I wrote about LPQ before for Wonkette but this time I will not be so nice, because I am officially docking off a star on my little imaginary five-star scale (although, you will be happy to know that I am usually not this harsh — I recently added a half-star to Busboys and Poets. I think the first few times, I was just gaga over the fact that the chain graced DC’s presence, but I’m over that.

The service, in short, is bad. The food took forever to come out and it seemed like we had three different servers. The food runners kept confusing the tables. The couple next to us ordered one thing and got another (some asshole with a Kindle, so he deserved it). Two plates of food came out to a party of three sitting next to us, and Number Three got her plate ten minutes later, while her polite brunch companions’ food got cold.

Also, I did not have a good Communal Table experience. The Egyptian man sitting next to me smelled of vinegar and spoke Arabic loudly. The width of the table is really huge, so I had to publicly announce the juicy gossip I wanted to tell my friends to the entire restaurant (I was screaming). Elbows bumped. Someone was breathing on my egg. I played footsie with the Egyptian man. Eek.

Also, the food wasn’t that stellar this time around, either (trust me, I am NOT being cynical. I give credit where credit is due). My bread tasted like a towel, and the Belgian waffle we ordered was too doughy on the inside, not crispy and lukewarm. Also, the chocolate sauce was a thin, bittersweet disappointment.

Here’s some pictures of our meal anyway. Things that we ordered: yogurt parfait (up at top), Belgian waffle, soft boiled egg plate, Nicoise salad.

Eggs benedict with lox and Essex house hashed browns.

Pressed Cuban sandwich with pickles and fried plantains

Baked eggs and cheese on top of crispy ham

Complimentary mimosas and bloody marys...Ha, Andrew looks like a chump.

Here is why you need to go to Essex: Everything on the menu is effing droolworthy, for $18, you get brunch and THREE cocktails, and brunch goes till 4PM. Is that good enough for you? Essex, 120 Essex St. NYC. Directions here.

Plus everyone looks cool as hell. Our hostess was wearing these floral pastel overall pants…a la Blossom. Who wouldn’t want someone like that seating you?

Fries with mole sauce

There are only three things you need to know about Oyamel: small plates mastermind Jose Andres is the owner, so that can only mean one thing, which also happens to be the first point, that the plates are small; it’s a cocina Mexicana so don’t expect a Spanish torta; and everything is grossly overpriced.
Oh and a fourth thing, sorry, the entire menu is en espanol. Surprise!

Ceviche

The red snapper ceviche was really, really delicious, and I could have probably eaten 10 more servings of it if wasn’t $10 for two spoonfuls. Not only was the flavor there, but so was the texture — ceviche is a beautiful thing, but because it’s pickled fish, everything has a tendency to get a little rubbery. The soft avocados, crackly chicharon and crunchy onions were a textural paradise.

Pastel de chocolate con crema de Mole Poblano y helado de vanilla

The desserts are interesting and chancy. The chocolate cake was so much more than chocolate cake. The sauce had the earthiness of mole, a kick of Mexican hot chocolate, a note of dried chilies.

Come here if you want to be entranced and entertained by the food or if you have a date you want to impress. But for the love of god, don’t come here if you’re hungry, cuz you ain’t gonna get fed.

http://www.oyamel.com/

The portions are indeed small, but jam-packed with flavor. What I ordered then isn’t on the online menu now, so I’ll have to re-describe.

It was something like a fatty cut of grilled duck (mmm) on top of polenta with a red wine sauce. The duck was succulent and perfectly seared, truly a delight, and the polenta, creamy and decadent.

The whole grilled prawns tasted of summer bonfire, and don’t be afraid to rip off its head and suck out the brains (that’s where the flavor is).

I was sad to not have gotten the steamed mussels or the butternut squash soup, but there’s always next time.

Bar Pilar 1833 14th St.
Oh PS I LOVE the website, it’s so cute.

http://www.examiner.com/x-882-DC-Ethnic-Food-Examiner~y2008m11d9-Four-gripes-about-the-food-scene-in-DC

I’ve only been here for six short months, but I made a few observations about the D.C. food scene:

1. There’s no Asian bakeries: I was under the assumption that every major city had at least one Korean or Japanese bakery, but there’s none to be found in the District of Columbia and that bums me out. I have to rely on my mom to FedEx me loaves of Japanese raisin bread or Korean scallion buns from L.A.

2. The street vendor food sucks: I have counted exactly two non-hot dog vendors in the entirety of the D.C, area. One is a gyro stand on Vermont St., and the other is a burrito stand on K St. And they’re both absolutely disgusting.

3. The Asian food markets are wayyy outside of D.C.: Want to buy kim chee? Too bad, you’ll need a car to drive all the way outside of the city for it.

4. The “hole-in-the-wall” places are rip offs: Seriously, $3.50 for a freaking empanada at Julia’s? I thought there was an understanding here that “hole-in-the-wall” means cheap. I guess D.C. is exempted.

http://www.examiner.com/x-882-DC-Ethnic-Food-Examiner~y2008m10d22-Greek-fast-food-Zorbas-Cafe

A couple of weeks ago, I had invited a few friends out to dinner and suggested that we try Zorba’s Cafe on Dupont Circle. I made a big deal out of it and told everyone that it got rave reviews. But when we arrived, I was mortified to discover that Zorba’s was a fast food restaurant (oh, the horror!). I shoved my friends out the door and we scurried on out in search for a dining experience that didn’t include plastic trays and fluorescent lighting.

I never did get my Greek food fix, so a week later, I found myself at Zorba’s yet again. I ordered avgolemono, a Greek chicken soup and tzaziki, garlic and cucumber yogurt dip. The avgolemono wasn’t stellar — it basically tasted like regular old chicken soup with a bit lemon squeezed into it . The tzaziki was good, but could have used a bit of parsley and lemon juice. My friend Andrew ordered a pork gyro, but he didn’t touch the bread lying beneath the meat. “It’s soggy,” he said, reaching over for my pita bread. The food seemed very homemade, and a tad Americanized, the kind of food a Greek mother living in Centreville would cook for her first-generation American-Greek kids.

Zorba’s really makes the effort to not make the place feel so fast-food like, so I feel bad for walking out on it before. It’s cozy and cute, the perfect place to meet up with friends for quick post-work gnosh (but apparently, not good enough for dinners to impress your friends).

Finally, amid elaborate, lavish celebrity chef hoo-hah, comes a cooking show that takes a backseat to the whole fame-and-glamour thing and goes back to basics. “Jamie at Home,” the Food Network’s new show hosted by British mega-chef Jamie Oliver, is a rustic, family-centered rendition of his trendier, BBC-syndicated cooking shows, “The Naked Chef” and “Oliver’s Twist”. Unlike other cooking shows, “Jaime at Home” is pretty to watch (definitely not like fellow Food Network star Sandra Lee’s tacky housewife set) and dripping with quirkiness and charm (although, that might be based solely on his Cockney accent). The show is filmed right at Oliver’s home, in his cluttered cottage and garden in the ever-overcast English countryside.

The premise of the show is simple: Oliver cooks the “foods he loves” with fresh ingredients from his backyard. He draws inspiration from Mediterranean and Eastern Asian cuisine, preparing dishes such as chili-avocado salsa, zucchini risotto and Thai-style leg of lamb. Each episode begins with a clip of Oliver rummaging through his garden for a vegetable (such as pumpkin or rhubarb) to be highlighted on the show. His enthusiasm for the color, the freshness and the flavor of his produce is infectious – you almost can’t wait to see what he’ll do with the peppers he lovingly picked from his greenhouse.

Sometimes, you forget why chefs use certain ingredients in a dish, and Oliver makes damn well sure you understand the impact of each element. The cameras zoom in on Oliver’s food to the point of Georgia O’Keefe-like abstraction, and you can actually hear yourself sighing upon a close-up of cherry tomatoes doused in extra-virgin olive oil, without the Pavlovian responses induced by Emeril or Rachael Ray. His dishes are not 30-minute meals or semi-homemade – these are rich, luscious, slow-cooked comfort foods. The show’s no-fuss approach makes the cooking process look effortless. There is no hokey background music to distract you (shocking, for a British series), Gordon Ramsay-like egos or formal attire. Oliver putts around in a camo sweatshirt and jeans, caressing various ingredients and cracking corny jokes. He is endearing and a bit nerdy –on the Chilies and Peppers episode, Oliver refers to various vegetables as “Mr. So and So” a total of four times in a 5-minute period. His quirkiness continues with his innovative cooking methods. He fashions a contraption out of a biscuit tin and chicken wire in preparation of rosemary-infused smoked salmon.

“Jamie at Home” is a refreshing reminder that cooking is really all about the food, a comforting thought coming from a happy-go-lucky chef worth $50 million.