Au revoir Roger Miller

Well, the next time you're jonesing for fufu, you're not gonna have 'ol Roger Miller to satisfy your cravings. Some time in the last couple weeks, the Cameroonian restaurant at 941-1 Bonifant (just next to Thai Derm) closed its doors.

While there aren't a lot of details available, the good folks at Thai Derm say a new dining spot will soon be taking over. Had it not been for the blizzard, a new place might have thrown its doors open already. Word has it that we're getting a Peruvian chicken outpost. Now don't confuse this with the new Portuguese chicken restaurant, Nando's Peri Peri, that is supposedly opening a place on Ellsworth in the Peterson Development. However there is no mention of that on the company's website.

While I doubt a Peruvian chicken shack will hold much interest for me, I'll be curious to see what they have to offer. I can't say that I'll miss Roger Miller all that much. It's a good thing that Cafe d'Abidjan opened a couple miles south of RM on Georgia Ave for the next time I'm in the mood for some west African fare.

And if anyone has any details on the closing of RM or the new restaurant taking its place, please shoot me a note. Thanks.

Lotus Cafe comes through - big time!

After spending several days cooped up in the house, the missus and me ventured out into the hood on Thursday afternoon seeking lunch. Rather than call places ahead, we decided just to take a stroll and see what was open. We felt confident we'd find something.

We did not want to hit the Ellsworth area, so we figured we'd walk to Georgia and head south. On the way to Avenue we did notice that Thai Market was open. So this was good, just in case other places were shuttered we knew we could do TM if necessary.

As we walked south on Georgia, we first saw La Bamba was closed. That was OK, we aren't big fans. Next up, Olazzo and Newcaro - but they typically don't do lunch, so as expected they were shut tight. In addition, the awning had fallen down from Newcaro and a sign in the window stated they'd be closed for a bit while snow-related renovations were completed. Not sure how long this will take. In addition, I couldn't make a direct link to the restaurant's website here on the blog. When I tried to pull up their site, it says "account for nicarorestaurant.com has been suspended." Maybe someone more tech savvy than me can explain. Are they just behind on paying the hosting service?

OK, what's next? Abyssinia - closed - don't like Ethiopian food too much anyway. Big Greek Cafe - closed? Now wait a minute. We thought they'd be busting out the falafel. But no. We kept walking. Hook & Ladder, Pacci's? Well, you know the answer to that. We can't really complain they were closed since they have yet to officially open. But Pacci's is coming along nicely. I'm feeling good for a spring opening. Next, Taste of Jerusalem - closed. We didn't peek around the corner for Vicino, but we did see Jackie's was closed - again, no real surprise since they usually don't open till 5:00.

All right, with fingers crossed we approached Kim Than (or as it is now known, the Lotus Cafe). Open! And with a crowd. Why not? No one else is serving. So we were ready to chow down. We started with some crispy veggie spring rolls (well I started with a big boy Fischer - tasty). As usual, the rolls were very good. The missus then moved on to the Pho with tofu and I did the vermicelli noodle salad dish.

The pho comes loaded with veggies (carrots, jalapenos, mushrooms, onions, broccoli, bean sprouts and cabbage) that accompany the noodles, cilantro, tofu, and a wonderful broth.

My vermicelli had lettuce, tofu, shrimp, peanuts, another spring roll and that killer fish sauce I love. Mmmm. Throw in a hearty amount of rooster sauce and I was in business.

Needless to say, we left Lotus Cafe stuffed to the gills and ready to head home for an afternoon siesta - thanks mother nature. If you haven't been to Lotus lately, or yet to give it a try, check 'em out. While the decor is not the greatest and the atmosphere is lacking, the food is really good and the prices are very reasonable. I am certainly glad we have them in the hood.

A Taste of West Africa

While the region begins to settle into our most current form of snowchosis, I've decided to stray outside the region of SoCo and post a story on a brand new west African restaurant that has opened its doors about 2 miles south of the 'hood at 6115 Georgia Ave.

Typically, a place like this would escape my notice, but having become good friends with an Ivorian (someone from Côte d'Ivoire) I became well aware of its opening. The restaurant is called Le Cafe d'Abidjan. While it is new, Dominique, the lovely proprietress of the restaurant has actually been serving Ivorian food for quite some time. Prior to the Cafe's opening Dominique ran what is known in Côte d'Ivoire as a maquis, located in Adelphi, MD. If you're not familiar with the term - which I was not until a few months ago - a maquis is the name given to private houses that have been transformed into little restaurants. Their prices are typically very low, but they're always not easy to find since their addresses are passed around by word of mouth. (I hear we have our own maquis in the 'hood near Montgomery College - if I find it, I'll let you know).

But now Dominique has left her maquis and her new place is up and running on the Avenue. I've now had 2 of Dominique's meals - one at her home and one in the restaurant - and I must say both were quite tasty. On our most recent outing, we started with an order of what are essentially fried donuts made from ground chick peas. If you are a fan of garbanzo beans, you need to try this dish. It is great! You can eat them plain, but they're served with a mildly spicy sauce made with tomato paste, onions, garlic and other secret ingredients.

We followed up our starter with what felt like a sampling of the entire menu - including chicken, lamb and fish. The chicken we had was baked and marinated with parsley and oil. Not an elaborate production, but moist and very good. Accompanying the chicken was a platter of baked lamb, seasoned with onions and topped with a mixture of cucumbers, onions, tomatoes, mustard with oil and vinegar. We also sank our teeth into a couple of whole baked tilapia.

While tilapia often times gets low marks for its bland taste, if it's prepared the right way and is topped with something big and bold, I think it really works. And these tilapia really worked. They were topped with a similar mixture to the baked lamb, were nicely cooked and while it does take some work to extract the meat from the bones, it is definitely worth it.

And while our dinner may already seem to have been gluttonous, we can't eat an Ivorian meal without also having rice, fried plantains, and a specialty of the country, cassava cous cous. For vegetarians, this would be a great dish to have, and when combined with the chick pea donuts and fried plantains it would be a good meal. And I'm guessing if you still had room Dominique would whip you up another vegetarian dish of your liking.

Le Cafe d'Abidjan has now been open a little more than a month, taking over an African restaurant called Chez Aunty Libe, but has still yet to have its grand opening. Dominique is planning something for either March 13 or March 20. The restaurant opens every day (except Sunday) at 11:45 AM. From Mon-Thurs it closes at 11:45 PM, but on Friday and Saturday she gets a big late night crowd and remains open till about 6:00 AM if you can believe it.

There is no website for the restaurant yet, and if you drive by you'll only see 'African Restaurant' displayed on the front window. But do yourself a favor and try it out. If you do, tell her you read about it on the blog. The entree prices run from about $12-$17 and on Valentine's, she doing an all-you-can-eat buffet for just $10.

It's also worth noting she does not serve alcohol. But I believe it's fine to bring in beer or wine for your meal - I know we did. OK, I hope you get out there and try some very traditional Ivorian (and Senegalese) fare. I'm confident you'll be glad you did.

A Plug for the Peruvian Taste Test

Wanted to give a plug for fellow local blogger Dan Reed, who writes Just Up the Pike and is running the Great Peruvian Taste Test.

Starting this Friday (Jan. 29), you'll be able to vote on your fave Peruvian pollo dining spots in the area. The top five rated restaurants will then be taste-tested by an obvious connoisseur of pollo a la brasa, Mr JUTP.

I myself have never tried Peruvian rotisserie chicken. It certainly sounds good with its mix of garlic, cumin and chili powder. Maybe if I can get a rotisserie attachment for my home grill I'll give it a try over the summer. Watching this video of one of my fave TV chefs, Tony Bourdain, does make my mouth water. And please note, he's eating in Northern VA.


But I just can't bring myself to hit up one of our local places to try out what I'm sure I would like. Since abandoning the vegetarian bandwagon I have chowed down on my fair share of poultry. But for me, I don't want to eat any industrially-raised birds. And I feel confident this is the case at pretty much every place that serves pollo a la brasa. I'd love to hear otherwise, because I'd definitely go out of my way to try it.

I know we have some great farmers locally raising terrific birds and I'm sure there are even bigger ones outside the region using humane practices that probably could supply a fair amount of birds to a restaurant. I'm not holding my breath, but it'd be fabulous if one of these restaurants gave it a try to see how popular this would be.

I know everyone would not want to pay a premium for this, but I bet some would. I mean, what would it be, $1 or $2 more per entree? Here's hoping someone emails and says they've found humanely-raised pollo a la brasa.

Now we need a dentist in the 'hood

And no, that mobile dentist guy on Easley Street does NOT count.

I write the need for a dentist after trying a few different treats from Velatis, our new caramels shop on Georgia Ave. Man, is some of their stuff sweet! I guess I shouldn't be surprised when the main ingredient found in most of what they sell is sugar.

But I do have to say, as not as big sweets guy - I would definitely choose savory over sweet if it came down to it - they make some pretty mean caramels. The two distinct styles they make are sugary and chewy - coming in about 20 different varieties. Now I can't say I've made much of a dent in the 20 different varieties, but I did try a few over the break. This is much to my chagrin of my waistline.

I think the first one I tried is still my favorite. That is the Sea Salt Turtle. It is pecan halves covered with caramel, dark chocolate and then topped with sea salt. To me, the addition of the salt really takes it over the top. And I like the crunch of the pecans. Just one is a nice dessert. This also helps since each one is $3.50 a pop. However you shouldn't go into Velatis looking for bargain-basement sweets. You're gonna need a little bit of scratch to sample their goodies.

In addition to the turtles, I've also sunk my teeth into their truffles. It appeared Velatis offered almost 2 dozen different varieties of truffles ($3 each). While many sounded good, I tried a couple of the cappuccino variety. And yes, I recommend them! They were excellent. Very rich, chocolatey-gooey and not too over the top sweet. I would have to imagine if you like truffles, Velatis will have one to meet your needs.

I also tried the toffee with nuts. This one was my least favorite. I bought a 1/4 pound and I just couldn't get through it. This one was way too sweet for me. I was thinking since it had nuts it would be more brittle-like. But it really didn't have much of a crunch to it, and that's what I was looking for. It really was predominately chocolate and toffee. Oh well, two out of three isn't bad.

I do plan to throw Velatis my business when I can, but at least for me, I can't see shopping there on a regular basis. I was told that during the holidays they did a brisk business. I'll be curious to see how they fare in the post-holiday season when folks are heading to the gym, not the caramel shop.

My guess is the most profitable part of their business is corporate events and weddings. Just as long as they're not relying on us local yocals walking into the store and buying pounds and pounds of caramels to keep them afloat.

But I definitely recommend you give them a try if you've yet to go in. I think you'll be happy you did. Just stick your scale in the bathroom closet for a while.

Felice Anno Nuovo!

Well, we're less than 48 hours away from a new year and a new decade. Where did the time go? Can I finally throw away my Y2K ballcap?

But I must say I am looking forward to the new year. First, we have several new restaurants on the way. I won't go on about them since I have in posts past, but I think we can look forward to Pacci's, H&L Brewpub and 8407 coming in the months ahead. However we won't have Jackie's charcuterie to add to that mix since she finally pulled the plug on that. Just as well - it leaves an opening for yours truly. That's a niche I'll hope to fill at some point in the new decade if someone doesn't beat me to it.

We also can look forward for the first time to the SS Winter Farmers Market. They'll kick things off in a couple weeks (1/9) and you can get your fill of potatoes and cheese - maybe turnips too. Well, there will be more, but the offerings will be limited since we are talking about seasonal items. For you carnivores out there, you can now get good local meat all year round. I love that! I purchased a lamb loin from one of our vendors (the guy who usually sells only lavender) for Christmas dinner and boy was it good. Very simple preparation (coated with olive oil, salt and pepper) and cooked for about 40 minutes and then topped with this fabulous rosemary/ olive oil drizzle. It was a winner. And had plenty of leftovers for lamb sandwiches all week. Just finished the last bit for lunch today. Still tasty!

And speaking of home cooking, I will quickly say that our Feast of the 7 Fishes went very well. I think we ate for about 5 hours straight - just my speed. We ended up with 9 fishes - here was the line-up (and pics may come later, I can't access them right now, sorry).

Smoked salmon (Alaskan - not Atlantic, that is way too over fished) on top of rosemary and olive oil Triscuits (if you haven't tried them do yourself a favor and get a box) and then topped with creme fraiche, red onion and capers. A very big hit.

Brandade - this is a dish with potatoes and salted cod (I know, I'm a hypocrite, talk about being WAY over fished - but it's a must have with the Feast so I broke down) mixed together with garlic olive oil. I was a bit disappointed here - too much potato flavor and not enough cod. If I do this next year I need to cut out at least 8 oz of potatoes.

Salad with seafood - simple mixed greens with a vinaigrette and squid, shrimp and octopus. This was a winner, but my wife complained about the greens. But I love salad - so I think the greens have to stay.

Mini crab cakes - straight out of Maryland baby! Pretty straightforward, very little filler and covered in panko and then pan fried - with aioli. Another winner.

Tuna and white beans - needed some legumes in the mix and this did it. We do this often, but this time we took the extra step and made fresh beans and had a better grade of tuna than we usually buy for ourselves. Mix in some red onions and olio and that's it.

After our 5 antipasti, we did linguine alla vongele for the primi. Did it with just an olive oil and garlic sauce and had both fresh and canned clams. I took the easy way out and just use dried pasta instead of making fresh. I almost think it worked better with the dry pasta. Molto buono!

For our secondi we went back to Maryland and cooked about a 2 pound fillet of rockfish. Again, the simplest preparations worked best. I marinated the fish in olive oil, lemon and salt and pepper and let it sit for about 45 mins. I then put it in the oven at 400 for about 30 minutes. Once it was cooked through I pulled it out and then topped it with a putanesca (a mix of cherry tomatoes (local, hothouse toms), red onions, capers, olives, parsley and olio - about 4 cups). It really did top off a fab dinner.

For our dolci, a friend made an Italian cheesecake topped with currants. I am not a big sweets person but this was great. Again, I've been eating leftovers all week. To make sure everything went down well, I broke out my new digestivo - Fernet Branca. It went over better than expected. It's only meant to be drank in small amounts and I really think it does help with digestion after a big meal. It is a acquired taste and can be considered a little medicinal, but it has a nice finish that really warms up the body. I also cracked open the Sambuca for those who needed something a little sweeter.

All right, that's enough out of me. Wishing you all a happy new year. Looking forward to many fabulous meals in the year ahead and hopeful that our local restaurant and food scene continues to thrive. I think soon more people in the metro area will take notice and may begin to consider SS a dining destination area.

Happy Holidays

Just wanted to wish folks happy holidays. I hope you eat some wonderful meals during this festive time.

My Feast of Seven Fishes seems to be coming together nicely. I'll post some pics soon. I think we might end up with more than 7 fishes though. But who's counting. I'll also report on an Italian digestivo I'm serving. Our County liquor store did not carry this variety (Fernet-Branca), but were very nice and brought in a few bottles for me. Although I only needed one. I hear it's an acquired taste. We'll see how it goes.

And I'd love to hear from anyone who's been over to the caramel shop -- Velatis -- on Georgia Ave. I know they opened about a week ago. I think I'll make my way over tomorrow so I can include some of their goodies as part of the dolci for our Feast.

OK, go on now and eat, drink and be merry!