Acadiana

I can't stand the dead of winter. Worse than that, I hate summer's sweltering heat and humidity. I would not make it through either season without Restaurant Week. For those unfamiliar with the joy of Restaurant Week, here's the run down: for one glorious week in August and February, 180 of DC's best restaurants offer three course meals for $20.09 (lunch) and $35.09 (dinner), not including drinks or tip.

I decided to celebrate Mardi Gras early at Acadiana. It's consistently rated as one of DC's best restaurants and has even received national press. It is also a Jeff Tunks' restaurant, and I love DC Coast and Ceiba. So, I was curious whether Acadiana would live up to expectations.

Acadiana has a great ambiance. It's not hushed, yet not too boisterous either. The decor is sleek. But quirky touches like its jeweled chandeliers, keep the atmosphere light-hearted.

The Restaurant Week menu was excellent. Unlike other restaurants that provide only two or three options for each course, Acadiana gave Restaurant Weekers access to all their entrees and most of their soups, salads, and desserts.


Since it was Sunday night, we were also able to take advantage of their half-priced bottles of wine. The wine list was impressive, and it was difficult to chose a wine. Fortunately the server suggested a light, crisp French Chardonnay that went well with everyone's meal.

I started off with the smoked chicken and andouille sausage gumbo:

The gumbo was was spicy, but not exciting. While it was good, I don't agree with the Washingtonian that it was one of the restaurant's best dishes. I tried some of Liz's roasted sweet corn and crab soup and John's classic turtle soup (snapping turtle, traditional garnishes, and a dry sherry splash), both of which were far more appealing.

Next I tried the grillades and grits (sauteed veal medallions and creamy jalapeno cheese grits covered in mushroom pan gravy):

I cannot resist anything with jalapeno cheese, so this was dish for me. The grits were creamy and well worth the mushroom gravy compromise. (If you are like me and do not like cooked mushrooms, you'll be pleased to know that the mushrooms are easy to identify and sequester on the side of the plate, allowing you to enjoy the gravy without the fear of eating slimy mushrooms.) The veal medallions were succulent and flavorful. I am picky about red meat; for me, bleeding meat is a reminder that the animal was once alive, it does NOT add flavor. But Acadiana's veal was savory without freaking me out.

Other dinner entres: Liz tried the grilled gulf redfish with the seafood jumbalaya risotto and smoked red bell pepper sauce. She loved it and I could see why when I tried a bite. John and Anna had the New Orleans style barbeque shrimp with garlic butter, black pepper, Worcestershire sauce, and warm bread. This is Acadiana's signature dish and USA Today declared it one of their top 25 dishes in 2005. Anna and John thought it lived up to the hype and I was impressed with my sample. I thought the barbecue sauce would be too overpowering for shrimp, but it was a perfect blend of butter, rosemary, and Worcestershire.

I finished up with the decadent chocolate doberge cake with espresso ice cream:

Overall, this was an excellent dessert. The top was a bit crispy, but the cake itself was rich and a perfect balance between cakiness and fudginess.

I tried some of Liz's warm raisin bread pudding with butterscotch sauce and Tahitian vanilla ice cream; the flavors complemented each other well and it was a fun choice. Anna's white chocolate creme brulee with citrus marmalade was exquisite.

The service was fair. Our waiter was accurate, helpful, and didn't do anything glaringly bad. The bread server did not impress. He asked if we would like more biscuits and we eagerly said that we did. We waited, but biscuits never came. Then he took away our bread plates so quickly we couldn't ask where our bread was! If this seems trivial to you, then you have not tasted their buttery biscuits. They are heavenly. Not to mention, at a restaurant of this caliber, I expect more from their wait staff than I do of my server at Busboys.

Overall, I really liked Acadiana. I'm not sure it's one of the best restaurants in the country, but it is definitely one of the best in the city. It is a fun restaurant with consistently good food and I recommend it.

Pimp that snack

I recently stumbled upon a website dedicated to (I am not making this up) snack pimping.

The site takes the pimping culture to a whole new level by challenging people to pimp their snacks. It features tons of humongous pimped snacks that boggle the mind. Bizarre.

I love the shirts. But my favorite feature is the Pimp Trumps where you can select which snacks you want to pimp off against each other.

The site's most puzzling feature is its Diet Blog. Not exactly what you'd expect from a website dedicated to making super-sized snack foods. The blog explains itself:

Since it links nicely with the idea of gorging yourself on giant foodstuffs, we've created a diet blog for anyone that wants to write about their diet or how they're maintaining their weight.

Does it really link nicely or are these people just masochists? Are the purveyors of snack pimping really so eager to measure their body mass index?

As fascinating as it is, I'm not sure I understand this subculture. Or maybe I just need to spend more time on pimpthatsnack.

Turning Japanese

I love Japanese food but have always found it too daunting to prepare. So when my friend Moizza suggested we make a Japanese meal, I had some trepidation. Fortunately she has experience cooking Japanese food and knew where in the Asian grocery to find Japanese ingredients.

We started out with Miso soup.

Ingredients:

• Dashi soup stock (warning: this smells bad, but don't let that scare you off)
• 1 block of tofu
• 3-4 tablespoons of miso paste
• 1/4 cup of chopped green onion

Overall the recipe was easy and tasted delicious.

Next, we made Japanese curry and short-grained rice.

Rice:

I don't have a rice cooker, so I've struggled to make decent rice. Here were some of Moizza's tips:

• WASH the rice. I sort of knew this one. I'd seen some friends do it before, but never understood what they were doing or why. Nor did I understand how they determined the rice was clean. (You rinse it until the water is clear.) This gets all the excess starch out of the rice.
• It'd difficult (but critical) to determine the correct rice-to-water ratio. With white rice, for every cup of rice, you should use a cup and a half of water. Or you can fill the pot/rice cooker with water up to your thumb knuckle (this is the method we used and it worked well).
• If you are cooking rice in a pot, use one with a thick bottom. Thin-bottomed pots will increase the risk of burning your rice.

Cooking rice is pretty straight-forward: Bring rice to a boil. Once the rice boils, put on a lid and lower the heat. Let the rice simmer with the lid on for about 20 minutes (give or take ten minutes depending on the type of rice you're preparing). If keep a close eye on the rice and taste it throughout the cooking, you will better time how long it should simmer. Next, remove the pot from the heat and live the lid on. Let the rice fully absorb the liquid for about five minutes.

 

Japanese Curry

This was the only dish we didn't make from scratch and it was a very easy dish. We went vegetarian (potatoes and carrots), but you can use beef, pork, or chicken:

After adding water, boiling and then adding the curry mix, we were ready to eat:

The curry has a semi-sweet, tangy taste. Definitely not Indian or Thai curry, but still good. It paired nicely with this Japanese Plum Wine:

Tea Cake

This was the most complex recipe of the night. I’m not sure it is possible for one person to make this cake. There was way too much whisking. At one point I found myself stirring a sugar/egg mixture over simmering water waiting for it to turn a creamy color (this never happened). The end result was tasty, but not easily repeatable:

The truth about wheatgrass shots

My yoga teacher suggested everyone try a wheatgrass shot before the next class. This sounded absolutely terrifying. How would I take a shot of grass? Doesn't that require chewing? Why should I put myself through this, does wheatgrass taste like chocolate? My teacher explained that the wheatgrass was milked for its juice (yes these are the words she used to explain the process) and then you take a shot of it. Wheatgrass has tons of anti-oxidants and vitamins, but only if you take the shot immediately and don't let it oxidize.

Whether my looming birthday sends me running toward anything with anti-oxidants or I just love a dare, I decided to check this wheatgrass situation out. My brave friend Anne joined me and we headed to the local Robek's. We chose a 2 ounce shot with an orange juice chaser. Then we watched Michael milk the wheatgrass (sounds wrong, doesn't it?):


Finally our shots were ready. They looked like slime, not encouraging:


But we are brave souls and went for it. At first it tasted sweet, but that taste was closely followed by what tasted like fresh cut grass.

Our post-shot conversation:
Me: That tasted...fresh.
Anne: I feel like a cow.

The taste lingered and both of us noticed a scratchy throat. (Maybe if you have grass allergies this aggravates them?) We also agreed that the 1 ounce shot would have been easier to down without spilling, and you do not want to sip wheatgrass. Overall, worth trying, but if I am going to take a shot of an unpalatable liquid, I'd prefer traditional shots. Maybe a vodka wheatgrass shot?

Fortunately we were able to lose the wheatgrass after-taste next door at my current favorite restaurant Busboy's and Poets. (For those unfamiliar with this food mecca, it combines all things awesome. Incredible brunches, desserts, and food. Plus, it has live poetry readings and a bookstore you can peruse while you wait for a table.)

I passed up my favorite sandwich in the world (the Sweet Fuji Apple and Gorgonzola sandwich with fig spread on toasted walnut raisin bread) to try the vegan Peanut Butter and Banana panini with agave nectar:

It was light and delicious, but it didn't inspire the obsessive devotion of my Fuji Apple sandwich. Still, it is perfect for a filling lunch that won't leave you feeling sluggish and heavy. You can get the sandwich with a side of fruit to maximize the light, healthy feel. I got it with a side of fries because the combination of fries and a peanut butter sandwich was fun and made me feel like a kid again, only more sophisticated. (The six-year-old me would never have touched agave nectar.)

Dine Out for Life on March 5

Nothing beats trying a new restaurant or revisiting an old favorite, except helping a worthy cause. On Thursday, March 5, North American foodies will enjoy a the best of both worlds if they visit a restaurant taking part in Dining Out for Life. Participating restaurants donate a percentage of their sales that night to AIDS service organizations. The DC restaurant list includes one of my favorites, Busboys and Poets.

How to fight the dark side of Valentine's Day candy

I am not a hopeless romantic, but I love Valentine's Day. It is the only time of the year when it's socially acceptable to demolish an entire box of chocolates in one sitting. But beware, there is a darker side to Valentine's Day candy: gamble chocolates and antacid hearts. Fortunately, it is fairly easy to avoid ruining the holiday. Don't buy Russell Stover candies (they invented the toothpaste-filled chocolate conveniently next to the caramel-filled chocolate you meant to try) or the antacid hearts (which you should have gotten over after 5th grade). Godiva and Lindt are safe bets for avoiding Pepto-Bismol-filled nastiness. But to celebrate Valentine's Day in all its chocolaty glory, check out:

Artisan Chocolates
I have only tried their chocolates once, but I haven't forgotten them (a more detailed review to follow in the near future).

Artfully Chocolate Kingsbury Confections (ACKC)
I have fallen in love with their hot chocolate and brownies, but have not yet sampled their hand-made chocolate confections. If their chocolate truffles are as good as their drinks, it will be a Valentine's Day you won't forget.

On a budget or don't have time to pick up these chocolates? You can never go wrong with a pan of fresh, warm brownies. Just stay away from the chocolate candy Russian roulette. It's no way to spend your holiday.

Watch Jim Gaffigan talk about holiday fun, including gamble chocolate and antacid hearts.

How I got here

One would expect the first entry of a food blog to have something to do with food. But food alone could not motivate me to start a blog; the people in my life are the real inspiration. After suffering countless hours listening to me go on about all things foodie, an awesome (and very patient) co-worker suggested I start a blog. My friends and family have encouraged my food obsession too; they are always ready to try a new restaurant or are sending me cool food blogs, recipes, and articles. From Restaurant Week to embarrassing cooking catastrophes – food is part of my favorite memories with family and friends. Food has the unique ability to bring people together and help them appreciate the best life has to offer. Especially cupcakes.