrumptious fries (with a highly recommendable chipotle mayo dip) and general just-hip-enough vibe at Granville Moore’s (1238 H St. NW) more than make up for the eye-popping price tag on the humble bison burger.

The traditional triumvirate in New Orleans: beignets at Cafe Du Monde (see photo), the red beans and rice at Mother's (see photo of hot sauces), and the Bananas Foster at Brennan's, a highly unoriginal, yet hard to resist culinary itinerary.


Darts:

The supremely lame, albeit understandable, no Wi-Fi on weekends policy at Tryst (2459 18th St. NW), from the same penny-pinching philosophy that leads Chef Geoff's (1301 Pennsylvania Ave. NW) to corral its happy hour crowd in a cramped quadrant by the bar.

The general laziness at Dos Gringos (3116 Mount Pleasant St. NW), a self-consciously quirky lunch spot that never offers Wi-Fi (social engineering), regularly runs out of ingredients (a supposed sign of freshness), and uses the microwave like it's going out of style. 

Patatas bravas

Patatas bravas sauce, at the low end, is a mayo miasma. (We found this tapas platter at Arts, by the riverside on Girona's Rambla Llibertat, and also at Txapela, an otherwise über creative tapas restaurant opened late into the night on the über fashionable Passeig de Gracia in Barcelona.) But a good jarred variety can be pretty heavenly on potatoes, a baguette rustica or just a spoon. We had no memorable meals in Figueres, but we did pass a restaurant called the "Dalícatessen," and an open-air market with barrels of olives and piles of dried fish.

Eye Bar cure

Keryn's Eye Bar (1716 I St.) hangover cure, frozen Tater Tots, a fried egg on an English muffin and Marie Sharp's. 

The Reef madness (Tell Your Children)

I was starving and freezing up there on the third floor and still dazed from the handful of Sam Adams that had helped me get through the male beauty pageant known as "Mr. SAIS," where surprisingly toned, Speedoed and Spandexed classmates gyrated on stage and made clever economics jokes ("If you got a problem set, yo I'll solve it/check out the graph while my TA revolves it"). Still, even sober, toasty and un-PTSDed, I would have appreciated the food at The Reef (2446 18th St. NW).

Adams Morgan on a weekend night is more fraternity party than foodie paradise. And The Reef, with its fish tanks, bouncers and low lighting, looks deceptively like a bar/nightclub. Still, it lives up to its boast that its chef, who favors locally purveyed, seasonal vegetables, free-range poultry and meats and fair-catch seafood, "keeps it real." I tried the bison burger ($12), six ounces of New Frontier buffalo from Virginia topped by caramelized onions ($0.25) and blue cheese ($1), and the special fries, seasoned with lavender and sea salt. Delicious.

Braai rules

I am beginning to take this personally. First, my Greek South African-born friend Tanya (in photo below, at left) invited me over for a "peasant stew," telling me that the lamb and orzo medley, however delicious it may taste, is a strictly plebeian platter. Then last night, just as I arrived back at Tanya's, I was instructed not to remove my coat but rather to proceed directly to the balcony to help Tanya's brother, George, keep an eye on the Boerewors, South African sausage served on rolls and favored by drunk clubgoers after last call.


As if that was not enough of an indignity, Tanya also served chakalaka, a vegetarian chili that, she explained, is a staple for impoverished Johannesburg gold miners.

Tanya is just lucky that all this low-class cuisine is so highly tasty, otherwise I'd have to start boycotting these dinners, lest I end up complimenting an entree only to have Tanya explain, "This is what we feed our cattle."






Sides included Iwisa-brand, mielie-meal pap (the word actually means "gruel," and I'm not making this up); a South African beef jerky known as biltong; potato salad; dried mango; and for dessert, milk tart.

I could tell you more about cooking up Boerewors (hint: for Tanya, the process starts by getting The South African Food Shop to FedEx enormous coils of raw meat), but according to this hilarious instructional video that George passed along, it seems like you have to earn entrance into the Boerewors fraternity in a process that resembles a cross between Freemasonry initiation and an episode of Top Chef.

Mardi Gras, on U Street

I missed the Mardi Gras Tweet, so I had no idea I was in for 2-for-1 Hurricanes and special Cajun apps, including discounted gumbo accompanied by a crayfish fritter and fried oyster and a look-what-we-can-puree soup previously known as a side of sweet potato & andouille sausage hash. There were also complimentary beads at the U St. Corridor's year-old Eatonville (2121 14th St. NW) served alongside the $2 fresh corn bread, and the waitresses who were singing the praises of the marinated pan fried pork chop ($18, over wilted spinach, fingerling potatoes and green tomato chutney) and crispy chicken breast ($14, over garlic mashed potatoes, braised collard greens and mushroom gravy) were all masquerade masked and Bourbon Street bedecked.

Stumping the Irish

"There's a potato dish I haven't heard of?" So asked my Irish diplomat friend, Iseult, when she heard Keryn was whipping up twice-baked potatoes. For my part, I had at least heard of them, I had just never tasted them before last night. (Refried beans, on the other hand, are an old friend. As they say, "My compliments to the chef. Again.) Keryn baked, twice, two varieties, one with roasted broccoli, the other roasted red pepper.

Tonight's dinner: Keryn's salad nicoise, with green beans and kalamata olives.

In other Pipóneratable news, here's three juicy culinary tidbits from a wedding invitation that just came in the mail from my friend, Harvard Magazine writer Elizabeth Gudrais, who is getting married in Minnesota and the Azores in June:

1. The "campfire" steak gets a cognac demiglace (a rich brown sauce that begins with a basic espagnole sauce and is combined with beef stock and madeira or sherry and slowly cooked until reduced to a thick glaze)
   
2. The almond-encrusted walleye gets a cream veloute (one of the five "mother sauces," velouté is a stock-based white sauce)
   
3. The post-wedding "picnic lunch" in the Azores involves burying food in the soil of a volcanic geyser, canoeing and then, when you return a few hours later, "it's cooked!"
   

Curried Ballston

Here's what I think my friend Anoop cooked up tonight in his Ballston high-rise: curried broccoli and potatoes with black mustard seeds and spiced basmati rice. We scooped it up by hand, the greatest of utensils.

To celebrate Halloween, try chewing a thrupenny bit

I invited a friend tonight to an "Irish Halloween" dinner, and though his official excuse was being out of town, I'm not sure he'd have come if he'd been home and dying of hunger. "It is actually kind," he replied, "even if the two English words that scare me most are probably 'Irish' and 'Halloween,' and I've never even seen them in such proximity to one another."


I have also taken a few cheap shots at Irish cuisine in the weeks leading up to this dinner, hosted by my friend Iseult Fitzgerald, an Irish diplomat who seemed so worried about feeding guests Irish cooking that she nearly put together a Georgian menu instead.


Oddly, Halloween inspired some Irish national pride in Iseult, who not only insists the Irish invented the sweetest and spookiest of holidays, but she says there are traditional Irish dishes (not candy corn) cooked but once a year in October. No, it's not brown bread, though Iseult did bake a tasty loaf and served it with slices of smoked salmon. No, it's not beef stew, either, though I was happy to find that Iseult had filled her cast iron pot with red wine-stained onions, carrots, celery and meat.


Courtesy of the Irish pagans, the Halloween specialties we sampled were colcannon, a floury potato casserole with curly kale, and melted cheddar cheese; barmbrack, a raisin loaf flavored with cloves and allspice; and a sweet Irish crumble fruit pie.


Nothing sounds particularly crunchy, right? But be careful as you chew. In another Irish Halloween tradition (would it be so hard to simply dress up and trick-or-treat in Dublin?), the host hides coins and trinkets in the brown bread and colcannon. Your teeth are not the only thing at risk. Sure, a coin is good luck, a ring means you'll marry in a year and a piece of miraculous medal could win you a spot at a nunnery or seminary. But be careful not to spit up a pea, or you'll be doomed to a life of bachelorhood, or a piece of rag, a harbinger of poverty.

That's pretty heavy stuff from the people who brought us green beer, parades and kiss-me-I'm-Irish pins.

North Carolina vinegar, I mean, bbq

Memorable meals I neglected to Pipónerate #2: North Carolina bbq.


I'm not sure why North Carolinians insist on spritzing vinegar on their bbq (I'd say it makes the slow-cooked, pulled pork sandwiches taste just like garden salads, but N.C. is a "swing state," and I might just run for president one day). Still, in Chapel Hill for a wedding in July, I hit up The Barbecue Joint (630 Weaver Dairy Rd.), and frankly, it was exciting just to say the word "hushpuppies." "Hushpuppies." There, I've said it again.








We also stopped by Breadmen's (324 Rosemary St.), where since 1974 they've been making people feel weird about not following UNC football. (They also serve up buckets of fried okra, barbecued chicken and meaty soups into which somehow, someway, it appears some vegetables occasionally sneak in.)

Tiny hot dog buns

I have had neither the time nor disposable income to explore the D.C. restaurant scene, not even the Latin restaurants that line 14th Street by my apartment. (A few exceptions: I've grown to accept Baja Fresh as a serviceable substitute for Chipotle; I was unmoved by La Frontera Cantina, a small Mexican restaurant with pleasant outdoor seating and homemade tortilla chips on 17th Street, by Dupont Circle; I was pleased to find the biodegradable entrees and packaging at Sweet Green, on Connecticut, only slightly overpriced, the mix-your-own greens salad selling for $6; and I enjoyed the curry peanut sauce at Bua, a Thai restaurant on P Street, between 16th and 17th.)

Lately, however, I have managed some good eating, mostly thanks to visits from my wife and in-laws. Outings included a scallops feast during a Bethesda Restaurant Week trip to Grapeseed; an Ethiopian lunch on U Street, around 10th; and a banquet at Founding Fathers, on Pennsylvania Avenue by the IMF, where we ordered, as appetizers, the cornmeal battered fried green tomatoes with herb goat cheese and homemade "green goddess dressing," the homemade potato and cheddar cheese crisps with onion dip and a pimento spread, and the grilled oysters with homemade BBQ sauce (afterward, I meekly attempted to conquer the "Farmhouse Mixed Grill," made up of pork ribs, "Barackwurst" sausage and fried chicken, served alongside watermelon and coleslaw).


All delicious, but I was ready for some home, vegetarian cooking. So the next day, we stopped by Whole Foods and then Keryn whipped up a refreshing salad, with fresh mozzarella, local heirloom tomatoes and arugula.


She also boiled up some, er, I think it's called "Casarecce" (a pasta shaped like "tiny hot dog buns"), with a medley of sauteed mushrooms and Parmesan.

Christmas in August

I'm still not sure why my friends Susie and Andi hosted Christmas dinner in August (something about enjoying the holiday sans "the bother of capitalist appropriation"), or for that matter, why "dinner" commenced at 3 p.m. EST. I am sure that it was the most regal feast I've enjoyed since starting graduate school in D.C., where I've mainly subsisted on canned Goya products from the Panam Latin grocery on 14th Street NW.

There was Susie's pumpkin soup, hot, smooth and gingery, served with croutons and a glass of refreshingly cool, creamy, nutmeg-sprinkled eggnog.


There was pork tenderloin, peppercorned by the good people of Trader Joe's, sliced and served beside peas; mashed russet potatoes with roasted garlic, milk and Italian seasonings; and a robust vegetarian lasagna, constructed of home-roasted red peppers, stewed tomatoes, zucchini, sauteed baby bella mushrooms, spinach and fresh garlic, and basil grown on a windowsill in Columbia Heights.

Sadly, I only had time to pick up a baguette and some frosted cupcakes from the Whole Foods on P Street, indisputably lame contributions. Fortunately, Stephanie, another guest, was more ambitious. She rolled in with quinoa, the hippest grain around, mixed with kale, roasted shallots and halved cherry tomatoes, and seasoned with brown sugar because, she explained, "it's Christmas."




The mashed sweet potatoes side, fortified with eggs and gussied up with vanilla extract, butter, milk and (of course) brown sugar, and covered in chopped pecans, was plenty sweet. But there was dessert, too: gingerbread cookies (one was decapitated, but most wore handsome neckties) and pears, peeled and roasted by another guest, Sara.

Potato puree

Seven Idaho potatoes just weren't potato enough. So for soup on this rainy, spring night, I added diced, boiled yam to the pureed potatoes and sauteed leeks, shallots, yellow onions and garlic that had been stewing in vegetable broth. For a little heat, I drizzled in some D.L. Jardines Blazin' Saddle habanero pepper sauce. (Special thanks to the Russell Hobbs hand blender, a truly inspirational kitchen gadget and candidly, a dear, dear friend.)