The best burger ever!

My good friend Steve and I sometimes have to run meetings at work.  Because we're friends we of course have to compete on everything from golf to work we often compete to run "the best meeting ever".  Truthfully, I don't think that either of us could ever say we have ran the best meetings but it is fun to say anyway and at least we feel like we're doing a good job.  But that of course is a corporate meeting.  Big difference from making a cheeseburger.  One of the many great things about the DC area is that Fall lasts one hell of a lot longer than it did during my 12 years in New England (which has been pummeled by rain for the past week I might add) and way longer than my growing up in Buffalo.  Because of that, I can grill pretty much all year round and that is a good thing.  While the grill is not good for everything, making a cheeseburger is one of those things that a grill is a must for.

So now the best burger ever:  1 1/2 lb 85 / 15 ground beef, 1/2 cup water and 1 packet of Lipton Onion Soup mix.  Mix all 3 (yes 3 ) ingredients together, shape into patties and Grill.

You are probably thinking what I was when I first started making these 10 years ago, too good to be true.  I have made many a Cheeseburger in my day.  I have played around with ingredients, cheeses, meats, food processors, beer but after many attempts, I still always go back to good old Lipton Burgers (by the way the same recipe is on the onion soup mix box).  Perhaps part of why they are so good is because they are so simple.  Of course you can experiment with cheeses.  I personally like Sharp Cheddars or some sort of sharp aged Gouda.  I have tried Blue cheeses although I feel they make the burgers really rich but of course that is an opinion and I love blue cheese so take that suggestion with a grain of salt.

Anyway, to go with it I made sweet potato fries.  Fun stuff.  Nothing like cutting up a sweet potato into stips and then deep frying them in oil. 

So yes, tonight for dinner we had the "best burger ever" and it only took 3 ingredients, 5 minutes to prepare and a few good beers!  I'd like to see Steve top that.

Ah, the chicken wing!

For Halloween my wife and I decided to do something different.  What you ask, yes, we decided rather than travel over Thanksgiving we would take our annual pilgrimage to my home town of Buffalo New York.  It's true, all of that statement.  I only go back to Buffalo once a year and usually it is around Thanksgiving and yes, it usually snows.  So since my blog is "cook or go out dc" why would I write about Buffalo?  Good question.  The truth is that there has to be something good about a city when a bar is the 2nd most popular tourist destination (behind Niagara Falls of course).  Am I exaggerating, probably a little but The Anchor Bar on Main st. in Buffalo is a really popular tourist destination.

For those of you who don't know, The Anchor Bar is the official home of the Buffalo Chicken Wing.  The Anchor Bar has inspired many great things - Buffalo Chicken Tenders, Buffalo Shrimp, Hooters (sort of anyway), and yes, Buffalo Wild Wings.  So of course on Halloween, about 4pm in order to avoid the rush we drove the twenty minutes from my parent's house and went to the Mecca of the chicken wing.  The Anchor Bar in all fairness is nothing special.  At least they renovated since when I was growing up there.  Because when I was growing up the place was definitely a dive.  Now it is still a dive only cleaner with a little gift shop area that sells tee shirts.  See, kinda like Hooters!  Anyway, you don't go to the Anchor bar for the atmosphere, you don't go there for a unique dining experience.  You simply go there for their Buffalo Wings and Buffalo cuisine.  Think Beef on weck, the roast beef sandwich made famous by the late Tim Russert.

So once again, as we have for the past several years we went to the Anchor bar and ordered our wings.  And when they came out, on a big platter with blue cheese dressing and celery sticks I knew I was home.  There simply is nothing better than a deep fried chicken wing, with just the right amount of buffalo sauce.  I know, the chicken tender is easier to eat, Buffalo shrimp is healthier but still, the Buffalo wing has become iconic throughout the world.  (I say world because I did see Buffalo wings on the menu at a Cafe in Paris, Seriously) 

So every time I go to the Anchor Bar I ask myself why is it so hard to find good chicken wings?  Is it the famous Buffalo Beer Gennessee Cream Ale that makes it special? (probably not since it tastes like metal)  The reality is that a good chicken wing is super easy.  First, buy good quality large chicken wings.  Deep Fry them for one extra minute than you normally would to get them nice and crispy.  Then, mix them with a sauce made from Frank's red hot and butter.  Serve.  Yes, that's it.  Nothing more.  No seasonings like cayenne or black pepper, just 3 ingredients. 

Then there is the beef on Weck.  Yes my wife and I ordered one of those too.  Again, very easy to make.  Take a hard roll, brush it with oil and sprinkle a generous amount of sea salt and some caraway seeds on top of the roll.  Toast it for a couple minutes and Voila, you have a Weck Roll (kimmelweck in Buffalo).  Then, take thin cut roast beef and some gravy and put it on the roll.  Again, that's it.  not difficult and I probably just gave away the secret to pretty much every bar and restaurant in all of Western New York. 

So now that I'm back in DC, do I miss Buffalo?  Not a bit, it was cold, dreary, windy and frankly, it is kinda depressing there.  But, sometimes we all need to take a food road trip.  Some go to New York City, others to Wine County (which I'm doing in January) but if you want one Damn good chicken wing and some really good people that love to just drink and eat some pretty simple foods than Buffalo is the place to be.  Just don't go in the Winter!  Oh, and while you're there, stop by Niagara Falls.  It is one of the 7 wonders of the world after all!  Then after that, go have a few wings!  Go Bills!!

Syrah? Shiraz? Yes, they are the same

Since it was 72 degrees, A Saturday in Late October and well, plain and simply one gorgeous day in the DC area, there was few things better to do than head out to one of our National Parks - Shenandoah and hike.  Unfortunately, when we got into Front Royal, we realized that everybody else in what seemed like DC had the same idea.  Not cool or fun.  Nonetheless, we hiked, albeit shorter than expected and then headed over to a Virginia Winery. 

So while drinking a glass of Rappahanock Cellars voigner http://rappahannockcellars.com/ we all realized that we were tired and wanted to get back to Arlington to have some good wine and eat.  Of course getting back was no picnic either because all the people who headed out to Shenandoah apparently had the same idea we did and left at the same time.  So now we needed a drink even more.  What to do?  I turned to my most quotable and knowledgeable wine friend - Marcus, and we decided to have a Shiraz / Syrah tasting (same grape, really.)  I trust Marcus and his wine tastes quite a bit, we have drank many good bottles together and he has on several occasions come up with descriptors like "smoky grape juice", "It kind of tastes like gasoline" and my favorite "uninspiring" .  Who could describe wine better?  Anyway, below is it the comments from Marcus about our Syrah tasting.  And in case you wondered, Shiraz is the Australian name for Syrah.  Kind of like Fosters is Australian for beer only different.  Why do they do that, I don't know.  I have a personal annoyance at times to Australian wines even though there are some iconic and amazing wines from there.  For me it is the cheap Australian wines that annoy me.  All those corny named wines - bitch, Vampire, etc are almost always Australian.  It actually dilutes from the iconic wines such as Grange, Clarendon Hills Astralis and Mollydooker's blue eyed boy.

Anyway, here is Marcus's entry from the other night, We celbrated fall and hiking and traffic with fresh bratwursts from Whole foods, Sweet potato fries and SauerKraut!

 
There are so many things that make Virginia a great place to live. One of the things that I love is knowing that twice a year, both in the Spring and in the Fall, you get a couple of absolutely mind boggling great weather weeks. Weeks where all you want to do is to be outside on a deck with friends, food, and wine... a grill goes without saying. So perhaps it was just fate that we had this great weekend to usher in an impromptu Syrah tasting, and also the inaugural wine tasting for this blog.

For those of you unfamiliar with Syrah, it is a grape with lineage that traces all the way back to France, and is also commonly sold as Shiraz. Regardless of the name, Syrah's are known for the big and powerful red wines that they produce. For our tasting, we picked specific wines that would both compliment and contrast each other with our countries of choice being California, France, and Australia. For those of you who like to do this sort of thing at home, make sure to pick wines which are made from the same grape, watch out for blends. So let's talk a little about our wines:

1. 2006 Vie Syrah Las Madres Vineyard Carneros
2.2004 Paul Jaboulet Crozes Hermitage "las crozes"
3. 2008 Molly Dooker The Boxer Shiraz - this wine has been somewhat of a cult wine as well. Produced in limited quantities (limited quantities means that either the vineyard is small, or that the vineyard decided to really take their time and produce a wine that was extraordinary), this wine was the beast of the group. At least that's what we thought going in given that the wine is 16% alcohol. Talk about big! Most wines in the US are between 12% and 15%. Understandably you can see why we decided to taste this one last.

Now that introductions are done, onto the wines! The first in our tasting was the Vie from Sonoma County. Upon opening the bottle, wonderful berry flavors burst out of the bottle. The wine itself had a deep plum color. After our first taste, one could easily understand why this wine had such a great reputation. There was a definite elegance and grace indicative of the care that the winemaker had put into making this wine. This was nothing at all that I would've imagined from a big bold Syrah yet the complexity left be wanting more.

Onto our next wine, the ... Upon opening the bottle, there was much more of a petrol flavor bursting out. This is not necessarily a bad thing though as big red wines usually exhibit the alcohol flavors in their nose. Chianti's and Nebbiolo's are perfect examples of this. Unfortunately for us, this wine was only 12.5%, ranging at the lower end of our alcohol scale. In terms of taste, the wine was good, though coming after the Vie certainly did nothing to help it here. I certainly would have no problem drinking this wine on a typical night, but after the Vie... it was a little tough, basically, we simply wanted more of a wine and were a little dissapointed.

Finally, onto the Boxer. Aptly named, we opened the bottle about 20 minutes prior to serving. With big red wines, you would typically open the bottle before serving in order to let the wine mix with the air. Remember that this is our 16% heavy hitter. Upon being poured into the glass, many of the same berry flavors that were apparent with the Vie came bursting out. The alcohol was also apparent though not in an unpleasant way. My initial thoughts after my first taste were more about the finish, and how this wine seemed to linger. There was a creaminess to it, almost vanilla, that was so savory. Whereas on the Vie, as soon as I finished my first taste, I wanted more. With the Boxer, I was just as happy to sit an enjoy the first taste. Of course, than I wanted more!

So there goes our inaugural tasting. If you want to taste these wines for yourself, you should be able to find them with some searching. Nothing here should be more than $35 per bottle.  In fact, you can usually find the Boxer for about $25 and the Paul Jaboulet for about $20.  The Vie can be hard to find but if you can find it it goes for about $30 or so.

Soup - it's what's for dinner!

For me, going to the farmers' market is always great.  I usually buy way more than I could possibly need and I often buy things that I don't necessarily even like.  My most recent exampe was 2 weeks ago.  There I was, at the farmers' market in Court House (one of my favorites by the way) http://www.arlingtonfarmersmarket.com/index.php buying the things I always buy, lettuce, tomatoes, potatoes, bread.  And then there it was, A butternut squash.  I never loved or even liked butternut squash.  Or any squash for that matter, not really sure why.  Unlike eggplant I was not scarred from it as a child.  Just one of those strange things.  Anyway, so I bought one.  2 weeks later, this funny looking orange colored vegetable was still sitting in my kitchen.  It was at this point I came to a crossroads.  Either let the squash rot while bums are starving over on Columbia Pike or find a use for it. 

So I turned to the expert.  When in doubt, ask Thomas Keller.  I pulled out my Bouchon cookbook and found a recipe for Sage and Butternut Squash soup.  As I have always said, I use recipe's as guidelines.  Although few chefs have engaged me as much as Thomas Keller.  His cookbook Ad Hoc is amazing, and when I bought it he was doing a signing at the Williams Sonoma at Mazza Gallery.  However, I got there too early for the signing but he still came out and shook my hand.  That impressed me, not because he shook my hand, but because he was genuine, nice and frankly, didn't seem too stuck on himself despite the fame.  Anyway, back to Butternut Squash.  So the next day I realized that the Squash that I bought was kinda on the small side.  Probably not quite enough to make soup out of so I went to the Columbia Pike Farmers' market and bought another small butternut squash.  Now I was ready.  So I picked up some broth and some shallots, picked a few sage leaves from my herb garden and started making soup:

Approximatly 3 lbs of butternut squash

1/2 cup Onion

1/2 cup leeks

1/2 cup chopped carrots

1/2 cup chopped Shallots

1 small apple, diced

6 cloves of garlic.  Chopped or crushed

2 Tablespoons honey

Canola Oil

salt and pepper

2 sage leaves, chopped

2 tablespoons chopped fresh Thyme

1 tablespoon chopped fresh basil

about 6 cups of good quality vegetable stock.

A pinch of Nutmeg.

First, cut the neck or necks from the squash leaving you with the bulb and the neck.  Cut the bulb in half and scoop out the seeds.  The roast the bulbs cut side down after brushing with olive oil, salt and pepper at 350 degrees for about 45 minutes.  Then, peel the neck of the squash and then cut into cubes small enough to saute.  I would estimate about 1/2 inch or so.  Meanwhile, heat the canola oil (about 2 tablespoons worth) in a stock pot.  Then, add the onions, garlic, leeks, shallots and carrots.  Saute these vegetables for about 6 -10 minutes until they are soft.  Once soft, add the apple and the squash and saute for about 5 minutes.  Then add the honey, herbs, salt and pepper.  I used about 1 and 1/2 teaspoons of sea salt and probably about a tablespoon of fresh pepper.  Next, add the broth and bring everything to a simmer.  Remover the Squash bulbs from the oven.  Simmer the vegetable for about 10 - 15 minutes before adding the roasted squash.  Once you remove the orange flesh from the squash, add that into the stock pot and bring to a simmer for about 30 minutes.  Once the 30 minutes is over, all of the vegetables should be really soft and you should have a reasonably thick but not watery stock. 

Now the fun part.  Add the pinch of nutmeg to the soup.  Then, once cooled somewhat add the stock in batches to either a blender or a food processor.  (I used a food processor and it worked great) Then you should have a nice pretty thick soup!  Since I made this soup at about 9pm that night, and had a few glasses of wine I definitely knew that I would not be eating the soup that night.  So the next day (today in fact) I reaheated my butternut squash soup, served it with some crispy sage leaves and a dollop of creme Fraiche. I now realized that I could cook butternut squash! 

So there it is Butternut squash soup.  Will I make it again?  Yes.  Do I have to give one final shout out to the man who made it all possible?  Absolutely.  Couldn't have done it without you Thomas Keller! 

The Sous Chef

We all know that Batman had Robin, Zach had that little dude Screech and most importantly, any good chef has a really good Sous chef.  Except for me.  Why?  Because I find myself being kinda bossy, to know it all ish and frankly, sometimes I tell people to do things and they don't listen.  I remember a few years ago when I gave my friend Mike an assignment to cut a Baguette.  Not hard you would think.  I wanted real thin (think 1/8 in) slices.  Unfortuantely Mike heard "cut thin slices" and cut 1/4 inch slices.  I was not happy and even a little bit annoyed. 

However, I als have to realize that since I am not paying them, I should lower my standards.  My two best sous chef's I know are my sister Juliette and my sister in law Jill.  What is interesting is that they are two very different styles of "sous cheffing" (yes, I think I made that word up).  But what is annoying about them is one lives in Boston and the other in Kansas City respectively.  The distance thing makes it quite hard to develop any real consistency for a sous chef.  My sister is great, she is the queen of taking complex tasks and making them simple.  She doesn't try to do too much and from spending all 30 years of her life with me she knows how I like things and is a good cook herself and is always willing to provide good ideas without taking over.  My sister in law Jill is quite the opposite in many ways.  Jill however tries, and tries hard and I admire that.  In fact, this past week I was so impressed with her because she cooked dinner 3 times back in KC.  Incidentally, she also had a stellar face book post that said "A weekend without wine is like a weekday without coffee!"  Amen to that.  What I like about Jill though is that she really wants to learn, she asks questions, listens and most importantly does what I tell her (not that I'm bossy).  Last Christmas Jill and I made Lasagna for the family.  We reduced, simmered, assembled, baked and served to reviews of "the Greatest Lasagna ever"  (well, I may have made that comment up but it's something like that)

Don't get me wrong though, I have put many people to work in the kitchen over the years.  My wife Bri tries but I don't like bossing her around as much as other people so I sometimes get annoyed at myself for that.  Funny how that works, probably because she is my wife and since she lives with me, well, use your imagination!  Of courese it's easier now since she is usually entertaining our 5 month old and that is far more of a task than making dinner.  That being said, the sous chef is key to a good dinner party.  They keep things going and all those little tasks that you run out of hands for they do for you and at least pretend they enjoy it.  So my advice to everybody is to find a friend, family member, pet, whatever and make dinner.  Bonding in a kitchen is great, bonding in a kitchen when you get to boss a friend or family member around is even better!

A good pizza in Arlington?

So there I was last Friday night, finally walking into what I figured to be the over crowded and overhyped new pizza place in Arlington.  The new Fireworks Pizzeria that opened up in the relatively new Residence Inn in Courthouse.  Fortunately last Friday was a perfect October day in Arlington and I was pretty impressed with the amount of outdoor seating that Fireworks had.  In fact, I was even amazed that the County would even allow that much outside seating and it did not seem crowded.  But since I was meeting up with a few friends I did not have time to figure out how their zoning worked so I went inside.  I was also impressed that another restaurant in Arlington continued the tradition of having a very large bar area and quite a few seats at the bar as well.  Even though it was a Friday night I was still able to find a seat while I waited for my friends to show up.

So I ordered a beer, why? Because what goes better with Pizza then Beer and frankly, Fireworks had a pretty impressive beer selection so I made a difficult choice and ordered a Terrapin India Brown Ale and was pleasantly surprised at how light of a beer it was despite the color.  In Some ways it reminded me of a blend of of Newcastle Brown and Sierra Nevada Pale Ale, two of my favorites. 

Then My friend JJ showed up and reminded me that there is something else that goes really well with Pizza.  Surprisingly not wine, but Tequila.  Yes, he ordered a couple shots of Patron and instantly took me back to my fond college days of drinking shots of Cuervo and eating Dominos usually way too late at night.  But that being said, Patron is certainly not Cuervo and Fireworks actually seemed like they knew what they were doing.  The shots were served perfectly in pretty stylish shot glasses.  Not much says Pizza like Patron!  Anyway, since we now had a quick cocktail in us it was time to take advantage of Happy Hour.  Ahh, happy hour.  Easily one of the greatest things about the DC area.  Truthfully, I was impressed with Fireworks' happy hour, even on a Friday.  They had $3.00 beers, $4.00 appetizers and $5.00 pizzas all on their happy hour menu.  So we went ahead and ordered the Firecracker Pizza and the Guadalajara Pizza.  A few minutes later, after I ordered another beer (A Victory Saison Du Buff, a Belgian style IPA. and and excellent choice I might add!) our pizzas came. 

My DC experience can be summed up in one word.  Paradiso.  (http://www.eatyourpizza.com) Pizzeria Paradiso in Georgetown is probably one of my favorite Pizzas anywhere in this country.  I pretty much base anything on their pizzas because I find that they know how to get a perfect crust and they keep the Pizzas simple enough to really enjoy them.  In fact, Paradiso was the first restaurant that my son Casey (at the time 3 weeks old) actually went to so that says something in itself!

Anyway, I then ordered yet another beer, this time a Coronado Idiot IPA and at 8% alcohol I was now ready for a good time.  But back to the Pizzas.  So for $5 per Pizza because of happy hour pricing I was impressed.  The firecracker was spicy with a lot of toppings while the guadalajara was different.  I was not too impressed with the jalapenos on the guadalajara because I felt they were too spicy and distracted me from the rest of the pizza.  Don't get me wrong, I like spicy foods and definitely was not surprised when they arrived on the pizza but as we all know there are different degrees of spiciness for jalapenos and when they are soo spicy they can distract from other flavors.  So did these pizzas meet my expectations?  Honestly, for $5 each they were incredible, if I would have paid the $11.99 normal price I would not have been impressed though.  I felt that they pizzas had an incredible amount of toppings on them which some people think is good but in my opinion it distracted me from the dough and the crust.  I love a nice charred and crispy pizza crust.  I have had so many issues trying to find a perfect crust that I have since started grilling my own pizza dough to great success. 

But back to Fireworks.  Overall, fireworks pizzeria met my expectations and I was really pleased with the use of the space.  It almost made me wish that I lived across the street from there again like I did for my first year I was in DC.  The Pizzas themselves may not have blown me away necessarily but the happy hour, the crowd, the beer selection and most importantly the service that the staff provided (despite some other reports on yelp I thought the service was really good and the bartender was very attentive to my friends and I) did make for a good night out.  Would I take Mario Batali there for Pizza?  Doubtful.  But would I take my friends and family there for a good pizza and a good night out?  Absolutely.  Since I always keep an open mind, I will certainly be back.  Overall my rating would be a 6.8 out of 10!  Enjoy!!

Tailgating - The Greatest of all fall activities!

Not too much says fall to me like Football.  And that includes one of my previous posts about apple picking.  Frankly, I could get apples without picking them.  But let's not kid ourselves because going to a football game really is more work then watching it on TV.  Sure it is great to be a part of it but in reality, the ball is much smaller and harder to see without those cameras zooming in on it.  And don't you wish that yellow line was on the field?  I know I do!  Of course you can pay more attention to the cheerleaders when you are there.   

Fortunately there is the real reason I love going to football games.  Tailgating.  Drinking outside - fun.  Eating and drinking outside - even more fun.  And eating, drinking and hanging out with family in a parking lot before a football game - priceless.  So there I was, getting tickets for another 8 pm Redskins game.  (www.Redskins.com)  Let's make one thing very clear.  I am not a Redskins fan but I love football and I root for the home team unless they are playing my beloved Buffalo Bills.  My two brothers and sister in law tagged along for one of my tailgates.  Luckily my wife loves kids enough to babysit their 3 year old and our son.  Again, I love going to football games but I really love tailgating!  So I packed up my Weber Q grill, 2 cases of beer and planned ahead.  Rule # 1 about tailgating - always plan ahead.  Never find yourself in that position where you need to chop, cut or marinate at the tailgate.  Plan Ahead!

Anyway, my family and I packed into the car and drove over to Fed Ex Field in Md.  Personally and I know it has not received rave reviews I like Fed Ex Field.  I think they do a good job managing the fans and Frankly every time I have been there I have had a blast.  This time was no different.  I figured I might as well blow the minds of my family by making the traditional tailgate sandwich - The Cheesesteak.  I lived in Philadelphia just out of college.  I ate at Geno's, Jim's and a bunch of other random places and I admit, at 2 am after a good night of drinking, a cheesesteak was pretty awesome.  Unfortunately that was 14 years ago and those days are behind me. 

But I still love a cheesesteak!  So first, my little brother Jon brought with him a six pack of Otter Creek Octoberfest and a six Pack of Hofbrau Oktoberfest.  It was already a good day.  The Hofbrau was a Marzen style beer, not too hoppy, great matly flavor and light enough where I didn't feel full after drinking 3 of them in an hour!  The Otter Creek was good too.  It was a heavier Octoberfest style beer, slightly hoppy with a good sweetness that I enjoyed and a great dark beer color.  Since they brought the beer, I brought the food!  So first I thinly sliced New York Strip Steaks so that I would be able to grill the strips quickly.  I Marinated those stips in a mixture of bourbon (Jack Daniels), Ketchup, Worcesteshire Sauce, Mustard, Vinegar and assorted spices.  Marinated beef, Cheddar Cheese and sauteed onions and peppers makes one really great Sandwich. Seriously.  I used the nice soft Sub rolls that you can buy at the deli areas of most supermarkets.  Maire's Italian bakery makes the best ones.  They are nice and soft and grill up really well.  Mix that with Octoberfest beers on a perfect day and it is tough to beat.  So after the tailgate we went to the game.  The game was good and as always, it is tough to have a bad time after having beers with the family, eating tailgate food and enjoying a perfect fall day in DC.  Even if the Redskins lost to the Colts.  They played a good game though and that is really all I cared about.

My next post will be a restaurant review.  It is also time to start reviewing wines!

Eggplant?! Why Eggplant?

Yes, post # 2!  I know it has taken me a week but putting my thoughts together is not always easy. 

Last Thursday my wife asked me how I felt about "catering" her book club on Monday.  No problem - Tenderloin, Chicken Satay and pulled pork all came to mind and then she dropped it on me - "one of the attendees is a vegetarian so could you make a vegetarian meal?"  Whoa!  hold on a second I said and then gave a very honest answer - "I don't know!" so then she suggested eggplant. 

Eggplant - a weird looking vegetable that is often eaten like a piece of meat.  I have always wanted to like eggplant, or at least for the last 10 years of my life from when I lived in the North End of Boston.  So there I was, going to the Farmers' Market at the Dept of Agriculture on Friday.  Fyi, great farmers market  (http://www.yelp.com/biz/usda-farmers-market-department-of-agriculture-washington) the yelp review pretty much says it all, most importantly the post about the kettle corn is pretty accurate!  Anyway, the funny thing was that the farmers market was pretty darn cheap so there I was, face to face with 6 different varieties and colors of eggplant.  My first question, why is it called eggplant?  It does not look, taste or even seem anywhere remotely close to an egg.  My second question was, what is the difference in the colors?  I asked the farmer and she said that the difference is in the seeds and the bitterness of the "fruit"  Bitterness?  Maybe that is why I grew up not liking eggplant.  That or because my Mother (love her to death) scarred me for life from eggplant which is why I have not eaten it in many, many years.  Yet here I was, picking out eggplant to make a test run of eggplant Parmesan. 

Now lets make one thing clear.  Anything coated in Flour, then dipped in egg, then coated in bread crumbs and fried with tomato sauce, cheese and basil cannot really be that bad.  So that night, I picked up some fresh Parmesan Reggiano and some Fresh Mozzarella cheese from my favorite wine and cheese store Calvert Woodely wine and cheese  (www.calvertwoodley.com) right on Ct. ave and Van Ness street in Northwest and then went to town on the test run of yes, Eggplant Parmesan.  So I started off with a few glasses of wine in order to clear my head and began the process.  Let's make one thing really clear - I have breaded and fried many things and Chicken Parm is the meal I made my girlfriend at the time  (now wife and mother of my child) when she had a bad day a few months after we started dating.  By the way I was having a bad day too that night!  Anyway and needless to say, Parmesan to me is comfort food.  So our friend Michelle came over to demo the test batch. 

I Fried the eggplant, I baked it for almost an hour and you know what it was good, in fact, I thought it was some of the best eggplant I ever had.  Of course my last memory of eggplant was me crying and telling my mother that I refused to eat it!  Anyway, MIchelle and my wife both loved it and said how good it was.  I served it with a nice crusty Tuscan bread that I also picked up at the Market and made a nice Caeser to go along with it. 

3 days later, I made it again for the book club.  While I did not stay to get the reviews they seemed to like it.  I however, asked myself a difficult question.  If I was one of the POW's rescued from that camp in the movie "The Great Raid" how would I feel about Eggplant Parmesan.  Great question, I decided that my answer would be "this is good, but it would be so much better if it was chicken Parm!"  and yes, that there is the great eggplant debate summed up in the statement "I wish it was chicken"

Well, my next post will be about one of my favorite fall festivities - tailgating at a football game!

Fall in DC

So we will begin my blog by starting with the most fall of all activities.  Yes, apple picking.  After all, what could say fall more than apple picking?  On Sunday October 3rd the family and I packed into the SUV and drove an hour over to Stribling Orchard in Markham, Viriginia.  http://striblingorchard.com/default.aspx  Let's be honest with ourselves, paying $1.50 per pound of apples (I did pick 10 pounds worth) is great, but then you realize that you can go to pretty much every local farmers market and pay about $2 per pound and not have to choose the "perfect" apple or end up in a silly competition with your wife about who is the better apple picker.  That being said, there is something about walking around an orchard with a goal in mind.  It is sort of like a hike through a field only you come out with more than just a lousy walking stick or some random rock.  (at least that is the way I go hiking).  Stribling Orchard is a great place though, very organized considering the thousands of families who decided to pack up and go apple picking and they had quite a few different varieties of apples availalbe to pick at the time.  They also had a pumpkin patch with my 4 month old son got a real kick out of.  Would I go apple picking again?  Sure, why not?  Especially since it is literally next door to Chateau O'brien winery http://www.chateauobrien.com.  I used to go all the time in Western New York growing up so it is the experience that counts.  However, let's now discuss that Stribling Orchard.  The apples - good, I like apples and they were picking 4 varieties.  The picnic area was nice and I have to give a shout out to my good friend Mark who made a great eggplant Tapenade and Fresh Mozzarella Sandwich.  That I have to say was great.  I will get the recipe for the Tapenade soon!  However, as I walked into the "gift" area, I realized they did not have one thing that made many a New England Orchard.  Yes, the cider donut.  How can an Orchard not have Cider Donuts?  They had Cider bbq sauce after all, but no cider donuts.  My friend Bill from Connecticut was amazed as well.  An Orchard without Cider Donuts is like Movie Theater without popcorn.  Unheardof!

so this will lead us into the second part of this post.  What to do with 10 lbs of apples and how do I satisfy my craving for Cider Donuts?  Well, on 1 week later on Saturday Oct. 9th, I did what few people have accomplished.  Thanks to our good friend Michelle who so graciously googled a recipe for cider donuts I decided to take the plunge and make my own!  How did I do this?  Well it was not easy at first.  I used this recipe : http://www.katyelliott.com/blog/2009/10/recipe-homemade-apple-cider-donuts.html with one difference, I went to the local Sur La Table  (www.surlatable.com) and bought 2 donut pans and 1 donut cutter.  So that evening, while Michigan - Michigan State were playing, (MSU won by the way) I made the dough for the donuts.  The highlight was reducing the cider and then making the sticky donut dough.  Once the dough was made, things got interesting.  The dough was sticky, I didn't have any parchment paper and worse, I had never even attempted anything like this.  The project started off ok though.  I rolled it between greased and floured foil which worked just fine and then froze the dough and then was able to cut some donuts out of it.  The problem was that the dough softed very quickly and became just as sticky. 

There comes a time during a recipe when one realizes he can be in over his head.  I was at that point.  Not because I wasn't confident, but because I did not think that my random looking cutouts would hold in a deep fryer, thus I decided to use my skills and $10.95 investment in donut pans and bake them.  I gasped when I did this.  The first batch - they were a little like muffins because the dough rose so much, but the second and third batches I became that fa t dude from the old dunkin' donuts commercial and yes, I made the donuts.  Later that night I dipped the donuts in melted butter and then in cinnamon sugar. Once that step was over I marveled at my skills because they actually looked like donuts.  Next time I will have pictures, I promise!

A few hours later, with my wife Bri, our friends Michelle and Marcus we went and tested the first apple cider donut and received many a rave review.  Sure it helped that we were drinking a wonderful 2002 Caymus Cabernet Sauvignon (Great fruit on the nose and the palate, and a nice elegance as well as a smoothness not often seen in some current Napa Cabs).  But what I am saying is that for one evening I was a donut maker and yes I will do it again!  In fact, maybe Stribling Orchard should hire me to make Cider donuts for them!