Movie caterers

Nicole Kidman is in town filming some movie. I ran across the movie caterer's tent set up in a parking lot underneath the Whitehurst Expressway along the harbor in Georgetown. They were grilling lots and lots of marinated flank steaks!

Sequoia, Georgetown, D.C.

Robert rang me this evening and announced he was at the Foggy Bottom Metro stop and wanted to go to dinner while he was in the neighborhood, so, since I was just sitting here editing foliage pictures, I thought it might be kinda fun, and away we went. The Georgetown bus was sitting on 23rd Street as we were headed towards the Metro station and that gave us the inspiration to hop on and head to Georgetown. We landed at the Washington Harbor, which is the Georgetown waterfront along the Potomac River.

There are several restaurants there which overlook the harbor, and we picked Sequoia, because it had a more varied menu. I've wanted to go there for some time, anyway, since one of my friends at the DOI Solicitor's Office has been promising to take me there for months.

Sequoia is an elegant restaurant. Upon entering from the plaza, diners must go up a staircase past murals of rowers on the river to get to the main dining room. That room was occupied, though, tonight with a black tie private party for a convention of plastic surgeons; we went to the other dining room, which was still a very large room overlooking Christmas light-wrapped trees and the huge floor to ceiling window walls that allowed all tables a view of the waterfront. While a couple of large round tables occupied the corners, most all of the other tables were white cloth-covered two tops with very comfortable modern highback chairs upholstered in a soft sueded fabric. I was a little confused by the staff's attire: our waitress was in formal white shirt and apron with a black bow tie and black trousers, but the assistants and expediters were wearing casual Henley-style grey shirts with the restaurant's logo silk screened on the front. Regardless of their choice of attire, however, they seemed efficient and there were a number of people who tended to our table during the course of the evening.

After we were seated and given our menus and water, the waitress brought us a basket of bread and rolls wrapped in a white napkin. After about a minute, we smelled smoke. Suddenly, the bread basket burst into flames! The waitress had set the basket down with the napkin over the lit votive candle on our table. Fortunately, though, we were able to blow out the flaming napkins, then then staff spirited the smoking basket back to the kitchen and brought us a new basket of bread and a new candle, and strategically arranged them with a foot of space between them.

Our food was quite lovely. I started with a larger-than-expected bowl of butternut squash bisque; it had a strong cinnamon presence and was decorated with a heavy sprinkling of paprika and then a decorative drizzle of creme frâiche. For a main course, I had a Caesar salad with grilled shrimp—four jumbo shrimp with visible grill marks—decorated with two long leaves of romaine that made perfect rabbit ears! Robert had a grilled swordfish steak resting on a bed of garlic mashed potatoes and surrounded by a scattering of haricots verts, and a glass of the house chardonnay. There was a yellow sauce on the swordfish, but I forgot to ask if it was butter or lemon. For dessert, he had a tart with a poached pear encased in frangipane that looked and smelled delicious; I talked him out of getting the ubiquitous creme brulee, so I hope he liked the tart!

Dinner for the Waleses

White House Photo

Amidst all the excitement this week about Halloween and church services, I forgot to mention that the President and Mrs. Bush had some foreign relatives in to lunch and later to dinner on Wednesday. The President's cousin from England, HRH The Prince Charles, Prince of Wales, was in town to show off his new wife, HRH Camilla, Princess of Wales (but for public relations purposes currently going by her subsidiary title, Duchess of Cornwall).

My efforts to pull strings and call in favors were to no avail in getting an invitation to the black tie dinner at the White House, or even to the larger group invited to the "after dinner entertainment." The Bushes have had so few state and formal dinners, there are just too many major contributors waiting in line for tickets to such things, and poor little me didn't have a chance, especially since they only had 100 guests.

So, for those of us who missed the dinner party, here's what we missed:


Dinner Menu in Honor of Their Royal Highnesses
The Prince of Wales and the Duchess of Cornwall


Celery Broth with Crispy Rock Shrimp
Newton Chardonnay "Unfiltered" 2002

Medallions of Buffalo Tenderloin
Roasted Corn
Wild Rice Pancakes
Glazed Parsnips and Young Carrots
Peter Michael Pinot Noir "Le Moulin Rouge" 2002

Mint Romaine Lettuce with Blood Orange Vinaigrette

Vermont Camembert Cheese and Spiced Walnuts

Petits Fours Cake
Chartreuse Ice Cream Red and Green Grape Sauce
Iron Horse "Wedding Cuvée" 2002

Reports are that the tables were set in gold silk cloths each decorated with large white phaeleanopsis orchids with camelia leaves. They used the Clinton china (that gaudy stuff Hillary picked out with the wide gold borders and the gold picture of the White House in the center).

I get the impression that Yo Yo Ma must be a Republican, because once again he was called upon by the President to play his cello after dinner, along with pianist Kathryn Scott.

It was a fairly low-key event for a black tie White House dinner, and there's been virtually no news coverage here in the District. I'm told Mrs. Bush looked lovely in her lacy, off-the-shoulder, satiny-looking red dress with a stunning antique garnet necklace, though some of my more acerbic friends thought she looked a little old-fashioned with the bows on the dress. The Princess wore a long, deep sapphire skirt with a matching velvet jacket trimmed in irridescent blue bugle beads and a diamond drop necklace I'm told is worth over £400,000 (that's about $700,000 American). My friends were disappointed that she didn't wear a tiara. She must be in a blue mood, cause she wore a blue suit to the luncheon that day, too.

So, I guess it's time to put my tuxedo back in the closet.

Thai Tanic, Washington, D.C.

Yesterday was my friend Doug's birthday, but between All Saints' Day Mass and him having to go to a meeting at the cathedral where he is on the parish council, he didn't celebrate, so we went to dinner after tonight's All Souls' Day Mass at Thai Tanic. Thai Tanic is usually a reliable, inexpensive place to eat (the Washington Post calls them "dirt cheap," but those Post reporters must be used to some pricey dirt; it's one of the paper's "editor's pick" restaurants, too), however, tonight the restaurant reeked of moth balls, and I've no idea why. The food was good, though, and eventually our noses got desensitized to the odor.

For appetizers, Doug started off with a chicken satay, grilled chicken on skewers served with a peanut dipping sauce. I had the potpourri mussels, a serving which was truly large enough for a main course. The mussels were steamed with slices of fresh ginger root (the surprising source of a great deal of spice heat), slivvered scallions, basil, and horizontal slices of some shiny green leaf which was the wrong size for the menu-advertised lemongrass. There was enough of the steaming broth leftover in the bottom on the bowl to make a small soup course, and I would have drunk the tasty liquid, but the main courses arrived as I was eating my last mussel and I let the waitress take my bowl away.

Doug told me he was going to order the pad thai for his main course, but when the waitress was taking our orders, he requested a shrimp pad see eew, instead. I didn't taste it, but it was a mixed dish with wide rice noodles, bean sprouts, ground peanuts, and grilled shrimp. I had one of their two daily specials, crispy roast duck. To demonstrate the high standards of service at Thai Tanic, I can tell you that I ordered my duck without rice (my ubiquitous diet), and the kitchen peeled an entire tomato in one long strip that was then rolled into a rose for my plate, flanked by two fan-cut cucumber halves, all just to keep me from having an empty looking plate. My duck was delicious. The duck was roasted, then cut into small boneless pieces which were dredged in a spice mixture and then flash deep fried. Tiny juliennes of hot Thai red chile peppers were scatterred decoratively over the top.

Very tasty dinner. Happy birthday, Doug!

T.G.I.Friday's, Washington, D.C.

After All Saints' Day Mass tonight, Leo and I went to the neighborhood T.G.I.Friday's for dinner, where we had their standard mediocre but palatable food that took 50 minutes for us to get served, and the restaurant wasn't even full. How hard can it be to bring Leo a Cajun pasta (they are frozen and only have to be nuked) or me a Cobb salad? Our poor waiter kept checking on us and saying he was bringing the food soon, but when the kitchen is inefficient, there's little a waiter can do except pray he doesn't get stiffed on his tip.

Fifty things to taste

The British Broadcasting Company asked people to vote for the top fifty things everyone should try a bite of in their lifetime. This is the final list.

1. Fresh fish
2. Lobster
3. Steak
4. Thai food
5. Chinese food
6. Ice cream
7. Pizza
8. Crab
9. Curry
10. Prawns (a/k/a shrimp, in the U.S.)
11. Moreton Bay Bugs
12. Clam chowder
13. Barbecues
14. Pancakes
15. Pasta
16. Mussels
17. Cheesecake
18. Lamb
19. Cream tea
20. Alligator
21. Oysters
22. Kangaroo
23. Chocolate
24. Sandwiches
25. Greek food
26. Burgers
27. Mexican food
28. Squid
29. American diner breakfast
30. Salmon
31. Venison (a/k/a deer)
32. Guinea pig
33. Shark
34. Sushi
35. Paella
36. Barramundi
37. Reindeer
38. Kebab
39. Scallops
40. Australian meat pie
41. Mango
42. Durian fruit
43. Octopus
44. Ribs
45. Roast beef
46. Tapas
47. Jerk chicken/pork
48. Haggis
49. Caviar
50. Cornish pastry

The original link: http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/tv_and_radio/50eats_index.shtml

Obviously, there are a few foods on here not common to American diners, so let me explain a few things.
• A Moreton Bay Bug is a crustacean from Australia very similar to a crawfish/crayfish/crawdad.
• Paella is a Spanish seafood and rice stew.
• Barramundi is a type of very expensive Australian fish.
• Australian meat pies are just like any other culture's kind of meat pie; cubed steak with onions are the most popular.
• Durian fruit comes from southeastern Asia; it is quite large, looks yellowish with spines, has a custardy texture with an almond-sweet flavor, and bears an unusual smell which can probably be best described as "fecal."
• Tapas are little hot or cold appetizer dishes common in Spanish cuisine.
• "Jerk" meats are Jamaican-style grilled meats seasoned with very, very hot spices.
• Haggis are traditional Scottish things made mostly of barley and minced organ meats stuffed in a sheep's stomach.
• Cornish pastries are much the same as Australian meat pies.