the arugula files

Eatonville: Good for The Right Reasons

Just look at that crab cake.  It's huge.  Lumps of sweet crab meat with a pinch of filler. Just enough to hold it together. On our first trip to Eatonville, Marcus and I were pleasantly surprised by the quality of the food.  It was more than a solid meal at a the right price point, which is what you will find next door at Busboys and Poets.  Eatonville's crab cake was among the best I've had in the city, and let me tell you I've eaten a lot of crab cakes.  Add the pickled onions and arugula topping and this crab cake was dressed for something special.  Me!  

Farm Table at Planet Wine

 

Recently, I was one of many lucky blogger guests of Planet Wine's Farm Table.  The Farm Table is spearheaded by Chef Will Artley, who heads the kitchen at Evening Star Cafe, the popular neighborhood restaurant next door. The Farm Table, which anchors the room at Planet Wine Shop, provides Chef Artley an opportunity to create new dishes based on seasonal ingredients sourced from local farms. My dinner was a veritable visit to farms across the Chesapeake Bay and Pennsylvania.  There were soft-shell crabs, ramps, fava beans, asparagus, morels, strawberries, and rhubarb.  Oh my!  My favorite dish, by far, was the Ricotta Gnocchi with Spring Pea Ragout, Baby Carrots and Mint Pesto. I  fooddream® about this dish.

I'm working on getting the recipe.  I told the Chef that I would drop dead from joy if he shared it.  I will share it with you (before I keel over, of course).

Let's Dish About Lauriol Plaza

Yes, those crowds waiting for a table on a Friday night are preposterous.  True, I could replicate many of the dishes at home.  I'm with you on the spotty service: it sucks.  And why wait until 11:00 to open for brunch on Sunday?  Despite the long list of complaints, the good outweighs the bad at Lauriol Plaza. You just have to know what you are doing to enjoy its highlights.  First, don't go on a Friday or Saturday night.  That's just asking for trouble.  You also need to know what to order.  The best dish, in my opinion, is the Masitas de Puerco.  Pork with bitter oranges, Cuban style, served with fried plantains, black beans, and rice.  Sure, the cooks turn over quicker than pancakes, so food consistency is a problem, but it usually ranges from good to great, never bad, and at $11.50, they are practically giving that pork away.  Speaking of another reason to love Lauriol -- it's recession-ready. And did I mention the tortillas?  Tortillas so soft you could use them as a pillow, and, of course, there are the chips and salsa.  Other dish recommendations?  The creamy Enchiladas de Mariscos or Chicken Fajitas, a solid standby. The Huevos Entomatados is a wise choice at brunch.

Strawberry and Arugula Salad with Feta Dressing

This past week on the Splendid Table Lynn talked with the guy who wrote How to Pick a Peach.  His name? Hold on, let me google him....Russ Parsons, that's him.  Anyway, Lynn and Mr. Parsons were talking about strawberries.  About how industrial strawberries are cultivated for traveling, and as a result they have little tough skins that protect them from bumps in the road.   I can't tell you how many times I've excitedly bought strawberries from the supermarket and been left utterly disappointed and annoyed.  Tough and tasteless, these bright red berries need a pound of sugar to make them edible.  Somehow I learned my lesson and avoided buying strawberries for the past six months.   So when I saw the season's first batch of strawberries at the farmer's market I almost turned to a complete stranger and giddily exclaimed, "Strawberries. Yummy!"  Instead of scaring anyone, I put out a little tweet, telling everyone to RUN down to the market before they were gone, which, judging by the crowds hovering over them, would be soon.

My Sunday farmer's market dinners are always the best taste of the week.  This strawberry and arugula salad with feta from Keswick Creamery was no exception. I included arugula, a handful of basil, almonds, and sweet, juicy  strawberries.  For the dressing I used a 2:1 ratio with 2 parts red wine vinegar and 1 part olive oil.  If you like your dressing a little on the tart side - the way I do - then 2:1 is for you; otherwise, you should play around with the ratio (standard is 3:1, with more oil than vinegar). To finish the dressing, I also added my favorite feta from Keswick (Feta de Provence) and a little flavor magic in the form of Penzy's Sandwich Sprinkle.  Combine the dressing ingredients in an old jar and shake it wildly.  Best. Salad. Ever.

Eating My Way Through New York or "I had the Time of My Life. No I Never Felt this Way Before....and I Owe it All to You."

If I Iived in New York City I would weigh 300 pounds.  Seriously.  There are so many tasty places to eat, it would be tough to avoid.  Sure, NYC has an absurd number of pricey restaurants, but many are affordable, making eating out even more difficult to resist.  Plus there are so many little places to stop for gelato or to grab a slice. 

A few weekends ago I hopped on the train with my two pregnant friends and headed to visit another friend who lives in Manhattan.  It was a perfect weekend.  The weather was beautiful, shoe shopping was productive, and the food was delicious and never ending.  I even got to eat at Perilla, a restaurant owned by TV boyfriend and top chef Harold Dieterle.

Mark Your Calendar: It's Almost Picking Season

Every summer I like to take at least one trip to a nearby farm to pick my own SOMETHING DELICIOUS.  At local farms, you can pick blueberries, strawberries, peas, raspberries, peaches, sour cherries, and, in the fall, apples.  PYO, it's called.  I know it sounds very Tom Sawyer, and I can just imagine the farmers chuckling and saying to each other, "Here come those city folk! After they pick all the blueberries let's see if they'll whitewash Aunt Polly's fence."  Sign me up, I say. I know it's hard work, but sometimes being a farm hand for a day sounds way better than inhaling freon in my office.

Picking your own gets you outside in the warm sun, and is a lot cheaper than buying fruit at Whole Foods.  Last year I went blueberry picking and then made blueberry muffins that would have knocked the pants off Violet Beauregarde.  My PYO blueberries were $1.99 a pound compared to $3.99 in the store.  Economist would argue that I need to factor in opportunity costs, but I say their assumptions are erroneous unless they quantify the fun factor. 

This year I'm obsessed with peas, and pea season is right around the corner.

There are numerous PYO farms in the area.  I like Butler's Orchard in Maryland.  At Butler's there's a farm market where you can buy canning materials and other tasty treats (caramel, jam, relish, cheese), which is open 10-5 daily, and it's only a short drive from DC to Germantown. 

Here's an approximate picking schedule.  You should call ahead because strawberries come when they are good and ready, not when you want them, unfortunately. 

Strawberries - Soon!  Check the website, Butler's thinks they will be ready 5/22.
Peas - Around June 10th
Blueberries - About June 20th

The Washington Post has a great pick your own guide.  Check it out. 

Thanks to Flickr user adwriter for the scrumptious photograph.

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Lemony Israeli Couscous with Arugula

Remember when I said that I wanted to be eating more whole grains?   It wasn't really working out that well, mostly because I like pasta way more than I like quinoa.  I found something that might help me overcome my quinoa resistance.  It's from Trader Joe's and it's called Harvest Blend.  Sure, most of the blend is Israeli Couscous, which is, at least in my mind, basically pasta.  But there's also orzo, split baby garbanzo beans, and red quinoa.  For this dish, I added arugula, feta, and some more garbanzos. And lots of lemon.

Marcus calls garbanzo beans "butt beans" (because he thinks they look like little butts). He doesn't like them, and picks them out of his food.  I may not love quinoa, but I sure do love garbanzos. (Yes, it's true, I have a carbohydrate disorder).

This dish is quite delicious, and only takes about fifteen minutes to make, including chopping and zesting.  "Lovely," as Gordon Ramsay says.

Goat Cheesecake with a Ginger Snap Crust

My favorite dessert is cheesecake, no contest.  Creamy, light, and not too sweet, it's everything I want in dessert, if I want one at all.  My lack of a sweet tooth is odd considering that every day, all the way through middle school, I ate a ginormous, chocolate chip cookie, washed down with two chocolate milks.  I can still remember the warm, gooey chips seeping out as I broke off pieces of the cookie.  Those lunch ladies sure knew their stuff. 

Today I resist most desserts, mostly as a strategy to allocate more calories in the direction of something savory.  Cheesecake, though, is tough to say no to.

Most cheesecakes rely heavily on cream cheese.  Not this one.  Substituting goat cheese for some amount of cream cheese gives this cake a lighter, slightly tangy taste.

The crust?  Instead of graham crackers, which is traditionally used in cheesecakes, and what the original recipe called for, I used ginger snaps, which gave the cake a spicy, crunchy crust.  Why the substitution?  It wasn't because I'm a culinary genius; the store didn't have any graham crackers, well, except for Teddy Grahams. I wisely said no to those and settled for ginger snaps.  It was the best decision I made all week.