Food Trucks and Space Ships

In the past two days, I’ve made pretty good work of exploring DC’s trendy food scene. As you’d expect, restaurant’s often get their name on the map in this city because of their famous owner/executive chef/etc. As is the case of El Centro where I went on Friday, a Richard Sandoval operation. Richard has an impressive resume of big time restaurants across the world, and this one didn’t disappoint.
Tucked away into Adams Morgan, the snazzy but authentic Mexican restaurant boasts 250 different types of tequila, table-side prepared guacamole and creative taco options. I stuck with white wine, I’m not sure I’m a tequila kind of girl, but Melissa and I couldn’t turn down the guac. I ordered the grilled cactus tacos. They were great! The cactus was tender and vegetable-like. Who knew?
Day two Evan and I went on a mission to find food trucks.

These are all the rage and I, for one, was a little ashamed to not have tried one of them yet. The Dangerously Delicious truck cranks out all different types of pies. We split the SMOG (steak, mushroom, onion and gruyere) pie

and the strawberry rhubarb pie.

The smog was okay, but the strawberry rhubarb was deeelish. I should’ve sprung for the peanut butter chocolate chess pie too… Next time.
Our other food truck of the day was Red Hook Lobster Pound for a lobster roll.
This petit lobster roll set us back $15, but oh.em.gee. We ordered the “Connecticut style” where the lobster is butter poached and served warm. I had to sit there and bask in it’s glory after it was gone.
Last, and probably least exciting (in my opinion) thing we did this morning was go to the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum.

I have trouble summoning the patience it takes to explore museums. Not to mention when they’re about things like space ships and planes. Poor Evan will have to find a more suitable museum tourer to bring back there.

Nevertheless, it felt like a productive Saturday morning

Vegetable Burrito Bowl

Meatless Thursday.

After a night like last night, it had to be. A bunch of us went to the the Congressional Blues Festival at the National Building Museum. The tickets were only $25 dollars for all you can eat, drink and blues-listen. In theory this sounds awesome, but as usual it was a bit of a let-down. The line for food was 45 minutes to an hour long, which was really my biggest qualm. The food its self wasn’t terrible, but it was all meat. Fried chicken, chicken salad, honey baked ham, ribs, chicken gumbo, with side options of slaw and potato salad. Hence, Meatless Thursday.

I’ve never made burrito bowls, per say, but it’s one of those dishes you can throw in whatever you have in the fridge, top it with salsa, and call it a burrito bowl.

Tonight we have:
rice
black beans
corn
lettuce
bell pepper
cucumber
red onion
white cheddar cheese
salsa
Greek yogurt
tortilla chips

Ina’s Lemon Chicken

I am TOO suggestible. It has always been a problem for me. Yesterday, I went to the gym with a dinner menu in mind, but while on the treadmill I watched an episode of Barefoot Contessa where she makes lemon chicken, and what do I do? Walk next door to Whole Foods and buy the ingredients for lemon chicken. I’ve been disinterested in chicken for a few months now, but watching the white wine, garlic and lemon bubble around chicken with crispy browned skin…I was convinced. Watching the Food Network while working out is tricky. Sometimes it can act as a motivator when you think about the work out as the way to justify eating that Chocolate Honey Almond Tart I’m staring at. Other times, it just makes me hungry and eager to get home.

I only made half of this recipe:

1/4 cup good olive oil
3 tablespoons minced garlic (9 cloves)
1/3 cup dry white wine
1 tablespoon grated lemon zest (2 lemons)
2 tablespoons freshly squeezed lemon juice
1 1/2 teaspoons dried oregano
1 teaspoon minced fresh thyme leaves
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
4 boneless chicken breasts, skin on (6 to 8 ounces each)
1 lemon

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.
Warm the olive oil in a small saucepan over medium-low heat, add the garlic, and cook for just 1 minute but don't allow the garlic to turn brown. Off the heat, add the white wine, lemon zest, lemon juice, oregano, thyme, and 1 teaspoon salt and pour into a 9 by 12-inch baking dish.

Pat the chicken breasts dry and place them skin side up over the sauce. Brush the chicken breasts with olive oil and sprinkle them liberally with salt and pepper. Cut the lemon in 8 wedges and tuck it among the pieces of chicken.

Bake for 30 to 40 minutes, depending on the size of the chicken breasts, until the chicken is done and the skin is lightly browned. If the chicken isn't browned enough, put it under the broiler for 2 minutes. Cover the pan tightly with aluminum foil and allow to rest for 10 minutes. Sprinkle with salt and serve hot with the pan juices.

I served the chicken with basmati rice and grilled summer squash - on my new grill pan!! Thanks to Evan’s parents for the William Sonoma gift card ;)

Monday night’s in the summer, a group called Screen on the Green set up a large screen in between the Washington Monument and the Capitol to play classic movies. Evan’s been wanting to go to this for months, so since it wasn’t 100 million degrees outside, I agreed to go. It was a pretty incredible setting, and the movie In the Heat of the Night was very relevant to the book I’m reading (The Help). We brought lawn chairs, but were a little unprepared compared to the people around us. Next week we’ll be sure to bring some drinks and snacks!

Tapas: It’s what’s for dinner!

How great are tapas? It’s the perfect way to use up what’s in the fridge and make a creative dinner with a lot of variety. Furthermore, I always read about appetizer recipes I want to make for a dinner party or entertaining guests (but at my age, these occasions don’t happen that often). When I grow up - and live in a nice house with a huge vegetable garden - I will have friends over for creative appetizers, tea and desserts, and fun cocktails all the time!  Until then, I’ll just make them for myself for dinner.


~Tapas Menu~
Watermelon
Caprese salad with a huge farmers market tomato

White peach wrapped in prosciutto with a sprinkle of fresh mint and honey

Mixed olives
Sriracha buttered shrimp

The sriracha shrimp left a lasting burn in my mouth, but they were delicious. This was my maiden voyage with the spicy Asian sauce, and I’m definitely a fan. I found the recipe on Bon Appetit's website.

Ingredients:
1 lb shrimp
6 tbsp sriracha
2 tbsp butter
3 cloves garlic
1 tbsp lemon zest
2 tbsp minced fresh mint
2 tbsp minced fresh basil

Whip butter with Sriracha and melt in skillet.  Sauté minced garlic in it and toss in shrimp. Just before they're done, add lemon zest and mint and basil and let them wilt.

For dessert, two scoops of this gorgeous ice cream:

Margherita Pizza

Holy smokes, this hot weather is getting old! The only way I’ve been able to survive is by spending most of my days splayed out on top of my bed, in front of my AC unit reading The Help. But a girls gotta eat. I love how quick and easy pizza is, especially when you buy the premade crust.

While the zza was baking, we cooled down with a Harpoon IPA in a frosty glass. 

Margherita Pizza

1 thin pizza crust
marinara sauce
fresh mozzarella cheese, sliced thin and patted dry
cherry tomatoes, sliced and patted dry
fresh basil, julienned

Bake for 12-15 at 400, until the cheese is bubbly. Attempt to wait long enough so pizza doesn’t feel like molten lava when you bite into it. We served this up with some cold watermelon.

Vegetable + Fish = Recovery

It was a balmy 100 degrees with 80% humidity today in the District. Oh California, how I miss you. One problem with vacation is that you usually end up eating food you would not normally eat, which can really throw me off. By the end of the trip, I wasn't feeling so hot and I think the unhealthy food was to blame (not that it wasn't phenomenal at the time!). I got myself back on track the past few days with meals made of vegetables and fish. 
Tuesday night: Dijon salmon with spinach rice and corn on the cob

I'd never thought to add spinach to rice, but it tasted great.

Ingredients:

1/2 cup rice (1 1/3 cup water +1/2 tbsp butter, cook for 20 min)
chopped frozen spinach (or fresh)
1 clove garlic, minced
Grana Padano cheese, grated (or Parmesan)
salt and pepper

Tossed all together with hot, cooked rice. 

Wednesday night: Mediterranean Tuna Salad Pitas

Ingredients:
2 cans white tuna, packed in water
1/2 cup plain 0% fat Greek yogurt
red onion, diced
green olives, chopped
cucumber, chopped
lemon juice
mint, chopped
dash of garlic salt
salt and pepper
sliced tomato
romaine lettuce
pita

Thursday night: Veggie Greek Pitas

Ingredients:
pita
garlic hummus
tomato slices
romaine lettuce
red onion
cucumber
peas (crazy, right? however, peas and mint are a happy marriage)
mint
feta cheese
red wine vinegar

Lunch everyday this week: Roasted red pepper and goat cheese panini + carrots

Ingredients:
Ciabata roll
goat cheese
roasted red peppers
roasted red pepper hummus
sliced cucumbers (added on after grilling)
*basil would be a great addition*

I'm hoping for a restful, productive weekend, including a large farmer's market trip and maybe some baking…

Trip to NorCal

Reentry is never easy, especially when you’re leaving behind the most delicious produce in the country.

Evan and I spent Thursday through Monday traveling around northern California, visiting my family and friends and eating a LOT. We arrived late into SFO where my aunt Susan picked us up and drove straight to her and my uncle Ron’s condo in Santa Cruz.

Maeve, my best friend from junior high, lives in SC and stopped by with her fiancé for some bagels the next morning. It had probably been five years since I’d seen her.
After breakfast we got back on the road, headed to Carmel. I didn’t remember ever visiting Carmel, but it’s gorgeous! We drove the famous 17 mile drive, and stopped into the Pebble Beach Lodge. That place is not messing around.

The beaches in Carmel have the whitest sand of anywhere I’ve seen in California.


We even found some stray golf balls in the sand along the 10^th hole. Naturally, Evan had to climb up for a better view.

The shopping along the main street is phenomenal. We popped into one store that only sold dips and sauces.

It was the Mecca of Samples. Literally, you could taste any sauce you want. The Cabernet Sauvignon spread was amazing on top of ripe cantaloupe. If only you could fly carrying more than 3 ounces!! 

For lunch we stopped into A.W. Shucks Oyster Bar. I had the most amazing beer battered fish and chips salad ever.


This was only the beginning of the delicious fried food to follow on this trip… In case we hadn’t eaten enough already, we stopped into a bakery that boasted delicious smelling chocolate macaroons, almond twists, cookies and cakes.

Then it was back in the car to head north and east to Lathrop, home of the Dell’Osso family farm. On the way, we stopped at a fruit stand off the highway that was more of a food theme park, nestled into the rolling golden hills of Hollister, California, called Casa de Fruta.


The fresh fruit and vegetables in this place were to.die.for. It’s all grown by farms nearby and as fresh and ripe as you’re going to get. This may not seem that exciting, but it’s pretty remarkable how different fruit is here compared to back DC. I grew up eating honey dew melons that were soft and tasted like melon, not bright green bricks. There’s nothing like an apple, apricot, or plum that is ripened on the tree.

Not only does this place sell produce, but they have chocolate dipped fruit of all kinds, dried fruit, fruit pies, nuts, fudge, etc etc.

We picked up my Oma’s favorite kind of pie, apricot. When we bought it, it was still warm (!!)

A short hour later, we arrived at the ranch!

The ranch has turned into much more since Susan and Ron opened a pumpkin patch and corn maze back in 1997. Now it’s more of a theme park/county fair from September to December, with a train, zip line, ropes course, pumpkin blaster, haunted house, snow mountain for sledding and ice skating rink. You kind of have to see it to believe it.
Anyway, Friday night we went over to my Oma’s house for dinner. My uncle Ron got out a couple nice bottles of wine for us to bring…that man knows his wine.

She outdid herself as usual, with little appetizers and a meal of beef wellington, fruit salad, salad, green beans, biscuits with honey and mashed potatoes.

If you’ve never had beef wellington, it’s a puff pastry pocket surrounding a piece of steak and liver pate, all baked together.

Very true to Oma’s style of cooking, and delicious as always. For dessert, I had a piece of the apricot pie topped with vanilla ice cream.

I was up bright and early on Saturday morning (I never adjusted to the time difference), so Susan and I hit the gym. I’ve gone with her to gym classes before and am usually left in the dust. This time we went to Body Pump – essentially aerobics while holding a barbell – but I was able to keep up this time!  The one downside to this killer workout was the soreness of my thigh muscles. I was struggling walking around hilly San Francisco the next day. Honestly, I’m still having trouble walking today.

The rest of Saturday was spent running around little Lathrop with Susan, including but not limited to the BBQ Cook Off at the Senior Center. We ate some saucy grilled chicken, listened to some Christian rock and met just about everyone, including Chaka, Mayor of Lathrop. Luckily, we had the excuse of “rushing to the airport” to pick up my sister, Sophie, to extricate ourselves from lengthy conversations at the Cook Off.

We did, in fact, need to rush off to the airport to pick up Sophie, but not before stopping in Sacramento at a waterfront restaurant for a drink and some appetizers. Pearl on the River was exactly what we were looking for.

 Speakeasy's Big Daddy IPA was a gem we uncovered at Pearl, and happily continued to find in restaurants in the Bay Area. We went a little crazy on the appetizers, ordering fried squash blossoms, calamari, Caprese salad with delicious crunchy croutons, and a melon and prosciutto salad.

We scooped up Sophie, then head back to the ranch in time for the big birthday barbecue. It was no small spread at this barbecue.


Appetizers came out: guac, cream cheese with pepper jelly, cream cheese with barbecue sauce, and the crowd favorite, bacon wrapped hot dog bites baked in a brown sugary sauce.

Dinner included a California classic, Tri Tip grilled with rosemary and garlic, grilled corn which was fantastic with absolutely nothing on it, grilled zucchini, garlic cheesey bread, roasted asparagus, the most delicious fruit salad (I’m telling you, I can’t get over their produce), roasted potatoes….



When it was time for dessert, we went to put the candles into the cake, but found it had cracked under the pressure. (We blame the strawberry jelly filling) But notice the valiant effort to tooth pick the cake back together.

Hence, the birthday pie.

Sunday, we packed everything up and Susan, Ron, Sophie, Evan and I drove to San Francisco.

A tradition of ours is to eat Dim Sum in Chinatown whenever we go to San Francisco, so that’s precisely what we did.

Four Seas is our preferred Dim Sum location, and it’s as authentic as you get. Dim Sum is essentially Chinese Tapas, but they bring around various dishes and ask if you’d like it.

They keep a tally of your dishes, and continue bringing you dish after dish until you finally say stop. The sesame balls are my favorite: deep fried rice dough with a peanut curd mixture in the middle. We walked around a bit together before Susan, Ron and Sophie left us at Ghirardelli.


I knew San Francisco was hilly, but no one told me it’s that hilly. I literally thought Lombard street was sloped at 90 degrees, until Evan pointed out that was impossible.


But the views are O.O.C.* (*out of control)
We briefly got mixed up in the wrong side of town, got hollered at by a few homies asking if we were lost, then I picked up a map from a hotel to point us in the right direction. First we met up with a family friend of mine and his girlfriend for drinks in the Mission neighborhood at Zeitgeist – SF’s #1 beer garden. (picture from website, it was actually packed when we went).

From there, we met our friends Emery and Chris, who are currently traveling along the west coast, for dinner at the E & O Trading Company.

The corn fritters are famous, so we couldn’t say no to those.  I wasn’t feeling so great, so I just ordered a salad with goat cheese and plums as my dinner.
Followed by a brief night cap, then took the BART back to the Piedmont area where my very considerate family friend, Jill, picked us up, brought us back to her house for the night, then took us to the airport the next morning. Not an easy place to leave, especially with so much family in the area, but I’ll be back soon. After all, I haven’t even been to Napa yet. What kind of foodie am I?