My new favorite hotel room

I'm been spending a bit of time in Washington, DC again of late - it's amazing how much the city has changed since I lived here seven years ago. Collections of sparkling new high rises dot formerly blighted areas everywhere, loads of new restaurants (including the second US outpost of my friends Gianni and Stefano's beloved Acqua al 2 from Florence which has replicated the amazing convivial atmosphere and delicious food of the original perfectly. Bravo to Ari and Ralph).

But the purpose of this post is to sing the praises of something that hasn't changed -- the reliablity of the St. Regis Hotel on the southwest corner of 16th and K. It is still a relatively quiet part of town. It's near the White House, and there's now a P.J. Clarke's across the street (which is good and reliable). The hotel is everything a hotel should be. It is not too big, so you never feel overwhelmed with other guests. It is elegant, the design is that of an Italian Renaissance palazzo. The Staff is extremely professional, friendly and attentive. The rooms are very well kept, cleaned and comfortable. In particular the x25 line is quite spacious and quiet. While it faces an internal courtyard, it has southern views so it gets plenty of light. The perfect room for a business trip. My new home away from home in DC.

Rao's, yes, Rao's

Ask 10 New York foodies what table they'd love to try once, and I'll bet you get more than three Rao's. The old-school Italian-American restaurant on the corner of East 114th Street and Pleasant Avenue is a highly coveted meal first and foremost because most people can never eat there. You see, the 10 tables are "owned" on an annual basis by particular patrons, who have the right to occupy the table one night a month (or more) for the whole night. Rao's is only open for dinner, and only Monday through Friday. The "owners" of these tables, it is said, run the gamut from long-time neighborhood regulars (the neighborhood used to be Italian Harlem), to New York political honchos, celebrities, law enforcement, and the like. There's also the unfortunate and ubiquitous speculation that, as all things popular and Italian-American, there are men with "connections."

Interestingly, despite the exclusive hype, the food has always been reputed to be excellent, not always a sure thing for a celebrity hot-spot. The one indication most of us have is Rao's jarred tomato sauce. Growing up in an Italian-American home a jar of tomato sauce was sacrilige, but I will confess gladly that I have Rao's in my kitchen because it is truly excellent, and we don't always feel like cooking.

And Rao's sauce was as close as I had gotten until last Wednesday.

It turns out a long-time friend of mine has had a table for 10 years. I didn't know this until about a week and a half ago, though if I told you who it is, you'd say "of course he does. " In any event, he invited me for dinner with his son and a colleague late the week before. I must admit that I could think of little else from the moment he said it. It was a bit like looking forward to Christmas morning, as a kid. I spent a lot of time reading posts about the place, trying to figure out what to order, as this might be my only trip to Rao's.

Having read that the neighborhood could be a little rough, I took a cab. When you pull up, Rao's is the brightly lit, shiny Red and white corner beacon on an otherwise dark and drab Harlem block. People were huddled outside smoking and talking loudly. You can see most of the restaurant through the windows in the front. It was actually bigger than I expected, with more room between tables. The bar is long, and actually open to the public - though I don't believe you can eat there.

The place has an incredible festive energy. Everyone there seems to be enjoying it as a treat. The Negroni I had at the bar was very well made, for starters. We sat at our booth, and I surveyed the room. There were some notable, but low-key people there. The walls are covered with framed celebrity pictures. A man in a suit jacket came and pulled up a chair and explained what he had for dinner that night - he was the menu. He explained that the food is served family-style. I surrendered to my host - the only thing I knew I would chime in was if he didn't order meatballs.

We started with Rao's famous seafood salad, their home roasted red peppers, baked clams oreganata, and a simple tossed salad. The seafood salad had big chunks of lobster meat and squid, shrimp and crab in a light olive oil dressing. It was excellent. The roasted peppers were good. The baked clams acceptable but not memorable (to be fair, I had chosen them), and the salad was surprisingly tasty. I reminded me of the salads that my grandmother used to make, with oregano and red wine vinegar on chopped iceberg lettuce and tomatoes.

For pasta we had rigatoni with broccoli rabe and sausage and ravioli in marinara sauce. The rigatoni was cooked perfectly al dente, with plenty of broccoli rabe and pork sausage, but the sauce was a little thin. The marinara is excellent, and the ravioli were good (a little soft to my taste). Accompanying the pasta came the meatballs - one big one each. They're about the size of a baseball. They are incredibly moist, and indeed, medium rare on the inside. They have this excellent, garlicky, romano cheesey flavor. I fully understood the hype on these meatballs from the first bite.

It would have been easy to quit there, but we weren't finished. Jumbo shrimp oreganata and chicken scarpariello, chicken braised in white wine with hot and sweet sausage, and hot and sweet peppers. The shrimp may have been great, I couldn't honestly tell you because the chicken was absolutely delicious. It had exactly the right mix of salty, savoury and hot. I could've eaten another full tray.

By the time we were done, the place was really jumping. A notable celebrity had taken the table next to us, all the other tables were full, and the famous juke box had been turned up. The owners were making the rounds of the room - it was truly delightful. I didn't want to go home (and the difficulty finding a cab up there almost ensured I didn't).

Bottom line: the food runs the gamut from B+ to A+ - and there really is some A+. When coupled with the atmosphere, it is an unparalleled New York experience. If you have a chance, you should definitely go. With any luck, I'll have an opportunity to post on it again some day. P.S. they take only cash, and I have no idea what the bill was, though my sense is that it ain't cheap.

Remembering Nonno

The first time Nick met Nonno. They were both impressed. Understandably.

Florence update

I'm just finishing a quick weekend in Florence (one lunch to go!) and I hit a lot of the standards so updates are warranted.

I've been staying at the Westin Excelsior, which I quite like. The rooms are big and well furnished, many of the rooms have Arno views, it's on a great, relatively quiet piazza (Ognisanti) a bit off the beaten path, and it's part of the Starwood chain so I get points. It's not cheap, but deals are available (particularly with points). Room 250, which I've had before is particularly nice, as it's in a corner and is very quiet.

Onto the food!

I arrived late Friday night so I headed over to Acqua al 2 as their kitchen is open quite late. They, as usual, did not disappoint. The fusilli lunghi marscapone e funghi may be my favorite dish of pasta in the world. The tagliato di rucola was very good, though after eating it I was reminded that I should simply have two dishes of the fusilli when I eat at Acqua. Gianni and Stefano are both still there, wonderful hosts as always. Gianni confirmed that they are opening an Acqua in Washington DC in Eastern Market with massive outdoor seating. A much shorter plane ride from New York, I'm very much looking forward to it.

Next day came lunch at, where else, Trattoria Cibreo. Feeling particularly uninventive, I ordered my standards again: Pomodoro in gelatina, sformato di ricotta e patate and calamari inzimino with a half bottle of chianti di fonteruoli 2004. Friends, alas, something has changed at Cibreo. Don't get me wrong, it was very good. But something in the kitchen has mellowed - it is no longer mind-blowing. For example, the Pomodoro historically had a bite - a combination of raw garlic and hot pepper. Neither was present. It was still silky smooth with great olive oil, but it didn't have the kick that makes it so addictive. The Inzimino similarly had no heat, one of its signatures in the past. Also, it was soupier than usual, with less calamari and more greens (that seemed to by spinach rather than cavolo nero). The sformato was delicious (I still wish I could get a recipe...).

For dinner, hold onto your hats, I tried something new. I had run across the name La Vecchia Bettola numerous times before, and had driven past it on a number of occasions while looking for a gas station to refuel rental cars. I decided to branch out last night and eat there. I reserved for 9:15, arrived promptly to a very long "line" spilling out into the small piazza in front. It took 15 or 20 minutes to be seated at one of the long, marble topped communal tables. The crowd was overwhelmingly Italian (a good sign). We ordered an antipasto a la Bettola con funghi (afettati - prosciutto, salame, finochianna; crostini di fegato; and marinated porcini) but our primi came first. The waiter, who appeared to be handling the entire interior himself (there's a small outside as well) had forgotten, so we decided to have it after our primi. I had paccheri a rottanculo (not a particularly appetizing name), a meat sauce with beef, pork and chicken livers, that was delicious. My friend had penne a la Bettola, a spicy, incredibly rich penne a la vodka that was similarly fantastic. The antipasto arrived (without the funghi) and was fairly standard, I'd probably try something else next time. They had an insalata di ovoli (amazing mushrooms sliced thinly and raw) that tempted me when I saw it on the menu (they're unbelievably good) and I finally ordered it once my secondi arrived, but they'd run out. For secondi, I had braciole con caperi e acciughe (a breaded, thin veal cutlet sauced with a wonderful tomato sauce made with capers and anchovies). It was incredibly flavorful and moist. My friend had Coniglio Arrosto Morto (rabbit roasted to death), which was very moist and flavorful, but far too bony. Red wine della casa came in a large, straw wrapped jug and cost 4 euro per person no matter how much you drank. It was remarkably potable. Desserts, particularly the fresh fruit, looked great, but we were far too full. The place is great, try not to tell too many people...

And now, off to lunch.

Eulogy for my father

Tragically, my father died this past Tuesday, the 28th, after a 19 month battle with cancer. He was an extraordinary man. His memorial service was held in South Philadelphia, his boyhood home, yesterday. I was asked by several attendees to share the text of the eulogy I gave. Here it is. There were some deviations from the orginal text that I have tried to capture in this version, and some I already have forgotten.
_________________________________


Thank you for joining us here today on behalf of my family: my mother, my siblings, myself, and my dad. I had thought I would begin by describing my father, but as I look around the room, it is clear to me that virtually everyone in this room knew him. Nonetheless, my father, as you know, was a remarkable man. He was brilliant, he was dignified, he was elegant, he was selfless, generous, he had a great sense of humor, he was passionate. The assembly of such a personally and professionally remarkable group of family and friends -- and the condolences of hundreds more from across the world who wished they could be here to join us in paying respects to my father says more about my his accomplishments as a human being than I could hope to in words.

Indeed, as I thought about the daunting task of paying appropriate tribute to my father this morning, I was at times overwhelmed at where to begin. To chronicle and praise my father’s achievements would be impossible: he quite simply did everything and excelled at all of it. And he wouldn’t have liked that anyway, he would have viewed it as boastful. I also thought about my fondest memories of my father, but knew immediately that I had no hope of getting through those without sobbing incomprehensibly.

I thought about what my father would have wanted me to do today, and it quickly became clear. Life, for my dad, was always about lessons – lessons taught and learned. He looked for the lesson in everything he did, and he relished the opportunity to share them. Anyone who has eaten with him is familiar with what one of my friends aptly dubbed “lunch and lecture.”
And while he certainly could make any setting feel like a classroom – I suspect that is why the Socratic method of law school seemed so familiar to me – it was always clear that he did it out of an intense curiosity, a joy for human interaction and a belief in constantly trying to make the world a better place through mutual understanding.

So today, it seems most appropriate that, on my father’s behalf I share with you three essential lessons that he imparted to me over the last 40 years.

The first one is deceptively simple, but it was his overriding mantra:

Family First

My father was an incredibly busy man. He never had fewer than three full-time avocations: physician, writer, Chairman of the National Italian American Foundation, pundit, restauranteur, political advocate – and that leaves many out. As we reflected this week on all that he accomplished in only 65 years, my brother Greg wondered aloud whether there had been three of him. Indeed, each of you undoubtedly feels like my father spent a significant amount of his time speaking to you, and yet he had time for all the people in this room, and more. I have no idea how he did it.

And yet, no matter what my father was doing – from seeing patients to meeting with Presidents of the United States – he made unambiguous to everyone that he would drop anything for his family. For my dad, any success he achieved in his life was a direct result of the complete dedication and self-sacrifice of his parents, and he wanted his family to have no less advantage. And we didn’t.

His dedication to and love for my Mom is the stuff of fairy tales. We each can only hope to have that kind of true love in our lives. She was his inspiration and his rock, and he was hers.

For the five of us, his children, he was always there. He worked tirelessly to provide for us, and raise us to be strong, moral and self-sufficient people. He coached our baseball teams, edited (or in some cases wrote) our college admission essays, and advised and opened doors for us as we each pursued our careers. He gloried in our personal victories and assuaged our defeats.

And when his seven grandchildren came along, my father was a grandfather in the model of his father. And for those of you who knew my grandfather, you know there is no higher compliment.

And then there was his extended “family.” I remember when I was about 8 or 9 and it suddenly dawned on me that I had a lot of “aunts” and “uncles” given that my dad was an only child. But that’s because my father defined family broadly to include all of those that he loved. And for those who became his family, you know the same awesome sense of total security he provided. There is nothing like it.

The confidence that my father’s total selflessness to us provided was essential to that which we have acheived. I truly believe, as he did, that if each of us put our families first – before career, before personal fulfillment, certainly before politics -- each of us would be happier, and it would solve most of the world’s problems.

Second,

Don't Ever Forget Where You Came From

As an Italian kid from a modest beginning in this very neighborhood, my dad went on to do things that few people do. And yet he never forgot, and indeed trumpeted where he came from. As I’ve already said, he never received any honor or notice without using it as an opportunity to extol his parents and the tenets of their Italian-American culture.

He constantly said that life is not a single-generation race to collect the most toys or “tickle your hypothalamus” in the most ways. The key to life, for my father, was to remember that it is multi-generational. That you are where you are because of the sacrifices and lessons of those who came before you.

It is this approach that informed so much that was inspirational about my dad: his wisdom, his humility, his selflessness, and in particular his strength when facing adversity.

Each day I remember, and am thankful for where I came from because of him.

Third,

Do It Now

It is an understatement to say that my father's life was tragically short in time. I find solace, however, in the fact that my father did not waste any of it. He devoured life. He always had a project, a conference, an article, a trip, an idea. If there was a subject that interested him, he would study and master it, seeking out the experts in the field to hone his understanding. And I used to marvel at both his capacity for learning information, and the confidence and ease with which he would strike up friendships with highly talented people he didn’t know at all. Even more extraordinary was his ability to tell these experts that they were wrong about something on which they were the expert.

When he became interested in architecture, he sought out noted architect Robert Venturi. When he became interested in law, he befriended Justices Alito and Scalia. When he was interested in politics, it was Rudy Giuliani, Mario Cuomo, and Congressman Guarini. With literature it was Gay Talese and Jay Parini.

Getting sick didn’t change any of this. In the last year and a half, my father approached life the same way he always had – living every day to its fullest. He traveled to Italy for conferences, went to Alaska because he had always wanted to go, though exhausted from a 25 day cycle of radiation, he attended and spoke at my brother Tonio’s wedding. Indeed, just two weeks ago, though wheelchair bound and visibly affected by his sickness my father attended the annual gala of the National Italian American Foundation in Washington to be honored and celebrate the end of his four year term as its chairman.
Carpe Diem doesn’t do it justice. My father’s example always reminded me that each of us does not know when we will leave this earth, so if you want to do something, do it now.

***

Shortly after my father was first diagnosed last year, he sat down and wrote each of us – my mom and my brothers and sisters – letters for the time when he wouldn’t be with us anymore. It was his way of providing lessons he knew we would need for the future. In the letter to my mother, he noted that you achieve immortality through your children. What he meant by that was that if you do your job as a parent right, your children learn the lessons of how to live life, and they try to make the world the kind of place that you spent your life working towards. The best honor I can give to my dad is to live my life according to these lessons: Family First, Don't Forget Where You Came From, Do It Now. To teach them to my son, Nicholas, and to share them with you today, that you might help me make my father’s life continue in its most important ways. Thank you.

A Quick Paris Post

This will need to be filled out more, but I've just been asked for Paris recc's for the second time in a week (must be the season), so I'm posting a quick list. As you know, I foreswore haute cuisine after back-to-back unmemorable meals at Alain Ducasse New York and Per Se a few years ago.

This resolve is particularly underscored by the quality of the bistrots in Paris led by such haute-trained, but local-focused chefs as Yves Camdebord who made his fame (and led the local cuisine shift) at his own La Regalade (49 av Jean-Moulin, 14 th, Tel: 01 45 45 68 58) for many years starting in 1991 on the back of local, traditional cuisine of the highest order. It's a bit off the beaten path in the 14th, but it's worth the trek, even though Camdeborde sold it several years ago. Every meal starts with a huge terrine of house made pork pate passed to your table with cornichons and bread as a welcoming gesture of hospitality. The food is delicious and very reasonable.

Camdeborde sold La Regalade to buy the Hotel Relais Saint Germain, a very centrally located and charming hotel just off the main shopping drag in St. Germain du Pres where I spent the weekend after my wedding. Fear not, as Camdebord did not convert entirely to a hotelier, but opened the bustling Le Comptoir du Relais (9, Carrefour de l’Odeon, +33 (0)1 44 27 07 97) - an even tinier eatery fronting the hotel and spilling out onto the tiny carrefour du L'Odeon a triangular plaza in St. Germain du Pres. Camdeborde continues to create fantastic, traditional local food. His hospitality this time manifests itself in the complimentary cheese tray - enormous in size and selection - that makes the rounds after your meal. A normal menu during the week at lunch and on weekends, and a 5 course, no-choices prix fixe on weeknights. Reservations for dinner are a must and are difficult to come by unless you book far in advance, or are a guest at the Hotel. Another special by-product of staying at the Hotel is breakfast for guests only in Le Comptoir.

Le Reminet (3 Rue des Grands Degrés , Paris +33 (0)1 44070424) is also a fantastic tiny little place on a small alley just off the Seine across from Notre Dame. It has an excellent wine list, a great cellar in which you can dine, and a very cozy ambience. It has the advantage of being open Sundays and Mondays, and the disadvantage of not being air-conditioned, which one hot June night was unbearable even by the open front French Doors. That said, its stellar food and very reasonable prices make it a staple stop for me in Paris.

L' Os au Moelle (3 rue Vasco-de-Gama, Phone: 01-45-57-27-27 ) vaguely near the Eiffel Tower is another fantastic bargain, which has been more than discovered by American and Japanese tourists. Chef Thierry Faucher nonetheless continues to please with a multi-course prix-fixe and an excellent wine list. Reservations, again, are essential.

There are others (L'Epi Dupin, Violin D'Ingres - which is admittedly more haute and expensive, to name a couple) that I'll expand upon later.

New Orleans...The Big Easy is not the easiest place to eat well

Last October, The noted food critic Alan Richman published a fairly scathing article in GQ about the quality of food in New Orleans post-Katrina. His point was, interestingly, not that the quality had failed to return after the hurricane, but that quality actually had long since disappeared pre-Katrina, and that New Orleans cuisine had become a mediocre, tourist-focused charicature of itself for years now. This understandably prompted a lot of outrage from New Orleaneans, who felt kicked when they were down.

The article happened to coincide with my first ever trip to New Orleans, so I read it with interest, and a bit of skepticism. Unfortunately, after two trips in short succession (one in early November and one in February) and more than a dozen meals in the Big Easy, I have to conclude that he was mostly right about the current quality of many of the places that had come highly recommended (I can't comment on what the food was like pre-Katrina, of course). There were several wonderful exceptions, however, so i'll start with those. You'll note that my first two choices happen to be Richman's recommendations. I would note that I ate at them on my second trip, after finding the other places so lackluster.

Great
Liuzza's by the Track at 1518 North Lopez Street is the only meal I had in New Orleans that was I would call extraordinary. And by extraordinary, I mean one that was so good that I asked what time they closed that night so I could come back and have the same meal for dinner. That meal, by the way, was a bowl of their piquant gumbo and their famous barbequed shrimp po' boy. The latter is not barbequed in any traditional sense. It is small, shelless shrimp, seemingly braised in a sauce of extraordinary amounts of butter, black pepper and other spices, and then generously ladled (sauce and all) into a hollowed out roll. The roll, by the way, is unique in my experiences in New Orleans, in that it is good. The overwhelming majority of po' boys I've had are served on a light facsimile of a baguette with the internal consistency of a cotton ball and a thin skin of stale, papery crust. When I say that the Liuzza's po' boy was divine, I am understating the taste of this heavenly sandwich. The proportions are all perfect: the spices, the consistencies. This is a meal I would fly in just to eat.

August - at 301 Tchoupitoulos is a sophisticated restaurant that has blended traditional Lousiana cooking with modern restaurant technique and presentation. The menu had a large number of interesting choices, pushing me toward the house degustation menu - a promised three-hour meal with wine pairings. It was an excellent way to sample the kitchen's capabilities, with no course less than very good. The most memorable item was a crawfish boil with black truffles. The only disappointment of the meal was that the wines, though copious, were quite average compared both to the food, and to the quality implied by the menu and server in advance. This is an excellent place for an important meal, business or personal, or a splurge. It has the advantage of being directly across the street from one of the W hotels in town, which is an excellent place to stay.

Stewart's Diner - at the corner of North Claiborne Avenue and Desire. We stumbled on this place because it was the only place open for lunch post-Katrina (or open at all, actually) in the 9th Ward where we were working. Little did we know that it's where President Bush ate when he came visited the area. A very simple, clean place with a lunch counter and about eight tables, this family-run diner is excellent. Fried shrimp po-boys (dressed, of course) come loaded with an abundance of good-sized, crisp shrimp. The daily specials include a fried pork chop in a secret seasoning that is delectible. Prices are extremely reasonable, and co-owner Kim Stewart is a pleasure to speak with. We ate there three days in a row.

Good

Lola's 3312 Esplanade Avenue (504) 488-6946. This was another stumble-upon. A neighborhood Spanish place with a very loyal clientele. The garlic shrimp appetizer was fantastic. So good, in fact, that it overshadowed everything else we tried by a significant margin. We all agreed it would be a good place to go simply to drink wine and eat garlic shrimp. (one caveat, they tried to serve us a cheaper wine than we'd ordered).

Napoleon House 500 Chatres Street. Still recovering from Katrina, it is only open for lunch, and with their still-limited staff, waits can be long. We sat in the courtyard, which is both comfortable and very atmospheric. We tried a variety of items, but the standout was the gumbo. Thick and packed with seafood and rice, it was the best I've tasted in New Orleans. That said, everything else was fairly average. One observation worth making, this is the first and last time I had a muffaletta. The muffaletta is a famous New Orleans cold-cut sandwhich on a large round loaf, slathered with a tapanade of olives and vegetables. It never sounded particularly interesting to me, I but I figured I'd try one. Sadly, it was precisely what I'd feared a muffaletta to be: a terrible riff on a traditional italian hoagie. This is not specific to Napoleon House. The problem with these sandwiches is that the proportions are off. There's way too much bread, a particular problem in a city that doesn't seem to know how to make very good bread. I'm told that Central Grocery is the king of muffaletta's, but I resisted, convinced that it would just be another sandwhich. Maybe I'll relent on my next trip.

Cafe du Monde - While they've become a chain, the orginal at the French Market, 800 Decatur Street, New Orleans, La, 70116 is pen 24 hours a day, closed 6pm December 24, opens 6am December 26 504-525-4544 is a delightful place to drink their delicious proprietary blend of chicory and coffee, and gorge on freshly fried beignets. One word of advice as to the latter, they are markedly better hot, so eat them as quickly as you can.

Dick and Jenny's 4501 Tchoupitoulas Street (504) 894-9880 a long cab ride from downtown, this creative, friendly cajun restaurant is known for long waits. We had none, however, as we opted to eat at the bar. The winelist is pocked with reasonably-priced gems (including a Seavey cabernet). The appetizer sampler was a good start, and the scallops were very good, though a bit on the small side.

Undistinguished

Acme oyster 724 Iberville Street is as generic as its name. Sitting at the oyster bar the fresh-shucked oysters were ok, and everything else was similarly unmemorable.

Cochon 930 Tchoupitoulas Street in the Warehouse district is a restaurant dedicated to the joys of pork. What could be wrong with this, you ask? Lots, actually. Starting with a wine of a different vintage that they tried to pass off as the same, and then an argument when we raised it, the experience went down from there. The food was ok, but again, the fact that I remember nothing in a joint serving my favorite flavor of flesh speaks volumes.

Mother's 401 Poydras StNew Orleans, LA 70130(504) 523-9656 is famous for breakfast and for its "debris" po' boys -- the remainders of cut roast beef. The portions are huge, but nothing is particularly stand-out.

Don't bother
Deanie's Seafood 1713 Lake Avenue in Metairie promised a real crawfish boil, which is remarkably hard to find in New Orleans. When we got there, we discovered that the crawfish were out of season and therefore only frozen. We opted instead for a fried seafood sampler. The portions are enormous, but the food was average at best.

K-Paul's Lousiana Kitchen 416 Chartres Street Paul Prudhomme's Cajun flagship was dull, hackneyed and terribly overpriced.