24 hours in Santa Pau

The food scene is not exactly erupting in rural Santa Pau, a small Catalan village in a national park dotted by dormant volcanoes. But you will not go hungry (as long as the resupply route to Olot is open).

Breakfast: Can Menció, opened in the historic Plaça Major in 1940 beside the only hostal in town, serves up fresh bread, bags of raw Fesols de Santa Pau (the ubiquitous locally grown white beans) and a wine selection about as long as the village census roll. (Rooms just €45; breakfast downstairs cheap, but not included.)




Lunch: Fresh La Fageda yogurt, from the cooperative inside the volcanic reserve. (I'd say more, but we did not stop for a visit to the plant, and the Web site is all in Catalan.)

Dinner: Can Rafelic, where the locally raised, roasted meat is remarkable, even though the only real dinnertime competition comes from the frozen pizza and prosciutto-and-tomato sandwiches at the local pub.

Barcelona

Yes, Catalans have a real thing for paella, that rumor is true. (The plate above is from Can Kalav, a bar-restaurante-pizzeria along the paseo del mar in Tossa de Mar, along the Costa Brava, a few hours north of Barcelona.) But there is also a surprising amount of pizza bolognesa, just in case you need a breather from all that rice and seafood madness.

Southern France

Above, our favorite Tapas joint, in Perpignan, France, where they serve up chorizo and clams, potato-encrusted shrimp, Iberian ham on crostini, fried calamari and patatas bravas well into the night. Below, "assiette du terroir" (a pâté terrine) and a traditional duck and sausage cassoulet at Brasserie Pantagruel in Carcassonne, France.

NBW

I gave Cashion's Eat Place (1819 Columbia Road NW) a hard time recently for its awkward name (it sounds like it was "poorly translated from Japanese," I wrote). So it's only fair I mention two other marketing missteps I've also encountered around town: New Big Wong (610 H St. NW) in Chinatown, where the 5 a.m. closing time (on weekends) and the tasty $1.75 hot and sour soup do not begin to make up for the sexual innuendo; and Moby Dick's House of Kabob (1300 Connecticut Ave. NW) in Dupont Circle, which has 14 other locations that all carry the same inexplicable non sequitur.

Condiments, at the Bethesda Row Cinema

UPDATE: I do not get out much, so I thought this was a unique offering. Turns out, these seasonings are all the rage these days at American cinemas. But at least they're free in Bethesda, whereas at the nickel-and-diming Regal Gallery Place in Chinatown, a sprinkle of "nacho chedder" will set you back $1.50.

$9

I would have thought the Mainers behind Allagash White would have mandated that it never be sold for more than, say, $5 a bottle. Apparently, Perry's (1811 Columbia Rd. NW), in Adam's Morgan, did not get the memo. I mean, there are great views from the patio and tasteful (though energy inefficient) lighting. But seriously, Manhattan beer prices just a few doors down from the Blockbuster?

Waterworld

My fried, Naureen, ordered us the garlic naan ($3.50), raita ($3), the baingan bharta ($10) (grilled fresh eggplant sautéed with ginger, garlic, onion and tomatoes), and the kurkuri bhindi ($11) (fresh, crisp okra sautéed with onions, tomato, green pepper, dry mango powder and fresh herbs), all served with basmatic saffron rice. "I'll have the same," I joked. 30 minutes later, our waiter arrived and began serving two platters of everything we'd ordered.

So that was my bad. But you can't blame me that the eggplant tasted like apple sauce, the result of some kind of wild cardamon explosion in the kitchen. So I guess, Indian Ocean (4221 Connecticut Ave. NW, in Van Ness), we're even.

Lists

So far, Pipón has not posted nearly enough "Best Of" lists, that inescapable (but oddly still appealing) gimmick of American publishing. But I'm ready to say this (paraphrasing a friend who recently recommended a Barcelona restaurant by remarking that their txipirones, Basque squid with chick peas and a pomegranate glaze, was "the best thing I ate in 2005"), I had my favorite dish of 2010 the other day, the ragu of wild mushrooms with rosemary, Tuscan liver sauce and polenta ($9.50) at Cashion's Eat Place (1819 Columbia Road NW) in Adams Morgan. The rich, meaty mushrooms were so fresh and earthy I felt like I was grazing in New England woodlands, while the three types of liver (yes, three types of liver, rabbit, duck and quail, if I recall correctly) offered a juicy and unique protein medley and the bed of polenta made sure I did not miss an ounce of the sauce.

In general, I should note, the restaurant is a bit uneven given the prices, offering on the one hand inexplicably inattentive waitering (at least on my single visit), an inedibly bitter chilled watercress and potato soup and an ungrammatical name that sounds like it was poorly translated from Japanese, while also serving up, in addition to the aforementioned lively livers, remarkable Greek spreads including a smooth hummus, a roe paste and an eccentrically spiced yogurt dip.

Fare Share

My buddy Jeff Novich, a serial entrepreneur and Bobby Flay body double, has been getting some good press (in amNewYork and The Wall Street Journal) for his newest business, an iPhone app that offers economizing New Yorkers a digital ride board for taxi trips. Here's an ad for the app, featuring Jeff's foxy wife, Maddy, going gaga over the technology.

Halibut: "Ni lo pienses"

Normally, it is not my policy to hype dinner parties I'm not invited to, particularly when, as a consolation prize, I'm offered leftover cold fish as a late-night, study break pick-me-up. But because this sounds so very tasty (and not just because I'd eat a dirty batting glove if it were simmered in coconut milk), I give you Lauren Miller's "luscious halibut."


"Luscious, while also sustainable, this free range halibut combines the richness of organic coconut milk with the spiciness of jalapeños, making it the perfect meal for two environmental lovers," Ms. Miller tells Pipón. (It's not clear to me if they should be lovers of the environment, each other or both.) Ms. Miller's recipe involves marinating halibut in lemon juice and olive oil and then baking it for 10 minutes before it is "bathed" in a sauce of onions, garlic, ginger, tomatoes and spices (including fennel seeds, tumeric, cumin, coriander and cayenne pepper) and then returned to the oven for an additional 20 minutes. Serve with orzo and asparagus, and pair it with Food Inc. or An Inconvenient Truth. (To be fair, the film recommendations are mine, not b-school-bound Ms. Miller's, but the orzo et al. are all hers.)

Photo by Julia Oliver.

Toledo

As I explore the DC food scene, there are a few mysteries I cannot yet unravel:

1. Why do so many Chinese fast food joints serve subs?
2. Why do so many Mexican restaurants, including the highly regarded but surprisingly high-priced Mixtec (1792 Columbia Rd. NW), serve waffles?
3. Why do so many people wait for so long to eat at Pasta Mia (1790 Columbia Rd. NW)? (My best guess: crack in the marinara.)

While I dig into these eccentricities, here are a few things I have figured out over the past few days:

1.  El Tamarindo (1785 Florida Ave. NW) is now abierto las 24 on weekends, joining The Diner (2453 18th St. NW) as an Adams Morgan source of decent late-night eats.
2. On Wednesdays, the grimy but hip Toledo Lounge (2435 18th St. NW) serves up mediocre but cheap grilled cheese sandwiches ($3.50) and $2 draft beer. (It appears likely that the cheese in the grilled cheese, Toledo's top seller, comes to the bar pre-sliced and individually plastic wrapped, if you know what I mean. But the bread is nicely buttered and browned, and the onion rings are fat and delicious.)

Emergency Exits

"Please take a minute to locate this planet's emergency exits. As you can see, there aren't any."

En brodo

I owe Pipón capsule reviews of a handful of restaurants we've visited lately, including El Rincón Español (1826 Columbia Rd. NW), a great tapas joint in Adams Morgan; Mama Ayesha's (1967 Calvert St. NW), a popular Middle Eastern restaurant in Woodley Park; and Thaiphoon (2011 S St. NW), a mediocre local Thai chain that competes with Thaitanic (locations in Columbia Heights and Logan Circle) for the most clever Thai pun. (kg has promised some penitent guest blogging after ditching me for great meals at The Diner (2453 18th St. NW), run 24 hours a day by the good people at Tryst, and Volt (228 N. Market St., Frederick, Md), that most talked about of Frederick attractions.)

In the meantime, we've done a bit of cooking. Above, my new 30 Minute Meal, cheese tortellini, sauteed mushrooms and onions and baby spinach served in vegetable broth (en brodo) instead of red sauce.


To get people to drink some wine with us up on the roof, our Argentine friend Lara mashed up some gnocchi and kg whipped up some crème brûlée. Below, proof that Lara has not become too American to make make gnocchi, at least on the 29th, and kg's newest pizza eccentricity, toppings underneath.

Tidal wave

Neither of these videos is likely to "ganhar a internet," as my Portuguese professor likes to say, but I still feel gratified public servicing it up here on Pipón. The first is a bit of Earth Day love c/o my ecologist spouse, kg. The second tackles another equally interesting, albeit comparably dispiriting, subject, the national debt. Admit it, you thought I was only interested in my fantasy baseball squad.