Ladies and gentleman, whores and whoremongers... I can confidently say I have found THE best steak and cheese eggroll in the city (well, the District that is). Now, as a DC resident of a combined 5 years now and the gastronome/fatass at heart that I am, I have had my share of steak and cheese eggrolls. Have you ever experienced love at first taste? Yes, TASTE. The minute you bite into these crispy, steamy pockets of deliciousness, you know better. Not only do they add the proper fixins of a steak and cheese (grilled onions and peppers), the eggroll wrap is flaky and crispy to perfection! A better grade of steak (not that gristly stuff), and cheesy, actually MELTY cheese (I loved Dandy's at HU but I'm pretty sure they used 'guvment' cheese in the steak and cheese eggrolls). They're simply delicious. Delicious pockets of hot heaven.
For everyone that doesn't reside in the DMV (from a Michiganian POV), DC's carryouts are equivalent to Coney Islands in Detroit. They sell a little bit of everything and you have your favs but the carryout takes it a bit further and have the nerve to sell Chinese food, pizza, burgers, seafood and subs! Don't get me wrong, I'll order that lunch special steak and cheese, fries and a ginger ale in a MINUTE...it was just a little shocking to see when moved here back in 2006.
My dear sweet mother came to visit me in DC and since I know she loves steak and cheeses AND all things crispy, I took her to try one. My mama took one bite and was like "this is best eggroll I've ever HAD!" I couldn't say anything but "Yes, Ma. Yes, it is" Lmao...this is the effect they have on people, I'm not even exaggerating. My kindred Jerell K. felt the same way, too bad we couldn't actually make it to Lucky's (amongst other things that Homecoming weekend lol)
***Note: After writing my post on Lucky's, I ran into a damned good steak and cheese eggroll from Panda Chinese Restaurant, somewehere in NE. I ain't mad at their Chinese food either. Their steak and cheese is GOOD but I think they remain a close second behind Lucky's because they put real peppers and onions in that joint!
Also, if you're not near a carry out and you wanna try them, they're pretty easy to make on your own! I make them for the fam when I go home since my mom went raving. All you need is:
Steak Umms (or some other thinly sliced steak product)
Egg roll wrap
Your choice of shredded cheese (feel free to mix!)
An egg
Oil
Onions, Peppers, and/or mushrooms if you like
Sautee the steak and accoutrements and scoop spoonsfuls into the wrap (follow directions on the package for proper wrappage). Deep fry those boys for 3 to 5 mins and enjoy! :D
Andy trying to snap pics of Black women who notice
Today, I finally got the opportunity to stop into Dangerously Delicious Pies on H Street. It's the expansion of a pie shop from Baltimore where they serve both sweet and savory pies, and quiche. I've been wanting to stop in out of curiosity for a minute but when my Supervisor brought them up at work it crept its way up to the top of my food sampling list. Since I had a little time, I pulled up the menu so I wouldn't seem like a newbie when I make my order. The mixed reviews online only piqued my interests and I couldn't help but to see a set few pies recurring in all the reviews. So, when I got there I ordered the SMOG pie (Steak, Mushrooms, Onions and Gruyere) with complimentary salad and a slice of the Baltimore Bomb pie for dessert.
Now the SMOG delivered everything it promised (big chunks of steak and mushroom in cheesy goodness) and it was GOOD but The Baltimore Bomb??? YUM! Okay? It's a pie borrowed from the original store since it was such a popular seller (DC's local pie is the Marion Berry w/Marrionberries from the Pacific Northwest served with Rock Candy--Rude, right?!). The Baltimore Bomb is, per the menu, "loaded with Berger cookies [a B-more specialty] that melt down into a sweet vanilla chess filling" and that ish don't BEGIN to describe how delicious this damn pies is! It's like a vanilla custard base on flacky pie crust and the cookies literally melt in! Like they were creme-brulee-edon top...it was delicious!
Also, H Street Corridor is on its way to being the new U Street, Adams Morgan, Dupont type area. There's new bars and restaurants galore and they're building a trolley car route through it. There's even a spa for kids and toddlers which is absolutely RIDICULOUS but that's another issue. But of course there are "Others" in all the residential streets of the main street..and you KNOW they ain't settling for Popeye's and a Foot Locker.
All I have to say is that the entity that is Good Food Eatery is most definitely appropriately named....YUM. Today I finally got to go to this new spot I'd been hearing about in DC called Good Stuff Eatery. Right next door is We, the Pizza, a pizzeria under the same owner. I had heard about these places from several different sources so being able to work that into today's schedule was a great treat for me.
http://www.goodstuffeatery.com/
My roommate Brittani and I walked in around 4pm with her young nephew visiting from Detroit. For the gastronome who loves homemade burgers and hand cut fries, THIS was the burger joint for ME! I. love. burgers. They also had decadently tasty milkshakes and I don't even MESS with shakes like that. Cookies and cream with an oreo and fresh made whipped cream hit the spot but next time I wanna try the d-lechable leche or toasted marshmellow shake-- it looks DE-licious. We even met the owner's old, Jewish father who was telling us how they're expanding and his son was soon to have his own show!
I was especially excited about how fresh all the ingredients are, one can surely taste the difference in the food. My other roomie Jamie literally exclaimed "I don't wanna eat anymore, it's just so GOOD!" I didn't check her seat or anything but I'm pretty sure her 'gasm (expanded) to regions far lower than her mouth. Lol.
So...if you're near the Pennsylvania Ave/Eastern market area (and even if you're not!), do YOURself a favor and stop in :o)
Helloooooo again! Excuse the massive gap in posts, I've been in the after graduation shuffle thus, unfortunately, broke. Of course low funds means cutting back on eating out :o( BUT, in an interesting change of events, I've realized that I can keep this thing going and make my blog "poverty friendly" by doing posts on the delicious treats made by everyday people. We all know some of (if not all of) the best food is made with a personal touch. Homegrown. Down South. Or in a hole in the wall somewhere like my absolute favorite West African restaurant, Sumah's in DC (but that's another post). Considering this, I'm going to now include any and all Mouthgasms, not just restaurants....enjoy :o)
*Sigh* So I'm back in DC, my beloved second home, on this job hunt. I've been on a rollercoaster ride of straight bullsh*t since graduation and I refuse to settle for mediocrity. In between applying for additional jobs and prepping for interviews, you know I haaaad to reach out to the HU homies in the area! After about a week and a half of keeping my alter "Patricia Dawn" under control, I ended up sharing 'Christmas presents' with Queen Sawdayah and a new friend, Zaria. Zaria is a senior Print Journalism major at HU's illustrious John H. Johnson School of Communications. It's always great to meet new, intriguing people and Zaria is just that. As I got to know her, she reminded me so much of myself. Her sense of humor, paranoid tweaks and being a stickler for last names in the Contacts list was like I was looking into my very own personality mirror. This was only solidified when I tried her bomb ass recipe for a tuna melt at Subway...delicious fooood!
This is not an actual photo but it looks tasty, no? Geneva (my phone) threw a hissy fit, and decided not to work.
**********Toppings and instructions for Zaria's Tuna Melt ***********
Starts off with their Italian Herb and Cheese bread then white American cheese and tuna, toasted. Then add veggies, sauce an seasonings:
Lettuce
Tomato
Onions
Pickles
Banana Peppers
Cucumbers
Light Mayo
Oil & Vinegar
Salt & Pepper
Oregano
Chipotle sauce
**********************************************************
Let me also add that I've never been a fan of tuna melts. Something about hot fish with cheese on it didn't sit well with me. BUT when I tell you I've never shoved something down my throat so smoothly...yeah. It was the sloppiest, most delicious mess I've ever eaten. Completely yummy. I'm definitely gonna swap up my tunas with this recipe, my own tuna seems kinda boring in comparison. (Toasted wheat with salt and pepper on the tuna, lettuce, tomato and pickle....in case you were wondering. What? Shut up, you'll never be the man your mother is! :oP)
For more creative genius from Zaria you can follow her on Twitter @ZariaPoem and check out her personal blog.....
A little over a month ago, I returned from a magical two week vacation/University business trip to the French West Indies or, the lower Antilles islands of the Caribbean, specifically Martinique and Guadeloupe. It all began during my French-Caribbean Literature class where we read a massive amount of work by poet and Négritude co-founder Aimé Césaire (The amount of Césaire literature we read in class made a LOT of sense when we got to Martinique, but that's to be revealed later). When spring broke, a group of wonderful students from AMEP (Association Martiniquaise d'Education Populaire) came to the States and visited Howard University where we hosted them for a day. We enjoyed them so much we decided to go visit them in Martinique and also try to establish an exchange program between Howard University and the Université des Antilles et de la Guyane (UAG). We put on our artillery uniforms and marched to the A Building at Howard University and asked for money to go. After weeks of follow up emails, phone calls and impromptu office visits, we managed to secure the funds for the trip.
Martinique.
This island may as well be known as "Aimé Césaire-land", there are pictures of this man EVERYWHERE! The airport is named after him AND we went to see a play based on a poem he wrote in an "Aimé Césaire" theater. He is definitely their hometown hero! Either way, the Martinican land, people and culture are beautiful and amazing. It was so intriguing to see brown skinned people and listen to them speak their native language of French. And, because Martinique and Guadeloupe (along with French Guyana) are territories of France, so was their lifestyle. Their food was like a mix of French and Louisiana Creole. For breakfast, we had baguettes with Nutella and hot chocolate. At my host family's house, I woke up to the sounds of fighting roosters, where I also find out those suckers crow all day, not just in the morning!) We slept under mosquito nets At Tati Marie- Élise's, a fabulous woman was awarded a prestigious Légion d’honneur (Legion of Honor) by France. Every get together (party, kid birthday, religious holiday) was celebrated with lots of people, delicious Kreyol food and rum. Lots and lots of RUM! In keeping his promise to always provide a good time, it was thanks to rum that we witnessed our upstanding professor get loose (and LOW) on the dance floor! We met lots of great people including many members of our Professor's family, University and high school students, authors, government officials and random people who heard speaking English and wanted to practice. We even learned some of their Antillean Kreyol. At the moment I can only recall "Mwen pa sa parle Kreyol" which means "I don't speak Kreyol" so there you have it...I'm a polyglot :o) My favorite Antillean food is definitely gonna be the "accras", a fritter. We firsts had "accras de morue" which is codfish fritter but THEN we had the overwhelming pleasure of running into "accras de crevette"... SHRIMP fritters! I ate so many fritters at the Francois house, I should have been helping with the dishes. And it didn't help that they also served a delectable thick yellow cale with a layer of banana jam between the cake and its crust. It. was. DELICIOUS. My mouth is watering just typing about it. (By the way, Dimitri if you're reading this, tell your mom my email inbox is still waiting for those recipes...whenever she's ready :o) Definitely, Martinique's best features are those of their origin. The "métissage" of Antillean (Caribbean) culture with the French is what makes Martinican culture so exciting.
Guadeloupe.
We spent a few days during the latter half of our trip in the neighboring island of Guadeloupe, also a French territory. My colleagues and I felt a little more at home here because (1) we had an entire apartment to ourselves, thanks to our professor's family and (2) Guadeloupean culture was a little more Caribbean than French so we all felt a little less like outsiders. We also met with the UAG students at the Guadeloupe campus where, among other things, I learned about a local treat called "bokit".
A "bokit" is a hot sandwich served on "agoulou", a warm chewy bread that LOOKS like a pita pocket. We found a little park near our apartment that had vendors, live music, and kids playing-- all at 11pm on a Sunday. Like we were warned, the line at the bokit stand was long and the types of bokit VARY! They had dozens of toppings but I played it safe and got one with steak, egg and chesse. It was DEE-licious and kinda reminded me of a breakfast sandwich. We also had lunch at a trendy little restaurant whose name I have NO IDEA of because there was no sign on the building. Just know that everything else was on. point. Food. Decor. Music selection...ON POINT!
We walked in this "hole in the wall" to find small but quaintly decorated white paradise bumping D'Angelo. Yes....D'ANGELO. A mixtape of live covers and songs from his albums. I was so pleased (Color Purple voice). When we saw/tasted our food, I was looking around for St. Peter. It was perfect! I ordered the stewed goat. Erica and Brandon ordered the tandoori chicken, of which Erica labeled "the best tandoori she'd ever had"and she's had her share of tandoori. Erica, the trip's resident picky eater (love you Erica!) even dubbed this the best meal of our entire trip. I was forced to oblige. I wish I had gotten a picture of the building or asked our waiter the name of the place. Everything was delightful.
Needless to say, I greatly enjoyed my trip to the Antilles. It was the best trip I've been on in my 22 years and I hope to be able to experience other countries this way. BUT I also think that Martinique and Guadeloupe will hold a special place in me forever. I've already settled on buying a home there some day. If you know or want to learn French, go visit! I think you'll enjoy it :o)
***Àma famille martiniquaise***
De nouveau, je crois que je suis vraiment Martiniquaise et à présent
Remember that other HORRIBLE Mexican restaurant that I mentioned the other day? The crappy one with the crappy service? Yeah, well this place was the complete OPPOSITE of that :o) And I'm still disappointed that a smaller, more authentic restaurant with Mexicans in the kitchen would allow themselves to be showed up by a chain but they did. The chain? On The Border Mexican Grill and Cantina. My particular visit was the Orange, CT location (random, I know).
I'm in Connecticut because I'm visiting my old college suitemate, DeAndra. I finally got in at like 4pm and hadn't eaten all day so we were looking for cheap and delicious food. And cheap and delicious, we found. Our waitress attended to us immediately and was better than great the entire time we were there. We got there before 7pm which meant we made it for Happy Hour! Appetizers and drinks were half price so my ass got two mango and passionfruit margaritas! Why not? Little did I know, they were massive. They came with hot chips and salsa, as they should! (I forgot to mention at Mixtec, our rude waitress had the nerve to tell us that chips and salsa were not free, we had to order that travesty of a dish as an appetizer). Adding to my excitement, they hand press their tortilla chips right there in the restaurant! Fresh chips, fresh salsa, fresh guac and balling ass Margaritas= an amazing intro to On The Border. I was ecstatic, because I only saw my experience getting better. To maximize, I went ahead and asked the waitress what was good, specifically the Dos Equis fish tacos (I've been meaning to try them for awhile now). The waitress answered "Oh my God, I can't even, oh my God!". That was all I needed to hear. DeAndra got beef brisket tacos and her fiance Michael got the taco salad. About 15 mins later, our waitress arrived with our plates and everything was GREAT! She was NOT LYING about those fish tacos! They were cooked in Dos Equis beer batter and the fish was flaky and delicious. It was served on a grilled tortilla with cheese, shredded cabbage and a really tasty chipotle ranch-ish sauce that complimented very well. DeAndra's beef brisket tacos came with little "onion strings" kinda like thin onion rings that she SMASHED so I'm assuming they were tasty. By the time I looked over at Mike's taco salad, it was nonexistent. Yeah.
(These aren't the ACTUAL tacos I had. I couldn't get pics so I wanted to provide a close visual)
So, yeah, I don't really have much else to say other than On The Border is the shit. For real. I overindulged on chips and salsa so by the time my fish tacos got there, I was full. Thus, we packed everything up for a round two later that evening. We were planning on having our friend Allen* over and I figured I'd finish enjoying them then. Not. NOT! Remember I said i had two massive mango margaritas? Yeah, well those shits set in by the time we were leaving. I cool sailed out of there, praising our waitress for her good service on the way, and forgot all the food on the table. (As a matter of fact, I'm writing this post right now hungry as shit.)
Final thoughts: GO TO ON THE BORDER! NOW! Seriously, treat yourself. You deserve it :o)
(CGIU posts are designed to point out the restaurants that failed to satisfy me during my visit, thus, I think the title serves correct)
It's funny, I was just thinking these posts are probably getting boring. I figured I could only talk about delicious food for so long before it became a "same sh**, different day" situation. In the event that this true, today's post will be brand new sh** on a totally different day, thus the "couldn't get it up" category. Today's failure of a meal came from Mixtec Mexican Restaurant in Adams Morgan.
Looks good right? Blah.
I've been meaning to try MixTech for awhile now since they advertise themselves with actual pictures of the food looking all delicious. And I won't take that away from them, the food did look delicious. The taste? Not so much. In fact, not at ALL. But I won't start there, let's start at the beginning so you can really understand my disappointment.
We get to the restaurant where my friend Brandon and I literally walk into a room full of people eating. No person smiling, saying "welcome to MixTech". No stand with the sign that says "Please wait to be seated" or "Seat Yourself". No scarecrow substitute. Nothing. Just blatant disrespect. But I'll take it, I'll be nice. I walk over to the kitchen area and ask the first chick I see, "do we just sit down or...?" She tells me to sit and someone will be over. We do and we are left reading the menu for like 15, 20 mins. When my waitress comes to the table, it's the same chick I just spoke to in the kitchen and she goes "you ready?" (BEAT) You ready? YOU READY?! Have some courtesy and introduce yourself! "Hi, my name is Rrrosa and I'll be your waitress this evening!" No? Okay. We tell her we're not quite ready yet and she takes off. No "how are you?", no taking of drink orders, just no air of "my job is waiting tables and these people will probably tip me based on my performance tonight". Apparently Rosa didn't get the memo. Long story short, she finally brings us our food and the piss poor excuse for chips and salsa (looked like they shook all the flavor off of some Doritos chips and stole some day old pico de gallo from Busboys and Poets). I ordered a Yul Brynner burrito (the menu claims he like it) and Brandon had chicken tacos and they were both completely tasteless. Like TASTELESS.
It's Mexico, they have seasonings right? Somehow Taco bell is getting a hold of some, I'm not sure where Mixtec got left out.
At this point, I am the embodiment of "disappointment" At home, there's a restaurant near me in Dearborn Heights (Detroit) called Mexican Fiesta. Lucky for me, this place is one of the best Mexican restaurants in the city. They make their own chips and they're served hot out the grease with salsa. Did I mention they're hot? It's delicious. Seriously (in fact, post on them coming soon). But Mixtec? IT ALL TASTED LIKE MULTIPLE PILES OF NOTHING. In fact, without any intent of being malicious, I can comfortably say that Mixtec was the worst restaurant I've ever been to in my life. It blew me that I was loading my fork with delicious LOOKING food and tasting none of it. I should've eaten styrofoam, I'm sure it would have been cheaper. There's nothing worse than getting full off of nasty food. Don't ever, I mean EVER be fooled into going to MixTec in Adams's Morgan. There's nothing worse than EXPECTING highly of something and it being lower than your previously expected low! Not even in the ball park of what you expected. AND the service was bad. It was ALL AROUND BAD! That was like buying tickets to see Kanye West and you get there and Webbie's on stage. Singing some old song that was hot for a minute like 2 YEARS ago. You'd be pissed, right? In all, don't allow yourself to be fooled by the smiling white people in the window, it tastes like shit. Probably worst.
My dear sweet mother came to visit me in DC and since I know she loves steak and cheeses AND all things crispy, I took her to try one. My mama took one bite and was like "this is best eggroll I've ever HAD!" I couldn't say anything but "Yes, Ma. Yes, it is" Lmao...this is the effect they have on people, I'm not even exaggerating. My kindred Jerell K. felt the same way, too bad we couldn't actually make it to Lucky's (amongst other things that Homecoming weekend lol)
