Bibimbap 'Til You Drop

My first attempt at bibimbap - pile it all together
on some rice and add a fried egg. Yum!

I am embarrassed to confess that my first taste of Korean food was not at the famous Woo Lae Oak in Tysons Corner, or even the Korean Deli in Fairfax. My first taste of Korean food was actually a frozen dinner from Trader Joe's. I'm not sure why Korean restaurants haven't made it to mainstream America the way that other Asian cuisines like Thai, Chinese, and Japanese have, but somehow it's taken me 30++ years to give it a go. The verdict? It was, um, actually pretty delicious. Delicious enough that it has spawned a temporarily all-consuming weekend quest for me and my husband to find the perfect NoVA bibimbap (traditional Korean dish of rice, mixed vegetables and meat, usually beef, topped with a fried egg).

Over the past few months we have eaten bibimbap at the mall, we have eaten bibimbap at a place called Myung-Ga Gim Bop (or as it says from the outside, "Korean Deli"), and we have eaten bibimbap at a place in Annandale that is open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week where the servers wear traditional Korean dress and the menus are 10 pages long and haven't been wiped down since they opened. We have asked every Korean friend and acquaintance we have for advice on where to go, and we have subjected our poor children to many, many difficult meals. For some reason, they are not as concerned as we are about finding the best bibimbap in driving distance from our house.

I wondered if we might have a problem, but then a recent issue of Bon Appetit had a feature on making bibimbap for a large group, so I knew that if we did indeed have a problem, at least we weren't the only ones.  The Bon Appetit recipe calls for grated Asian pear, which is not easy to find all the time unless you go to the Korean grocery stores, but the idea of making it at home had me hooked. I scoured my favorite food sites and came up with this recipe at Allrecipes that looked pretty simple and delicious. It was really easy to make, and the best part? The marinade of the beef has so much brown sugar in it that it caramelizes when you cook it, giving it a rich, sweet taste and perfectly crispy and chewy texture - a lot like the Szechuan Beef Proper at another favorite Asian restaurant - Peking Gourmet. Mmm... Now I'm thinking about Peking Duck. I wonder how hard it is to make a good Peking Duck at home?

Dinner at Rasika - Was it Worth the Wait?

Tawa Bangan - appetizer of
eggplant, potato and peanut sauce

Whenever a restaurant like Rasika makes it to Washingtonian's Top 100 list, it becomes next to impossible to get a reservation. And with so many choices, it's hard to imagine how an Indian restaurant could be so good that it would be worth the two to three month wait it takes to get a dinner reservation there. So despite how much my husband and I love Indian food, it's taken me years to add my name to the long wait list. Even making the reservation over two months out, we still only had the option of 6 or 9pm (Guess which one I chose? Hint: We still got home in plenty of time to watch another episode of "Homeland" before bed, essentially making it the perfect date night).

Entering the warm and dark restaurant, you would never guess it was barely 6 on a weekend. The place was bustling and the bar was full of hipsters and theater go-ers (it's right next to the Woolly Mammoth Theater in Penn Quarter). From the moment I had a look at the expansive menu, I knew we were in for something special and Chef Vikram Sunderam did not disappoint. Each dish was so carefully plated, the flavors blending and complementing each other in such balanced harmony, you felt as if you could see into his soul. Okay, I know that might sound a little cheesy, but I dare you to try a bite of the Palak Chaat (crispy spinach with tamarind, yogurt, and date chutney) without moaning in delight and awe that another human being could have come up with such a combination of flavors.

There were so many things we wanted to order, but we stuck mainly with the items suggested by the local reviewers at Washington Post and Washingtonian. In addition to the Palak Chaat, we shared an order of Truffle Naan, a trio of Chutney (though the Tomato and Golden Raisin one was the best), the Black Cod with Honey and Star Anise, and the Pork Chop Vindaloo, which was so melt-in-your-mouth tender you didn't need a knife. My go-to order at Indian restaurants is always Chicken Tikka Masala and our waitress said the chef does an amazing version, so next time I won't be able to resist giving that a try.

Now, run, run, as fast as you can - make a reservation at Rasika and write and tell me all about it afterwards. Or better yet, invite me along. Now go!

Pretend it's Summer - Have Some Strawberry Shortcake

Strawberry Shortcake with Fresh Whipped Cream

One of my fondest memories of childhood is going to the Roy Rogers drive-thru with my family and ordering strawberry shortcake. It wasn't an every day occurrence, rather it followed a special event - like an award at school or a day spent at the museums downtown. Buckled in the backseat, I would crane my neck to make sure the drive-thru order taker was putting my strawberry shortcake in the bag. We'd pull away from the window and my mom would dig through the bag to find each of our orders and pass them back. The sweet treat would come in a clear plastic container with the hot biscuit buried at the bottom, topped with vanilla ice cream and strawberry sauce. I couldn't get to the plastic wrapped spoon fast enough. Then I'd take that first magical bite, dipping my spoon down the side to catch equal portions of each component. First the sticky sweet strawberry sauce, then the cool, creamy, vanilla soft-serve, and finally the hot, flaky, salty biscuit. Ahhh. Heaven on a spoon.

Roy Rogers is long gone, and to be honest I'm not sure it would taste quite the same now, but my love for strawberry shortcake persists. If it's on the menu, I will order it. Many times I'm disappointed when the flaky biscuit is replaced with spongy cake. When summer comes, and with it strawberry season, it's one of the first things to come out of my kitchen. It is pure happiness on a plate.

It's the middle of winter, yes I know, but with Valentine's Day, the strawberries come back. They may not come from the farm down the road, but pint upon pint of delicious red berries are showing up in grocery stores all around us this time of year, so I say, why not cheat a little. Put some summer into your life and whip up some strawberry shortcake. Perfect for a special Valentine's dinner for anyone you love - or eat it yourself straight from the oven. I won't tell. One of my favorite recipes comes from Southern Living - of course they know how to do biscuits right. Enjoy!

8 Rules to Help You Survive Eating out with the Kids

When I was pregnant with my first son, people would always tell my husband and I to go out to eat as much as we could before the baby was born because we wouldn't be eating out at the same kinds of places once we had kids. P-shh-aw, I would think to myself. We are going to train our sweet little angels how to sit quietly in restaurants, and eat whatever we eat, and not drop food on the floor. We are going to be good parents. With good kids. Nice, well-behaved kids. Ha! 

5 years and 2 children later, let's just say my view has changed a bit. It's not that our kids are not good, nice, and well-behaved. They are. Well, mostly. But they are not Nobu-nice. Or Volt-nice. Sometimes they are not even TGIFriday's-nice. Still, we love to eat out, so we persevere. And over the past few years, we've figured out what it takes to have a good meal out that we can all enjoy. They're still not ready for Nobu, but that's what babysitters are for, right?

Rule #1: Check your shame at the door

In case you have any shame left, after lying with your feet up in stirrups for 14 hours straight while any variety of strangers and family members walked by, let it go. Your kid isn't the first one to throw a fit in a restaurant. If I can survive my two-year-old pooping (yep, right out of the diaper) and peeing on the middle of a restaurant floor while dozens of restaurant patrons looked on, you can too.

Rule #2: Noise is your friend

You may have once enjoyed romantic dinners with your spouse in quiet, candle-lit restaurants. Not anymore. The more background noise, the better. Clattering dishes, poor sound-proofing, rude waitresses...all these noises will help mask the sound of your own child throwing his dish full of buttery noodles on the floor while he screams at the top of his lungs that he did NOT want cheese on it, even though he said he did when you placed the order 5 minutes before.

Rule #3: The early bird catches the worm

Your favorite restaurant only has an 8pm seating available? Forget it. You're eating on the early-bird special for the next few years. Eating at 5pm may seem lame when you're 25, but it's the absolute best time to eat out when you've got kids in tow. The restaurants are empty at this time of day which means your waiter will be more tolerant of your special requests and mess. Plus there's an added bonus - the other grandmas and grandpas eating at the same time as you will ooh and ahh over your kids, making you feel like they are actually welcome at the restaurant. A feeling you will NOT have if you go to the same place at 8pm with all the singletons and newly marrieds on dates glaring and rolling their eyes at you and your precious bundle of joy. 

Rule #4: BYOF (Bring Your Own Food)

When you go out to eat at 5pm, chances are, you won't wait for a table. But if you do have to wait a little too long for the food to come, don't be caught without a snack. "But he won't eat his dinner!" you say. So what? Is a hunger-induced temper tantrum worth that risk? I didn't think so. I get super cranky when I'm hungry, and if it was socially acceptable for me to throw a tantrum when my food didn't come fast enough, I would. So stash some pretzels in your purse. Everyone will be happier.

Rule #5: Charge your cellphone

I understand that when you have your first child, you will resist the lure of technology for as long as you can. I've been there. When my son was 6 months old and we were out to eat with him, I clearly remember judging a nearby family for their portable DVD player which the 2 year-old was glued to like a zombie. Now, after two kids, it's a whole different story. Their brains won't rot after 1 hour on a screen and there are plenty of educational videos (our kids love LeapFrog's Alphabet Adventure) and apps out there. Of course, they could also become experts at every type of Angry Birds game ever made like my kids. Either way, you'll get a nice, quiet meal, and the kids just may learn something. Win-win.

Rule #6: Have an escape plan

In the beginning, my hard and fast rule was to only eat at places where we could escape with a moments notice. That meant, order at the counter, no slow-poke waiter bringing a check to rely on. If it got bad enough, I could always pick up the screaming kids and run out the door. Now they're a bit older, and I'm a bit bolder, so we go to more full service restaurants. I am always more comfortable, though, when I've got plenty of cash on hand to throw on the table instead of waiting for that credit card machine that will most likely pick that day to stop working.

Rule #7: A little bribery never hurt anyone

I'm sure there are dozens of parenting books that will disagree with me on this, but I don't care. Bribery works, people. It works with Santa, and it works with going out to eat too. You'd be surprised how much good behavior you can get with the promise of a few m&m's or a stop for frozen yogurt.

Rule #8: Find yourself a good babysitter

No matter how prepared you are, or how well behaved your kids are, there are just some restaurants you won't be able to bring them to. And that's okay. It's hard to find a good babysitter that you trust, but it is so worth the time and stress, I promise. Everyone deserves a night out alone once in awhile. So ask your friends, scour the neighborhood for responsible teenage girls, or join a sitter finding service if nothing else works. Then pick up the phone and make those reservations at the restaurant that has a 3 month wait. It will make all the meals in between a little more bearable.

Bon Appetit!