Lots of Little Things

My husband Topher always teases me about the lunches that I take to work: he says that I like to eat "lots of little things," which is true.

I never pack just one dish for lunch. I usually bring quinoa salad, baby carrots, a small bag of almonds and Craisins, and a banana. Or some tuna salad, a piece of cheese (like Mini Babybel Light), and some arugula. Or an avocado, an apple, and a soft-boiled egg. Or a few slices of roasted turkey, a few slices of Swiss cheese, and some dried apricots. And my hubby makes fun of me.

Well, now I have some ammo with which to defend this strange little eating habit: eating lots of littles plates is apparently quite healthy, because it gives you more nutrient variety throughout the day, which promotes food synergy.

What is food synergy? It's the way that foods interact with each other in a recipe or dish, thereby increasing their nutritional value.

For example, "cooking with olive oil allows micronutrients such as lycopene in tomatoes and beta-carotene in carrots to be more easily absorbed by the body" (p.106 in The Jungle Effect). The same is true of eating greens with a light dressing of olive oil and lemon juice, which increase the availability of the greens' antioxidants (p.122). Or treating tortillas with lime, which enriches the corn with calcium, niacin, and amino acids (p.23).

Even without knowing all the molecular, biochemical reasons for these interactions, some ancient cultures adopted the practice of eating multiple small plates as a meal. In Mediterranean countries, these small dishes are called meze; in Spain they're known as tapas; and in Okinawa, Japan, they're called okazu.

Although they're similar in size to our appetizers, they're not eaten as a way to start a meal; they're eaten as a meal themselves. And depending on how many people are eating, a single meal could consist of 5-10 different dishes. Most of them are mostly-vegetarian soups and salads (they might contain some fish), with only one or two containing a heavy animal protein like pork or beef.

So instead of being weird, maybe I'm just cosmopolitan. Yeah, let's go with that: I'm cosmopolitan.

Mad about Mediterranean

Last weekend, while visiting my parents in Savannah, we got lunch from the annual Greek festival at the Hellenic Center. As I sat munching on my dolmades (stuffed grape leaves), I began to wonder: When did I get so into Mediterranean food?

Sure, it’s common knowledge that I LOVE feta cheese and kalamata olives. But I’m not Greek (or Italian or Turkish); no one in my immediate or extended family is Greek (that I know of); and I’ve never been to Greece. So how did my love affair begin?

Dancers at the Greek Festival in Savannah, Oct 2010

Chapter 1
Thinking back, I’ve decided that my first real exposure was at the Olympia Café on River Street, where I went on field trips with my high school Latin class. I remember eating lamb gyros, mousaka (baked eggplant casserole), pastitsio (baked meat & macaroni casserole), and spanakotiropita (spinach cheese pie).

But my favorite, by far, was the saganaki, or “flaming cheese.” Our server would bring a skillet full of sizzling cheese to the table. While it was still hot, he would pour in a shot-glass of brandy (which immediately ignited) and shout, “Opa!” After the flames went out, we would eat the delicious, gooey cheese on crusty, fresh-baked bread. My dear friend Jessica and I went to the Olympia Café together several times for New Year’s Eve, and we ordered the flaming cheese every time – it was a ritual.

The photo above is from here.

Chapter 2
A few years later, when I was living in Philadelphia, I went to Turkey for ~10 days with some friends, to visit some other friends who were living in Istanbul and Ankara. Hospitality is huge in Turkish culture, so we spent a lot of time talking, sipping çay (Turkish tea, usually apple flavored, pronounced like chai), and eating.

Turkish cuisine is very similar to Greek food, and the meals we had were delicious - so savory and flavorful – I was in heaven! For breakfast, our hotel served a buffet of olives, cheeses, sliced tomato & cucumber, yogurt, bread & crackers with honey, marmalades, & butter, and a variety of sliced meats. For lunch we sometimes ordered köfte (meatballs, also called kefta in Greek) from a street vendor, and in the afternoons we drank ayran, a refreshing yogurt drink.

Dinners often started with a variety of mezzes, small appetizer-like dishes such as dolma (grape or cabbage leaves stuffed with rice, meat, & spices), baba ghanoush (spices, baked eggplant, and cooked tomatoes often used as a dip), or tabbouleh (a bright salad of bulgur, finely chopped mint & parsley, diced tomatoes, olive oil, & lemon juice). These were followed by meaty entrees like döner and iskender kebap (lamb dishes).

Dessert was, as usual, my favorite: baklava! We usually finished with Turkish coffee; a small glass of raki, an anise-flavored apéritif that, when mixed with water, turned a milky white; or an Efes pilsener (Turkish beer).

Chapter 3
Back in Philadelphia, my fellow travelers and I were thrilled to discover Divan Turkish Kitchen. If I was in the mood for a light snack, I got the falafel appetizer with hummus and tahini sauce. For something more filling, I usually ordered iskender, but on one occasion I opted to try a new dish: Kayseri Manti ("tender steamed homemade dumplings filled with ground lamb, topped with garlic yogurt sauce and mint," according to the menu). Good decision.

A few years later, after I'd moved away from Philadelphia, I came back for my friend Anne's birthday, and a group of us went to Leila's Cafe in Queen's Village. Leila's is a little more casual than Divan, but it offers all the standards – kefta, shawarma, falafel, hummus, tabouleh, baba ghanoush, lentil soup, grapes leaves, and baklava – plus tabletop hookahs. Fun times!

Dinner at Leila's Cafe, August 2009

Chapter 4
Thanks to a few good friends, it didn't take me too long after moving to Hampton Roads to find a good spot for Mediterranean: Azar's on Colley. I haven't been for dinner, but I've had lunch there several times - once for my birthday (a few years ago with my aunt & cousins), a couple of times after church, and once to get takeout for my friend Heather (while she was on bedrest this summer). When I'm really in the mood to eat, I order the Mid-Eastern Sampler (half of a chicken tawook wrap, a serving of baba ghanouj or hummus, and 3 stuffed grape leaves, plus olives and pita bread), but their veggie orzo soup makes a yummy light lunch.

The photo above is from here.

Next on my list: Pasha Mezze! I tried to go there once before, with my friend Beth, but we went on a Monday, and they're closed on Mondays. So it's still on my "to dine" list, for now. I've got my eye on the Salad Sampler Plate: “your choice of five: kale salad, garden salad, organic tabouli, organic red lentil pate, hummus, black bean & corn salad, chicken curry salad, smoked salmon, grilled chicken, or shrimp.” It makes me happy just to think about it.

Also, at the Greek festival in Savannah last weekend, we missed dessert: loukoumades, or honey puffs. Somehow I've never tried these. Boo! Add those to the "to dine" list.

The Scoop:

• Olympia Cafe - Savannah, GA (River Street) - Urbanspoon, Yelp
• Divan Turkish Kitchen - Philadelphia, PA (22nd & Carpenter Sts.) - Urbanspoon, Yelp
• Leila's Cafe - Philadelphia, PA (13th & Pine Sts.) - Urbanspoon, Yelp
• Azar's Natural Foods & Mediterranean Specialties - Norfolk, VA (Ghent) - Urbanspoon, Yelp
• Pasha Mezze - Norfolk, VA (Ghent) - Urbanspoon, Yelp

Pork Belly and Bergman

This past weekend was my first experience with the films of Swedish director Ingmar Bergman. On Friday night, Topher & I ordered pizza, drank Trader Joe's meritage, and watched "Wild Strawberries." It's about an elderly man who spends a day traveling through Sweden (from Stockholm to Lund, where he's being given an honorary degree), and along the way he revisits many of his memories and life's regrets.

Then on Sunday evening we had dinner with our good friends Randy & Kim and watched "The Virgin Spring," a story of tragedy, revenge, and atonement set in medieval Sweden. It was pretty intense but very good. To commemorate the occasion, the Raines served up a delicious, Asian-inspired feast.

What We Ate:

• appetizer: miso soup with dumplings and extra firm tofu - the "extra firm" is key here (at least for me), and I really liked the idea of putting the dumplings in the soup
• entree: seared scallops, sauteed bok choy, rice noodles, pickled daikon radishes, sauteed maitake mushrooms, and pork belly, all drizzled with gochujang sauce - honestly, I don't even know where to start ... this meal was amazing (and I learned quite a bit about Asian cuisine), but my favorite part was definitely the pork belly!
• dessert: lemon tart with homemade raspberry compote
• to drink: Marquis Philips Cabernet Sauvignon 2008 (quite jam-my and not nearly as oaky as most cabs) and a few others

Curry Cravings

If I could add one and only one restaurant to our offerings in downtown Suffolk, I would probably pick an Indian restaurant. It's easy to find good Indian in the DC area (Bombay Curry Company, anyone?), but not so much in Suffolk. We've got sushi, Italian, Mexican, and Chinese takeout, but no Indian. And sometimes a girl just needs a little curry, ya know?

So when Topher & I want to satisfy our cravings, we visit Rajput in Ghent. Topher first took me there a couple of years ago for my birthday. (It was the first birthday we'd celebrated together as a couple, and Topher set the bar for gifts very high: he gave me a first edition of To Kill a Mockingbird, my favorite book!)

We went back this past February for Valentine's Day, which fell on a Sunday, so we got to indulge in their amazing Sunday lunch buffet. All-you-can-eat paneer masala, chicken tandoori, lentils & chickpeas, basmati rice, naan, and kheer (rice pudding with raisins, nuts, and rosewater) - it was a perfect date for us.

Last week Topher's friend Matt and his new fiance Allison were in town for a visit, and we ate lunch with them at Nawab on Military Highway. (They have another location in VA Beach near Hilltop.) Nawab has a lunch buffet, so we gorged ourselves on vindaloo, curry, biryani, eggplant bhartha, and palak paneer, finished off once again with kheer.

A couple of nights ago I "cheated" on Topher and went to Rajput with my dear friend Stacy. It was delicious as always! But I felt kinda bad that Topher missed out. I was brave, though, and ordered my entree "medium-hot" (level 3 out of 5) - Topher would've been proud.

What We Ate:

• appetizer: vegetable samosas (stuffed with potato & peas)
• our entrees: chicken korma (mine) and chicken tikka masala (Stacy's), served with basmati rice and naan
• to drink: mango lassi (a sweet yogurt drink) - I would've liked this to be a little bit colder, but it was still very refreshing.

The Scoop:

Rajput Indian Cuisine is located at 742 W. 21st Street in the Ghent neighborhood of Norfolk, VA 23517. They serve lunch M-F 11:30am-2:30pm and Sat-Sun noon-3pm; they serve dinner Sun-R 5-10pm and F-Sat 5-10:30pm. You can make reservations online or by calling (757)625-4634. (I think their food is a little better than Nawab, and the decor is definitely nicer - it's better for an evening out.)

Note: The images above were found here.

Pho for the First Time

This past weekend Topher & I drove to Williamsburg to visit our friends Grant & Laura and their baby daughter Ava (she's gorgeous, with big dark eyes!).

It was a laid-back, relaxing visit. We drove up after work on Friday afternoon; Grant grilled bacon-wrapped steaks and Laura made tossed salad & roasted fingerling potatoes for dinner. We started to watch "Happy-Go-Lucky" but decided about 15 minutes in that we weren't up for it, so we watched Discovery's "Shark Week" instead. On Saturday morning, after a breakfast of sausage & pancakes, we went to the neighborhood pool.

We had planned to eat lunch at the Blue Talon Bistro, but Ava got a little fussy after her swim and needed a nap; so instead we ordered takeout from Saigon Pearl, a Vietnamese place near their house. Which worked out well, because Topher decided that it was high time that I experienced pho (pronounced fuh).

Pho, a cheap and flavorful beef noodle soup, is usually sold from street carts in Vietnam; in the US it's served in large, wide-rimmed bowls. It's not exactly a takeout-friendly dish, so when Topher & Grant brought it home, we realized that it was really "assemble your own" pho.

The pho tai chin that Topher ordered for us came in three containers: a large cup of steaming beef broth; one box of sticky rice noodles, thin sliced beef (both cooked & rare), and scallions & fresh cilantro; and a second box of "toppings," including crunchy bean sprouts, lime wedges, and jalapeno & onion slices. Add contents of box 1 and box 2 to cup A, and voila, yummy pho soup!

At first I was a little wary of the rare beef, but the hot broth cooked it in almost no time. The sticky noodles separated and softened in the broth, too. The soup was a little awkward to eat -- neither chopsticks nor fork/spoon are quite the right utensil for this dish - but after getting past the fact that I was going to have to slurp a little, it was filling and delicious. And the best part: I could add as much cilantro (and as few jalapenos) as I wanted!

After lunch, Topher & I packed up and drove home to Suffolk. Instead of taking the interstate, though, we decided to go the long way via the Jamestown-Scotland Ferry through Surry, VA.

More on Pho:
For more about the history of pho and its significance in Vietnamese culture, check out this article from the SFGate.com: "A Bowl of Pho: Vietnam's treasured beef noodle soup that brings families together." There's a recipe at the end.

Unfortunately, Hampton Roads doesn't have a "little Saigon" like San Francisco, but there are a few places in Tidewater where you can find Vietnamese: Pho 78 (VA Beach near Holland Plaza), Vietnam Garden (VA Beach near Great Neck/Hilltop), and Pho 79 (two locations - VA Beach near Town Center, and Chesapeake near Battlefield Blvd).

If you're not in the mood for pho, the com thit nuong (barbecue pork with rice and tomato/cucumber salad) that Laura ordered from Saigon Pearl looked and smelled delicious.

Note: The pho photo above was found online here.

Thai in Brooklyn

I spent this past weekend in NYC with my good friend Anne, and we had a delicious time!

It all started last Wednesday afternoon when Topher called and told me that work was sending him to Bath, England, for four days. After I stopped being jealous, I decided to look online for cheap flights to NYC and texted my good friend (and fabulous maid of honor) Anne to see if I could visit her in Brooklyn. Two days later I was in the Big Apple.

On Friday evening while Anne was in NJ for a few hours, I went out to dinner with her friend/roommate Gretchen & Gretchen's sister Madeline. They were in the mood for Thai, so we started walking down Court Street to find a place that looked good. I was amazed: In just 3-4 blocks, we passed at least half a dozen great-looking Thai places, including Joya. I'm not sure we have that many Thai restaurants in all of Hampton Roads!

We ended up at Ghang. The staff wasn't that great--we had to flag down our waitress to get drink refills and, finally, our check--but the food was good. I ordered Panang curry chicken with carrots & bell peppers, with a glass of the house pinot grigio. The curry was a little more spicy than I usually like it, but that night I didn't mind the burning tongue & drippy nose--the spice actually felt good. Maybe my heat tolerance is improving; if so, Topher will be thrilled.

Later this week: brunch spots in Brooklyn & Manhattan, and gluten-free Italian on the Upper West Side!

Dating in DC: Beef Tartare at Dukem

While we were engaged, my husband Topher was eager to try beef tartare (at the prompting of his friend Randy), so our second foray into ethnic food in DC was Ethiopian. Again, we ate with just our hands, sans silverware.

I wasn't brave enough to order a full serving myself, so I got a vegetarian platter instead. Imagine my surprise when the plate was accompanied by a whole cooked fish on the bone - head, eyes, tail, everything! (I think they gave me a fork to eat that.)

But I did try a few bites of Topher's entrée. It had a moist, warm, chewy consistency - not bad, but I couldn't eat much of it. I think we both psyched ourselves out a little. I mean, it was raw beef.

What I Ate:

• #33 Special Dukem Veggie Combo III: spicy splint lentils, yellow peas, greens, cabbage, shiro, salad, and chickpeas in spicy sauce, all served over injera bread, with a whole cooked fish

What Topher Ate:

• Dukem Kitfo: Beef tartare mixed with homemade cottage cheese, herbal butter, cardamom, and mitmita

The Scoop:

Dukem Ethiopian Restaurant (www.dukemrestaurant.com) is located at 1114-1118 U Street (12th Street NW), Washington, DC 20009. Their hours are Sun-R 11am-2am, F-Sat 11am-3am.

Note: The picture above isn't my actual plate, but it's as close as I could find online. It's from here.

Dating in DC: Belly Dancing at Marrakesh

Our decision to try Moroccan food turned out to be one of our more adventurous dining experiences in DC. Delicious but definitely unique, not for the faint of heart.

First, the place looks like nothing from the outside. There's no sign, at least not one in English. There's only a blue door. And on the night we went there, a young man sitting in a compact car parked out front, who (apparently sensing our confusion) honked at us and waved us towards the blue door.

Second, there's no menu. You can order house white wine or house red wine - those are your only choices. The meal itself is a fixed menu at a (presumably) fixed price, served family-style. We never actually saw a price anywhere; we just got a hand-written bill at the end of the night. For all we know, the table next to us was charged something completely different! :)

Third, it didn't seem to matter what time you got there; everybody got their food at the same time, because everybody was eating the same thing. And it didn't matter if you didn't want to watch the belly dancing. Everybody got to see the belly dancing, because it happened in the middle of the restaurant in the middle of the meal. Nobody got their dessert (or their check) until after the performance.

Fourth, there were no utensils. When we were first seated, our waitress brought us towels (instead of napkins) and poured water from a pitcher into a copper bowl to wash our hands. We ate the whole meal with our hands.

All that being said, the food was delicious. And I think (I hope) we got a pretty authentic Moroccan meal. This place would be great for a birthday or other special occasion, when you really want to experience something new and different.

What We Ate:

1. The Three-Salad Platter: cooked eggplants in tomato sauce, cucumbers & bell peppers in Mediterranean seasoning, and oasis carrots in coriander
2. The B'Stella: layered pie with chicken, assorted nuts, almonds, eggs, parsley and onions, topped with powdered sugar and cinnamon
3. Chicken with lemon and olives
4. Marinated Berber beef shish kebab
5. Couscous Grand Atlas topped with vegetables, chick peas, and raisins
6. Basket of fresh fruits, and hot mint tea with Moroccan pastries (for dessert)

The Scoop:

Marrakesh (www.marrakesh.us) is located at 617 New York Ave, Washington, DC 20001. Reservations are required and available by calling (202)393-9393.