Is it my imagination, or are a lot of restaurants opening in Howard County these days?

Trip Klaus sent me an e-mail today asking about Portalli's, the Italian restaurant opening where Jordan's Steakhouse was in Ellicott City.

Also today I got the following e-mail from Lee Biars, co-owner of the Diamondback Tavern and partner in this new venture (and frequent commenter on this blog): ...

"I wanted to give you an update on Portalli's in Ellicott City.  We had a soft opening on Friday and Saturday and everything went well, so we're looking to open the doors on Monday evening.  Our official Grand Opening will be the weekend of December 11th-13th, at which point we will be open for both lunch and dinner daily (right now we're doing dinner only) and have all menu and wine list items available.

"The website will be up in the next couple days [actually up now. EL] and people will be able to see our menu online.  Feel free to pass this information along to whomever you wish, but I would encourage people to understand that we got up and running in just under a month and are still working out some of the kinks.  Overall the feedback from the soft opening was largely positive, so I'm confident we will take great care of anybody that walks through the door."

(Photo courtesy of Portalli's Web site)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 3:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)
        

Of all the holiday events (and somehow this seems like a holiday event) you can think of, I bet one of them isn't making mead. When Lissa first told me about it, I asked her for a guest post on the subject. But actually it seems to involve more getting together with friends and eating good food than producing a fermented beverage. I like that. Here's Lissa. EL

Ah, fall, when the weather gets cooler, the rain more annoying and a middle-aged woman's thoughts turn to making mead. ...

Not drinking it, mind you. I'm sure it tastes great (many of my friends love it), but I drank my lifetime share and more back in the '80s. That doesn't stop me from the annual mead brewing with my friends, though.

We all show up with local honey, food to share and months' accumulation of stories, jokes and arguments. The dogs and cats get petted, the kids get played with, the chickens get fed. We don't stay up until 1 or 2 a.m. anymore, but we still stay up later than we would on other nights.

K, who has been brewing mead since slightly after the Vikings stopped thinking it was a food group, supervises us. He decides if we are making a traditional mead, a bragget, a cyser, a melomel or some other type of fermented honey product. He makes it all look easy, and I just do what he tells me to do. We even made a milk mead last year.

But, first, we have to eat! There are always bags of chips around, although fewer than when we were younger. I usually show up with bread and several kilos of cheese from Prima's. There is bound to be a pot of soup on the stove (homemade, of course).  Homemade cookies, fruit and other goodies appear on the counter and the table as people arrive. We'll nosh on all of this until dinner time.

This year, we made a bragget. This involved using roasted malt, regular malt, roasted wheat, yeast (of course – you have to have the wee yeasties around!) and several herbs including meadowsweet (bonus etymology – this actually comes from the Anglo-Saxon that translates as “sweet mead”), bog myrtle and heather.

K describes the bragget as being a cross between ale and mead, and being very, very traditional in Viking times. Apparently the Vikings made mead by cleaning out the pantry into the brewing vat.

So, there is pouring and grinding and stirring and heating and all kinds of stuff going on in the background of the important stuff, which is, of course, eating, drinking beer, talking and keeping the kids from tormenting the cats.

After hours of this, it is time for what is rightly called a feast. We all chip in to finish the mashed potatoes, gravy, roast pork and green bean casserole. Cheese, bread, fruit and cookies hover around the edges of the feast, sneaking on to slowly emptying plates.

Clean up is also a group affair, rewarded by getting out last year's mead and bottling it to take home. Of course, it must be tasted, so the drinking horns appear, get filled and get passed around. Fortunately, no one starts singing. One time, the only song I could remember was a rugby song about human-animal interactions. It was not a hit.

We're old enough now that some of us start to fall asleep before the kids crash. We're stubborn enough that we're not going to bed before the kids, no matter how much mead we drink or how long the drive was. But, eventually, the kids crash, the conversation lags, we agree to disagree on how much weight we can give Snorri Sturluson's views on Loki or Obama's on health care.

The next morning, we wake up earlier than we used to, pack up our stuff and our bottles of mead, say our goodbyes and hit the road. K is left with a carboy or two of mead that he'll baby along, so that next year, we'll all have something to bottle, to drink and to brag about.

Next year, in Delaware.

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 2:08 PM | Permalink | Comments (16)
        

You know how sometimes things that are important escape your notice and then something reminds you and you realize you made a mistake? That's how I feel about the heads up HowChowBlog gave us under an earlier post about the new Hunan Taste in Catonsville. ...

Several regulars on Chowhound.com, including Warthog who occasionally posts here, have had good meals there, some of them equating it to Grace Garden in Odenton (in authenticity anyway; it's a different region's cuisine).

However, I noticed that theminx, who also occasionally posts here, wasn't quite so enthusiastic in a review on UrbanSpoon.

There doesn't seem to be a Web site yet, but here's the basic info:

Hunan Taste, 718 N. Rolling Road, Catonsville, MD 21228, 410-788-8988.

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 11:06 AM | Permalink | Comments (5)
        

My daughter and a couple of friends had drinks at Crush in Belvedere Square Friday night. (Drinks also meant lobster mac and cheese, which I kind of liked.)

She says it's already beautifully decorated for the holidays, and that made it very festive.

Decorations are important this time of year as people choose the restaurants where they want to have their office parties or meet friends for dinner. Faithful readers know that every year we meet friends at the Ambassador a few days before Christmas, specifically because the restaurant's enclosed terrace is so beautifully decorated with two fireplaces, fairy lights, greens, red ribbons and candles.

But other than that, when readers ask me for recommendations I can't be of much help. ...

I see this as a possible Top 10 Tuesday (which I don't have one of as yet for tomorrow) except that I only get to about four restaurants a year that have their holiday decorations up.

So now I've got two possibilities: Crush and the Ambassador. Anybody want to nominate any others? 

(Photo taken at Crush by Gailor)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 6:47 AM | Permalink | Comments (17)
        

Here's the recipe Dottie requested for the oven-crisped eggplant. It's my mother's recipe.

I was rushing when I made it, so I threw the crackers into the Cuisinart. Big mistake. The crumbs weren't fine enough, and so the dish wasn't as pretty as it should have been. ...

Oven-Crisped Eggplant

2 small eggplants (1 pound each)

1/2 cup fine soda cracker crumbs

1/4 teaspoon oregano, rubbed

1/2 teaspoon paprika

salt and freshly ground pepper

1 egg

1 tablespoon water

1/2 stick melted butter

Peel the eggplants and cut lengthwise into six segments each. Soak in salted water for one hour. Crush crackers between wax paper with a rolling pin.  Mix with oregano, paprika, salt and pepper.  Beat egg and water. Dip drained eggplant into egg, then into crumbs. Let stand at least 30 minutes. Place peeled side down in a shallow baking dish or on a cookie sheet. Drizzle with melted butter, turning segments about in it carefully. Bake in 425 degree oven until crisp and brown (about 20 minutes).

These can be made hours ahead, and baked when needed.

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 5:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)
        

After a week off, I'll be reviewing the new Stoney River Legendary Steaks in Towson next Sunday in the Arts & Entertainment section.

This isn't the first of the moderately upscale steakhouse's locations in Maryland (the first one is in Annapolis), but it's the first in the Baltimore area and the first I've been to.

I do think location determines whether steakhouses succeed or fail, more so than other kinds of restaurants.

There are simply too many steakhouses, or places where you can get a good steak, to make people willing to seek out a particular one or put up with terrible parking or whatever. (Feel free to argue with me about this; I'm not sure I'm right.) ...

In any case, Stoney River has hit the jackpot with this location. It's right on the main drag, next to or maybe I should say part of, Towson Town Center. You can let people out in front easily and then go find a (free) covered parking space in the lot. I'm not saying finding a spot will be easy, especially this time of year, but there will be one eventually. 

Judging from the night I was there, the place is already a huge success.

To find out what I thought of our experience -- and eating there is supposed to be about more than just food, as you'll see from my review -- please check out my column in next Sunday's Sun.

By the way, check out my thoughts about the chocolate ganache cake (pictured) next week. It's even bigger than it looks.

(Kim Hairston/Sun photographer)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 9:45 AM | Permalink | Comments (12)
Categories: Review Preview
        

Editor Tim alerted me about a video that's making the rounds. Here's what he said about it:

[It's] a video of Chinese people eating a fried fish but the top half is still alive. Some chef in china perfected a method where the fish's head is protected by a wet towel while it's in the deep fryer.  It's really gross but probably an Internet hit. ...

I was going to embed the code so the video would appear here, but I couldn't bring myself to. If you have a strong stomach you can find it and a story about it here. I read the story, but couldn't bring myself to watch the video.

Needless to say, it's created a lot of controversy, and animal rights activists are outraged. I see their point.

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 5:24 AM | Permalink | Comments (11)
        

Not to quibble, jl, but those alleged superfoods made their case long before mouse experiments.
Pomegranate. See Persephone. She ate six seeds and caused winter to happen every year. What other food is powerful enough to combat global warming?

Garlic. Repels vampires. Thus, responsible for all the great and not-so-great Dracula movies ever made. To say nothing of the 746 comments on the Read Street blog under the post "Stephen King: Stephanie Meyer Can't Write".

Apple. The Fall of Mankind. Now, what superfood has the power of atonement?

Posted by: Laura Lee | November 25, 2009 1:30 PM

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 6:18 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)
        

Robert of Cross Keys' guest post, Free Market Fridays, is a day late. Blame your mayor. I didn't get a laptop for yesterday because the trial is still going on. Oh well, some things get better with age. Here's Robert. EL

I never cook Thanksgiving dinner, and this year wasn’t any different.
 
A few weeks ago my mom injured her foot, which meant that she would not be able to stand in front of the stove on Thanksgiving.  This development led to a request from my parents that the wife and I help out.  Since both of us like to cook our way, but hate the mess it creates in our home, we welcomed the opportunity to be creative in a kitchen other than own.   
 
My parents, however, saw the situation playing out a little differently.  They were hoping that we would make their recipes in our house and then bring them up with us on Thanksgiving.  Of course they didn’t come right and say that.  The hint, however, was played out over the last week. ...

The wife called my mom to tell her the dishes we were going to make and to see if she had some of the ingredients that we were missing in her pantry.  We wanted to do a corn bread stuffing, red skin potatoes and a tangerine-cranberry sauce.
 
The menu and the pantry requests were not met with enthusiasm.
 
Mom: I don’t know if we have any of those items in the house, and I’m not sure if we’re going to get to the store.
 
Now, the pantry at my parent’s house is like a store.  There are shelves and shelves of varied and diverse foodstuffs, most of which are stacked three, four and sometimes more deep.
 
As for not making it to the store before Thanksgiving, I’m not sure where that came from either.  They are always at the grocery store.  Both of their parents owned grocery stores.  There probably hasn’t been a two-week period in which my mom stayed out of grocery store, and you would probably have to go back to the late '60s when my dad was walking the jungles of Vietnam to find the last time he went a couple of weeks without visiting a grocery store.
 
Mom:  Is this stuffing going to have oysters in it?
 
No, we’re making a sausage and cornbread stuffing.  About 10 years ago, we made an oyster stuffing, and for whatever reason that led to us being typecast as the people who only make oyster stuffing.  
 
Mom: The red skin potatoes, are they instead of mashed potatoes? You know Robert loves mashed potatoes.
 
Many food discussions between Mom and Wife ultimately end up with a debate as to my eating preferences.  One side says that Robert loves such and such, while the other counters that no, he does not, and in fact he hates such and such. 
 
Actually I’m fairly indifferent to both mashed and red skin potatoes.  In fact, unless potatoes are fried in duck fat, very good, or boiled with cabbage, very bad, it is difficult to muster any passion for the tuber.
 
Mom: The cranberries you are making, are they whole cranberries?  I don’t think Robert’s father likes those.
 
A similar argument to what Robert loves/hates is that Robert’s father doesn’t like…  My father is fairly easy going, so this line is normally used by Mom when she doesn’t like something.  In this case, however, Mom is correct.  Dad wants his cranberry sauce straight from the can, and has remarked on several occasions that it is not Thanksgiving unless you can see the rings on the cranberry.
 
I knew our menu was not being received well, but there was still a question as to whether we would make it.  After all, without us bringing something there seemed to be a possibility that Thanksgiving dinner would end up being a turkey served in isolation.  So, just like when I was 10, I opted to go to Dad when Mom wasn’t telling me what I wanted I hear.
 
Me:   Do you want us to make all the stuff for Thanksgiving.
 
Dad: I’m not sure; I need to talk to your mother.
 
Me:  I’ve already been through that, and I’m not getting any answers.  I tell you what, we’ll make the stuffing and bring a Texas hickory smoked brisket.
 
Dad: Yeah, your mother said something about the stuffing.  You weren’t planning on putting oysters in it.
 
Me: I’m not sure where this oyster thing is coming from.  I told her we were making a cornbread stuffing.
 
We were making cornbread stuffing because our entire freezer, save for some bottles of vodka and Limoncello, has been packed with cornbread for the past year, a result of my wife having too much time and White Lily cornmeal and flour on her hands.
 
I didn’t have a recipe for cornbread stuffing readily available.  I do have a collection of about 100 cookbooks; however, almost all of my cookbooks are impractical tomes that deal with topics like campsite cooking in the Civil War or railroad dining at the turn of the century.
 
The wife would eventually find a recipe for cornbread and sausage stuffing from Tennessee Ernie Ford in the Southern wing of my library. Ernie’s recipe was long on colloquial ramblings and short on detail, with the exception of several admonishments he made about being sure to wash your hands.
 
My role was fairly limited in the preparation. On the instruction of Mr. Ford I got out my two biggest mixing bowls, and on the advice of my wife I then got out of the kitchen.  
 
Fortunately, the wife was able to decipher the recipe and made a pretty good stuffing, and I was able to get my freezer back.
 
Unfortunately, I didn’t end up cooking anything.  The stuffing was the wife’s and Tennessee Ernie Ford’s.  The brisket was made by Bret and Buddy, two guys in Lubbock, Texas.

I thought at the very least I would be able to use the can opener on the cranberries, but even that job ended up being taken away by my brother. 

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 6:43 AM | Permalink | Comments (13)
        

Next Friday I'm up for the 10 Spot feature. The editors took pity on me because they knew how much I would enjoy doing an extra Top 10, so they are reprinting one that appeared before Top 10 Tuesday became a regular feature in the print edition of the Taste section.

They do want, however, new comments, so you could do me a favor by reading the old Top 10 but putting your new comments, if any, here. On the other hand, you'll probably end up putting the new comments under the old list, so I better republish it here: ...

I deliberately didn't use Marconi's and Haussner's for my list of Top 10 Locations We Miss Terribly, because they're too obvious:

* Chester River Inn on Kent Island. Local culinary giant Mark Henry owned his own restaurant for awhile on the Eastern Shore between his successes at the Milton Inn and the Oregon Grille. You could get his wonderful food at very reasonable prices there.

* Danny's on North Charles Street below the train station. For years, this was considered Baltimore's most elegant restaurant. It had French food, tableside cooking of dishes like steak Diane, and yet just a touch of Hon in its waitresses. It was the first restaurant I reviewed for The Sun.

* Gabler's on the river in Aberdeen. Open from mid-April until September, Gabler's was basically one big screened-in porch with a kitchen attached. A great setting to eat steamed crabs.

* Hampton's in Harbor Court. I could never afford to eat here when The Sun wasn't paying, but it was nice to have one restaurant in town where the service was always four star.

* Jeannier's in Homewood. It was good, traditional French food, which you could get at other area restaurants, and the dining rooms had no style, but I loved having birthday dinners there and I loved the oeufs a la neige with spun sugar for dessert.

* M. Gettier in Fells Point. Michael Gettier was also at the Conservatory at Peabody Court, a fine restaurant that didn't last long, and a Towson location until he finally ended up where he is now, at Antrim 1844 in Taneytown; but I loved this restaurant for its cozy French dining room as well as his good cooking.

* Louie's the Bookstore and Cafe in Mount Vernon. I miss that Chestertown chicken. Why didn't I get that recipe?

* Metropolitan in Annapolis. This is the newest restaurant on this list. I enjoyed its rooftop dining, cutting-edge style, and artistry in the kitchen. I just learned it closed recently and has been replaced by Jerry's Seafood, so it's like the recent death of a friend.

* Pinebrook in Hampden. This was true hole-in-the-wall Chinese -- dingy, lots of linoleum and an iron gate when it was closed -- but it had the best dumplings in the world made by the owner. When he got too old to make them anymore, the place closed. My daughter always called it The Cheapest Chinese Restaurant in the World, and it was.

* Woman's Industrial Exchange downtown. I only survived 18 months on a political corruption grand jury because we could walk here for lunch and eat chicken salad, tomato aspic, homemade rolls and ice cream with homemade chocolate sauce. 

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 5:47 PM | Permalink | Comments (35)
        

It's been an eventful 24 hours. If I've been out of touch, blame our mayor, or rather her jury. There were no laptops available because of the trial.

We ended up going with Plan A, which was to have Thanksgiving dinner at Petit Louis in Roland Park, and then drive directly from the restaurant to a motel in Pennsylvania. We would then be able to wake up this morning and get to Frank Lloyd Wright's Fallingwater in time for our 8:30 a.m. in-depth tour.

This was the first year Petit Louis was open for Thanksgiving, and the maitre d' told me there were 360 reservations. We were the second group to be seated, at 1 p.m. when it opened. ...

My husband and I had the three-course fixed-price turkey dinner, he with the wine selections and I with a glass of sparkling wine. Our semi-vegetarian daughter, however, decided to order from the a la carte menu.

She asked for recommendations from our charming waiter, and he enthusiastically obliged, going through each course. When he got to the hot hors d'oeuvre and the foie gras, he explained how the chef deveins it first.

I sat watching Gailor's face and all I can say is, someone ought to stake her to play in the World Poker Championships. I would describe her expression as pleasantly interested, not "I'm about to get up and leave the table."

She ordered the quiche.

We all agreed this was the most successful Thanksgiving at a restaurant ever. The food was delicious, although I have a couple of suggestions, and the wine pairings, as you'd expect, superb.

The first course, a chestnut soup with wild mushrooms, was mostly cream. It was a lovely soup, but I would serve it in a smaller portion because it was so rich.

That would mean the main course would have to be larger. I think holiday meals should be elegant, not overwhelming, which is why I don't like buffets. But the portions of the entree looked a bit skimpy even to me. I didn't want any more to eat, I'm just saying that Thanksgiving is a meal where people expect the plate to be bountiful.

Maybe all it would take would be to arrange the collard greens on the plate with the turkey, the pretty little swirl of mashed potatoes, the tablespoon of cranberry sauce and the bit of stuffing.

Still everything tasted wonderful, and I can't pretend I was hungry again for the rest of the day after the apple-cranberry pain perdu (bread pudding) with creme anglaise.

Then we drove to Pennsylvania.

This morning we woke up and there were two inches of snow on the ground. I had forgotten about winter. Anyway, this is a food blog, so I won't give you a blow-by-blow account of our visit to Fallingwater. I'll simply say that winter is a fine time to visit, although driving there this morning was a little nerve-wracking.

Sadly, once we got there the snow changed to rain, so my photos don't show the house in snow. Then the snow started up again on our drive back.

Dinner last night, by the way, at a Ruby Tuesday (half an avocado quesadilla was all I could manage). Nothing else was open, even the Eat 'n Park, contrary to what we had been told.

I would love to hear about other successful Thanksgiving dinners out. If you ate at a restaurant and loved it (or hated it), please post below.

(Photos at Petit Louis by Gailor; the others by me: Thanksgiving afternoon on the road, Fallingwater shots, and the drive back today.) 

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 5:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)
Categories: Thanksgiving
        

I don't want to rush the season, and I know it's just a day after Thanksgiving, but this fortune cookie tree ornament caught my eye.

Consider this post my contribution to Black Friday.

Faithful readers know that I have something of a food ornament collection, but it's mostly fruits and vegetables. In fact, it's all fruit and vegetables.

The Chinese restaurant ornaments on the Urban Outfitters Web site would let me branch out a little, not to mention the doughnut with sprinkles and the cupcakes. And they amuse me.

One of these ornaments would be a nice tiny gift for someone who is into food.

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 10:23 AM | Permalink | Comments (11)
        

One thing this blog has taught me has been to look at things from the restaurant's, particularly the server's perspective, as well as the customers'.

But in one area I just don't get it.

I still don't understand why when three of us arrive early for a 7 p.m. reservation, some restaurants won't seat us until the fourth person (who may be parking the car, say) gets there. ...

Somewhere under an earlier post, I think a server explained that to tie up a table with no one ordering would mean that the restaurant might not be able to have a second seating there.

That makes sense to me, except that nine times out of 10 the wait isn't long enough to make that much of a difference. The restaurant still has to hold the table for awhile at least because we have a reservation.

And if the fourth person doesn't show, isn't the worst that can happen will be that the other three will go ahead and order dinner?

When I'm directed to the bar to wait, I always feel the restaurant is just trying to get me to order more alcohol than I normally would. And then there's the hassle with the bar check, and I end up feeling slightly annoyed before I've even ordered my dinner.

The photo is of Tapas Adela's dining room in Fells Point. I have no idea what this new restaurant's seating policy is; I just thought it was a pretty picture.

(Barbara Haddock Taylor/Sun photographer)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 7:09 AM | Permalink | Comments (29)
        

For the last vegetarian meal before Thanksgiving, we had carrot souffle, actually a sort of carrot pudding, because it's what my family has in place of sweet potatoes for Thanksgiving, and it's what I'm missing most by not creating my own dinner today.

With it I made oven-crisped eggplant and green beans with brown butter sauce.

The recipe for the vegetable stew Jack Ziegler requested is from Melissa's. It's super easy. I cheat and used canned black-eyed peas because it's meant to be a fast supper: ...

1 large onion, chopped

3 celery sticks, sliced fine

3 carrots, sliced lengthwise, then sliced

1 15-ounce can plum tomatoes

1 heaped tablespoon tomato puree

2 cloves garlic, crushed

1 green pepper, chopped

1 Melissa's Blackeyed Peas (11 ounces) rinsed, drained and cooked

3 tablespoons red wine or wine vinegar (I think it needs the vinegar)

In a large nonstick saucepan place the onion, garlic, celery, pepper and carrot and a little water. Cover and steam until almost tender. Add tomatoes, puree, wine or vinegar. Add black-eyed peas and simmer until heated through. 

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 3:09 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)
        

If you don't read Other Reviewer Richard's review in time to go there for Thanksgiving dinner, remember that the Eastern House will be open for Christmas dinner, too.

Photo caption: At Eastern House, left to right, manager Harriet Hatzidimitriou, daughter of former owners, new co-owner Alaine Li (she co-owns with Mr. Chen, but didn't know his first name), Mary and Nickolas Antonas who had owned the restaurant for over 40 years, but recently sold. Mary holds oysters stuffed with crabmeat with a crabcake, and beef stew, a comfort food. The restaurant will be open on Thanksgiving day. 

(Jed Kirschbaum/Sun photographer)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 12:36 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)
        

More Thanksgiving e-mail! Here's one from Bucky:

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 9:22 AM | Permalink | Comments (10)
        

I got a short holiday e-mail from my brother (Brother Bim on this blog) this morning. It says in its entirety:

Doesn't work.

If peeling chestnuts for the stuffing is part of your Thanksgiving ritual, I think you'll appreciate this link he sent me.

Check back later for updates on vegetarian dinner No. 4 and how our dinner at an as-yet-unnamed restaurant was.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone! 

(Photo of chestnuts, some still in their weird husks, AP Photo/Greg Wahl-Stephens)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 6:33 AM | Permalink | Comments (8)
        

What happened to vegetarian dinner No. 2, you're asking? That's a good question.

I had the best of intentions to be serving vegetarian dinners every night till Thanksgiving for my daughter's sake, but we got back from a matinee late. While I had planned dinner, I hadn't bothered to check to see if I actually had all the ingredients for what I had planned, a vegetable stew.

I considered my options: a) steam some broccoli and carrots and pretend they were dinner; b) open cans of Amy's Soup, which I've never had but my daughter swears by. I decided to go with Plan C. ...

Plan C was to pull out homemade spaghetti sauce from the freezer.

This had the disadvantage of not being vegetarian, but the advantage of being really good. I mean, it wasn't as if I slapped down a slab of rare meat on her plate, was it?

I made up for it last night by serving my vegetable stew, which has blackeyed peas, and cornbread (southern style, which means white cornmeal and no sugar).

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 5:42 PM | Permalink | Comments (7)
        

Once again our Shallow Thought guru John Lindner comes through with a superb guest post. Here's John. EL

Food scare stories don’t scare me. I’ve seen, as it were, where the sausage is made. And such stories always come to nothing. Always. Neither am I duped by reports of miracle foods, the likes of which I stumbled across recently in this New York Times fluffer on beetroot juice. (You too can die on your exercycle!) 

Full disclosure, I detest beets. Fortunately, my journalistic training allows me to report the following with haughty objectivity. ...

The “real story” lies at the end of the beet piece. Some drone added a brief list of “superfoods.” As you may have guessed, butter was not among the winners.

Alleged Superfoods

Them: Pomegranate. Revered in ancient times as a source of regeneration, a study in 2005 found it reduced harmful cholesterol in mice.

Me: Like I want healthy mice.

Them: Garlic. A study in 1999 found that eating half a raw clove a day may help to prevent cancer.

Me: Or … it may not. (I eat it anyway ... I'm just saying.)
 
Them: Apple. Research in the late 1990s discovered the fruit to be a useful food for preventing osteoporosis.

Me: In mice?
 
Alternative superfoods
 
The Bacon Cheese Rare Roast Beef Rollup (great for parties, especially if nobody shows up): Lay out a thickish slice of rare roast beef. At one end, lay in a piece of bacon and a slice of cheese. Roll up. Dip in Heinz 57 sauce (or Sweet Baby Ray’s BBQ sauce or any of a number of great sauces) and nosh.

Variations abound, let your heart be your guide. Contraindications: While you may not live longer (than what, we’re not sure), at least you will have lived. Low carb and covers about 30-50 percent of the food color scale depending on the sauce you choose.
 
Anything French: When it comes to living a miserable life well, no culture surpasses that of the French (possible exceptions within certain narrow definitions: Tahitians, Swedish polygamists, bikers). Whether it’s cheese, wine, or amphibians, the French know how to make the most of a shortened lifespan. Added benefits: They ignore no-smoking signs and have jobs for life.
 
Doughnuts.

(Photo by Tracy Olson, courtesy Stock Exchng) 

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 11:27 AM | Permalink | Comments (16)
        

I'm out of the office, as regular readers know, so I heard the news about Miss Irene's in Fells Point from Midnight Sun. Whoa. I would love to know the back story about this one.

It does feel as if unless it's connected to the Kali's Restaurant Group, an eating place can't survive in Fells Point that's not basically a bar or tavern. Or am I missing something?

(Ellizabeth Malby/Sun photographer)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 10:12 AM | Permalink | Comments (14)
        

Of course, atmosphere in a restaurant matters. But I think it matters more than most of us want to admit. After all, if food were the only important thing, we'd get take out.

I will be the first to say it. There are two casual restaurants that my family often goes to that are about the same distance from our house. One has slightly better food, but we usually eat at the other one because of the excellent outdoor eating space. ...

If the difference in the quality of the food were marked, I wouldn't make that choice; but good atmosphere is important to me, maybe more so than good service. Just the fact that I get more diners asking me about noise levels in restaurants than how the service was says maybe I'm not alone in this.

I'd go back to Grano again because it's just so darn cute, where I was never tempted by the pasta bar when it was open only on 36th Street.

I'm trying to think of a restaurant that I would choose primarily because of atmosphere, regardless of the food, and I can't think of one. But I'm sure there are restaurants like that in Baltimore. You know, where you say, "The food's not so great, but it's just such a cool place to be."

And then there are those cases where atmosphere is important in a reverse way, as in those wonderful Chinese dumplings actually taste better because you get them at a little hole-in-the-wall.

(Algerina Perna/Sun photographer)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 7:17 AM | Permalink | Comments (26)
        

When I checked my work e-mail just now, I got a link to an article in USA Today that featured the e-mail writer, Jennifer Regester, among others. It was about that good old Baltimore tradition I've never participated in, sauerkraut for Thanksgiving. I think she was talking about my Top 10; here's what her e-mail said:

I believe last year you had written an article about sides at Thanksgiving and actually said in today’s paper you are doing something different with bacon. I live in Montana but still eat Sauerkraut every year-
 
USA Today wrote an article about it-and featured this truly unique Baltimore tradition….I wanted to share with you. Although I live so far away, I read the Sun everyday….and am so glad that this made it in-

Do you know that there isn't one picture of turkey and sauerkraut in the Sun's photo archives? Don't you think that says something?

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 4:59 PM | Permalink | Comments (17)
Categories: Thanksgiving
        

Here you go. It's the Where to Eat Flowchart, the Fast Food Edition, from the Eating on the Road blog.

I love this, but frankly an elite restaurant blog where chain restaurants are never a topic of conversation and most of its readers would never admit to having eaten a burger -- a blog like Dining@Large -- needs a flow chart of fine local, independent restaurants.

Anybody want to take a crack at it?

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 11:54 AM | Permalink | Comments (10)
        

What? You say it's not Monday morning? Well, that's the thing about being on vacation. You feel you don't have to get to work things all that quickly.

This was actually an interesting review to do because at the last moment our companions had to cancel, so my husband and I went to Grano in Hampden by ourselves. That meant we had to go a second time a few days later.

The first time I felt a bit like an outsider. It was very, very busy. All the customers seemed to be old hands, getting up to help themselves to water on the sideboard and so on. ...

It did have the feeling of being in someone's home.

The second time we started feeling more like regulars. We sat at the communal table on the sunporch, and it turned out no one joined us. We had a better time because it wasn't as noisy.

Grano is a nice place, but offbeat, something I happen to like a lot, having eaten at a lot of cookie-cutter restaurants over the years. I've heard people complain that the food is too every day, but that's what Gino Troia is trying to do: traditional, unfancy dishes. It doesn't seem fair to complain that that's what he delivers. 

(Algerina Perna/Sun photographer)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 9:45 AM | Permalink | Comments (8)
Categories: Monday Morning Quarterbacking
        

You were probably expecting a Top 10 on, oh, I don't know, great go-withs for turkey on the Tuesday before Thanksgiving.

Instead I'm giving you bacon spinoffs. Thanks to David W., Bob and ryan97ou for nominations and contributions to this list.

And now, without further ado, here are the Top 10 Weird Bacon Products: ...

* What made me decide to do this Top 10 was the bacon soap post. Enough said.

*Cook down bacon, onions and spices and what do you get? Bacon jam. Not sure what you'd do with it but put it on burgers. At $17 for 8 ounces, it must be the most expensive burger condiment in the world.

* First there was bacon salt. And then baconnaise. Now the same company brings us Bacon Pop, bacon-flavored popcorn, three boxes for $12. Well, it's not a taste you'll be able to duplicate at the movie theater.

* Only Bacon Balm, bacon-flavored lip balm, would come with a warning that while your lips smell like bacon, they aren't bacon, so don't bite your lips.

* Bacon-Flavored Toothpicks. The concept is awesome: If you do eat bacon, you can pick it out of your teeth afterwards with bacon-flavored toothpicks. A box of 80 costs $4.99.

* Here's something to make your spirit bright around the holidays: BLT Votive Candles. I'm a little skeptical about the ones scented with lettuce and tomato, but about the bacon candle there can be no doubt. It will smell like bacon. Three candles for $33.95.

* I'm not saying the products (gourmet bacon) are weird in this one. It's just weird that anyone would buy the Bacon of the Month Club for $99 (three months) or $180 (six months).

* I personally don't like the taste of envelope glue. But I don't think I want it to taste like bacon either. However, if you feel differently, there's J&D’s Bacon-Flavored Mmmvelopes. Pack of 25 for $6.95.

* Here's another one I've highlighted on Dining@Large before: bacon floss. You can't expect me to come with 10 brand new bacon spinoffs, can you?

* Apparently, or so Gailor tells me, bacon ice cream is something everyone knows about but me. When I Binged it, I came up with this bacon ice cream post on the Freakonomics blog, which is well worth taking a look at.

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 4:32 AM | Permalink | Comments (37)
Categories: Top Ten Tuesdays
        

OK, this freaked me out. Thanksgiving Eve is one of the three biggest days for pizza delivery, along with Halloween and Super Bowl Sunday, according to Pizza Marketplace.

It's hard for me to believe that's true.

I mean, it makes sense. Mom doesn't want to cook. She needs to serve something that doesn't take much clean up. But it's never occurred to me or to anyone I've ever talked to about what they do for holiday dinners to have pizza on Thanksgiving Eve. ...

The last thing most folks would want, I would think, would be a big, greasy, carbo-loaded, caloric pizza, no matter how delicious, when a marathon eating day looms. 

Obviously I'm wrong.

Actually, I have no idea what people eat for Thanksgiving Eve. Most families have particular foods that are traditional for Christmas Eve (Italian seafood and pasta, oyster stew, whatever). I never heard of anyone having a traditional Thanksgiving Eve dinner.

(Coal Fire Ring of Fire pizza by Algerina Perna/Sun photographer)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 4:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (23)
Categories: Pizza, Thanksgiving
        

Our beer guru Rob Kasper has kindly written a guest post for me while I'm on vacation. I'm not a beer drinker, but I am fascinated by the four pies. FOUR pies for Thanksgiving. I also want to announce -- ta da! -- that the Kasper on Tap beer blog has a new home. Here's the link, and here's Rob. EL

The question I pose to the "sandbox"  is what place does beer have at your Thanksgiving celebration?

At my family Thanksgiving gatherings, there are plenty of pre-meal beers. These pilsners and ales are pulled from the fridge or a cooler shortly after the conclusion of the annual  basketball game of  the "youngins" against  the"oldsters." Applying a cold bottle of beer to a sore ankle helps ease pain. Tastes good, too. ...

World's Best Beers by Ben McFarland recommends Dunkel, Dunkelweizen, Vienna lagers, framboise, Marzen or Best Bitters. I have tried the Clipper City MarzHon  and the Victory Prima Pils with turkey and they work. Not so sure about framboise -- raspberry beer -- with the bird.

Meanwhile the Beer Sommelier, a new app for iPhones touted on the GreatBrewers Web site, also suggests Vienna lagers such as Flying Dog Old Scratch, a Belgian-style Dubbel such as Allagash Dubbel, and Dunkels, such as those made by Michelob and Anchor. Will this app for an iPhone replace your local bartender?

At pie time -- and at our house we often have four pies -- I crack open a bottle of stout. Brooklyn's Black Chocolate Stout, a glorious mixture of coffee and chocolate flavors, goes very well with a slice or two of mince pie.

What is your beer-sipping style at Thanksgiving?

Do you touch the stuff?

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 12:03 PM | Permalink | Comments (8)
Categories: Wine and Spirits
        

Dahlink posed an interesting, and what I'm sure she thought was a rhetorical question a couple of weeks ago that I've been meaning to get to:

"Lissa wrote So, how does one treat the formulaic strip mall restaurant with nothing all that wrong or right about it? Maybe some places just aren't review-worthy--?"

It's a good question. This is something I often wrestle with, and the answer isn't as easy as you might think. ...

First, I don't want to prejudge a restaurant. Of course, it's hard to avoid with so much information out there; but I don't want to do it as a matter of course. There is always the chance -- hope, really -- that as a reviewer you'll come across some hidden gem. Nothing is more satisfying.

Second, Other Reviewer Richard and I end up reviewing a lot of mediocre restaurants because there's also a lot of misinformation out there. I can't tell you how often I get an e-mail about some place I've never heard of and the person swears it's got the greatest whatever he's ever tasted.

Since tips are the only way we're ever going to discover those hidden gems no one has ever heard of, we have to follow them up. And given the money and time invested, we're usually going to go ahead and write a review based on our visit.

Third, mediocre restaurants deserve being reviewed, too. They call or write and beg for reviews. In the restaurant business, almost any publicity is better than no publicity at all unless it's really, really bad. I'm thinking of my review of Pappas earlier this year, which wasn't terribly negative but outraged readers. From the torrent of e-mails and letters I got, I'm guessing my review actually helped business as people rushed to support the place.

Fourth, if nothing else it's an interesting exercise for the writer to make the review of an unassuming place entertaining without being mean. I quote Rob Kasper here about once a week, and it's worth doing once again: As a restaurant critic, you need 6,000 ways to say mediocre.

(Photo taken at Kitchen of India, where Richard had a good meal, by Barbara Haddock Taylor/Sun photographer)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 6:50 AM | Permalink | Comments (20)
        

Faithful readers know that my daughter is off meat and poultry at the moment, so I decided I should try to cook vegetarian dinners every night until Thanksgiving.

If I weren't on vacation, I would tell her to suck it up and eat what's on the table (usually take out), but I feel with a little more free time than usual I can afford to cater to her every whim. Plus my husband likes vegetarian meals. ...

Tonight's dinner was a cheese souffle; lima beans; spring mix, spinach and avocado salad; and leftover butternut squash from last night (that we had with the lamb chops we had last night before she got here).

Have you tried the already peeled and cubed butternut squash that the Giant and Whole Foods are carrying this year?  (I'm assuming the other supermarkets are, too, if both of them are.) I don't remember seeing it before.

It's so easy. I'm sure some of the nutrients are lost, but it's a great help when you get in from work late. You just boil the cubes till tender (about 10 minutes) and then mash them with a fork with butter, salt and pepper and a little maple syrup or brown sugar if you like.

Do you think it would be bad to buy some ground beef and make a hamburger on a bun for lunch tomorrow? That wouldn't count, would it? I mean, everyone is on his own for lunch, right?

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 7:42 PM | Permalink | Comments (20)
        

Next Sunday I won't have a review in the paper because I'm on vacation this week. I think it's the first time the actual vacation has coincided with the announcement. That's because I always worked further ahead, but when I got the stomach flu this fall and couldn't review one week, I never got ahead again.

I kind of like it this way. These days restaurants open and close so fast it's best to get the review in the paper as soon as I write it.

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 7:19 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Categories: Review Preview
        

I woke up this morning thinking about the pumpkin pie discussion, and whether there could be a fabulous pumpkin pie. I decided if anyone could make one, it would be James Beard. Which is why I was in the basement going through my old cookbooks at 5:30 a.m.

One of my favorite cookbooks of his is Menus for Entertaining, first published in 1965. I only have it in a small paperback, and the pages are quite yellow and brittle now. Each menu is more interesting to read than the last, and the recipes are excellent (although in this day and age useless for many people because of their fat content). ...

This search also led me to Amazon just now to see if Menus for Entertaining is out of print, which indeed it is. There are, however, used copies available -- some of them staggeringly expensive. But I also found a hardcover edition "Like New" for $10, which I promptly bought.

The search for the quintessential pumpkin pie so far this morning has cost me $14. I need another cookbook like I need more leaves in my yard.

Anyway, I found a Rich Pumpkin Pie recipe under Beard's menu for Thanksgiving dinner.  In fact, I better give you the whole menu. It's quite unconventional, because he thinks cranberries interfere with the taste of the wine. It's expensive to make and elegantly simple, with a first course to have with cocktails and champagne. With the turkey and cheese courses, he suggests a fine Bordeaux, a Lascombes or Chateau Haut Brion, and a sweet sauterne for dessert:

Caviar or smoked salmon

Buttered pumpernickel or rye

Turkey with tarragon crumb and spiced sausage stuffing

Pan sauce with giblets

Mashed yellow turnips with butter

Salad

Cheese

Rich pumpkin pie

Now for the pie itself. I don't know how a pumpkin pie with candied ginger and cognac would go over if any children were being served. This is obviously a most adult Thanksgiving.

2 9-inch rich pastry shells [I've always had good luck making a crust with half sweet butter, half shortening; but he gives a recipe with egg as well. EL]

2 cups mashed pumpkin (canned is "ideal")

6 eggs

2 cups heavy cream

1/4 teaspoon salt

2/3 cup sugar

1 teaspoon cinnamon

1/4 teaspoons ground cloves

1/2 cup finely cut preserved or candied ginger

1/2 cup cognac

1/4 teaspoon mace

Fill pie shells with foil and beans and bake at 425 degrees for 12 minutes. Remove foil and beans. 

Place pumpkin in a bowl and make a well in center. Add lightly beaten eggs combined with the heavy cream, seasonings and ginger. Blend thoroughly. Correct the seasoning -- you may want a spicier pie. Pour into the partially baked pie shells and bake at 375 degrees till the custard is just set.

Beard serves it slightly warm with cognac-flavored, sweetened whipped cream.

(Los Angeles Times photo by Kirk McKoy)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 7:12 AM | Permalink | Comments (24)
        

Deep (and true, IMHO) thought from Garrison Keillor two weeks ago: "Pumpkin pie is the essence of mediocrity. The very best pumpkin pie you ever tasted is practically indistinguishable from the very worst pumpkin pie you ever tasted."

I happen to like pumpkin pie, but when I eat it I'm always conscious of the fact that I'm enjoying nostalgia, not food I love. Can you really say you've ever had a traditional pumpkin pie that knocked your socks off?

(I solve the problem by making a chiffon pumpkin pie with a gingersnap crust.)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 7:24 PM | Permalink | Comments (16)
        

If i were cooking Thanksgiving dinner and working this week, I'd be shopping for as much I could five days in advance, making the carrot souffle and freezing it (see earlier Thanksgiving menu), cooking the cranberry sauce and cutting the bread in cubes for the stuffing.

Instead I think I'll watch the episodes of "Flashforward," "The Good Wife" and "V" I've TiVoed.

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 8:06 AM | Permalink | Comments (27)
        

I'm taking next week off to do something I haven't done in forever: Have a week off at home. There are chores to be done, and my daughter and I have a movie list a yard long; but I'll still have time to blog with the help of some virtual friends.

I'm going to try to make vegetarian meals while she's here next week, and I'm already fighting the urge to wake up one morning early and start making stuffing for a nonexistent turkey. ...

In fact, I may have to cave and get one even though only two of us would eat it, because I already miss how the whole house smells when a turkey is roasting.

The photo shows the Thanksgiving feast shuttle astronauts ate in space displayed Thursday, Nov. 20, 2008 at Johnson Space Center in Houston. Clockwise from upper left: green beans and mushrooms, candied yams, cranapple dessert, cornbread stuffing and smoked turkey.

Just looking at it makes me feel better about not cooking this year.

(AP Photo/Pat Sullivan)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 2:05 PM | Permalink | Comments (34)
        

I just deleted a long comment about Bicycle and Ullswater. What thirstywoman said may or may not be true, but please remember I and the Sun can't publish unsubstantiated accusations like that. Let me refer you back to the Commenting Rules. Please use your common sense.

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 11:45 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

Robert of Cross Keys eats better than I do, and I'm the restaurant critic. Here's RoCK with a Free Market Friday guest post that's making me hungry. EL

This week the wife had a business lunch in Harbor East.  She decided to bring me along. I was already off for Veteran’s Day, and a downtown lunch beat my original plans for the day of watching reruns of The Golden Girls on Lifetime.

My normal weekday lunch routine is going to the American Legion in the burbs. (I should say that American Legions are great places to go for lunch.  Where else can you get soup, sandwich and a beer for $4?)  On this day, however, I went to Roy’s, where I got some Hawaiian with a touch of the Philippines and even a little bit of Baltimore.

One of the things I like about Roy’s is that there is some discretion over the menu that allows for the chef to add some unique items to be mixed in with the standard menu items.  At Roy’s Baltimore, the chef is from the Philippines; and you can see some of the culture in the menu....

Philippine food is something you don’t see a lot of in Baltimore, and I don’t think you really see a lot of it in the rest of the country either.  It often seems that presence of different types of Asian cuisine is either feast or famine.  Obviously Chinese food is everywhere, but it is also very common to see Japanese, Thai and to some extent Korean and Vietnamese.   Meanwhile, Indonesian, Malaysian, Cambodian and Philippine foods are seldom if ever seen.

I don’t know enough about it, but it seems to me that Philippine food could be very interesting. As a general rule, countries that have been invaded and occupied often have great food. With so many foreign boots standing on Philippine soil, that country is a prime candidate for tasty fusion fare.   

One of the Philippine items on Roy’s lunch menu is lumpia, which is similar to a spring roll.  The lumpia here is not entirely traditional. It is filled with Kobe beef, which produces a very succulent and meaty flavor.  The richness from the Kobe works well with the crispy roll and the salty black bean sauce, but I think the meaty flavor may be a little much (who said that?).   Yes, I think that some vegetables, maybe sweet onion or hearts of palm, could have balanced out the flavors in the lumpia.  

Not all the dishes unique to Roy’s Baltimore location are from the Philippines. All restaurants in Baltimore are seemingly required by law to offer a crab cake, and that means that the only Roy’s to offer a crab cake is the one in Baltimore.

The ubiquitousness of crab cakes in Baltimore is not a good thing, and it is not that I don’t like them.  I just don’t see the need to have them on the menu at a Hawaiian restaurant.  I’m not sure if their inclusion on the menu is due to the demands of locals or tourists, but either way it is pretty lame.  If I lived in the Carolinas, I wouldn't want BBQ served everywhere.  If I lived in Maine, I wouldn’t need to see lobster offered all the time.

The crab cake at Roy’s is labeled as classic Baltimore, but I’m not sure how.  It's not the standard mixture of mayo, mustard and Old Bay; rather there is a heavy dose of fresh herbs and an accompanying sesame beurre blanc sauce.  Not all crab cakes have to be traditional, but the herbs and sesame flavors overwhelmed the crab in this recipe.  Another problem was that the mixture was overhandled and packed tightly, which diminished the sweet flavor and moist texture of the crab meat.       

A bridge between the unique items at the Baltimore location and the standard Roy’s menu is the bento box.   A lot of the Roy’s have bento boxes, but their contents change from each location. The box I had was a nice sampling of shrimp and vegetable tempura, Ahi tuna poke, Dynamite Snow Crab Roll and salad.  Outside of the poke, which is wonderful mixture of raw tuna, avocado, wasabi sour cream and soy sauce, I’m not sure how many of these items I would order a la carte, but they worked well together.     

From the standard Roy’s menu, I tried the Sunrise at Haleakala, which is a tempura roll filled with tuna, hamachi, salmon, avocado and asparagus with togarashi butter.  This roll is well constructed.  What I liked best was that it was a tempura roll that managed a crispy outside but a raw inside.  Normally the fish ends up getting cooked or kind of cooked along with everything else.

Another standard I had was the macadamia nut-crusted mahi mahi, which along with the butterfish is probably the best thing on the menu.  A tender filet of mahi mahi cooked to medium with a buttery, salty, crunchy coating of macadamia nuts. I don’t know if it gets any better.

I stick with macadamia nuts for dessert with the macadamia nut tart with vanilla ice cream.  I know the favorite dessert at Roy’s is a chocolate lava cake, but I can’t understand why people would opt for that overly sweet, goopy concoction when they could have a tart loaded with macadamia nuts instead.      

On the beverage side I go with Kona coffee in two different ways.   I finished the meal with a few cups of Kona coffee, which were smooth and rich. I started, however, with a few bottles of Kona coffee in the form of Pipeline Porter, which is made with it.  I don’t normally drink a lot of porters, as I find them heavy and bitter, but I enjoyed the coffee flavor and aroma of this brew.  

I’m going to have to make a suggestion to the Legion to have a Hawaiian lunch special.   Unfortunately, I’m not sure they’d be able to offer macadamia nuts and Kona coffee for $4.  Spam and Hawaiian Punch, however, would probably work at that price point.

(Photo courtesy of Roy's)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 10:52 AM | Permalink | Comments (24)
        

I've come up with one more Thanksgiving dinner that you can probably afford, even if you can't do the $40 fixed-price menus or the hotel buffets that I mentioned in my Top 10 Tuesday.

My daughter and I stopped by the Crossroads Restaurant in the Radisson Cross Keys when she was visiting one weekend recently and had a bite to eat. (The not-so-great art is a camera phone photo by me.)

I was curious about it because I had gotten a press release about its new farm-to-table menu. ...

Crossroads is a nice little restaurant -- more than a hotel coffee shop but not fancy. It's been fairly recently renovated and is cheerful and bright.

Anyway, I see that it will be serving its regular menu on Thanksgiving Day from 11:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m., plus a turkey and trimmings dinner, dessert included. The price for the Thanksgiving dinner is $19.95 for adults, $10.95 for children (4 to 10), and kids 3 and under eat free. (Well, I should hope so. Probably on the snacks Mom brings from home.)

After 2:30 p.m., the regular menu and turkey dinner will still be served, but in the bar and lounge area, which isn't a bad place to eat. It will be open until 11 p.m.

I can't speak about the turkey, obviously, but we had a soup I liked a lot, basically roasted red pepper, cream and crab meat; a good salad; and salmon that was fresh and well cooked, but with a sauce that was on the sweet (too sweet) side.

I'd definitely chance the turkey dinner, though.

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 6:42 AM | Permalink | Comments (22)
Categories: Thanksgiving
        

Don't miss Other Reviewer Richard's review today if you like interesting, small ethnic restaurants. It sounds like a real find.

The restaurant is Cazabe, a Dominican restaurant in Jessup. It must have been a good evening if Richard enjoyed it in spite of getting stuck in traffic for 2 1/2 hours getting there.

(Lloyd Fox/Sun photographer)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 4:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)
        

...Susan Reimer tells me there's a canned pumpkin shortage again.

In other news, the Sun has a readers' cookie exchange going. 

And there's a new Taste Facebook page, not that it does me a lot of good because I can't FB.

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 2:43 PM | Permalink | Comments (19)
        

Recently I got an e-mail from a reader:

I'm an aspiring bread baker trying to work up the courage to leave my office job and begin baking full time.  The Sun article on [Dale] Dugan from a few months back is taped on my wall as motivation; I will definitely apply for the position if he is still there.  

The article in question was an excellent column by Rob Kasper, which unfortunately doesn't seem to be online anymore, so I can't link to it.

[Update: Community Coordinator Carla has come up with a link to the story.]

Today I got the sad news that Dugan died this morning after a short battle with kidney cancer. He was 48. ...

I'll link to the obituary when there is one.

Dugan was the baker for the Charleston Restaurant Group, the most prestigious baking job in the city. 

As Rob wrote:

Dugan, 48, is by his own description an old-school bread baker. He and his assistant, Carrie Goltra, bake between 200 and 600 loaves a day at Pazo restaurant on Aliceanna Street. The loaves are then distributed to the other Charleston group sites. He bakes in an oven fueled both by gas and chunks of wood that he splits with an ax.

"I spend a lot of time with my head and arms in the oven," he said. He forms the loaves by hand.    

"I don't knock the guys that use machines to shape their breads, but I don't think that is really artisanal. When the Sistine Chapel was painted, he [Michelangelo] wasn't using a blow gun."

(Jed Kirschbaum/Sun photographer)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 11:52 AM | Permalink | Comments (7)
        

I get so many e-mails like the following one, I need to come up with a Top 10 of every neighborhood and suburb.

Let's get started with Catonsville. My first choice is Catonsville Gourmet (seafood), followed by Jennings Cafe (pub), Pho #1 (Vietnamese), Wong Gai Bi (Korean) and Ships Cafe (seafood).

Any other nominations, specifically in the categories asked for below?

My father recently moved to Charlestown in Catonsville. I would like to take him out to a local restaurant but I am not familiar with the area. Could you please recommend a nice Italian, Fish, Am food, and Chinese restaurant in Catonsville. Thank you. ...

Totally off-subject (well, it does deal with Top 10s and seafood), the e-mail below his from my daughter, Gailor, with the subject line "oyster photo" said in its entirety:

Whenever you do "Top Ten Most Disgusting Photos in the History of Time," you have your pièce de résistance.  There's something about the way it's hovering in space, like it could jump out of the computer at me when I'm not looking, that really freaks me out.  

I don't think the color helps, either. I've never seen a pink oyster before.

(Photo of Catonsville Gourmet sign by Monica Lopossay/Sun photographer)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 11:28 AM | Permalink | Comments (35)
        

I'm finding out that fewer restaurants are open on Thanksgiving than I thought. If you want to eat out, you have my Top 10s to consider, or the traditional lavish buffet many hotels in the area are offering. But I freely admit these are expensive options.

NotableM, I hear you.

I also realized, reading the comments under my earlier post, that not everyone wants turkey on The Day. ...

Anyway, I'm going to continue to tell you about not-expensive places that will be open as I hear about them. Linda already mentioned the Eastern House on Eastern Avenue under the earlier post.

The following may not be restaurants I'd normally give a lot of publicity to; but because it never occurred to me they would be open, you may not have realized it either. They seem to me a reasonable alternative if you don't have family, don't have a lot of money, and don't want to stay home to eat on Thanksgiving.

Yes, they are chains. And in malls, no less.

Traditional American cuisine in a setting "reminiscent of legendary eateries of the early 20th century." (Not sure what that means, but it's OK. Kind of pubby.) M & S will be serving its regular menu and a turkey dinner. Open noon to 8 p.m. Reservations not required.

Uno Chicago Pizza in the Mall in Columbia

It doesn't just have pizza, but also steaks, salads and the like -- and, of course, cocktails. No mention of turkey, though. Open 4 p.m. to 9 p.m. Reservations not required.

Champps Americana in the Mall in Columbia

Champps will offer its regular menu (I never promised you haute cuisine) as well as a Thanksgiving dinner special. Open 11 a.m. to 2 a.m.  Reservations not required.

T.G.I. Fridays in Towson Town Center

The regular menu, which is heavier on seafood than it used to be, will be on offer as well as some Thanksgiving specials.  Open 5 p.m. to 12:45 a.m.  Reservations not required. 

When I got the press release about these, Tir Na Nog, the Irish pub with New American cuisine in Harborplace, was at the top of the list. I thought it might be the most promising (see photo), but yesterday they decided not to stay open on Thanksgiving.

I hope other places that plan to be open will post below -- or if any of you hear of any, please let us know. The big problem with making up a comprehensive list is that some restaurants decide  last minute to either open or close on the big day, maybe depending on whether they get any reservations. (That's my guess as to why Tir Na Nog decided so late to close.)

And speaking of last-minute decisions, Other Reviewer Richard is planning to review a restaurant that will be open on Thanksgiving Day, so you can read what he thought next Thursday morning and then decide whether to go.

(Jed Kirschbaum/Sun photographer)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 5:59 AM | Permalink | Comments (9)
Categories: Thanksgiving
        

Think RoCK's guest post on RA was controversial? How about this one from our Shallow Thought guru John Lindner? Here's John. EL

Note: there is no known connection between the Advanced Cat Yodeling video and the following Shallow Thought. My apologies to newcomers who haven’t learned to ignore the STW videos.
 
Food-related things I won’t say on my hospital death bed: ...

1. I wish I had spent more time watching Anthony Bourdain reruns.

2. Nurse, would you please bring me another plate of creamed corn.

3. My this hospital serves wonderful apple sauce.

4. No, thanks, I’ve had enough morphine.

5. Does this gown make me look fat?

6. My compliments to the chef.

7. More visitors!

8. I know it doesn’t look like gravy, but it’s good!

9. Hey, who’s paying for this?

10. Oh, no thanks, I don’t want to die with gin and garlic-stuffed olives on my breath.

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 3:29 PM | Permalink | Comments (25)
        

Instead of Table Talk this week, I wrote a more general wrap up story on restaurants for the Taste section today. Other Reviewer Richard also had one that dealt with less expensive eating places.

The package looks nice in the print edition. You don't get the same effect online -- and I don't usually praise print over Web. If you get a chance, take a look.

I also did my dining awards.  ...

I listened to those of you who wanted a Least Noisy Good Restaurant, but I just couldn't come up with one. I think noisy restaurants are here to stay. (I almost wrote "hear.")

Finally, last week's Top 10 on Fine-Dining Bars made it into print today, along with a few comments. I'm a little worried about next week's, which will be the places to go for Thanksgiving dinner, but maybe someone will decide to go out at the very last minute and I will have saved his or her holday.

Maybe.

(Algerina Perna/Sun photographer)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 12:43 PM | Permalink | Comments (8)
        

It seems to me, reading the comments under The best faux meatballs in the country post, that what we need is a Faux Meatball Poll. I fall into the category of happily eating vegetarian meals, but also enjoying meat. I'm really not attracted to meat substitutes, and the fact that my husband once ordered a veggie burger with bacon still gives the creeps. ...

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 10:48 AM | Permalink | Comments (24)
        

Talara in Harbor East has made various changes that all sound like improvements to me. But I'm not its core audience, so I'd be interested in hearing from others about them.

I liked the Nuevo Latino ceviche and tapas bar when I reviewed it, but it's a place I would think of more for drinks and nibbles than dinner.

But management would like to change that. ...

I mentioned somewhere, either here or in my Table Talk column, that the restaurant had added some "mid plates," i.e., entrees, to the menu. Good move if you want to be known as a dinner place.

Now managing partner Nicholas Rizzo tells me Talara has more recently added tablecloths, lowered the lights and lowered the music level.

Tapas and ceviche are still a big part of the menu, of course.

I'm trying to think of another restaurant around here that's changed that way, without changing altogether, and I can't think of one.

Talara is now open for lunch seven days a week, and has more promotions than you can shake a stick at. Check out the Web site.

(Kenneth K. Lam/Sun photographer)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 6:56 AM | Permalink | Comments (16)
        

I've done a lot of exciting Top 10 lists on this blog, but none quite as exciting as PETA's Top 10 Vegan Meatballs.

Normally I would continue to make fun of them (and me) except, hey, one of Baltimore's restaurants is on the list, the One World Cafe near Hopkins University. Its vegan meatball sub sandwich is a winner.

Suddenly I feel pretty good about the list, considering it's a national one. ...

It's never bad to be among the 10 best of anything in the country.

The press release announcing the list praises One World's sandwich by saying, "Bursting with flavor, the restaurant's faux meatballs have a truly 'meaty' texture, or 'mouth feel.'"

The No. 1 faux meatball can be found at Ike's Place, San Francisco, Ca. Actually, there are two vegan meatball choices there: the Vegan Meatless Mike and the Not So Sloppy Ike. 

The only thing that I don't understand is why One World's Web site is the only one the PETA list doesn't link to.

(Barbara Haddock Taylor/Sun photographer)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 3:31 PM | Permalink | Comments (26)
        

I got this e-mail from Sean yesterday (I don't think our Sean), but I had never heard of the following before:

I have some co-workers who have eaten at Faidley’s at Lexington Market and they wish to know why sliced hard-boiled eggs are placed on top of raw oysters. Is it a Faidley’s thing or a Baltimore thing?  An explanation would be great.

So I asked both my Old Baltimore food gurus what was up. ...

Jacques Kelly wrote me back:

I have not witnessed this at Faidley’s raw bar.

And Fred Rasmussen said:

I never heard of this, Elizabeth. Sounds dreadful.

Then I Binged it. No hits on "raw oysters hard-boiled egg slices."

Finally I called Faidley's. The person I spoke to didn't know where the custom came from, but said Faidley's has been doing it a long time.

So, anyone out there know anything more about this?

(The photo caption says simply "raw oysters at Lexington Market." Much as I love raw oysters, it's a little graphic for me at this hour. And no egg. Nanine Hartzenbusch/Sun photographer)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 10:36 AM | Permalink | Comments (26)
        

Now you decide you don't want to cook after all, and you're looking for a restaurant open Thanksgiving day. I did my best for you with this list of Top 10 Restaurants for Thanksgiving Dinner, but it wasn't easy.

First of all, check out my list from two years ago. I didn't want to repeat myself this time, so I'm really giving you 20 choices. I can't guarantee at this point, of course, that there will be any openings; but I didn't include any places that were booked as of this writing. ...

That didn't leave me much to work with. I had to throw in a couple of Thanksgiving buffets, but I tried to pick the best ones.

* Alizee in the Inn at the Colonnade. Traditional and gourmet buffet selections from 3 p.m. to 7 p.m. ($39.95/adult; $15.95/child 6-10; 5 and under free). I had a very good meal here. I don't know how a buffet will turn out, but I'd be willing to chance it.

* Brightons in the Intercontinental Harbor Court. Thanksgiving brunch buffet with various stations like carving, seafood, raw bar, soup, salads, kids (that's for kids), dessert. $55 for adults, $25 for children.

* Cafe Troia in Towson. This Itallian restaurant will be serving its regular menu as well as a traditional organic turkey dinner for $28.95. Open 4 p.m. to 8 p.m.

* Grano in Hampden. There will be one seating at 4 p.m. for this prix fixe Italian Thanksgiving feast. The $65 price includes complimentary bellinis and bloody marys, but if you want wine you'll have to bring it yourself.

* Kali's Court in Fells Point.This is a first for the seafood restaurant. The four-course menu will cost $49.95, and a portion of the proceeds will be donated to the Maryland Food Bank. Open noon to 6 p.m.

* Kent Manor Inn in Stevensville. Traditional Thanksgiving buffet ($39/adult; child 6-12 half price, 5 and under free). All non-alcoholic drinks included. Served from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.

* Osteria 177 in Annapolis. This may not be the best place if you insist on turkey. You will be able to get the regular menu of Italian "coastal cuisine," and the chef hasn't decided whether to have turkey as the nightly special. Open 4 p.m. to 9 p.m.

* Petit Louis in Roland Park. The three-course menu for $39.95 will feature Chestnut Soup with Wild Mushrooms, Roasted Turkey with Pommes Purées, Local Greens, Cranberry Relish, and Apple and Cranberry Pain Perdu with Cognac Crème Anglaise. Open 1 p.m. to 8 p.m.

* Prime Rib downtown. The holiday meal for $39.95 will consist of soup or salad; roast turkey with stuffing, homemade cranberry sauce, creamed spinach and sweet potatoes; and pumpkin, pecan or apple pie for dessert. Kids under 12 eat for $17.95.

* Rockfish in Annapolis. Regular menu plus roast turkey with the traditional trimmings for $23.95 for adults, $10.95 for children under 12.

(I didn't have good Thanksgiving restaurant art, but I liked this photo. It shows a Mexican-style roasted turkey in apricot-chili glaze. AP Photo/Larry Crowe) 

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 4:56 AM | Permalink | Comments (22)
Categories: Thanksgiving, Top Ten Tuesdays
        

There's an interesting discussion going on under RoCK on RA! about how newbies should be treated. Usually I'm the one begging for the conversation to be more civil and asking regulars to encourage new people, but I have mixed feelings this time.

I'm not happy that Robert of Cross Keys is getting attacked, because he's doing me a favor by writing his guest posts. They give me a bit of a break, and they give you a different point of view so we all benefit. But the important thing to remember is that he's not getting paid for this. ...

That doesn't mean you have to agree with him, or that you can't express your disagreement. But I'd appreciate people being more courteous about it than they are with me because he's not setting himself up as an expert.

Richard, I'm glad you spoke up because it's a good reminder for everyone. But you are a legitimate commenter on this blog and have regularly contributed.

I know everyone has to be new sometime, but it's just as well to tread lightly as a newbie until you gain some credibility. Otherwise you come across, as a couple of the negative commenters did, as having some personal axe to grind.

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 5:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (69)
        

I've written about how new restaurants aren't as quick to let me know they're open as they used to be because they don't want to be slammed and don't want me to review them until they've had time to get the kinks out. (Believe me, I won't come right away; I just need fodder for my Table Talk column, which is mostly about openings and closings.)

So I love, love, love the fact that some of you take the time to shoot me an e-mail when you hear (or see) that a place is open. ...

Neighbor sent me this interesting news. He forwarded me an announcement that Ullswater Restaurant & Wine Bar in Riverside is now open for business. This is the Italian/New American restaurant that Nicholas Batey, the chef/owner of the now-closed Bicycle, has been working on for months. The whole Bicycle/Ullswater thing remains something of a mystery to him (and me).

I was also impressed that mh47 did some great legwork for me. (Maybe it would be more accurate to say Googlework.)

He saw a liquor license transfer sign on what used to be Ray Lewis' Full Moon Cafe, and discovered it's going to be a Field House. I had to laugh at his note, "I hope they change the Zip code first." Take a look at the Web site. There's another Field House in Philadelphia. I guess if one sports bar doesn't succeed in a location, you might as well open another one in the same place.

While I'm thanking people, I'd like to thank Heather for giving us a heads up that Sam's Kid is up and running in Fells Point -- and for her mini-review. This is the Asian fusion small plates restaurant that opened where Mehek was.

Then I got this comprehensive e-mail last month from Ted, which was chock full o' info that I followed up on some of but not all:

As a weekly dinner - who also keeps an eye on Baltimore County Liquor Board actions - it seems the restaurant situation in Baltimore County North and Northeast is more volatile than ever. For incidence:
On Belair Road - Schooners is to become a crab house, Raffy's is to become The Twisted Harp, and Timber Creek Tavern was to become Hemingway's (a grand opening was advertised but never happened.) On Joppa Road - Moe's Fisherman's Exchange is apprently taking over the spot at 1528 E. Joppa Road that housed the Orchard Inn, M. Gettier's, and recently Orchard Landing, and The Original Steakhouse & Sports Theatre at 3615 E. Joppa Road (rumored to be in deep financial trouble) is under new ownership.

In Towson - Paolo's old spot is being taken over by Towson Commons and Blue Grotto on Chesapeake Avenue is to become 7 West Bistro.

In Timonium - Lorenzo' Timonium Dinner theatre's liquor license is being taken over by Kasan Enterprises (its not clear as a dinner theater or restaurant.) Please mark your scorecard.

About a week later I got another e-mail from Ted saying he had eaten at Hemingway's. He had positive things to say about both the extensive renovations and the food there. 

Now I get this from him:

Here are two more restaurants to add to your list of recent closings: Bouala's Thai Restaurant on Ebenezer Road in Perry Hall (telephone disconnected)  Hemingway's on Belair Road in Kingsville (Already) (telephone disconnected)

Wow. That was quick.

On the same day, Rich e-mailed me to say that Robert Oliver's Seafood near the Meyerhoff seems to be closed for good. I checked, and the phone is disconnected and the Web site URL no longer works.

You know how wary I am about reporting closings, so if you know something different about any of these, please let us know.

(Photo courtesy of Ullswater Web site)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 11:51 AM | Permalink | Comments (14)
        

Sometimes I wonder if readers read the same review I think I've written. This morning I got an e-mail from Laura in Queenstown saying, in part,

Your evaluation couldn't have been any more off the mark. Our dinner was very well prepared and delicious. I think that the prices are appropriate for the menu choices and are certainly well worth it. I guess if you are looking for the typical boring Chesapeake Bay menu you should cross over to Carols Creek or the Charthouse. Check out their prices for an assembly line service with an atmosphere so loud you can't hold a conversation with the person beside you. I'm glad I decided to check it out for myself. And I would drive 45 min. for the meal I had tonight and so would everyone else in our group. ...   

I made sure I informed the staff of your "bashing" article critical of their restaurant. Maybe you should go back and rewrite an article that's accurate.

When I replied to the e-mail, I sent her a link to Dining@Large and invited her to comment in more detail about her meal and why she liked it. I told her she could be as negative as she wanted to about me and my review; I don't censor comments just for disagreeing with my opinions. Of course, I don't know if she'll take me up on it.

Likewise for anyone else who's eaten at Robert Kinkead's Annapolis restaurant and wants to comment one way or the other, please go for it.

(Tasha Treadwell/Sun photographer)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 10:32 AM | Permalink | Comments (15)
Categories: Monday Morning Quarterbacking
        

If there were any doubt about the popularity of Bravo's Top Chef, and the importance to your business of doing well on it if you're a contestant, a couple of current magazine issues would dispel it. I'm thinking of Entertainment Weekly (the holiday movie preview issue) and The Week, which condenses all the news in the universe into one thin magazine each week.

First, Entertainment Weekly's Shaw Report -- no, really, I subscribe to The Economist; my daughter gave me the heads up about this feature -- says the following:

"In: the Voltaggio brothers; Five Minutes Ago: the Simpson sisters;  Out: the Hough siblings."

Then in this week's The Week my review of Volt was condensed but given quite a bit of space. Somehow I don't think it was my brilliant writing that caught the eye of The Week's editors. (You may not be able to get to it with the link unless you're a subscriber, so I'll reproduce it here.) ...

The hottest restaurant in Baltimore isn’t in Baltimore, said Elizabeth Large in the Baltimore Sun. It’s Volt in Frederick, Md., 50 miles to the west. After chef-owner Bryan Voltaggio began appearing on Bravo’s Top Chef reality show this season, waiting times for reservations started stretching to weeks.

Although the New American cuisine can run to $75 a person and up, it’s “worth the trip and the cost.” The menu changes seasonally, and dishes are appealing “both intellectually and viscerally.” Meals begin with a chef’s canapé and fennel breadsticks. The first-course charcuterie plate is “a work of art” that shows the range of pork “from rillettes to headcheese.”

Among the entrées, the pork loin with fennel, plums, and Swiss chard makes you just “want to curl up and get cozy.” Another autumn offering is the guinea fowl “jauntily sharing space with a pretty bit of cabbage,” some parsnips, and warm Concord grapes. Perhaps the best dish, though, is the halibut accompanied by ruby quinoa, winter squash, and Marcona almonds.

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 6:25 AM | Permalink | Comments (6)
        

Next Sunday I tell you about our dinner at the new Grano, the Hampden pasta bar that moved from 36th Street to larger quarters where Dangerously Delicious Pies Savory House used to be at 3547 Chestnut Ave.

I'm not sure what the status of the old location is. I know the Cuban shop/cafe or whatever it was going to be decided not to move in. Someone on this blog commented that the old location was still open, but when I called today no one answered, and there isn't a voicemail message that says it's Grano. ...

Anyway, we ate at the new location, which has basically the same menu, but offers an entree special every night like tuna or veal that costs a bit more than $20. There are also usually a couple of soups and appetizers that aren't on the menu.

I didn't eat at the first Grano, but this is more my kind of place, i.e. a little more elbow room. To see what I thought of our meal in the new digs, please read my review in next week's Arts & Entertainment section.

Be warned. As of this writing, the Grano Web site seems to be a work in progress.

(Christopher T. Assaf/Sun photographer)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 7:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)
Categories: Review Preview
        

Nice to see the sun again, isn't it? Hal Laurent just sent me a description of a recent meal at Charleston, and you know how much I like mini-reviews. To think some people get to do this for a living. Here's Hal. EL

Neither of us had been to Charleston before, so this was a bit of an adventure. We opened with cocktails (Rusty Nail for Peggy, Manhattan on the rocks for me). We also had a very tasty amuse bouche of lobster salad. The lobster was incredibly tender. ...

For wine, we ordered a very nice 1997 Clos des Papes. Our waitress was quite knowledgeable about the wine, or at least the Chateauneuf-du-Papes that I asked her about. It's not often I run into a wine that old at a price I can afford. I think we got the next-to-last bottle of it in the wine cellar. [Owner] Tony Foreman was nearby, and seemed to take an interest in our wine choice.

For the first course, Peggy had Rich Lobster Soup with Curry, and I had Mushroom Bisque with Madeira. Both were very, very good.

For the next course, Peggy had Salad of Roasted Golden Beets, Baby Greens, Lardon, Sherry Vinaigrette, and I had Salad of Baby Arugula, Reggiano, Lemon Vinaigrette. Again, both salads were really, really good.

For the third course, Peggy had Cornmeal Fried Oysters, Lemon Cayenne Mayonnaise, and I had Shrimp, Andouille Sausage & Real Grits. The oysters were perfectly cooked, and were very lightly breaded. Peggy thought the oysters themselves could have tasted more "oystery," but all in all was very happy with them. The Shrimp, Andouille and Grits consisted of two rather large shrimp in a very tasty sauce with minced andouille and rather soft grits. I think smaller shrimp would have blended better with the other flavors, but still enjoyed the dish.

For course four, Peggy had Pan-Roasted Wild Rockfish, Mushroom Fricassée, Lemon Beurre Blanc, and I had Grilled Lamb Rack Chop, Local Kale & Potato Gratin, Grilled Local Zucchini. Peggy was a little disappointed in the fish. It was perfectly cooked, but she thought it was a bit under-seasoned. She was also getting rather full by that point and wonders if that affected her opinion. My lamp chop was perfectly cooked and tasty, but what I really liked in that dish was the kale and potato gratin.

Next we got a piece of Chevre and a piece of Stilton from the cheese cart. The cheese guy thought the Stilton really wanted some port with it, so he brought us some gratis. Both cheeses were good, but especially the Stilton.

For dessert we both got Chocolate Ganache with Salted Caramel Ice Cream. We also sampled two red dessert wines, both Banyuls from Languedoc-Roussillon. One was a 2007 Chapoutier, and the other was a 2001 Coumde Del Mas "Quintessence". The younger Banyul was sweeter, but the 2001 had a more complex flavor. A "dessert amuse bouche" came out with the desserts, consisting of two each of four little confections. It seemed a little pointless coming out with the "real" dessert. The first time we ran into dessert amuse bouches was in September at the Fountain in Philadelphia. At least there the dessert amuse bouche came out before the dessert did.

Service was very good. Almost too good, perhaps, as as soon as we finished a course the plates were immediately whisked away and the next course came quickly. A more relaxed pace would have been nice.

All in all we were quite pleased (although next time we go there we'll order one less course). We'd rate Charleston up there with other fine-dining places we've been to in DC, New York, and Phllly (I'm having trouble thinking of other ones in Baltimore at the moment).

This photo of the Charleston bar area tables doesn't make much sense with Hal's review, but it's such a nice photo I couldn't resist. (Kim Hairston/Sun photographer) EL

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 7:14 AM | Permalink | Comments (17)
        

I liked the epigrammatic quality of this comment under Top 10 Fine-Dining Bars:

Its always more fun to eat in a bar than drink in a restaurant.

Posted by: kitty | November 10, 2009 10:20 AM ...

I also wanted to point out an instance this week when the comments made a post. I'm thinking of The Evil Vending Machine, Part Deux. When I published it I thought to myself, "This is sort of a dud post as posts go," but the comments totally saved it. Thank you.

And don't forget that tomorrow is National Clean Out Your Refrigerator Day.

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 9:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)
        

The 750 mL wine blog has extended its pairing service, so if you still need help choosing a wine to go with what you plan to serve for Thanksgiving dinner (or for any meal) fill out the form in the link provided. Here's an example of what you'll get back. EL

I love the earthiness of eggplant, and the risotto provides a great slate for just about anything. Depending on the wine, you'll bring out different characteristics in the vegetable, so don't be afraid to experiment. Here are some ideas that I think will work particularly well. ...

RED
You're definitely headed down the right path with your love for cabernet. While most people would consider the varietal too heavy for vegetables, when you think about it, the texture of eggplant is a lot like that of large mushrooms, which go great with cab, and both vegetables have an earthiness that complements that wine. Plus, if you're preparing eggplant like I do, you're salting it heavily to leech out the bitterness before you cook it. That added salt helps you pair it with more aggressive red wines because of the interaction of salt and tannins.

That said, with no meat at all in this dish, I'd still like to be a little more delicate. While the more classic pairing is a fruity pinot noir, I'd suggest you explore the wines of southern and Provencal France, where dishes like this are quite common.

Look for Costieres de Nimes, an often overlooked and very affordable red from the Languedoc region of France. A warm climate produces meaty syrah, grenache, and carignane grapes with great fruitiness that still stay light on their feet. Many of these wines are not unlike more expensive syrah from neighboring Rhone.

You'll find deep blackberry flavors along with a gentle smokiness and, if you're lucky, flavors of black olives. Sometimes, they even taste like eggplant caponata themselves. Season your eggplant liberally with salt and Provencal herbs like thyme, rosemary, lavendar, and oregano.

Occassionally, Nimes will have a fair amount of tannic grip to it, which you don't want here, though I've rarely encountered such wines. If you like wines to be particularly light, then stick to simple and light pinot noirs. Anything labeled Bourgogne, Cote de Nuits, or Cote de Beaune should be under $20 and absolutely perfect with your dish.

WHITE
For whites, this is a bit of a blank slate, but I prefer something with at least a little richness to go with the risotto. While high-acid wines would do a good job of "cutting" into the creamy rice, I think you really want to complement and highlight that aspect of your dish instead. Turn to chardonnay, yes, but not your typical buttery mess from California.

Instead, I like the delicacy of French-oak-aged wines, which pick up a gentle vanilla flavor alongside the apply taste of chardonnay itself. If you're willing to splurge a little, look for Meursault from the Burgundy region of France. These dynamic wines come off rich without being overpowering and can often be had for about $30. For a similar flavor without the cost, find Macon from southern Burgundy. A bit lighter on its feet, but a steal at $15.

If you want to be a little more adventurous, I'll turn you to Italy, specifically Sardegna and Campania, coastal regions where large smatterings of vegetables are quite popular. Look for Fiano di Avellino, a mild, medium-bodied white reminiscent of pinot grigio without all the acid. Often these wines have notes of orange peel that I'd really like against your dish. Also good and a little more summery would be Vermentino. Northern Italy's not to be missed either, as they produce Gavi, a minerally wine based on the cortese grape that tastes lightly of honeyed handpull lager.

Let me know if you have any questions or need help deciding between particular bottles.

Enjoy your meal!

(Mike Clarke/AFP/Getty Images)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 5:27 AM | Permalink | Comments (6)
Categories: Wine and Spirits
        

Is it my imagination, or are people on the blog crankier than usual today? It might be Friday the 13th, or the weather, or whatever; but we all need to try to be more civil if not nicer to each other. Please, take a deep breath before you attack someone personally, even if you disagree and even if you're annoyed.

Perhaps this will cheer you up: I'm working on getting HowChowBlog to do a guest Top 10 on gas station foods.

Scoff if you must. Point out that jl did it last  year, but HCB has some real winners here. Check this one out.

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 6:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (11)
        

I promised to tell you about restaurants that are going to be open for Thanksgiving for the first time this year, and I thought I would hear about more of them than I have.

But here's one you probably haven't thought of: Grano, the Hampden pasta bar that moved to 3547 Chestnut Ave. and is now much more of a restaurant.

Bored with the traditional American Thanksgiving dinner? Grano will be open on Nov. 26 for an Italian Thanksgiving. ...

Not to worry. The centerpiece will still be turkey. Lobster bisque is involved, and pasta, chestnuts, and a lot of other good things. There will be a buffet of side dishes, and complimentary bellini and Boody Marys. (Bring your own wine.)

The price tag is $65, or 55 euros. (What can I say?)

Grano will have one seating, at 4 p.m., which means there won't be many seats. To make reservations, call 443-869-3429.

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 12:16 PM | Permalink | Comments (9)
Categories: Italian, Thanksgiving
        

In today's guest post, Robert of Cross Keys has a similar experience to mine at RA Sushi, which is always reassuring to me, except he didn't take a classical music critic as his companion and his waitress didn't hand out condoms. Here's RoCK. EL

This week I went to a media event at RA Sushi.  The wife was able to get me an invite, but it wasn’t easy. She was getting stonewalled by the publicist with questions like, “Who is he?”

This lack of recognition had me feeling like Al Cowlings. Oh, how I wanted to say: "This is RoCK! You know who this is, dammit!"...

I doubt, however, it would have done much good. Apparently, the name Robert of Cross Keys is not widely known outside of certain niche markets, and by that I mean my Facebook account.  

RA Sushi eventually decided to let me attend.  Maybe it was because someone backed out.  Maybe it was because my wife told them that I was driving her down there, and the management decided it wouldn’t be good for business to have some guy standing outside with his face pressed against the window.  I can't say for sure.

I walked into RA Sushi for the first time, and I would be lying if I said it is my kind of place. My preference in a sushi restaurant is more traditional, low-key, and if you’ll indulge a moment of pretentiousness, Zen-like. 

Well, that's not RA Sushi.  You won’t find tranquility and Geisha girls here.  Instead you’ll find house music that is turned up to 11 and a healthy looking wait staff wearing adult Mad Libs T-shirts that say “Nice ____. Can I ___ them?” If that's a Buddhist teaching, it's one I’m unfamiliar with.

This event was to showcase a new tasting menu that featured a good selection of various items, including crispy shrimp, ceviche and chicken teriyaki.   These items, while tasty, are not what I’m looking for from a tasting menu from a sushi restaurant. I’m there for the sushi, and the sushi items they had on this menu, with a few exceptions, tended to be mostly baked, fried or filled with cream cheese.  Again, I’m not going to say that these items aren’t tasty because they are, but if I order a tasting menu from a sushi restaurant I’m looking for the taste of fresh fish.  I want bluefin, yellowtail and white tuna.  Give me salmon, scallop and uni.

Everything I had at RA Sushi was very fresh and of good quality, so I believe the place is capable of things beyond cream cheese.  I think the problem is that a lot of the people who go here really don’t like fish, and that leads to a tasting menu that is perhaps too accessible.

In the end I think I have to accept what RA Sushi is trying to be. Much like Sullivan’s Steakhouse, it's packaging sex, food and rock and roll into a party-like atmosphere. If that's not what you're looking for, I don’t know if adding some uni to a tasting menu is going to turn you into a regular.  Either this is your scene or it is not.  

At the end of the evening, however, came a reason to believe that maybe this place did have something for everyone. Over the stereo system there was a break in the hip hop for some “Don’t Stop Believing” by Journey. And everybody loves Journey.

(Lloyd Fox/Sun photographer)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 11:06 AM | Permalink | Comments (48)
        

Tapas Adela opened quietly this week in Fells Point.

This is the fourth place in the Kali's Restaurant Group, and the second tapas bar.

Adela's Web site isn't up and running yet, but I did get a copy of the menu. It's purely Spanish, not a mix of cuisines as so many small plates restaurants are these days. Nothing much costs over $8 except for the paellas for two ($20) and the roast suckling pig for four ($25). ...

I asked one of the business partners, Karen Patten, why Kali's decided to open another tapas place. Wouldn't it be competition for Mezze, just a couple of blocks away?

She explained that Mezze's food is completely different, because it offers only Greek and Middle Eastern small plates. At one point ceviche was on Mezze's menu, but they decided it was too Spanish and took it off.

Adela is open every day from 5 p.m. to 2 a.m.; the kitchen is open till 11 p.m. It's where Southern Accents was in the Admiral Fell Inn at 814 S. Broadway. (The space has been completely redone by Rita St. Clair Associates.)

Tapas Adela's phone number is 410-534-6262.

If anyone has been, please give us a mini-review below.

Sorry I don't have a photo of Adela yet. The shoot is next Tuesday. A picture of Mezze will have to do.

(Elizabeth Malby/Sun photographer)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 6:53 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)
        

Wow.This little problem hadn't occurred to me to watch out for. I clearly don't eat in enough chain restaurants. And I didn't have much to tell Steve, who wrote this e-mail. EL

I recently dined at a local chain "Bistro" and ordered their Jumbo Lump Crab Cake. While the flavor was good I was a little suspicious of the lump crab. For the price, it had a good number of very large lumps. As I ate the crab cake I realized that the lumps were very uniformly the same size and shape. After careful examination (I pulled a lump apart by hand) I determined that the lump was actually a surimi type of formed crab meat. I even found a very small shell bit inside the lump. I have dubbed these "Crab McLumps". Other than my first instinct to call the Consumer Protection Agency I was curious if everyone else was aware of this fraud and I was the last to find out. What say you?

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 4:53 PM | Permalink | Comments (10)
        

Other Reviewer Richard and I were e-mailing back and forth just now about the dining out edition of the Taste section, which happens next Wednesday; and he mentioned his review of Sushi Sakura.

I could tell he was facing the same quandry I've been facing in a troubled economy.

You hate to hurt anyone's business; but at the same time, you don't want to steer readers wrong. It's a delicate balancing act. Often you have to hope folks will read between the lines. ...

His review interested me because it addresses another problem I struggle with when I review sushi restaurants, particularly in the suburbs. There are so many of them these days, and so many that seem very much alike.

They are today's equivalent of the neighborhood Italian or seafood eateries of yesteryear. They serve a valuable function in that neighborhood, but don't need citywide exposure.

As reviewers, we don't get to know a restaurant's menu and what it does best. We usually don't find out how nice the owners are to regulars. In other words, we don't know why some of these places are well loved and why people are outraged by our reviews. That's why I like these Monday Morning Quarterbacking and Thursday Sometime Quarterbacking posts. It gives you a chance to tell us -- and others -- why these restaurants are better than we think they are.

(Kenneth K. Lam/Sun photographer)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 3:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (9)
        

You cannot imagine how diabolically cleverly my co-worker's potato chips were stuck, and how long she spent shaking the evil vending machine, trying to dislodge the package with a pica ruler, etc. etc.

Finally a knight in shining armor went to work on it for her. After numerous shakings, poundings, kickings (they ought to put a tilt feature on vending machines at the Sun) he gallantly bought the Reese's Peanut Butter Cups you see in the photo, which were heavy enough to dislodge the chips when they dropped.

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 12:05 PM | Permalink | Comments (26)
        

This is our first Thanksgiving since my mother-in-law died, so we decided to do something a little different this year. The question was what.

Then my daughter announced she was off meat and poultry, which made cooking a turkey dinner for the three of us even more unappealing.

On an impulse, I made a reservation at a local restaurant. (I'll tell you more about it after our meal.)

We also decided it would be a good thing to take a tour of Frank Lloyd Wright's Fallingwater Friday morning. That would mean driving to Pennsylvania after dinner and staying in a motel; the tour starts at 8:30 a.m. and it's a four-hour drive. ...

I was quite pleased with myself for having come up with a plan that all three of us could agree on until last night, when I realized I didn't want to leave work and drive home because it was dark at 5 p.m.

Let's say we eat Thanksgiving dinner at 1 p.m. We would have three courses, a glass of wine or two, get out of the restaurant at 3 or so, full and happy...and drive for four hours, half of it in the dark on the Pennsylvania Turnpike with all the other holiday travelers?

I don't think so.

I suggested to my husband we bag the restaurant, have a good breakfast and start off to the motel late morning, then have Thanksgiving dinner when we got there.

He loved it.

Anybody know what restaurants are open for Thanksgiving in Somerset, Pa.?

Gailor does. When I broached the plan to her, she was skeptical. Five minutes after I got off the phone with her, I'm not exaggerating, she called back. She had spoken to Gretchen at the Somerset Holiday Inn, who had told her that "the Eat 'n Park at the bottom of the hill" would be serving Thanksgiving dinner.

Apart from other considerations, I'm not eating at a place where you park after you eat.

There are some better restaurants around, Gretchen had added, like the Ruby Tuesday, but she didn't think they would be open.

Maybe we'll just stay home and do Fallingwater another day. 

(AP Photo/Larry Crowe)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 10:58 AM | Permalink | Comments (42)
Categories: Thanksgiving
        

My daughter, Gailor, called with an idea for the blog inspired by a cupcake.

She described taking the paper off and holding the cupcake in her hand and then -- eureka! -- she realized there was a post on foods you eat with your hands.

"There's an intimacy with your food," she explained, "that you don't get when you have the intermediary fork thingie."

That Gailor. She has a way with words. ...

She has a point, though.  To wit:

* The world is divided into two types of people: those who eat pizza and those who eat pizza with a knife and fork.

* Ethiopian food. Enough said.

* Fried chicken, ribs.

* Corn on the cob, buttered popcorn.

* Ice cream cones as opposed to a cup.

You get the idea.

(Andre F. Chung/Sun photographer)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 6:26 AM | Permalink | Comments (37)
        

Meanrandy -- love that user name -- just sent me an e-mail about my Table Talk today, pointing out that Hilltop Diner was the inspiration for the movie Diner, not the Bel-Loc.

I think he's right; but luckily I had an out, I was quoting Southern Living. And I think even the magazine has an out; it called the Bel-Loc "one of the inspirations." ...

In other Table Talk news, I discuss Mr. Rain's Fun House. Its Web site has suddenly gotten more serious: The phrase "iconoclasic cuisine," if I'm remembering it correctly, has disappeared. I wonder if the museum suggested the change. I also found out more about the cafe/coffee house/wine bar that will replace Freda's Kitchen in Mount Washington.

As for Top 10 Wednesday, last week's restaurant pig-outs, it caused quite a stir. Ale Mary's owner called me to thank me for including his Saints and Sinner sandwich. But someone at the gym today stopped me and asked me why I never did a Top 10 of healthy dishes. (Because no one would read it?) They did get quite a few comments in the print edition this time.

(Barbara Haddock Taylor/Sun photographer)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 5:39 PM | Permalink | Comments (10)
        

The subject line of the e-mail from our Shallow Thought Wednesday guru John Lindner wasn't promising: "No STW?"

The e-mail said in its entirety:

No.
Sorry.
All my thoughts have been deep the past week.
I don’t know what’s wrong.

It's lucky he's good at making me laugh out loud so I can't get mad at him. I did ask him to send us a deep thought, or at least a photo of his fridge.

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 12:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (9)
        

I recently got an e-mail about Mimi's Kabob, an Afghan restaurant in Clarksville. I always appreciate it when restaurant owners tell me about themselves -- don't be shy -- although I wish they would do it just as they are about to open or soon after.

Only one Afghan restaurant has been successful in Baltimore, the Helmand. (I'm talking about places that offer more than kabobs.) At least two other ones I can think of have closed. The Helmand is so extraordinarily successful that it encourages others to try, I guess, but it can also make others look bad in comparison.

The same is true of Tio Pepe. No other Spanish restaurant in Baltimore has been able to compete, although a couple have tried.

Anyway, here's the e-mail about Mimi's: ...

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 10:57 AM | Permalink | Comments (12)
        

Have you heard about underground restaurants? The New York Times was writing about them over a year ago, so they aren't exactly news.

(I did a search to see if the Sun had written anything that I had missed. We hadn't, but one of the results was a story mentioning Subway.)

When I was looking at last year's list of this year's supposed trends from our restaurant consultants to see how many of them pertained (before I got too excited about next year's trends), I came across this: ...

There’ll be big growth in “black market” restaurants this year … one-night-only unlicensed dinner ventures staged by skilled home cooks (and occasional professionals) in warehouses, garages, cellars, vacant nightclubs and personal dining rooms. With ambitious menus, these dinners are by invitation only … word spreads via blogs, text messages, notices on Craigslist. ... “Gastronomic speakeasies” are mushrooming because: they offer a sense of adventure … sort of like slinking out to buy some cocaine; people are seeking alternatives to standard restaurant experiences; in some cases guests help prepare the meal; they get to meet like-minded foodies in unconventional surroundings; and they’re “sticking it to the man” by patronizing entrepreneurs who have no health department license, pay no taxes, insurance or social security to the cooks and waiters that these promoters hire for the event.

And our Craigslist guru, turkeybone, hasn't pointed out any notices for them either.

But there is something naughty, romantic and appealing about the concept, isn't there? Except for the part about no health department license.

(Nanine Hartzenbusch/Sun photographer)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 7:05 AM | Permalink | Comments (22)
        

This afternoon and tomorrow I'm working on a story for next week's Taste section.

On the last Sunday in December I usually have a wrap-up of the year's dining scene instead of a review, but of course that's a little late for those of you who want some guidance on where to eat out during the holidays.

It's always fun for me to go back and review my reviews in preparation for writing my year-ender. This time was no exception. I was struck by how many good new restaurants opened up that I had forgotten about -- like Sabor in Lutherville. ...

I'm also going to do awards, so if you have any category suggestions, please post below.

While I was working on the story and trying to decide just what info people need this time of year (there are too many places open for Thanksgiving for me to list and too few open for Christmas, so I can't help you there), someone called with an odd request.

She wanted to find a restaurant for an 80 year old who is "rich as Croesus." (Not sure why I need to know that.) What does he want? An inexpensive place where he can get a steak for lunch.

He wanted to go to Outback, she said, but it isn't open for lunch. For a second choice, he likes dives with good steak. I couldn't think of any place to suggest except maybe Stoney River Legendary Steaks, and that only because I know it has steak and is open for lunch. Not because I've been there.

I finally said to wait until next week. "Fine-Dining Bars" will appear in next Wednesday's Taste section.

To get back to my story, there's only one problem. Now I have to come up with something for the last Sunday in December. If you're making suggestions, might as well make one for that.

(Lloyd Fox/Sun photographer)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 3:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (16)
        

This week's topic, Top 10 Fine-Dining Bars, intrigues me because they seem to me to be a peculiarly Baltimore institution.

They aren't bistros. They aren't wine bars. The decor isn't stylish -- in fact, you can't even describe it as decor. They are places in city neighborhoods to go for a beer that also happen to have surprisingly inventive food. ...

If I thought of a place as a restaurant first and a bar second, I didn't put it on the list (with the exception of one, and Other Reviewer Richard talked me into it).

Here's my list in alphabetical order. Let the arguments, outrage and scorn begin:

* Annabel Lee in the Canton area. At heart it's a neighborhood corner bar, only with duck fat fries, filet mignon and mushroom risotto.

* Brewer's Art in Mount Vernon. Other Reviewer Richard convinced me this is more brewpub than restaurant and deserves to be on this list, although plenty will argue otherwise. The fine New American cuisine isn't in question.

* Hamilton Tavern in Hamilton. OK, it's very casual fine dining, but the menu includes a beet and prosciutto salad, roasted harvest vegetables, and a meatloaf made with pulled duck as well as ground beef and pork.

* Mama's on the Half Shell in Canton. I know it's appeared on lists as a seafood restaurant, but it always feels more like a bar to me, even the upstairs dining room.

* One-Eyed Mike's in Fells Point. Still more bar than restaurant, but any place that offers both balsamic vinaigrette and raspberry vinaigrette offers more than just pub grub.

* Peter's Inn in Fells Point. The quintessential example of the genre. No one could mistake this for anything but a neighborhood bar, but oh, that osso buco and those pots de creme.

* Red Star in Fells Point. Any bar whose kitchen even knows what aioli is, let alone has $10 yam fries with brown sugar aioli on the menu, gets my vote as a fine-dining bar.

* Reserve in South Baltimore. This was the bar that inspired this Top 10. When I reviewed it recently, I commented on the disconnect between the imaginative food and the neighborhood bar-like atmosphere.

* Ryleigh's Oyster Bar in Federal Hill. A few years ago Ryleigh's Brewpub became Ryleigh's Oyster Bar, and the menu got much more imaginative, with dishes like coriander-crusted tuna and salad with duck confit.

* Waterfront in Fells Point. Under "Pub Grub" is panko-encrusted fried oysters with a horseradish cream sauce. Enough said.

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 4:09 AM | Permalink | Comments (73)
Categories: Top Ten Tuesdays
        

It's sad. I have a good Deal of the Week for this week, but I've already turned in my Table Talk column, so only readers of Dining@Large will benefit.

This Wednesday, Nov. 11, the two Ruth's Chris steak houses in the city and the one in Annapolis are offering free samples of the new $5 Prime Time menu from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m.

People sitting in the bar or on the patio (the weather doesn't look good for this) will get one "Prime Bite" and two glasses of wine. ...

Prime Bites are small plates -- seared ahi tuna, crab cakes, jumbo shrimp cocktail, stuffed mushrooms, and mini Kobe burgers -- that will normally be $5 each. Select cocktails and martinis will be $5 each, along with Hess Select Chardonnay and Peter Lehmann Shiraz for $5 a glass. Domestic and imported beers will sell for $3 each.

The $5 Prime Time menu is a limited-time promotion, offered in the bar during dinner hours every night but Saturday.

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 4:48 PM | Permalink | Comments (13)
        

Jacques Kelly had a good column Saturday on local foods that have vanished. These are foods that for the most part were even before my time. (I didn't move to Baltimore till I was married.)

Apropos of our discussion on organ foods, he mentions that Marconi's had three different sweetbread dishes on its menu! I hadn't remembered that.

(Sun file photo)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 2:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (8)
        

Just when you thought it was safe to start reading Dining@Large again...I'm not done with the 2010 trends yet.

Remember the restaurant consultants' No. 7?

#7 THEY LAUGHED WHEN WE SAID “TONGUE”: Last year, some bloggers said we’d gone bonkers by predicting that tongue – beef and veal – would be hot in 2009. Well … here’s the Offal Truth: For 2010, it’ll be tongue (including lamb) and oxtail along with beef and pork cheeks, chicken gizzards, tripe, and other innards and odd parts. “In a pig’s ear,” you say? That, too, along with trotters. Savvy chefs are using these odd parts to offset downsized portions of expensive steaks and chops. You interleave a few slices of strip steak with slices of smoked tongue; you top a petit filet mignon with a nugget of wine-braised beef cheek; you layer some oxtail ravioli over a half-size portion of New York strip and … bingo! … chefs create added interest and eye candy while lowering their food costs. ...

I have seen trotters and beef cheeks on menus around here, but not very often. Tongue, I don't think so. ...

Will "innards and odd parts" make it in Baltimore? I'm not sure. Liver has all but disappeared, except for pate and foie gras. I don't even see sweetbreads on menus much anymore.

Which reminds me of the time when I wrote a story on sweetbreads for the food section, and a copy editor wrote the headline "Sweetbreads -- Ain't It Gland?"

Needless to say, it was one headline that never made its way into print.

(Grilled mahi-mahi over mashed potatoes with maple candied brussels sprouts and oxtail dumplings at Kali's Court. Jed Kirschbaum/Sun photographer)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 11:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (19)
        

My review of Columbia's new Mexican restaurant and tequila lounge, Azul 17, ran in yesterday's Arts & Entertainment section.

I don't have much space to review the food in print, so I didn't want to go on about my annoyance over my $9 margarita that was mostly ice. But it was annoying -- and I wasn't even paying for it. I ordered a second one and it was all ice, too.

I should do a Top 10 of places that put too much ice in their drinks. Suggestions?  ...

Midnight Sun Sam didn't seem to have the same problem when he and Amie had drinks at Azul 17, so maybe it was an anomaly.

I would love to hear from someone who ordered the $100 margarita, or even the $40 margarita. And I would go back just to order my own tamarind margarita -- I just had a sip of my friend's, but I'm still thinking about it.

(Amy Davis/Sun photographer)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 10:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (6)
Categories: Monday Morning Quarterbacking, Wine and Spirits
        

My favorite wine blog (be prepared for quirky), is running a personalized wine pairing service for the next week. I'm hoping some of you will try it and report back here. There doesn't seem to be any charge.

This is 750 mL, which we've talked about here before. I don't read it for information about wine but because the blogger, Nilay Gandhi, expresses better than anyone I've ever read how passionate people can feel about wine; and, more importantly, some of his reviews make me laugh out loud.

(AP Photo/Mike Groll, file)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 6:46 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)
Categories: Wine and Spirits
        

Next Sunday I review Hell Point Seafood in Annapolis.

This is the seafood restaurant that Robert Kinkead, the well-known Washington restaurateur, opened.

I've heard that he calls it "Kinkead Lite," but since I've never been to Kinkead's in DC, I had nothing to compare it to. Maybe that's a good thing.

To see what I thought of our dinner there, please look for my review in the Arts & Entertainment section. ...

By the way, I didn't link to the Web site because there doesn't seem to be one. I've heard that a competitor bought up www.hellpointseafood.com, but so what? Come up with some other URL. People these days expect a Web site, and they like to be able to look at the menu or get directions before they visit.

(Tasha Treadwell/Sun photographer)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 5:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)
Categories: Review Preview
        

Now is that a cute baby or what? Our virtual friend Sean (whose wife's pregnancy we've been following here) became a father last Thursday. Here's what Sean wrote to me:

Hennessy Amanda was born on 11/5/09 at 1:56pm.  7 lbs, 13 oz., 20.5 inches long!

We're both thrilled and exhausted.  We first went in to the hospital Tuesday evening, but Hennessy (no relation to the cognac - it's a family name) decided she had no interest in the outside world whatsoever.  So, she didn't make her Planet Earth debut until Thursday afternoon!  The amount of strength and dedication that Emily (my wife) showed in this long, painful process has completely bowled me over and was ridiculously humbling.

I can't wait until I get to start cooking for little Nessie!

Oh, Sean, if she's anything like my kid was, you may regret those final words. Unless you like cooking Oodles of Noodles.

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 12:44 PM | Permalink | Comments (22)
        

Who knows? Pretty soon you may be seeing panko-crusted red lionfish with a sherry-Dijon beurre blanc on the menu of your favorite seafood restaurant.

The Economist is excited about the fact that the restaurant business may take care of a serious ecosystem problem.

No, I don't subscribe to the Economist. (Of  course that's not my Entertainment Weekly over there.) But I have a daughter in business school who does.

According to the story, the red lionfish is an invasive predator that can gobble up 80 percent of small fish when introduced into an environment where it's not native. It's a "top predator" because it has poisonous spines, so even sharks leave it alone.

Well, it's not quite the top predator.  ...

As Calvin Trillin once said, lobster is protected from its natural enemy by its high price. The same doesn't seem to be true of red lionfish -- yet.

A company called Sea to Table, which connects chefs with fishermen from sustainable wild fisheries, has gotten high-end restaurants in Chicago and New York to test out the fish. (Apparently when they are de-spined, red lionfish taste like snapper.) The idea is that if there's enough demand, divers in the Caribbean, where the fish is damaging the biodiversity of the coral reefs, will be happy to go out and catch them.

The restaurants' customers loved the flavor, but also loved the idea they were doing something good for the environment.

Why am I skeptical of this as an eco-solution? It reminds me of when Gailor explained the concept of "perverse incentives" to me and used as an example a government that put a bounty on rats to get rid of them, so people started to farm rats.

On the other hand, one commenter on the story online suggested figuring out a way to make kudzu taste good.

Now that's a concept I can get behind.

(Photo courtesy of the Economist Web site)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 5:52 AM | Permalink | Comments (26)
        

If I could, I would award every comment under The Awesomeness of Cheese post Comment of the Week. Can you have Comment Section of the Week?

But if I must limit myself to only one comment, it would have to be:

cheese is the beatles of food.

Posted by: ryan97ou | November 6, 2009 1:34 PM

How true. How simple and yet Zen-like in its wisdom.  ...

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 8:47 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)
        

One interesting thing to come out of of my post on dining trends for 2010 a few days ago was that another restaurant consultant jumped into the fray.

My finger hovered over the delete button because it felt like spam to me, but I finally decided to let the comment stay because there is some truth in what he had to say.

Or is there? I still can't quite decide.  ...

Here's Jeffrey Summer's response to a statement by the original consultants that they would tell us "How the downturn has altered consumer expectations and what it will take to lure ... diners out of their economic storm shelters. ":

This is the biggest myth to come out of journalists and businesses who just don't get it. The 'downturn' didn't do anything but amplify the ever increasing expectations of consumers across the board. And there's no such thing as "...luring diners out of their economic storm shelters.." because they don't exist. The recalibration of the consumer's mind was underway long before the economy went south. Operators who do not understand that past levels of spending won't return anytime soon or that the consumer isn't looking for deals as much as they are value, will be left behind.

My guess is that if you ask 100 potential restaurant customers if they are looking for value when they go out  -- and were even before the recession started -- 99 of them would say yes. The other one would say no just to be annoying.

But the reality is that before the economy went south, an awful lot of people were ordering $40 entrees and $12 mixed drinks, even at restaurants where you would be hard pressed to defend the food as "good value."

A $12 martini is never a good value to me -- not saying it isn't fun to order one anyway if you have the cash.

I have no hard facts to back up my feeling that people are living it up a lot less now. Certainly many of the recent closings suggest that. But I do know that restaurants are offering deals to lure customers in.

I'll use the example of the Prime Rib. I got a press release from Baltimore's premier steak house saying that it had had a great year this year in spite of the recession.

Even so, the Prime Rib has started offering various deals, including a half-price wine list on Sundays and a three-course meal for $30.09.  I don't think it would be doing that if giving good value were all you had to do to draw in customers these days.

(Photo by Brendan Cavanaugh/special to the Sun)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 7:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (23)
        

So I'm sitting here trying to get some work done, and the phone rings. I pick it up and my daughter is on the other end, calling me to say she's eating a fruit and cheese plate for lunch.

"Can we talk about the awesomeness of cheese for a moment?" she asks.

Uh, no. On deadline here. 

This is going to be a great blog entry, she insists. Cheese is a no-brainer. It's the kind of topic you can throw out there when you're on vacation and say, "discuss."

"How about a Top 10 Baltimore cheese shops?" she asks.

"We don't have 10 cheese shops," I say.

I don't want to be dismissive, so I add, "We did do Top 10 Cheese Plates."

Dead silence on the other end of the line.

"You have been doing that blog a long time."

(Jed Kirschbaum/Sun photographer)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 12:21 PM | Permalink | Comments (32)
        

I'm worried about Robert of Cross Keys. I'm afraid that associating with all the degenerate characters on this blog, including its writer, may be getting to him. Here's Robert and today's excellent Free Market Friday. EL

Right now I’m sitting in Red Emma’s -- yes, Red Emma’s.   I’m trying to write my Free Market Fridays, or Fascist Fridays as my wife calls it, but it is hard to focus in here.  I feel like the Jewish mother in “Fiddler in the Roof” when she goes into the Orthodox church looking for her daughter.  As I sit here in my Brooks Brothers shirt and sushi tie, I truly know the feeling of being a stranger in a strange place. ...

Oh well, the coffee here is actually very good…much better than Starbucks.  I’m very surprised that communists have Splenda, but here it is right next to a vegan Death by Chocolate cake and some Bush t-shirts marked down 50 percent.

So, anyway, this weekend was my annual Ravens tailgate.  I was hoping to bring one those Texas hickory briskets that I have written about, but I didn’t order it in time.  In its place the menu had a red theme, although different from the red theme I’m experiencing right now.  We had homemade meatballs and sausage in marinara sauce alongside Bloody Marys. 

This breakfast was prepared by one of my good friends, who is of Italian-Irish lineage.  Fortunately, he got his culinary skills from his Italian mom and his cocktail skills from his Irish dad, otherwise I would have been greeting the day with cabbage and Amaretto.   

The tailgate went great.  I had a couple of sausage and meatball combo sandwiches on fresh rolls with Provolone, and I had a few Bloodies. I also did quite well in the battle of wits, which consisted of a three-hour onslaught of insults among friends about receding hair, expanding waistlines and fantasy football ineptness that was surprisingly interrupted with a rather lengthy debate on whether deism can be reconciled with evolution.

Oh yea, then there was a Ravens game.  I cheered loudly. They played well. We won.

On the walk back to the car, I found myself hungry again.  Now, I should have gone back to the meatballs and sausage, but I found myself saying that we should stop off at Bill Bateman’s in Severna Park.  I don’t have much of a track record of making great decisions on days when drinking begins at 8 a.m., and this would be no different. 

Bateman’s: not good.

There was a time when I liked Bateman’s.  I’m not sure if I changed or they did, but it has been a long time since I’ve enjoyed anything about this place.   The wings, both bourbon and original, were fair to poor, and nowhere near as good as what you can get at place like Cluck-U or even the old Damien's wings that Bateman’s used to serve.   The fries were truly forgettable, limp and flavorless.  The onion rings were just strange.  I think they had a breading normally seen on coconut shrimp.

I shouldn’t just pick on Bateman’s. There are a lot of places like them, particularly in the suburbs.  Places that serve uninspired food that is bigger on portion than flavor.  Places that nonetheless seem to attract a lot of customers, not all of which started drinking at dawn before going there.    
 
As I wrote about last week, there are good places in the suburbs.  Places like Diamondback Tavern that use quality ingredients procured from local sources to create well-composed dishes that are flavorful and affordable.  There’s a place in Anne Arundel County that also does this.  It’s called Punk’s Backyard Grill, and it’s where I went the day after the tailgate to recover from Bateman’s.

Punk’s, which is located in the Annapolis Mall, could easily be mistaken for some corporate eatery, but it is actually an independent restaurant that began as a thesis project of a group of students enrolled in Cornell’s restaurant graduate program.

Their concept is to recreate a backyard cookout, but I think that undersells the quality of the food. This place isn’t just serving up simple burgers and hotdogs alongside Natural Light and bug spray.  Punk’s has excellent food that is fairly sophisticated but not pretentious.

I started off with a salad of beets -- beets are very big this year, I’m seeing them everywhere -- oranges, orange oil, walnuts and goat cheese on arugula.  It was a very fresh tasting salad with flavors that complemented each other.  There was no skimping when it came to any of the ingredients, particularly the cheese and nuts that more often than not in salads like this are relegated to a cameo appearance.      

I then had a turkey burger with applewood smoked bacon, cranberry relish and sage mayonnaise on a brioche bun.  This burger had a lot of flavor and a nice balance of sweet from the brioche, tartness from the cranberry, savory from the sage and salty smokiness from the bacon.

For beverage and dessert I went with pumpkin flavor.  I had a Dogfish Pumpkin Ale and a pumpkin bread pudding.   Both had a nice seasonal taste, and neither was overly sweet.

What I really like about the food at Punk’s is that it is thought out. Someone is saying this flavor goes with that flavor, and I’m going to combine them to create something special.  Obviously, crafting a dish isn’t anything new from a culinary perspective, but it is not something you always see at a casual restaurant.  I appreciate that the turkey burger at Punk’s isn’t like something you’d see at Bateman’s.  You don’t ask for ketchup or mustard. There are no optional add-ons of the cheese of your choice or bacon for 75 cents extra.    

Well, what do you know?  It seems that I’m coming out against the freedom to choose and opting instead to have someone make decisions for me.  It is probably time for me to leave Red Emma’s, but I think I’ll try that vegan Death by Chocolate cake before I do.

(Jed Kirschbaum/Sun photographer)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 11:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (14)
        

I feel I'm being unfairly blamed in Midnight Sun Sam's lament here. Everybody knew the Park Avenue Five Guys has been closed for ages. EL

In a vain effort to dodge the terrible city traffic last night, I took Park Avenue, which took me past one of my fallback burger joints – Five Guys.

Just then, my heart stopped. I wasn't dead, though -- I was just in shock.

The Five Guys at the corner of Centre Street and Park Avenue was gone. ...

Gone!

The sign had been taken down, the number was disconnected, and the Brown Paper of Death was taped up in the windows.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!

I wanted to jump out of the car, run over to the building and claw at the door until my fingers were sore. But I knew it would do no good. There was nothing I could do to bring Five Guys back.

Come to find out, Five Guys has been closed for some time. I didn't know this, even though I sit next to the Baltimore Sun's restaurant critic. Thanks for telling me, Elizabeth. Geez!

For the next few days, I'll be in mourning. I don't know what I'll do after that. There's another Five Guys in the Pratt Street pavilion in the Inner Harbor, but that's just so impractical. You can't park outside, and there are these tourist types everywhere. Yuck.

There's also a Five Guys all the way out on Boston Street, past Canton and past Brewer's Hill. It's nice, but it's just so far removed.

In all honesty, I'm not that hardcore about Five Guys. But I feel betrayed, and I want to take my revenge.

What if I open up another burger joint in the exact same location? I could name it Six Guys. It would be slightly better than Five Guys (because there's one more guy).

Who's with me?

(Photo of Harborplace Five Guys by Andre F. Chung/Sun photographer)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 10:28 AM | Permalink | Comments (33)
        

Are you ready for some buzzwords? (Sorry, my family watches a lot of Monday Night Football.)

Here are, as promised, the 25 buzzwords from international restaurant consultants Joseph Baum & Michael Whiteman Co.

Now don't go telling me there are more or less than 25. I can't figure out why they labeled them that way myself. ...

BUZZWORDS FOR 2010: Authentic Neapolitan pizza. Lamb riblets. Too many food trucks, not enough curb space. Latino street food. Farmed trout creeps up on farmed salmon. Curry- and Indian-spiced fried chicken. Vietnamese sandwiches (bahn mi). Gelati. Global comfort food. Artisan hot dogs. Made-to-order ice cream. Chefs turned butchers. Casual comfort. Touch-screen kiosks and home delivery in fast food outlets. Latino street food. Wood oven cooking. More energy drinks and adulterated waters. Mood food. Backyard and rooftop bee hives. Stevia. Kimchee. Urban farms. Griddled burgers. Free food. House-made everything, especially in sandwiches.

I wish we had Messrs. Baum and Whitehead here with us to talk a little about these. Free food, for instance, is sort of slipped in there. Is that like free hors d'oeuvres or oysters during happy hour? I have noticed more of those this year.

Obviously any and all of these are interesting and fun to talk about -- well, maybe not "casual comfort" or energy drinks -- but what would make them even more interesting would be if they have a good chance to be true in '10. (That looks weird, doesn't it? First time I've written the new decade that way.)

Anyway, I thought it might be fun to show you last year's buzzword predictions so you can judge for yourself:

BUZZWORDS FOR 2009: Maple syrup – in vinaigrettes, in sauces, as glazes on savory food. Brussels sprouts. Mozzarella bars – there’s one in LA, one in New York, and a San Antonio pizzeria recently opened a “burrata bar," so expect more restaurants promoting hand-pulled mozzarella in various forms. Shisito peppers and pimientos al padron – thumb-size peppers from Japan and Spain that vary randomly from hot to sweet, showing up as blister-fried bar snacks and atop grilled meats. With more and better types of mangos are entering the country, they’ve become the sweet fruit of choice. Porchetta. House-made pickled vegetables are enlivening the palate, especially when served with fatty foods such as charcuterie. House-made charcuterie is taking off as chefs demonstrate their artisan talents. Osterias. Spray cans of olive oil and balsamic vinegar for interactive customer experiences. Stevia. Ultra-slow cooking, either in pouches (sous vide) or in ovens (four-hour chicken at 250 degrees) that yields less shrinkage so that portions look larger, more succulent, and easier control in restaurant kitchens – so long as no one gets poisoned. Duck Eggs. Breakfast all day long. Nutella. Old fashioned Dutch gin with lots more flavor impact. Comfort food like baked beans in gourmet concoctions, and peanut butter. More drinking places calling themselves gastropubs. Korean food (tamed for western palates) as kimchee goes multi-culti; Peruvian cuisine, as we predicted last year, will make big strides; and other Andean countries’ foods will emerge this year. Basque and Catalonian cookery, as people explore the flavors of northern Spain beyond their local tapas bars. Salt will be the new trans-fat and there’ll be attacks on bottled beverages, especially energy drinks. Superfruit flavors and extracts added to gins and vodkas. Chickpeas are the vegetable of the year.

Chickpeas aren't my vegetable of the year, but it seems to me a lot of these were right on. So does that mean we'll have beehives in our backyards by the end of next year?

(Barbara Haddock Taylor/Sun photographer)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 7:07 AM | Permalink | Comments (14)
        

I think I better post a link to Part 2 of "100 Things Restaurant Staffers Should Never Do." It deserves its own entry.

I have to say, I would love to eat at a restaurant where the wait staff followed all his commands. I'm just not sure it's ever going to happen.

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 1:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (9)
        

Some press releases I just shake my head at.

The title of the latest one in that category is "MARTHA STEWART AND RACHAEL RAY MAKE TELEVISION HISTORY BY APPEARING ON SAME SET FOR THE FIRST TIME."

The moon landing. That made television history. The last episode of "Seinfeld." Not Martha Stewart and Rachael Ray appearing on each other's shows.

Oh well, if you must know:

Martha Stewart will appear on the "Rachael Ray Show" on Nov. 12, where she will show Rachael how to create a "unique Thanksgiving centerpiece." The next day Rachael  will return the favor and appear on "The Martha Stewart Show," where Martha will "show the baking-challenged Rachael how to prepare a perfect Thanksgiving Day dessert."

It sounds like Martha is having to do all the work here. ...

Obviously I don't have a photo of Rachael and Martha together because they haven't made television history yet, but I kind of like this one of Martha and her daughter Alexis. Of course, Gailor and I are better looking, but...it's a nice photo.

(AP Photo/Martha Stewart Living/Omnimedia, Dana Gallagher, file)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 10:52 AM | Permalink | Comments (17)
        

We've talked about gastropubs at length before, and the consensus seems to be good idea, terrible name.

But a couple of things came up just now that made me want to bring up gastropubs again.

First, scottbbfm and Lissa introduced the concept of fine-dining bars, or rather I introduced it, scottbbfm pointed it out and Lissa gave it a name I love. ...

Now I'm obsessed with having a Top 10 list of fine-dining bars. Nominations for the list accepted below.

Then this excellent story appeared in the Denver Post. Although there are only two gastropubs in Denver, so we know that the writer has no right to call it a local trend until he comes up with one more, I like the discussion of the word itself.

"The first half is Greek and the other half Latin, but never mind that," [a language expert] says. "The gastro part evokes acid and drastic and the Astros, and gastropod, more than it does gastronomy. A gastropod is a snail or a slug or a limpet — an animal whose one leg, pod, extends more or less from its stomach, gastro. Then there's ghastly. Not to mention gas."

Amazingly, some people actually defend the word in the story. Don't you prefer the term "fine-dining bars"? Or at least "bistro bars"?

It seems to me there's no advantage to calling your bistro bar a gastropub unless you really want to convey some sort of Britishness. And I can't think of a bar in Baltimore that wants to do that.

(Kim Hairston/Sun photographer)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 6:06 AM | Permalink | Comments (23)
        

Bucky sent me an e-mail earlier today that said in its entirety:

"Where does the Jazz apple rank on your list?"

I knew that this blog had introduced him to the Honeycrisp, which somehow has given me the aura of an apple expert, but I had never thought about having an apple list before. If I did it would look something like this:

1) Honeycrisp

2) Fuji

It's not that I have anything against any other varieties (except Red Delicious). It's just that I start eating those two and before I get bored with them suddenly apple season is over. ...

I don't remember seeing Jazz apples at the farmers markets or in the supermarkets around here, but then I haven't been looking for them. I know nothing about them except that a fresh Washington crop is available in November, and maybe that's why Bucky is getting them now.

While I was mulling this over I got a second e-mail:

"OK…this is weird. I pulled my Jazz apple out of the bag but when I looked at the little label, it says, 'American Cameo.'  So now I need to go back to the store and see what’s up.  I’m positive I pulled it from the bin that says, 'Jazz Apples.'  (The American Cameo tastes like a Delicious to me…)"

That reminds me to check those little labels myself. Nothing worse than expecting an edible apple and getting a Delicious.

That was immediately followed by a third e-mail:

"I found this on the Cameo: 'The Cameo is a cultivar of apple, discovered by chance by the Caudle family in a Dryden, Washington orchard in 1987. Its parentage is uncertain; it may be a cross between a Red Delicious and a Golden Delicious…'

"Know what that means?  I am apparently developing an apple palate.  (See previous email.)"

I had one wild moment of thinking he meant all that was written on the little sticker on his Cameo apple, and I was wondering whether he used a microscope to read it. But then I realized he must have Googled "Cameo apple."

The idea of Bucky's developing an apple palate seems a little, what's the word, incongruous.

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 3:17 PM | Permalink | Comments (52)
        

I got this e-mail today from a reader, which reminds me it's time to repeat myself again:

Dear Elizabeth,

Did you actually like Stoney River?  I could[n't] tell from your article.

Regards,

He was talking about the item that appeared in my Table Talk column in the Taste section today.  I get an e-mail like this about once a month from folks who don't realize that it's a news column where I tell about openings and closings and such, not a review. ...

My reviews appear in the Sunday paper. I don't go for at least a month after a place opens, while for Table Talk I try to tell you about new restaurants as quickly as I can get the owner to talk to me.

Today's column also has news about Langermann's in the Can Company in Canton.

This week's Top 10 Wednesday is last week's Restaurants in Hell, plus comments from you.

(Kim Hairston/Sun photographer)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 11:58 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)
        

Once again guest poster John Lindner has come up with a subject I wish I had thought of first. Times have really changed. My solution? I don't give dinner parties anymore. Here's John. EL

Do you host dinner parties? If so, have you ever, while planning the menu, stressed over whether your guests have food phobias, allergies, religious affliations (vegan, vegetarian, pescatarian, white-meat only) or other assorted intolerances? How do you plan? Do you call them?

“Hey, any objection to roasted cute things? Tortured geese? Seared Flipper?” ...

I was recently reminded on this very blog that I ought not to spill alcohol into the recipe without checking. But what if you don’t know? I have a vague recollection of almost killing a guy with a cookie because it never occurred to me to warn him that it contained nuts.

“Nuts? Nuts can kill you?”
 
Checking for allergies and even preferences for red meat, chicken or fish isn’t difficult. But what about the “moral” questions? I know my type is going the way of chest hair, but even I am considering never touching another forkful of chicken unless I know for absolute certain the little clucker wasn’t raised in a lunch-pail sized cage.

Does that make me an undesirable dinner guest? (Frankly, if it smelled good enough, I’d eat it and live with the guilt.) How would I convey that to my host?

“Hey, you didn’t buy this squab from an avian torture chamber, didja?” 

The last time I cooked for guests whose preferences and affiliations were unknown to me, I asked them what they couldn’t/didn’t eat. They said they could/would eat anything. Is it always that easy?

What does “I’ll eat anything” mean coming from a vegan? Have you ever not invited someone because of their vast spectrum of danger foods? Are hosting dinner parties getting more complicated? And how’m I supposed to know if the tuna was caught in a frickin’ dolphin-safe net?
 
(Photo by C. Spencer van Gulick, courtesy Stock Xchng)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 10:43 AM | Permalink | Comments (18)
        

I always like getting trend reports from international restaurant consultants, first because, as you know, I'm a sucker for trends and second, these are the things that may get foisted on us in the future because restaurateurs are paying these consultants big bucks to tell them what to do next.

Anyway, here's the provocative list I got in an e-mail from Joseph Baum & Michael Whiteman Co. Inc. of the 12 top restaurant and hotel food-and-beverage trends for 2010. ...

We'll discuss them in more detail later -- oh, yes, boys and girls, you know we will. But for now, just enjoy considering what they may mean for you at some future time when you feel like going out and having dinner at a nice restaurant.

* How the downturn has altered consumer expectations and what it will take to lure them [sic] diners out of their economic storm shelters. 

* Emotional resonance and the left side of the menu.

* Going downscale to go upscale:  What’s really behind the hamburger craze.  

* Fresh = Local = Hand-Made = Safer. 

* Why fried chicken is the new pork belly. 

* Food additives are back, but this time they’re “good” ones (maybe). 

* All about Innards and Odd Parts. 

* How “Voices of Authority” have lost control over food and beverage language.  

* Why tart/sour is the New Bitter. 

* Menu churn

* Meet you at the supermarket

* Catering to kids

* Plus:  25 buzzwords for 2010

(Photo courtesy of Baum & Whiteman)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 6:55 AM | Permalink | Comments (15)
        

I got word of an event this Saturday, Nov. 7, sponsored by the Historic Charles Street Association that sounds like fun.

Michelle Coiron, who is the association's executive director, says the merchants wanted something like a street fair, so the group put this together last minute.

It's called Let's Eat! Charles Street. Restaurants and bars, including Marie Louise Bistro, Sascha's, Mick O'Shea's, Lumbini, Cazbar, Maisy's, Spirits, Howard's of Mount Vernon, George's on Mount Vernon Square, El Guapito and the Helmand, will have booths. ...

The association will be selling wine and beer provided by Spirits and Brewers Art. Music and live entertainment will also be in the mix. Hours are noon to 6 p.m.

I checked the weather forecast for Saturday, and it's looking good -- sunny and a high in the upper 50s.

The event will be held on Read Street, which will be blocked off between Cathedral and Charles.

(Lloyd Fox/Sun photographer)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 3:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (10)
        

I recently got this e-mail from Sturmy:

Any local restaurants/wine markets/etc holding a Beaujolais nouveau celebration this year?

I'm sure there are, but I haven't gotten any press releases yet. I'll pass the information along if I do. And maybe you would post below if you know of any. A lot of people would be interested, in spite of how mean serious wine drinkers are about the wine.

One wine critic compared drinking Beaujolais Nouveau to eating cookie dough, which seems a bit harsh but is funny. ...

The reason the subject has come up now is that Beaujolais Nouveau is released the third Thursday of November.

This list of 10 facts (I don't know how fascinating they are in spite of the headline) will bring you up to speed about the wine if you don't know anything about it.

(Beaujolais nouveau or Beaujolais primeur, the first wine of the season, has the light, fresh summery taste one would expect in a wine barely two months old. Bob Fila/Chicago Tribune photographer)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 11:32 AM | Permalink | Comments (24)
Categories: Wine and Spirits
        

When I posted an earlier entry on heart attacks on a plate, I didn't think I would get a Top 10 out of it.

But sure enough, all of you came through. I had more than enough ammunition for a Top 10 Restaurant Pig-Outs. Thanks for your suggestions.

I loved this comment by Trixie, which epitomizes the enthusiasm with which you approached this topic: ...

Am I wrong to admit that I would actually like to try a beer battered burger? I mean seriously, break it down...Beer, batter, and burger. How could it be bad?

* Ale Mary's Saints and Sinners sandwich, served at brunch: fried egg, sausage, bacon, and cheese between two Krispy Kreme honey-glazed doughnuts.

* Chick & Ruth's Super Colossal Reuben with two meats (three pounds), cheese, sauerkraut, and Russian dressing on grilled rye with a six-pound milk shake.

* The Dizz's Fat Ass Crab Skins: Baked potatoes hollowed out and filled with cheese, bacon, and crab (served with a side of sour cream).

* Fogo de Chao's all-you-can-eat meat fest. Because it costs $46.50, you want to eat a lot to get your money's worth.

* The beer-battered burger stuffed with cheddar and deep fried, called the Heart Attack on a Plate, at Mother's Federal Hill Grille.

* The Pigwich at the Parkside: scrapple, bacon, ham, American cheese with tomato and onions on a hoagie roll with a side of fries.

* Brunch at Ryan's Daughter. I was going to say any all-you-can-eat brunch, but I looked at the menu and out of 16 items there is one vegetable (broiled tomatoes) and the fruit is a "seasonal fruit display." Every other dish is a pig-out waiting to happen.

* The Great Steak Challenge at Steak & Main: a 26-ounce Delmonico steak, an 8-ounce filet mignon, a 12-ounce New York strip, a 12-ounce veal chop, and 16 ounces of flat iron steak, as well as a baked potato and a side of vegetables.

* Vaccaro's Little Italy Monday Night Special. All the dessert and coffee you can eat and drink for $12.95. From 6 p.m. to 9 p.m., holidays excluded.

(Amy Davis/Sun photographer)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 4:32 AM | Permalink | Comments (29)
Categories: Top Ten Tuesdays
        

My review of the Reserve in -- to avoid a neighborhood argument I'll call it the Federal Hill area -- appeared in yesterday's paper. Federal Hill is one of those places where I would expect upscale little wine bars and bistros to do very well, but actually bars with standard bar food seem to do better.

Obviously there are exceptions; Corks and Regi's come immediately to mind.

Anyway, the Reserve falls somewhere between the two types, and I'll be interested to see how it does there. Parking is a real problem unless you're willing to walk. Be careful; you now need a permit after 6 p.m. to park on many of the residential streets nearby.

(Kim Hairston/Sun photographer)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 3:55 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)
Categories: Monday Morning Quarterbacking
        

Tune in to Sun columnist Dan Rodricks' radio show today on 88.1, WYPR.

In the second hour of "Midday," from 1 p.m. to 2 p.m., Dan will be talking with former New York Times restaurant critic Frank Bruni on "his long, complicated relationship with food, as revealed in his new memoir, Born Round: The Secret History of a Full-Time Eater."

You can also listen here.

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 11:12 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

I got this e-mail from another Elizabeth, and I can't say I know anything about the place. If anyone does, please post below.

I'm guessing it's another casualty of the recession, but that's just a guess.

When I drove past it yesterday I noticed the closed sign was missing a letter and it looked pretty bedraggled: ...
 

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 8:58 AM | Permalink | Comments (6)
        

The soft opening is a relatively new phenomenon in the restaurant business. When I first started reviewing, new restaurants didn't want a review right away, but they definitely wanted to get the word out they were open. Now some owners avoid me like the plague when I want to feature their new restaurant in my Table Talk news column. They will go for weeks or even months before they have their "grand opening."

The practice of having a soft opening for family and friends is a good idea, just like a dress rehearsal for a play. But the most surprising soft opening I've heard about yet is the one for Stoney River Legendary Steaks, Towson's new steak house. It opened last week. ...

A woman I know was going to the P.F. Chang's in the same wing of Towson Town Center for lunch. While she was waiting for her husband to park the car, she wandered over to the soon-to-be-opened steak house to look at the menu. The host approached her and asked her if she'd like to come in and have lunch. It would be complementary, he said.

It took her a little while longer as they talked before she realized he meant "complimentary as in free."

She and her husband enjoyed their lunch, so they went back the Saturday before the official opening for dinner -- with four friends. Their food was free; all they paid for was drinks and tip, about $40 a couple for what she said was a very good steak dinner.

Maybe this is common practice for chains; I had just never heard of it before.

(Kim Hairston/Sun photographer)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 6:51 AM | Permalink | Comments (10)
        

My daughter laughed when I told her we had just eaten at Azul 17 because the friends she had been with had spent time at two hot spots in Chicago that same evening: Hub 51 and Bin 36.

Is it a trend in the making?

Next Sunday I'll be reviewing Columbia's new Mexican restaurant and tequila lounge. Anyone who expects Mexican food to be cheap, plentiful and not hip probably isn't going to be happy here. ...

I think you'll be surprised by the place from the moment you walk in. I'm not sure you would guess it was Latin from the decor -- it almost looks Asian, if anything, except for the murals in back.

To find out what I thought of the food at Azul 17, please read my review in the Arts & Entertainment section next Sunday.

(Amy Davis/Sun photographer)

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 7:16 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)
Categories: Review Preview
        

Thanks to Linda and to Donna Beth Joy for pointing out the story "One Hundred Things Restaurant Staffers Should Never Do" (Part 1), which appeared in the New York Times a couple of days ago.

We've discussed a lot of the suggestions on the list, but from the point of view of a customer. I was interested in this because it's from the perspective of a restaurant owner.

Is he going to find a staff that's willing to follow his rules?

I don't think so.

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 1:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (38)
        

I blew it. In the excitement of Halloween (turning off all the lights and cowering in the dark), I forgot to post the Comment of the Week last night. So here we go this morning.

When you're ridiculing something, as a Serious Eats blogger was in an earlier post, you can't leave yourself open to ridicule, as Michael A. Gray so deftly demonstrated:

Somehow, I don't see myself asking the server to have the chef make whatever he or she thinks I'll love. On a busy night in a jam-packed eatery, I can't envision the waiter running back to the kitchen, catching the chef in mid-fricasee and saying "Maestro, there is a guy out there who wants you to concoct what you think he will love." And the chef, smiling pleasantly at the interruption as he watches a tureen of lobster bisque boil over, responding, "Jean-Claude, ask the gentleman to be more specific about his culinary preferences. Is he in the mood for fish, fowl or perhaps my legendary Bouef D'Avignon? With or without shallots, depending of course, on his personal taste." And the server, telling the chef, "Thank you for honoring this simple request, mon ami, rather than whacking me with the cleaver in your hand." No, the Serious Eats writer's advice notwithstanding, I think I'll continue to work from the menu.

Posted by: Michael A. Gray | October 29, 2009 7:44 AM

I want to reward elegantly written, thoughtful and provocative comments in this feature, but because I still need cheering up (still until April), I have to give a co-Comment of the Week to several exchanges on the blog that made me laugh out loud. ...

The first was under the Quiche Me, You Fool post on food-related jokes: ...

...Two carnivores were eating a clown, and one looked at the other and said, "Does this taste funny to you?"

Posted by: Dawn | October 26, 2009 1:20 PM

Cannibals, Dawn, cannibals!

;)

Posted by: sean | October 26, 2009 2:11 PM

And then, even though they are my buddies and Comment of the Week is supposed to be for those of you who don't have a broader forum to showcase your skills, as Midnight Sun Sam and Shallow Thought Wednesday John do, I just had to include Sam's review of Volt and John's reaction to it:

Shocking!

Posted by: Sam Sessa | October 26, 2009 4:27 PM

Electrifying, Sam. You've always seemed well grounded. I found your one-word review both positive and negative.

Posted by: jl | October 26, 2009 7:45 PM

And now we come to the R-rated portion of the show, so all of you under 17 years old please avert your eyes. This exchange between Corey and Trixie was under the post Why I Like Restaurants with One-Word Names:

I remember wandering around New York with my sister when I was 17 and noticing all these one-word named restaurants, and I told her, one day I'm going to open my own restaurant and it's going to be called "Boobs." Cause everyone likes boobs!

The dream is still alive.

Posted by: Corey | October 27, 2009 3:33 PM

Corey - Aren't you worried people might confuse you with Hooters?

Posted by: Trixie | October 27, 2009 3:41 PM

Trixie, no. Boobs will not be gimmicky. There will be no boob-shaped panna cottas. The food, the service, and the interior design will have nothing to do with breasticles.

If your food is good enough, over time people view your faults as lovable quirks. That is what's going to happen here.

Plus the word boobs is funnier than the word hooters, and it's not some lame, PC, indirect attempt to point to what it's trying to say. Boobs is boobs.

Posted by: Corey | October 27, 2009 4:12 PM

I forgot to mention that Boobs will be a high class dining establishment, the kind of place where they ask you what kind of water you want.

Posted by: Corey | October 27, 2009 4:14 PM
 

Posted by Elizabeth Large at 5:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)