Web recipes

Among the many wonders of the Web are the wonderful recipes that pop up from various corners. There are Epicurious and Recipes.com and various blogs but you just never know where a good recipe is going to come from -- a wine site, a cooking store email, wherever.

I printed out a recipe for Braised saffron chicken with pasta the other day, and I honestly have no idea where it came from. (Update: It's not where I found it, but it turns out the recipe comes from Epicurious.) It was really good and a simple dish for a weekday. You brown 2-1/2 lbs. of chicken thighs ("with skin and bones") in 2 Tbl olive oil, set them aside and sautée 2 c. chopped white onion with 6 peeled and crushed garlic cloves. Then you add 2 c. (!) white wine with 1 tsp crushed saffron and boil it down to half. Then you add 2 c. chicken broth and the thighs, bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer for 1 hr., turning halfway through. You remove the thighs, let cool, then remove skin and bones and separate meat into bite-size pieces. You skim the fat off the braising juices, and 1 c. heavy cream and 2 Tbl lemon juice and reduce that, then add chicken pieces to heat through. You cook 1 lb of paccheri or rigatoni, drain, put back in pot, pour chicken mixture over, toss, and add 2/3 c. of chopped basil and serve. We also sprinkled parmesan on individually.

Update: Two Web recipes in a row. Last night it was Spanish pork burgers that I found on Recipes.com by googling. Very simple. Sautée 3 c. sliced onions (they say Spanish onions, but nobody seems to really know what that means), then chop up half to mix with the ground pork and save the other half to put on the bun. Mix 1 lb. of pork with the chopped onions, 2 tsp of pimenton (doesn't say, but I presumed sweet), 4 cloves chopped garlic, salt and pepper. Don't overmix, then divide into patties (three or four, we like them big). To accompany, mix some lemon zest, lemon juice and a pinch of saffron with mayonnaise. Grill 10-12 min. Delicious, a real keeper!

Local gems

Despite my negative comments about some new Connecticut Avenue arrivals, I have a number of local favorites that reliably serve up high-quality food, are affordable, and not too hard to get into.

Recently I've been back to Surfside, Pete's New Haven Apizza, and Black's Market Bistro and they all fall into this category.

Surfside is just a bit far to be considered neighborhood. But it takes 7 minutes to get to Blue44 and it is certainly well worth the extra 8 minutes' drive to go to Surfside and get a really good, very affordable meal. We went back recently and realized we don't go the extra mile often enough. Also, as we ate our favorite Cuba and Maui tacos (pork and fish, respectively), we realized we don't experiment enough and need to try their burritos and quesadillas, which also look great. So we resolved to go more often and try different things. My target is the Bar Harbor quesadilla.

Pete's serves large, family-sized pizzas, which takes some getting used to. But a quick and easy lunch is their pizza by the slice. Again, very high quality for a very reasonable price, and, like Surfside, a very efficient system for ordering and serving.

Black's Market is one of the four Jeff Black establishments in the area. He is one of the happier success stories coming out of the seedbed of Kinkead's. I've been to two other restaurants of his lately as well -- Addie's and Black Salt -- and enjoyed them as well. Black's Market in Garrett Park has proven to be very handy on Sunday bike rides north on the Rock Creek Park Trail, following Beech Road to Garrett Park Ave. then up through the little park and across the railroad tracks to Black's very nice brunch. I've gotten the skirt steak with scramble eggs the past couple of times because that goes well with beer, but the pancakes and other sweet items look very good, too.

There are other casual dining options that are very good and it's good to remind myself we don't have to settle for mediocre restaurants just because they're a few minutes closer.

Update: Let me add Buck's Fishing & Camping to the list of local gems. We went back last night and it was refreshing after the misfires at some of the new places in the neighborhood to have a quality meal and service. I actually tried their big steak for the first time, splitting it with a friend, at it was truly delicious (still way too skimpy with the fries, though). The wedge was terrific as always and desserts -- chocolate cake with Lewes cream and a strawberry/rhubarb cobbler -- were superb.

Belga Café

You can plan and read and scheme but sometimes serendipity serves you best. We went to a cocktail party at a friend's place near Eastern Market and since we secured a parking place decided to explore 8th Street SE, which was hoppin' on a Friday night.

As we walked along looking at the numerous restaurants and their sidewalk areas we saw an empty two-top at Belga Café and got ourselves seated there. It vaguely rang bells and clearly sported a fairly authentic Belgian menu. It turns out that Chef Bart Vandaele claims to be the original Belgian restaurant in the District, leading the way in one of DC's biggest trends.

We split the four-cheese croquettes, which were hot and creamy and richly cheesy, with a frisée-bacon salad and balsamic gelée. I had the Flemish beef stew with red cabbage and the rich, brown braised beef truly melted in your mouth with a deep beef flavor. The red cabbage tasted of cabbage but was blander than some other versions I've had. It was served with frites -- which were very good and served nice and hot.

Service was good though I made the mistake of letting the server pick my beers without checking the price and while the blond Lucifer was good to start with and pricey at $9, the stout, though it paired well with the beef stew, was too expensive at $12.

We like Brasserie Beck and Marcel's, so we're definitely susceptible to Belgian cuisine. The Belga Café menu looks great, with a good mix of authentic traditional dishes and updated or Eurofusion creations. Not sure how pleasant it would be inside, but the patio on a breezy spring evening was ideal. The whole 8th Street SE scene was a revelation. It is really far from our house but definitely worth a trip back.

Blue 44

I don't want to be too negative but my first visit to the new restaurant on Connecticut was not promising. The new family restaurant that moved in after two mediocre Mexican restaurants failed in this location, certainly brightened up the place with some nice cosmetic changes. But it's still a small place with lots of tables crowded together. And, while a family restaurant presumably is great for families, the noise and running around of unruly kids is not always pleasant for the rest of us.

In the end, though, a restaurant is judged by its food, and I found the food in this first foray decidedly mediocre. I ordered a "Pittsburgh style" cheesesteak sandwich which was not very good. I don't really know whether Pittsburghers make a bad sandwich or whether this was just a poor version of it, but I suspect the latter. The meat was not freshly cooked but warmed up and the addition of fries to the sandwich as well as on the side may be authentic but it means there's less meat on the sandwich. The fries may have been "hand-cut" as advertised, but I got odds and ends of small fries that also did not seem to be particularly fresh.

Andrea ordered a Caesar salad which she said did not do any of the things that can make a Caesar salad good -- tasty dressing, crisp croutons, etc. I found the Romaine lettuce surprisingly pale and not very fresh tasting. She had to order an extra portion of dressing, but it is a common failing of entree salads not to have enough dressing.

The place was packed because the rich Chevy Chase market is under-served by neighborhood restaurants. It may survive on that basis alone. I will go back and give the place the burger test. If it fails that test, I don't rule out going there for convenience but I doubt it will be very often.

While no one can expect a neighborhood restaurant in DC to match a trendy West Hollywood eatery, we couldn't help noticing that we paid the same for a really great meal at BLD in LA as for this ho-hum offering at Blue 44.

Update: I realized looking back I never blogged about Jake's, the other new neighborhood restaurant on Connecticut. I've been there twice, sat at the bar, ordered a hamburger each time. Nothing special, but OK. I think it will be like Clyde's or Chadwick's -- a place where it's safe to go for a beer and burger but not much else.

Update 2: While I'm at it, I may as well include the comment I made about Terasol on the Chevy Chase listserv. I'm probably too hard on these neighborhood restaurants, but I think the problem here is the same as it was in Princeton -- you have a wealthy, captive audience so you don't have to be that good to stay in business. There were not any really good restaurants in Princeton, either.

On March 15, I wrote:

I'm glad that other people who have had an unsatisfactory experience at Terasol are also weighing in. Our first dinner there could at best be described as mediocre, but friends who like it persuaded us to give it a second chance, and the second time the food was even worse. There will be no third time for us.

It's good to have neighborhood restaurants, but they will survive and flourish only if they provide good food at a reasonable price-quality relationship. Sometimes, as when the Mexican restaurant closed recently, some people seem to suggest that we should support these local establishments because they are local. That's not the way it works for any other local store, which earns its support by providing quality goods or services. Restaurants are no exception to that rule.

Los Angeles

Our long weekend in Los Angeles was not all about food -- the graduation at Occidental and ancillary ceremonies were classy and spectacular in the Southern California settings and the Getty grounds and gardens were breathtaking in their spring beauty. We saw some old friends, made some new ones and had a convivial time with family. But LA is a real culinary destination. It has that critical mass of money and people to support a lively and creative restaurant scene so we had a great time sampling the offerings.

La Bastide has a charming interior courtyard with a vertical garden that is intimate and refreshing. I had a marvelous turbot, the best I've had since France, preceded by a spring truffle salad. We had a great bottle of Montrachet that managed to be stringent and fruity at the same time. For dessert, we went down the street to Sweet Lady Jane for some wonderful moist cakes served in gigantic portions. I had German chocolate, which was actually several layers of different chocolates and delicious.

We went to trendy BLD for lunch, and I had the signature spicy Cuban pork sandwich, which was generous and tasty. The cocktails, including one with a cocoa nib-infused tequila, were stimulating. Another day, we had a late breakfast at Blu Jam Cafe, which had a good two dozen breakfast dishes on the menu that are served all day. I had the Eggwich, a tremendously filling egg, cheese and avocado sandwich on a toasted ciabatta. Both of these were just fun places to be, with clean, funky decors, bright, innovative menus, and a nice buzz. LA can fill a breakfast place at 10 a.m. on a weekday because a lot of people don't work 9 to 5.

We went to a pizzeria and a sushi place where I had to learn these simple concepts could be taken to new heights. Pizzeria Mozza has so many lovely appetizers that even after we had ordered several for our table of six there were others to try another time. One standout was the farro and bean appetizer, which seemed to burst with flavor; the duck rillette, the fried squash blossoms and the crispy goat cheese were also fabulous. I couldn't pass up the chance to get the pizza with stinging nettles -- kind of a cross between spinach and greens in flavor -- with pepper salami and a salty cacio di Roma cheese. The pizza crust was light and puffy and the whole package excelled anything I'd had before.

Nobu offered some really special hot dishes, notably the signature rock shrimp tempura and a seared salmon with spicy cilantro sauce that were simply out of this world. While the sushi and other cold dishes were very good, I would focus on the hot dishes on a second visit. It's also the first time I've drunk sake out of a bamboo box, with an equal portion spilled into the saucer for good luck. That and a special single malt whiskey cocktail made the drinks the match of the food.

The Getty has a beautiful light and airy restaurant where I had a surprisingly delicate crisp pork belly on polenta for a starter and then a delicious farro risotto with spring peas, mushrooms and parmesan cheese that was delicate and hearty at the same time. Two for two on the farro dishes, so I've found a new favorite grain.

It was marvelous fun having this cornucopia of choices to play with. The dinner restaurants, particularly Nobu, were pricey, but the lunch places and even Pizzeria Mozza were reasonably affordable. I'm sure we'll go back to explore some more.

Yellow Indian Woman bean salad

I was looking for a recipe to use up the half-pound of Yellow Indian Woman beans from Rancho Gordo when I came upon this Moroccan-inspired salad in Heirloom Beans. It seemed the perfect follow-up to our chicken tagine earlier in the week because it used up the other half of the preserved lemon as well as using some of the newly opened jar of harissa paste.

It turned out to be delicious. And it was a stroke of genius, I say in all modesty, to pair the salad with grilled merguez from Broad Branch Market.

Steve Sando's beans once again proved their worth. I soaked these overnight then cooked them with a mirepoix. In order to use the bean pot, I sautéed the mirepoix in olive oil in a skillet and added it to the cold beans and soaking water to heat up gradually in the clay pot. It took a good hour or so to come to a boil and then simmered for another good hour. I added a tsp salt in the last quarter-hour of cooking then drained the beans. Per Sando's instructions, I heated up the 2 c. beans in the microwave at the time of assembly.

The other essential ingredient in this salad was 1 c. bulgur wheat. You simply add 2 c. boiling water and let it sit for an hour. The grain absorbs all the water, but remains moist and you fluff it up with a fork. It looks a lot like couscous but has a different, wheatier flavor.

Other ingredients were 2 Tbl chopped preserved lemon, 1/3 c. chopped scallions, and 1 c. chopped parsley. The dressing was 1/4 c. lemon juice, 3 minced garlic cloves, 2 tsp harissa, 1/3 c. olive oil and salt and pepper. You put the salad ingredients in a bowl, pour over the whisked dressing and toss to make a healthy, well-balanced salad.

The merguez was great, though it created huge flames on the grill as the fat escaped. I also put on a couple of the thicker sweet Italian sausages from Broad Branch but the merguez really matched the salad best. We drank a Gruner Veltliner with it, though I think a red would have been a better match.

Tagine

Tagine was the last on my list of special clay pots to buy and I finally got one at La Cuisine in Alexandria. It was made in Tunisia and is a pretty pistachio green.

I was not in a hurry because I wasn't sure how well I would like these stews that mix sweet and savory. But after trying it the first time, I think I'm going to like them fine.

After all the lamb over Passover and Easter, I didn't want to try the traditional lamb tagines, but took a recipe for chicken tagine with harissa, artichokes and green grapes from Ghillie Bașan's Tagines & Couscous, a new cookbook I bought on the basis of its high rating on Amazon.

The result was really delicious -- warming, exotic, tangy and very pretty with the ocher-yellow color it got from the turmeric. And very simple for a weekday.

I had cured the tagine right after I bought it, soaking it 24 hours then smearing the inside with olive oil and baking it at low temperature for 3 hours. Although this is a working utensil, it is also very decorative sitting on top of the hutch.

Whole Foods was very cooperative in providing the special ingredients needed for this recipe -- a nice jar of harissa paste and both artichoke hearts and preserved lemons in the olive bar.

I cut 4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts into wide strips and tossed them in a marinade of 1 Tbl olive oil, juice of 1 lemon, 1 tsp turmeric and 2 crushed garlic cloves. I covered it and put it in the fridge for 1 to 2 hours.

For the tagine, I sautéed 2 onions cut in half lengthwise and then sliced with the grain and half a preserved lemon, thinly sliced, with 1-2 tsp of sugar, in 2 Tbl of olive oil until the vegetables were lightly caramelized. Then I added the chicken strips along with 1-2 tsp of harissa and 2 tsp of tomato paste. Then I poured in 1-1/4 c. chicken broth, brought to a boil (slowly in the clay bottom sitting on a heat diffuser), put on the conical top and reduced the heat to let it simmer 15 min. Then I added 13 oz. of artichoke hearts cut in half and let it simmer another 5 min. At the end, I stirred in 16 seedless green grapes cut in half and part of the coarsely chopped leaves from a bunch of cilantro. I sprinkled the rest of the chopped cilantro over the top for serving. Bașan suggested an accompaniment of warmed flat bread, which Whole Foods also thoughtfully provided. We accompanied with a dry Côte de Provence rosé that we had picked up on our rosé shopping spree last weekend at Weygandt's and Addie Bassin's.

Both the new clay pot and the new cookbook passed their inaugural test with flying colors! We'll be doing more tagines.