beverage dessert dinner restaurants: cocktails d.c. mexican
by Lindsey
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El Centro D.F.
I actually have a whole bunch of posts that come before this one chronologically, but I promised to move this up my queue, so here it is! A couple months ago, I got an email from my friend Junk Food Guy asking me to help him set up his new blog. As a bribe, he would take me to a free dinner that he won via Urban Daddy at El Centro D.F., a new taqueria near U Street NW. I’m actually not a big fan of Mexican food, but I have a feeling that has something to do with the fact that I haven’t had very good Mexican food in my life. I remember thinking during Top Chef Masters Season 1 that I would like to try Rick Bayless’s Mexican cooking, because it looked so good! Maybe I was missing out on something really amazing, here. So I headed off to El Centro with “open heart and empty stomach.”
For the dinner special, we were taken down to a stony, almost dungeon looking room downstairs that serves as their “tequileria” – where they stock a huge number of tequilas at the bar. We had some time beforehand, so the bartender told us about the various tequilas they have there, and that you can order a “tequila flight” if you wanted to try a bunch of them. (He even showed us the shot glass tree thing they serve it in).
After waiting around for a while, we finally got around to ordering food. The dinner was in three courses. For the appetizer and dessert courses, they gave us a sampling of three items each. The entree course was the only one where we got to choose from a selection of things. I’ll begin with the appetizers, pictured above. There was a sampling of chicken flautas, chicken tamale, and steak huaraches. They were all very good! I think my favorite was the steak, though it’s a bit hard to see in this photo (it’s near the back). It was like a mini steak flatbread pizza. I actually don’t think I’ve ever had a tamale before, but I really enjoyed this one.
The rest after the jump:
Red Hook Lobster Pound
The Red Hook lobster truck has been around for a while by now, but I did have occasion to try them a few months back. I took an hour out of my lunch break to wait in line on a cold winter’s day in a queue that went down the length of a city block. What was I thinking? But I suppose that the blogger part of me felt somewhat obligated to give it a go! By the time I got to the front of the line, I ordered practically everything on the menu, just because I doubted I’d be back again very soon. I got one Maine style lobster roll ($15), New England clam chowder ($7), apple cider ($3) and a whoopie pie ($3.50). The service was really nice, and I think they appreciated that you’d waited in line for so long.
I think I made a mistake when I ordered the Maine style. Actually, I didn’t even know there were two different kinds of lobster rolls, which was an oversight on my part. I don’t remember if they asked me what kind I wanted, because I would’ve asked them what the difference was and would probably have ordered the other kind had I known. Anyway, the Maine style is served cold, with mayo. The Connecticut style is warm, with butter. Clearly the Connecticut style sounds superior! I was expecting it to be warm, so was very disappointed when I bit into the cold lobster meat. I think the flavors are more robust when they’re warmed up. The bread was nice and buttery though, so that was good.
Les Delices Bakery
A friend of mine highly recommended a bakery in Rockville called Les Delices a while back. (I did a post on their Christmas cookies a few months ago). I love this place! It’s off of Gude Drive in Rockville, in a rather smallish strip mall. It doesn’t look like much from the outside, but once you walk in and the buttery aroma wafts around you, you know you’ve come to the right place. ♥
I’ve only tried their mango and black currant cakes so far, and they’re both quite delicious! Pictured above is the black currant cake. It was a great balance of tart and sweet. I loved that it wasn’t too heavy or cloying!
Remember to bring cash, as they don’t take credit cards there.
A few more pics:
Shiroi Koibito
Shiroi Koibito (which means “white lover” in Japanese…hahaha) are langue de chat butter cookies with white chocolate filling. I looove these cookies. Unfortunately they’re not so easy to procure stateside, so one has to rely on the kindness of strangers (namely, my dad’s Japanese colleagues) to gift them to you. Here’s the open box that I’ve already dug into as you can probably tell.
As with a lot of Japanese snacks, each cookie is meticulously wrapped individually. I guess it prevents you from pigging out TOO much, though I always think it creates so much waste.
Here’s a close-up:
Bistro D’OC
Bistro D’OC is a little southern French restaurant near the Ford’s Theater in downton DC. They have a nice and relatively affordable menu of items that were all very thoughtfully done and tasted comforting and warm, like bistro food ought. Pictured above is my main course – squab roasted with chanterelle mushrooms and fingerling potato with a gratin of turnips. It was decent, though I was a bit disappointed by how little meat was actually on the bones (though I do realize it’s a small bird..). And it didn’t quite hold up to the squab dish I had at Citronelle, which made me a squab fan to begin with!
The rest of the meal:
Amalfi
Ah, finally back to posting about home! These first few posts are going to be kind of vague, since I didn’t really takes notes and it’s been a few months little while since I’ve had these meals. (^___^);;;
I’ll start with a lunch I had at Amalfi, a family owned Italian restaurant located in the back roads of Rockville. It’s apparently been there for a while, probably even back when I was taking my dogs to the veterinary hospital right next door, but I never knew about it! Funny enough, it also happens to be next to a bakery I discovered recently – St. Michel (cash only).
The decor is pretty dated but it’s cozy enough. Pictured above is the clams in garlic broth, which were simple and delicious.
The rest after the jump:
beverage lunch restaurants: bistro coffee hawaii oahu tea
by Lindsey
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Panya Bistro
My last Hawaii post takes me to Ala Moana shopping center, where I had lunch at Panya Bistro. Unlike the Panya I covered in a previous post, which was just a small bakery outpost, this one is a full on restaurant with savories as well as sweets on the menu. The food was not bad, though nothing to really call home about. Pictured above is the coconut chicken curry with fried rice. The curry was on the mild side, and creamy. I liked how the chicken was on the bone – it gave the dish a very hardy feeling to it.
And the rest!
dessert dinner restaurants: asian fusion hawaii oahu seafood
by Lindsey
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Hiroshi
All right, I’m finally at my penultimate Hawaii post! I can’t believe it’s taken me 6 MONTHS to get through these posts. I’m ashamed to say I still have DC posts from November that I haven’t blogged yet. I’m a failure! (;___;) Will have to console self by remembering the fabulous meal that was my last dinner in Honolulu.
My friend has fabulous taste in food, so I was expecting nothing less than spectacular when she took me to Hiroshi, one of her favorite restaurants in Hawaii. Hiroshi serves Eurasion [sic] tapas, which I guess is Euro/Asian fusion food? Whatever it was, it was delicious. The fish was fresh and perfectly prepared, and everything that came out was beautiful to look at and bursting with flavor. I would definitely go back there again the next time I’m in Honolulu!
I couldn’t get a nice shot of my drink (lychee soda), but it was absolutely amazing – refreshing and sweet, but not too much so.
Pictured above is the Crispy Skin Thai snapper (they weren’t serving moi that night). It was served with “Mrs Cheng’s tofu,” edamame, Kahuku corn and Hau’ula dried tomato-hijiki broth. An amazing dish altogether. Loved the crispy fish that paired wonderfully with the smooth tofu. The broth had a lot of flavor and I just wanted to drink it all up!
The rest:
beverage lunch restaurants: hawaii kauai seafood soups
by Lindsey
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Hanalei Dolphin
A foodie friend of mine highly recommended the Hanalei Dolphin restaurant on the north shore of Kaua’i, so of course I had to go check them out! The drive up was scenic and lovely, though riddled with quite a few narrow roads and some one-way bridges that made me a little nervous at first. We spent most of the morning driving and stopping at various lookouts, and then stopped at the Hanalei for lunch. …And not a moment too soon! Half-way through the meal, it began pouring outside! Rain was coming down in sheets. Apparently this is pretty typical Kaua’i. (So, apparently, are the roosters that kept me up the night before with their infuriating cockadoodle doos!) The drive back to the airport after our lunch was pretty harrowing, but we made it back in one piece. Thankfully, we were able to make it back before some of those aforementioned one-way bridges were closed off from the flooding.
Pictured above is the poke – ahi with sesame. This was just okay. I don’t know, maybe I had heard too much hype about the poke, but it wasn’t as memorable as I expected.
The rest:
Caffe Coco
After our day-long boat ride to the Na Pali Coast, we headed to the hotel to get washed up and ready for dinner. (Actually, we had gone on the “sunset dinner” cruise, which sounds much more luxurious than it was. The “cruise” aspect of it was quite bumpy going and it took a long time to get to the coastline. The views were fabulous though, and on the way back we were joined by a pod of playful bottle nose dolphins! But I don’t have much in terms of “sea legs” and ended up feeling quite queasy near the end. Couldn’t even look at the food they prepared, which I think was kind of typical buffet style fare).
I felt so rejuvenated after washing up, but by then it was getting pretty late in the evening – by Kaua’i standards, anyway. All the restaurants close up around 9pm there, even on the weekends! The nice restaurant we’d made reservations at was a 40 minute drive away, and it was already well past 8. In the end, we decided to check out a quaint local restaurant (Caffe Coco) about 5 minutes up the street from the hotel.
Caffe Coco is one of those authentically Kauaiian local joints, kind of hippy and rustic, and run by the kind of proprietor who makes her liliquoi sauce from the trees she has on the premises. The dining area was outside under a tent, and there was a stage area where they had a live band and hula dancers. We ordered our food at the counter near the back, then found an open table where we sat down to enjoy the music and dancing. I loved the laid back atmosphere and outdoorsy feeling of the place!
Pictured above is the tofu potstickers, with gauva grilling sauce. I was surprised by how flavorful they were, considering they had no meat in them!
Toi’s Thai Kitchen
During my stay in Honolulu, my friend and I popped over to Kauai for a weekend trip. It’s just a quickie plane ride from Oahu. We arrived early and spent a good portion of the morning driving up the long and winding road to Waimea Canyon. The roads were very narrow and somewhat harrowing for an urban ninja like myself, but I managed to get us to the top in one piece! Unfortunately, many of the views were foggy, so we could barely see anything at all. (^__^);; But what we could see peeking through the mist was absolutely gorgeous!
After a morning of hard driving, we made our way down to the pier near Hanapepe for a quick bite before our boat tour to the Na Pali Coast. Our guidebook recommended a little place called Toi’s Thai Kitchen right near the docks. We ordered a pork pad thai to share (pictured above), and it was fabulous! The portion was enough to share, and the flavors were spot on.
They gave us a side of papaya salad as well:
Sushi Bistro Shun
Can’t go to Hawaii without checking out a sushi joint, and so we headed to Sushi Bistro Shun in the Moilili neighborhood after it came highly recommended by a friend. We sat at the bar (another recommendation) and I ordered up a bunch of things from the sushi menu a la carte. Of course, I had to try to the chutoro (pictured above), buttery and fresh as it should be.
The rest:
afternoon tea restaurants: chocolate hawaii oahu pastries sandwiches tea
by Lindsey
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Tea at Hawaii Prince Hotel
After a long day’s shopping at Ala Moana mall, my friend and I stopped in at Hawaii Prince Hotel in Waikiki for afternoon tea. This hotel is right by the water, and its afternoon tea is served in its airy foyer overlooking the yacht harbor. The foyer has an elevated seating area, and the waiter brings out the food from one of the restaurants that flank the atrium. The service was on the slow side (maybe because of its location), and I thought the furniture looked a bit retro (in a dated way, not in a hip way). It was a nice and sunny area though, and I did enjoy getting a breather.
The afternoon tea itself was just…okay. Nothing spectacular or unique about it. When a tea is done with little flair and no originality, I scrutinize it even more. If there’s nothing standout about the menu, then they should at least attempt to do a good version of the traditional tea. Not so here. I think they need to go back to the drawing board and study a real tea.
Pictured above is my Darjeeling, which was actually quite nice. Loved the china pattern. The rest:
Pacific Place Tea Garden
After shopping around the numerous shops at the Ala Moana Shopping Center in Honolulu, my friend and I stopped at the Pacific Place Tea Garden kiosk for a drink.
I got the matcha (green tea) latte, pictured above. I’m not sure why I got the hot version – it was pretty warm that day, and Ala Moana is an outdoor mall. Still, it was tasty enough, and I always enjoy the calming flavor of matcha. It wasn’t overly sweetened, which was nice.
My friend got something called a pink bamboo float:
Formaggio
For dinner, we headed to a local wine bar called Formaggio, located in some nondescript strip mall off to the corner. The restaurant itself didn’t look like much from the outside, but it had a nice atmosphere inside. The place was a bit narrow and cramped (and a bit dim, which made for difficult photographing), but I enjoyed it overall. The food was fabulous.
Above, we have the grilled vegetable napoleon, made with portabella mushroom, eggplant, zucchini, roasted peppers, caramelized onions, truffle oil and goat cheese. It was definitely as wonderful as it sounds. I loved grilled veggies – the smokey flavor really brings out the natural sweetness of the vegetables. The goat cheese added a nice pungent kick.
The rest:
