Last night we went to Pentagon City so pick up a few things and while we were there, Leo showed me where the Saigon Saigon is that Kody and I wandered around looking for unsuccessfully one night (I think we ended up at a French place instead). We had a really good dinner at Saigon Saigon, and I always enjoy this place.
After a huge madberry martini, Leo had some fried spring rolls on a heavily garnished plate for an appetizer, then their Vietnamese version of the traditional Korean dish bi bim bap for his main course. It arrived in a little handled metal pot with the usual egg on top and a little side bowl of both kim chee (rotten cabbage) and barbecue sauce. Of course, since it wasn't the traditional version, Leo didn't like it, but I noticed he ate all of it. Must have been that big martini leading him astray.
I had a house salad, which I expected to be small, but it turned out to be a dinner plate of salad with actual non-lettuce vegetables in it—quite a pleasant surprise. My main course was a delicious yellow curry with large pieces of chicken breast and a side dish of actually fresh and tender white steamed rice.
No pictures this time. I didn't have my camera with me cause I thought we were just going to shop and not eat. I'm sure everybody's happy I'm not slowing down their dial-ups for a change.
Thursday, April 27, 2006
Tuesday, April 25, 2006
Russia House, Washington, D.C.
At long last I finally got to dine tonight at Russia House Lounge and Restaurant in the restaurant strip north of Dupont Circle. I've been trying for months to get my Russian friend Svet to take me there, but he always refused and claimed the food was awful, forbidding me to go. Well, my friend Robert was bored tonight after his day of dealing with too many politicians at the office and decided that we should go, since he'd walked by the place many a time and was curious about the food. So, off we went, and what a great evening we had!
Russia House is located in a large, old, grey, stone building on the corner of Connecticut and Florida. Patrons have to go up a grand staircase to the main entrance, where a large lounge with heavily pillowed sofas everywhere offered dozens of vodka selections as well as normal bar fare. The dining room is downstairs, though, so diners had to walk up only to have to walk down again. The dining room was quite nice with a lovely dark burgundy and green patterned wallpaper on the walls between dark wood paneling and moldings and brass chandeliers everywhere. Tables were covered with white clothes and formally set.
We each were presented with three menus, a "large plate" menu, "small plate" menu, and a wine list. The wine list was mostly New World wines, and surprisingly lacking in Russian selections. We found the Russian wines in the by-the-glass section of the "small plate" menu. While we read and considered all of this, Robert had a Baltika Porter #6, which was a dark Russian beer, and I had a glass of mukuzani (I forgot to write down the vineyard), which is a red wine from Georgia (the former Soviet republic, not the U.S. state) that reminded me very much of a shiraz.
For an appetizer, we shared an order of perogis. Perogis are baked, filled dumplings or little miniature meat pies that usually are pretty heavy, but the dumplings here were artfully formed and the pastry was surprisingly flaky. They were filled with a delicious mixture of smoked duck, potatoes, and onions. A bowl of crème fraîche with scallions and the slightly sweet taste of ginger accompanied the perogis as a sauce.
We chose different dishes for our soup courses. Robert did a traditional borscht. This was a vegetable version with beets, onions, and potatoes and a side of sour cream; the soup was served in a little pottery soup pot.
I had the mushroom barley soup. It was wonderful! I'd feared a thick, heavy porridge, but this was a light vegetable stock with just a little bit of barley, and there were both morels and chanterelles in the mix with winter vegetables. A sliced quarter-loaf of pumpernickel bread arrived on our table hot from the oven along with the soups.
Robert selected the trout "Forshmack style" and it looked quite interesting. A whole trout had been skillfully fileted and roasted in its skin until flaky and accompanied by a potato puree (think thin mashed potatoes) and a sautée of green apples and red onions.
I thought it would be fun to try the chicken Kiev. I haven't had chicken Kiev in Washington since 1978 when I was at a private dinner in the Senate Cafeteria. It used to be a common menu item in many of the nicer restaurants in the country, but I've not seen it much of late. Anyway, it's a delicious dish where a chicken breast is pounded flat then rolled around a small stick of cold, herbed butter; the chicken breast is breaded and deep fried; when one cuts into the chicken, the melted butter spurts out. I really liked the Russia House version. My two chicken Kievs were served on a bed of potato puree with some steamed baby carrots, a baby zucchini, and slices of red onion serving as edible garnish.
Oh, I'd wanted some caviar, but it was $65 an ounce and up here, which I thought was a little extravagant.
We wanted to finish our meal with a Russian dessert, but while they had several standard nice desserts on the menu, none were Russian. So, we opted not to eat dessert and decided to do a vodka course instead.
This place had a whole page of vodkas from ultra-ultra-premiums "all the way down" to their cheapest vodka, Stolichnaya. After consulting with our waiter, we chose an Altay and a Mernaya Business Class. Both were excellent: crisp, clean, smooth. Robert thought maybe the Mernaya was a bit stronger, and both were very, very smooth.
The interesting thing about the vodka service, though, is that our little tiny chilled glasses were each accompanied by a cornichon (tiny dill pickle) on a skewer, and it is traditional to eat pickles while drinking vodka!
I thought it interesting that this Russian restaurant (which has been open about a decade) didn't have more Russian participation. Our excellent waiter was Polish and we saw other staff that looked eastern Asian. And, while it's no guarantee of nationality, the executive chef has a very English/American sounding name. The patrons in our dining room also all appeared to be Americans, since I heard no one talking in Russian.
Russian cuisine from the Russian Imperial Court has had a majorly important impact on modern American and western European food, even the traditions of haute cuisine in France that is often considered the standard for elegance in dining. Formerly, the French would bring out all of the dishes for a meal at one time, often in an elaborate procession, and this was called service à la française. The idea of multiple, separately served courses during a formal dinner—perhaps as many as fourteen—came from Russia in the early 19th century and is called "service à la russe.
As you can see, Robert had a great time with the vodka and pickles! I'm sure he'd have liked to have tried all 50+ vodkas, but we both have to work tomorrow!
Anyway, I actually liked this place a lot despite Svet's negative recommendations, and I'm looking forward to another visit to Russia House. There were quite a number of dishes I'd still like to try, especially including their grilled boar sausage, and many more vodkas to drink.
Russia House is located in a large, old, grey, stone building on the corner of Connecticut and Florida. Patrons have to go up a grand staircase to the main entrance, where a large lounge with heavily pillowed sofas everywhere offered dozens of vodka selections as well as normal bar fare. The dining room is downstairs, though, so diners had to walk up only to have to walk down again. The dining room was quite nice with a lovely dark burgundy and green patterned wallpaper on the walls between dark wood paneling and moldings and brass chandeliers everywhere. Tables were covered with white clothes and formally set.
We each were presented with three menus, a "large plate" menu, "small plate" menu, and a wine list. The wine list was mostly New World wines, and surprisingly lacking in Russian selections. We found the Russian wines in the by-the-glass section of the "small plate" menu. While we read and considered all of this, Robert had a Baltika Porter #6, which was a dark Russian beer, and I had a glass of mukuzani (I forgot to write down the vineyard), which is a red wine from Georgia (the former Soviet republic, not the U.S. state) that reminded me very much of a shiraz.
For an appetizer, we shared an order of perogis. Perogis are baked, filled dumplings or little miniature meat pies that usually are pretty heavy, but the dumplings here were artfully formed and the pastry was surprisingly flaky. They were filled with a delicious mixture of smoked duck, potatoes, and onions. A bowl of crème fraîche with scallions and the slightly sweet taste of ginger accompanied the perogis as a sauce.
We chose different dishes for our soup courses. Robert did a traditional borscht. This was a vegetable version with beets, onions, and potatoes and a side of sour cream; the soup was served in a little pottery soup pot.
I had the mushroom barley soup. It was wonderful! I'd feared a thick, heavy porridge, but this was a light vegetable stock with just a little bit of barley, and there were both morels and chanterelles in the mix with winter vegetables. A sliced quarter-loaf of pumpernickel bread arrived on our table hot from the oven along with the soups.
Robert selected the trout "Forshmack style" and it looked quite interesting. A whole trout had been skillfully fileted and roasted in its skin until flaky and accompanied by a potato puree (think thin mashed potatoes) and a sautée of green apples and red onions.
I thought it would be fun to try the chicken Kiev. I haven't had chicken Kiev in Washington since 1978 when I was at a private dinner in the Senate Cafeteria. It used to be a common menu item in many of the nicer restaurants in the country, but I've not seen it much of late. Anyway, it's a delicious dish where a chicken breast is pounded flat then rolled around a small stick of cold, herbed butter; the chicken breast is breaded and deep fried; when one cuts into the chicken, the melted butter spurts out. I really liked the Russia House version. My two chicken Kievs were served on a bed of potato puree with some steamed baby carrots, a baby zucchini, and slices of red onion serving as edible garnish.
Oh, I'd wanted some caviar, but it was $65 an ounce and up here, which I thought was a little extravagant.
We wanted to finish our meal with a Russian dessert, but while they had several standard nice desserts on the menu, none were Russian. So, we opted not to eat dessert and decided to do a vodka course instead.
This place had a whole page of vodkas from ultra-ultra-premiums "all the way down" to their cheapest vodka, Stolichnaya. After consulting with our waiter, we chose an Altay and a Mernaya Business Class. Both were excellent: crisp, clean, smooth. Robert thought maybe the Mernaya was a bit stronger, and both were very, very smooth.
The interesting thing about the vodka service, though, is that our little tiny chilled glasses were each accompanied by a cornichon (tiny dill pickle) on a skewer, and it is traditional to eat pickles while drinking vodka!
I thought it interesting that this Russian restaurant (which has been open about a decade) didn't have more Russian participation. Our excellent waiter was Polish and we saw other staff that looked eastern Asian. And, while it's no guarantee of nationality, the executive chef has a very English/American sounding name. The patrons in our dining room also all appeared to be Americans, since I heard no one talking in Russian.
Russian cuisine from the Russian Imperial Court has had a majorly important impact on modern American and western European food, even the traditions of haute cuisine in France that is often considered the standard for elegance in dining. Formerly, the French would bring out all of the dishes for a meal at one time, often in an elaborate procession, and this was called service à la française. The idea of multiple, separately served courses during a formal dinner—perhaps as many as fourteen—came from Russia in the early 19th century and is called "service à la russe.
As you can see, Robert had a great time with the vodka and pickles! I'm sure he'd have liked to have tried all 50+ vodkas, but we both have to work tomorrow!
Anyway, I actually liked this place a lot despite Svet's negative recommendations, and I'm looking forward to another visit to Russia House. There were quite a number of dishes I'd still like to try, especially including their grilled boar sausage, and many more vodkas to drink.
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