Drift Reality

Yesterday evening I was down in Ashburn visiting some friends when we decided to search for a good place to eat before heading to watch I am Legend.

Ashburn is not really known for its cuisine. Actually, it is not really known for very much besides being home to Redskins Park and having a high foreclosure rate so it is not really a destination that people go unless they know someone who lives there (which is the case with me).

However, its high per capita income and older demographic have fueled the development of a handful of good restaurants and Bangrak Thai Cuisine is one of them.

Bangrak has a great ambiance, amazing service, and top-notch food. I tried the Tod Mun, which was very tasty and followed that up with a delicious plate of Kao Pad Kaprow.

One of my friends ordered one of the dinner specials, a stew consisting of jumbo prawns, scallops and squid (I can’t recall the name) and asked that they hold the squid. They ended up bringing the dish out with the squid and the manager (also one of the proprietors of the place) came out, apologized, and then had a replacement sent out despite our assurances that the dish was fine.

At any rate, should you find yourself down in Ashburn looking for a great place to enjoy Thai cuisine, Bangrak Thai Cuisine should fit the bill.

For our final evening, we decided to stay in Grand Case. On Kris’ recommendation we headed out to L’Escapade, a fabulous French restaurant on the main strip.

We arrived only about thirty minutes before closing and Axel, the manager, seated us in the lounge and gave us a few complimentary glasses of champagne while they prepared a table near the balcony overlooking the water.

While waiting, we snapped a picture that doesn’t really provide a vivid depiction of the interior of the restaurant but does a good job capturing its ambiance.

L’Escapade

After a few moments we were seated and looking through their menu. We ordered lobster bisque to start. For the main course, my companion ordered the pan sauteed jumbo shrimps with a grapefruit risotto and I had the filet, which was served in a Bearnaise sauce.

The food was great and I thoroughly enjoyed our experience at L’Escapade. I would say the only drawback was the fact that the wind was starting to pick and it was even starting to drizzle a bit outside. On a clear night the place would have been perfection.

We finished our meal and had a final glass of wine before retiring for the evening and preparing ourselves to head back to the States and back to reality after a few days in Saint Martin.

After a quick nap to regain some of our energy from a day of sun and shopping, we were ready to head out to dinner at Sol e Luna.

Sol e Luna had come highly recommended to us from Kris, one of the owners of L’Esplanade and she had not steered us wrong up to then so we decided to follow-up on her advice and make reservations at the restaurant.

It was a quick drive from Grand Case and soon we were seated outside on the patio, enjoying the warm Saint Martin evening.

Both the exterior and interior of the restaurant have a slick, romantic feel, as you can somewhat tell from this picture:

Photo courtesy of Sol e Luna Web site

Our waitress, who was also the daughter of the proprietors, was extremely friendly and helpful in assisting us to choose a wine as well as provide insight into the menu.

We ended up order the Lobster Bisque to start, which was tasty but could have used a bit more substance. For the main course my companion had the jumbo shrimp, flammed with brandy and green pepper sauce, and served on a bed of lobster risotto. I ordered the linguini, which was cooked in a garlic and spicy tomato broth with a healthy provision of seafood.

We polished off the meal with some fresh berries and cream and a couple of shots of ginger rum, which I ended up developing quite an addiction to during our trip.

In all, it was a great experience and Sol e Luna lived up to its reputation as being one of the top restaurants in Saint Martin.

I was recently visiting a friend who lives in the West Village when I had the displeasure of encountering Socialista. As I was riding over, my friend wrote me the following text:

“Socialista is at 505 West St. between Horatio and Jane. Text me when you get here. Maybe your looks will get you in.”

I found the last line of the text a bit peculiar to be sure, but didn’t think anything of it until I arrived at the front door and saw a group of people standing outside negotiating with the doorman. I immediately knew that there was going to be some infuriating front door politics involved as I sauntered up.

“Hey, is there a guest list or something?” I asked one of the doormen, who was standing guard over the exit.

“Yeah,” he grunted. “There is a guest list.”

I began texting my friend that I had arrived when I saw several other people try to gain admittance to the club and be denied.

Turning to the doorman standing in front of the entrance, I asked, “Hey, what’s the deal with this place?”

“Well, you really have to know someone here to get in,” he responded categorically.

“I know my friend who is in there,” I responded.

“Who is your friend?”

“My friend is __________,” I responded knowing full well that this moron didn’t know who my friend was.

“I don’t know your friend,” he responded.

I resisted the temptation to blurt out, “That’s because you don’t know f#%k all,” and instead decided to call my friend and ask him to come out. It was freezing so while I was calling my friend I walked over to the place next door (not realizing it was connected to the lounge).

I walked in the entrance and immediately a man in the suit came up and asked, “Do you have a reservation? Because we are closing pretty soon.”

I looked at him and simply responded, “No, I’m meeting some friends here,” thinking ignorantly that this would be enough to get him to walk away.

“Who are your friends?” he responded. “Maybe I can help you find them.”

I took a quick scan about the place, which couldn’t have been more that 15′ by 15′ and repeated my friend’s name.

“Sorry,” he responded. “I don’t know him. Perhaps they are at the lounge next door? This is the Socialista restaurant.”

Realizing that this was my queue to stand outside I headed out and called my friend to come meet me. After a few minutes, he emerged from the lounge and we went to hail down a cab.

After coming home to DC, I decided to read up on the place. I found out from the Observer write-up that the owner, Armin Amiri grew up in Iran and it suddenly made a great deal of sense to me that the place was so pretentious (disclaimer - I am half-Iranian).

I sort of threw up a little in my mouth when I read his quote in the article:

“What I’d like to be done is a socialism as far as the door. . .What socialism really means is, I give you this and you give me that. And as the door goes, I’m gonna bring you into this nice atmosphere; hopefully, you’re going to bring your great energy in here. And that’s it—that’s the only even exchange I want with people.”

Dude, do you even know what socialism is? Have you ever been to f#%ing Cuba? Were you on drugs when you did the interview?

Reading on, I struck upon a real gem from Amiri: “Back in the old days—you know, the 1940’s—when you went out, it was all about respect. You respected the establishment; it was very chill. And when a single man went out, if he wanted to pick up on a woman, it was very classily done. These days, unfortunately, there’s not much, you know, class left.”

I’m not even going to dwell on the fact that Amiri was negative thirty years old in the 1940s. Instead I’m going to dwell on the fact that this idiot is talking about socialism and 1940s style when his place is so obviously about pretension, elitism, and a tacky effort to actually be stylish while failing miserably.

Style isn’t imposed by an owner. Style evolves over time because a place cultivates relationships with patrons and creates a unique experience for them.

I couldn’t understand how someone could be so ignorant until I saw the picture of Amiri in the article. You can tell Amiri is desperately trying to look stylish but ends up looking like a hairy version of a young Dustin Hoffman, except not as good looking:

Amiri, are you trying to seduce me?

It turns out there are quite a few reviews of Socialista in the blogosphere - none of them too flattering, further affirming the fact that bloggers are smart. Joonbug did a nice little recap. of Socialista if you want to read more.

My opinion is next time you are in the West Village do yourself a favor and keep walking by this place.

This past weekend I decided to take the initiative and seek out a new restaurant in DC.

After a bit of digging, I struck upon Rock Creek Restaurant in Bethesda, MD (incidentally, why is it that every restaurant’s Web site either looks like it was built by a college student in 1996 or tries to be uber-hip with ridiculous amounts of flash and a lounge soundtrack).

I haven’t been to the gym in about a month (since I dislocated my shoulder), I’ve been trying to make a concerted effort to eat healthier.  At any rate, what appealed to be about the place was their emphasis on “delicious meals with nutritionally balanced ingredients.”

So I made a reservation and checked the place out.  It was probably one of the best dining experiences I’ve had in DC for the past few months.  The first thing I noticed was that the service was amazing - our waiter was laid back and friendly to the point that I thought he might have been taking bong hits in the kitchen except for the fact that was remarkably sharp and on-point -

The food was perfect - I had a perfectly grilled filet mignon and my companion had some well prepared (and fresh) crab cakes.

What’s more, they have a number of wine ‘flights,’ or samplers that allow you to try several of their wines.  We had the Alsace Summer flight, which consisted of a Willm Pinot Blanc, Trimbach Riesling and Trimbach Gewurztraminer.  The Riesling was particularly tasty.

I polished the meal off with a Grahams 10-year port and we shared a very solid creme brulet.

On a side note, when I initially ordered a glass of Warres Otima 1o-year the waiter came back and said, “Sorry, we are out of the Warres Otima but in its stead, would you prefer the Grahams 10-year?”  His use of old English phrasing, ‘in its stead’, almost made the night worthwhile in and of itself. 

All in all, my experience at Rock Creek Restaurant in Bethesda reminded me that DC can in fact be a great place to grab dinner, and I’m planning on putting the Rock Creek Restaurant in Friendship Heights on my short-list of places to try next.

I walked into my apartment the other day and was not surprised to see a piece of junk mail that someone had slipped under my door. What I was surprised to see, was the new marketing message that Pizza Boli’s is using in their direct mail campaign.

I am no nutritionist but I am pretty sure that eating Pizza Boli’s is not considered healthy, nor is it the ‘healthier choice’ unless the alternative is eating a bowl of rusty nails covered with formaldehyde.

Whoever put their mailer together also could have chosen a better image than a plate of chicken wings and a ramican of ranch dressing to use in conjunction with their ‘eat healthy’ campaign.  They might as well have gotten Kirstie Alley to be their spokesmodel.

Pizza Boli’s direct mail campaign did give me a solution to a marketing challenge I had been working on:

Nam-Viet is a great Vietnamese place in Cleveland Park with really tasty pho (if anyone knows the accurate pronunciation of this word please let me know), good prices, and friendly service. I ordered a beef dish once and regretted it when it came drenched in a slimy glaze that reminded me of cheap Chinese food. I often go with a friend who lives in Cleveland Park and she normally orders the grilled shrimp and scallops on skewers and although I have never tried them, they look pretty delicious.

Actually, that’s all I have to say about the restaurant. The reason I’m even writing about the restaurant is because of an experience I had the other day when we ate there before heading to the gym.

We entered and the host promptly seated us at a table near the front window. The restaurant was absolutely packed, a situation my friend believes can be attributed to a recent positive review of the place in the Washingtonian magazine.

At any rate, my friend immediately noticed a young boy who couldn’t have been older than three, seated at the table directly adjacent to ours. We both were tentative on whether or not to sit near the potential threat of a screaming, unhappy kid, but he looked rather calm so we decided to take our chances.

The meal passed without any incident and as we were finishing up, I looked over to see that the young boy was standing right next to me and staring at me intently, with his Mother standing several feet behind.

“Hey buddy,” I blurted to the boy. “What’s going on?”

In response, the young boy put his arms out.

Then, a very strange thing happened.

A voice inside my head began whispering a quip to me, but I brushed it off and instead leaned forward and picked the boy up, placing him so that he was standing on my lap. He promptly sat down and made himself comfortable while his Mother giggled a bit.

He then swiveled in my lap, so that he was facing across the table at my friend.

“I think he is trying to move in on your date,” his Mother said.

Again, a voice inside my head began to formulate an explanation of how it wasn’t a date, but simply dinner with a friend, but somehow the words just dissolved as I instead addressed the boy.

“Hey buddy, are you moving in on my date?”

It was strange, like there was some sort of emotional gravitational field around the kid and in the face of this field, my normal personality just dissipated and it became completely about the kid.

He turned away from my friend and I could tell that he wanted to go, so I helped him to the ground and he headed towards his Mother.

My friend and I both smiled at him and his Mother as they returned to their table and I couldn’t help but be thankful that we hadn’t decided to sit elsewhere out of fear of a crying, screaming kid.

Don’t ever eat at Thai Basil Restaurant. The service at this restaurant is definitely the worst I’ve ever experienced at any restaurant in Boston and if you order the chicken, you may get salmonella poisoning.

The other night, I was getting some takeout sushi from Shino Express on Newbury Street (which is a great place by the way) when I passed Thai Basil, and made a mental note to try it out at some point in the future. A few days later, I was back on Newbury Street for a late dinner and decided to try the place out.

After being seated, I ordered dumplings and wonton soup as starters and was actually moderately pleased with the product. Shortly thereafter, my platter of pepper chicken arrived and I was a bit disgusted to find that the chicken was undercooked. My companion had ordered the pad thai, which I would describe as ‘edible.’

We arrived a bit late (around 9:30 PM) and had decided to order a bottle of wine with the dinner. After munching on the semi-raw chicken for a bit, I decided to push it away from myself and focus on the wine and conversation. Around 10:15 PM, I noticed that the restaurant had begun to clear out as the staff had begun to clean the restaurant with little regard to the patrons who were remaining.

At 10:20, our waitress came over and asked us in an abrupt manner if we were ready to leave yet. “No, not really,” I responded and she left, seeming a bit miffed.

By 10:30, my companion and I were the only ones left in the restaurant and it had become clear that we were no longer welcome. All the chairs had been picked up and a man had begun sweeping the floors around us. Furthermore, they had turned on the stark overhead lights. My glass of wine was still half-full and according to the restaurant, closing time was 10:30, so my companion and I continued to relax and converse while we finished our wine.

At 10:35, a man from the back of the restaurant came to the front and in a few moments, all the lights in the restaurant had been turned completely off and my companion and I were seated in darkness. After a few moments, the woman working at the front turned the lights back on and giggled, along with a few of the staff who had already changed into their street clothes, as the man returned back to the kitchen.

At that point, my companion and I decided it was time to leave (even though we had not finished our wine). We stood up and walked out of the restaurant. I thanked the woman at the front desk as we left, to my companion’s surprise.

The reason I felt calm was because by that point, I had already decided I would return home and tell the world about how crap the service and the food at Thai Basil is, so there was no reason to push the issue any further.

Do yourself a favor, never eat at this piece of crap restaurant.

The issue of how to study and get drunk simultaneously is one that has plagued man for centuries. In our modern era or supposed convenience, it continues to befuddle us. We can go to a bar and get drunk, but we can’t take our books there because someone will throw the books out of our hand and then call us a pussy. Conversely, we can’t go to Starbucks and slam a shot of tequila because first, they don’t serve tequila; and second, mocha frappacinos are terrible chasers.

Then came Tryst. It is a lounge/bar complete with a FREE wi-fi connection. You can go sit on one of the plush couches, drink a Pilsner, and surf the ‘net to your heart’s delight or until you’ve had too much to drink. Tryst is located at 2459 18th St. N.W. in Adams Morgan.
 

Moby Dick has the best Iranian food that I’ve ever had that isn’t home cooked. They bake their own bread and it is out of this world. They have somehow managed to perfect their cooking technique to the point that the kabob comes out perfectly. The Kabob Kubideh is simply mouth watering, as is the Jujeh Kabob.

The best part of Moby Dick is that it is laid-back and completely inexpensive. It’s the type of restaurant that I fantasize about when I’m at some trendy foo-foo fusion Mediterranean crapstand, paying up the wazoo for roasted bananas and fish eyes.

There are locations in Georgetown, Downtown, Bethesda, and Mclean.