What’s The Little Theatre of Alexandria without a Brit Wit comedy in its repertoire? For its 2013 fall season opener it has chosen Caught in the Net, a rollicking romp by the wildly successful British playwright Ray Cooney about a husband’s marital deception. And this one’s a doozy.
Mike Baker as John Smith, Annie Ermlick as Barbara Smith (Center) and Tricia O’Neill-Politte as Mary Smith – Photo credit Tabitha Rymal – Vaughn
John Smith (Mike Baker) has spent his marital life leading two lives with two wives – one in Streatham, the other in Wimbledon. He has a teenage child with each. Gavin Smith (Luke Markham) lives with his mother Barbara (Annie Ermlick), while Vicki Smith (Eliza Lore) resides with her mother Mary (Tricia O’Neill-Politte). John races back and forth between the two families, juggling his affections like a Chinese plate twirler. The trouble begins when the teens find each other on the Internet and uncover an odd coincidence. Each has a father named John Leonard Smith, age 53, taxi driver.
Luke Markham (Gavin Smith) and Eliza Lore (Vicki Smith – Photo credit Tabitha Rymal – Vaughn
The teens become fascinated by their shared knowledge and Vicki invites Gavin to tea at her home. John is appalled, or as he puts it, “horrified, mortified, petrified and crucified,” should they meet. He tells Mary that Gavin must be a sexual pervert and locks Vicki in her room. Thus begins the farcical shenanigans of John’s subterfuge and many disguises, as he tries to keep his family members from running into each other. Little white lies lead to evasions and outright fabrications as John digs his self-imposed grave.
Mike Baker (John Smith) and Paul Tamney (Stanley Gardner) – Photo credit Tabitha Rymal – Vaughn
Mike Baker presents us with a pitch perfect portrait of the harried husband caught a web of lies. In one particularly brilliant scene, faking a wrong number to conceal his identity from one of his wives, he puts on a Chinese accent, rattling off countless dishes at a furious clip to keep Barbara at bay. In another phone call Baker employs a German accent all to the relentless pace of sight gags, pratfalls and a stream of hilarious one-liners. Mary, “He’ll kill himself.” Stanley (Paul Tamney), their longtime boarder and John’s comrade-in-tomfoolery, “That would solve all our problems!”
When Stanley’s doddering, half-blind and senile grandfather, played handily by Richard Fiske, is enlisted in the scheme to keep the beautiful Barbara at bay, he rises to the occasion. “I have a curious urging in my loins,” he exclaims while lusting after her with arms outstretched.
Director Eleanore Tapscott, who recently returned to the DC area from New York where she directed Shakespeare and Moliere for the Westside Repertory Theatre, and her Co-Producer, Alan Wray, steer a terrific cast in this masterful comedy of sex, lies and mistaken identities.
Special mention to Set Designer, Michael deBlois, for the seven-door set lending the production a note of mass hysteria as the characters alternately chase and avoid each other across a central living room.
Through September 28th at The Little Theatre of Alexandria, 600 Wolfe Street. For tickets and information call the box office at 703 683-0496 or visit www.thelittletheatre.com
Thom Sesma plays the French-Vietnamese club owner who refers to himself as The Engineer in “Miss Saigon” Photo: Christopher Mueller.
With the Vietnam War as dramatic backdrop, Miss Saigon, presents a poignant tale of doomed love amidst the horrors of war. This well-known re-interpretation of Puccini’s classic opera, Madame Butterfly, with music by Claude-Michel Schönberg and lyrics by Richard Maltby, Jr. and Alain Boublil, has become one of the longest running shows ever to hit the American stage – – in no small part because of the thousands of Amerasian children called “Bui-Doi” that continue to be part of the greater tragedy.
It’s Saigon in the spring of 1975 near the close of the ‘Great Undeclared War’ when Chris, a young Marine meets Kim, an innocent country girl forced into a life of prostitution. In a strip club named Dreamland Chris’s buddy, John, buys her attentions, giving her to the forlorn Chris who is searching for meaning in a world gone mad.
The cast of “Miss Saigon” welcomes you to Dreamland, the Vietnamese nightclub where bargirl Kim will meet American GI Chris. Photo: Christopher Mueller.
The club’s owner, a crafty con man they call, ‘The Engineer” senses the men’s interest and ups the price. “Men play the moon to get fresh meat,” he snickers. Thom Sesma plays the sleazy Svengali to the hilt, delivering a memorable in-your-face performance filled with equal parts charm and smarm. “The Heat is On in Saigon” is a number aswirl in strippers, beefy Marines and lounge hustlers, but especially notable for the introduction of Gigi (Cheryl Daro) the sexy pole-dancing queen of the strippers who is crowned Miss Saigon. When Gigi, Kim and the bar girls commiserate in “The Movie in My Mind”, a song later reprised, we are forced to recognize their despair.
In one fateful night Chris and Kim find love amidst the ruins and pledge to spend their lives together. Gannon O’Brien (who took over the role of Chris on press night) showed engaging sensitivity and starry-eyed innocence against the fierce pathos of Kim as played by Diana Huey. Huey is an outstanding actress and singer whose compelling portrayal of a young woman fighting for her dignity and that of the couple’s love child in a country ravaged by war and uncertainty, is magnificent. Her delivery of “Sun and Moon” to their son, Tam, is a master class in character immersion.
A warm welcome from the girls of Dreamland (from left: Tamara Young, Katie Mariko Murray, Cheryl Daro, Diana Huey, Eunice Bae) in “Miss Saigon” Photo: Christopher Mueller.
Theatergoers will be wowed by this brilliantly crafted production. Signature Theatre’s award-winning Director, Eric Schaeffer, has assembled a cast and crew in spectacular synch. Kudos to Sound Designer Matt Rowe for the rhythmically clanking and stomping devil-masked dancers and thundering helicopter rotors in the iconic scene of the last plane out of Vietnam, and Lighting Designer Chris Lee’s blood red expression of Communist rule, neon-lit B-girls cavorting erotically, and a hauntingly evil nightmare sequence of the Commissar’s ghost. Special effects run the gamut from wind to smoke and create an atmospheric ambiance that envelops the audience in a sensory explosion. And with thirty-four spectacular musical numbers to orchestrate, Music Director Gabriel Mangiante accomplishes a herculean task using both classical and Asian instrumentation.
In this iconic show with plenty of memorable acting to rave over, Diana Huey, Thom Sesma, Christopher Mueller as Thuy, and Chris Sizemore as John, give the performances of their lives.
Chris Sizemore, playing the American soldier John, sings of reuniting families through international aid work (“Bui Doi”) in “Miss Saigon” Photo: Christopher Mueller.
Highly recommended.
Through September 29th 2013 at Signature Theatre (Shirlington Village), 4200 Campbell Avenue, Arlington, VA 22206. For tickets and information call 703 820-9771 or visit www.signature-theatre.org.
Fabio Trabocchi insists his new restaurant Casa Luca Vino E Cucina is a tribute to his roots in the Le Marche region, which also happens to be the land of truffles. “I grew up very poor and this is the food we had on our table,” he told me in a recent phone conversation. Now I’m not one to challenge a gentleman’s pentimento, but if you go by the dishes here, you will say the peasants ate very well…very well, indeed. Certainly I did on a recent visit.
Trabocchi who is far and away one of the most respected Italian chefs in the country has opened what he calls a “casual dining” experience, which is to say it is not the fine dining of Fiola, his first restaurant in Washington, DC, nor that of the Medici family table. On the other hand don’t expect massive platefuls of meatballs and spaghetti – – this is not your mamma mia’s kitchen.
Grigliata Mista di Pesci
Soft light bathes the high-ceilinged space, from the pendant lamps to the floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking 11th Street. It is a contemporary Euro vibe with a nod to the past from blowups of old family photographs. Red accent walls and grape motifs dot the room on table runners hanging from wrought iron racks to linen lampshades sporting the restaurant’s logo. Half moon banquettes offer an intimate retreat much like they do at Fiola, while window tables and outdoor seating are cherished spots for people watching.
We cooled our heels with a lovely cocktail from celebrated local mixologist Jeff Faile, who has been jockeying back and forth between the two restaurants as the staff gains their footing.
Stone fruit salad from Casa Luca
The china here is worth mentioning as it is purposely and charmingly mismatched. While plates range from white china in classic 19th C patterns or 50’s modern, soup vessels are made from old wine bottles and delicate flowered saucers appear to have been plucked straight from auntie’s breakfront. It is what you would expect to see if you were in someone’s home in the country…in Italia, that is.
The Marche Classic Cheese Bread with buffalo butter
Begin with some bread. It is not to be ignored. The “Marche Classic Cheese Bread with Buffalo Butter” is a rich, glistening, cheesy, crust-topped mega-muffin served with a steak knife and an elongated pat of butter. The butter may be superfluous, but it is certainly the point. Do it justice. I can only assume the buffalo reference comes from the water buffalo from which mozzarella di buffala is made, but I’m a bit fuzzy on the menu’s translation.
Maria Trabocchi, Fabio’s beautiful Spanish wife, created the recipe for the restaurant’s gazpacho, one of the most delectable versions this epicurean has ever lapped up. Garden vegetables are finely diced and crunchy on the bottom half. Then the same combination of tomatoes, peppers, onions and garlic is slightly pureed and floats on top. A tiny pool of aromatic olive oil rests on the surface to smooth out the flavors. It is perfection.
Maria’s gazpacho in foreground
There is a listing of piccoletti to tantalize the diner. We could not decide on which alluring small bites to choose from and so requested a smattering of each, including a chunk of manchego in rosemary and olive oiland canestrato pecorino with a few rounds of fennel salami. The cazzimperio is a slice of toasted bread piled high with meltingly ripe tomatoes piled high with capers, fennel sprigs, olives, peppery pansies and a hint of garlic – a veritable blizzard of sensuous flavors. Little cups held jewel-like salads one of sweet corn, prosciutto and mint, another of heirloom tomatoes and stracciatella, the third of burrata and tomatoes with pesto.
An assortment of piccoletti
A salad of tender greens, plums, peaches and cherries arrived adorned with colorful pansies and dressed with a whiff of vinaigrette that spelled orchard meets field in the loveliest way.
If you are looking for Trabocchi’s renowned gingered lobster ravioli, which I have written about before on these pages, you won’t find it here. These are rustic regional pastas fatta in casa. Expect some to be earthy and unrefined like smoked gnocchi with duck ragu and cremini mushrooms – – not terribly summery for my taste but a well known Le Marche dish – – or soupy like Campanelle inBrodetto with prawns. Grilled scottadito, defined as “finger burning” on the menu, are smoky, juicy, fat-laden lamb chops that beg to be picked up by the bone and gnawed over but only if dining al fresco beneath a trellis of grapevines, not supplied here.
Grigliata Mista di Pesci is a dish that embodies summer holidays whiled away along the Italian coast. Mixed grill of locally caught seafood is found most anywhere along the sea, be it Adriatic or Mediterranean. And for me Trabocchi’s way with seafood evoked sun-filled days spent seaside and starry nights of dining on the beach in sight of pastel-colored fishermen’s boats. For this dish gorgeously tender octopus, briny head-on shrimp, golden-seared sea scallops and the daily catch are grilled over a wood fire and tossed with fresh bay leaves, rosemary, parsley, olive oil and charred lemon halves. Ahhhh. La dolce vita! Could life be any sweeter than this?
Sicilian Cassata at Casa Luca
After much to-ing and fro-ing we settle on three desserts (all in the name of research, dear readers, because we are stuffed to the gills). We are steered towards the Ciambellone di Nonna Palmina, a hazelnut coffee cake sounding more like a breakfast treat. The surprising combination of caramel gelato and vin cotto to pour over the cake, assure us it is not. Sicilian Cassata is a colorful concoction of pistachio and orange semifreddo, a firm ice cream, with baby meringues and strawberry-campari sorbetto decorated with the ubiquitous pansies as is the Luca Macedonia –stone fruits and the sorbetto of the day. Each dish is beautiful in a carefree way as if tossed together with flower petals gleaned from the kitchen garden. If this is how the peasants are eating these days, I wonder what it’s like to be a duke!
Hazelnut Coffee Cake with caramel gelato and vin cotto
Casa Luca adheres to its casual definition by offering nearly two dozen wines at $28.00 a bottle with a few selections by the glass or carafe including the Tuscan Donna Laura Sangiovese the restaurant keeps on tap. But go for the limoncello with strawberry, one of four varieties of vin dolce,or one of five grappas from Poli,produced by a 5th century Veneto family since the 1800’s. And buon appetito!
Get Your Mad Men On
Photo credit – Harald Gottschalk
Craft Cocktails is writer Brian Van Flandern’s latest homage to the hand-crafted cocktails enjoyed pre-Prohibition – – a period between 1920 and 1933 when talented bartenders fled to Europe in droves, Eliot Ness and “The Untouchables” chased mobsters and moonshiners, and a hatchet-wielding Carrie Nation ransacked her way into speakeasies all under the guise of the Volstead Act banning “intoxicating liquors’ throughout the U.S. Given today’s fascination with these throwback cocktails, it’s difficult to fathom what it was like to live in the shadows just to get a little drinkie pooh.
In his follow-up collection Van Flandern, who has been named one of the “Top Ten Hotel Bartenders in the World” by Travel and Leisure Magazine, selects a few fellow bartenders from New York’s top craft cocktail lounges to join in the fun by contributing some of their recipes to the “mix”. Death & Co., PDT (Please Don’t Tell), Employees Only and Clover Club in Brooklyn are the four bars that meet his approval for innovative drinks, retro-chic ambiance and high standards of service. Mr. Van Flandern is very particular…and that should come as no surprise to those who have sampled his creations at the Bemelmans Bar at The Carlyle Hotel; The Worldship, the private residential luxury liner that plies the high seas; and Per Se, where he fine tuned his art at Thomas Keller’s Michelin three-starred restaurant in New York City.
Recipe for “Port of Call” cocktail by Brian Van Flandern
Filled with quirky-charming hand-written recipes naming the exact liquor brands along with specific instructions on how to achieve the perfect drink, Craft Cocktails is written as a companion guide to Vintage Cocktails, an earlier book in the same vein, that featured a revival of elegant handmade cocktails by the noted mixologist. Lavish photographs of the finished and garnished cocktails in period settings and in Baccarat crystal glassware are by Harald Gottschalk.
So get your shakers and stirrers out, and as the uncompromising Mr. Van Flandern would say, “Bottoms up!”
The debonair Brian Van Flandern with his cocktail kit
One of the private dining rooms. Painting by Brian T. Dang
Uber Restaurateur Ashok Bajaj Has a New Baby
When it comes to cooking up success, Ashok Bajaj has a formula that could well be called the ‘ultimate dish’. It’s simple, really. Hire a talented chef, train your staff to a fare-thee-well, commission a trendy architect to design a stylish restaurant, and put it in a high-end location with plenty of foot traffic. What could go wrong? Not a blessed thing, as it turns out.
Over the past twenty-five years, Bajaj, a transplant from New Delhi whose training at the Taj Hotels, Resorts and Palaces prepared him well for DC’s kingmakers, has been showered with umpteen awards from industry titans to magazine editors, who track his latest ventures like Bengal tigers. Earlier this year Bajaj was named “Restaurateur of the Year” by Washingtonian Magazine, an accolade bested only by his recognition by the James Beard Foundation, Forbes, CNN and GQMagazine.
So what’s nopa got that sets it apart from the others? To begin with nopa’s Executive Chef, Canadian Greg McCarty, who has brought along his impressive resumé. Before landing in DC he spent six years alongside celebrated chef, Jean-George Vongerichten at the luxurious Bahamian restaurant Dune, later trotting off to Manhattan to open Nobu 57 and assisting renowned restaurateur Drew Nieporent on a number of special projects.
The zinc bar
Described as an American brasserie, nopa’s fresh decor has beautifully transformed its earlier incarnation as Zola. Martin Vahtra, the resto’s swank designer has swept away the heavy velvet drapes to reveal a series of light-filled dining rooms with white-washed brick walls, rustic wooden beams, and a black-and-white original mosaic tiled floor beside the zinc bar to reveal a unique space that can now highlight the historic building’s distinctive architectural elements.
Let’s have a cocktail, shall we? The bar’s designer cocktails are surprisingly well priced at ten dollars and list six under two categories “The Classics” and “Signature Cocktails”. “Blood and Sand” is an updated version of the original using Black Bottle Scotch Whiskey with LuxardoCherry Liqueur, Dolin RougeVermouth and blood orange puree and “Red Envy” is an exotic concoction of El Dorado Rum, Heitz Cellar Ink Grade Port from the Napa Valley, lime and Fee BrothersChocolate Bitters. But the warm day spells gin to me, and the “800 F & Tonic” sports Plymouth Gin, house-made tonic and lavender with a ginger infusion to spice it up.
Because of its Penn Quarter proximity to the International Spy Museum and other local attractions, the menu ranges from family friendly choices like burgers and vegetarian options like the veggie bánh mi sandwich with cauliflower purée and a fresh herb salad, to fine dining and designer drinks. At a recent lunch I found some hits and a few misses. Foie gras terrine with a swoosh of carrot ginger purée was addicting, but the bluefish paté was disappointing, the negligible amount of fish in the spread renders the whole thing inconsequential and its accompanying triangles of earthy Russian-style black bread become far too ponderous a vehicle, especially when the bread basket has such alluring choices.
Nopa – Foie gras with carrot ginger swoosh – Spring radish salad with pineapple, mint and feta
Gazpacho seems to be the only soup offered. Unfortunately it was blended into the consistency of a breakfast smoothie and the crunch of summer vegetables unexpressed. But crispy soft shell crab with avocado basil purée was precisely on point as was the sprightly radish salad with chunks of pineapple, feta and mint.
Soft shell crab with avocado basil purée
When it comes to fish the chef treats it with a gentle respect, no doubt from his days in the Bahamas preparing fresh catch with a French chef, and a glazed Chilean sea bass with tender baby eggplant and wasabi pea mash was everything one would hope it would be – the sweet taste of the fish balanced against smoky soft eggplant and a hint of fire from the Japanese horseradish.
At this point dessert beckoned and it was, well, cute! Tasty fried cherry hand pies with crushed raspberry icing – the sort of thing grandma would toss into a cast iron skillet and a creamy dreamy version of banana pudding that was reminiscent of a church picnic.
I could say what a long strange trip it’s been, when reflecting on last night’s Grace Potter concert at Wolf Trap. With her band the Nocturnals the indie group performed a reimagined form of vintage psychedelia and hard-driving rock that hasn’t been heard since the heady days of the Fillmore West in the late 60’s.
Grace Potter & the Nocturnals. Photo courtesy of Wolf Trap.
You have to wonder what’s taken Potter so long to emerge as one of the most promising hard rock, blues and country stars we’ve seen since Grace Slick and Stevie Nicks stole our hearts with the same raw emotional style. Maybe it’s because Potter is too beautiful with her swirling, head tossing, mane of honey blonde hair and legs way out to the next county. Or maybe it’s because we can only imagine men tearing the guts out of their guitars to find notes that only the Eric Claptons of the world could unleash. Is the male-dominated rock world ready to accept a woman who can write her own music, dance like Isadora Duncan on LSD, play both keyboards and guitar, and sing with as pure and powerful a voice as has ever been heard on a rock stage? Oh yes, it is. And a packed house at Wolf Trap proved it last night.
Playing songs from their latest album, The Lion The Beast The Beatas well as earlier material, Potter showed off powerful wailing leads on her signature Gibson Flying V guitar and haunting notes from a Hammond B3 organ, all the while creating a bold new sound built on the old yet without ever sounding retro.
Clad in a sizzling hot platinum lamé bat-wing sleeve gown that revealed her long legs with a slit up to there, Potter and the Nocturnals opened with “I’ve Got The Medicine That Everybody Wants”. Later she gave a grateful shout-out to a guy named Sandy she knew would be at the concert and who’d introduced her parents, Sparky Potter and Peggy Sparks, to each other back in 1969 by explaining, “That’s why I’m here!” She later introduced locally born tenor saxophonist, Ron Holloway, who came on stage for a duet on “Treat Me Right” with the sentiment, “We go back to the days of hard drinking and hard touring.”
The Nocturnals consisting of Matt Burr (drums/vocals), Scott Tournet (guitar/bass/keyboard/vocals) and Benny Yurcot (guitar/bass/vocals) are as tight as they come and it shows. During one number the entire band dropped their instruments and held a group drumming session on Burr’s drums. In others Potter traded fiery licks with her fellow guitarists and gave tribute to the Jefferson Airplane with the number, “White Rabbit”.
Trombone Shorty & Orleans Avenue. Photo courtesy of Wolf Trap.
Famed musician Trombone Shorty & Orleans Avenue, opened the show. Born Troy Andrews in the Treme section of New Orleans, he’s performed with U2 and Green Day and recently played at the White House in celebration of Black History Month. His 2011 album For True features Jeff Beck and Warren Haynes. Andrews, who calls his sound “Supafunkrock”, opened with “American Woman” amping up the crowd with his fierce horn and a rumbling bass. Amazing lead guitarist, “Freaky” Pete Murano, and a back up horn section gave it the stuff soul was made of. There were George Clinton-style funkadelic 60’s riffs using a wah-wah pedal from Murano coupled with Shorty’s signature staccato repetitions in which he appeared to split notes into fractals ending in long breath-averse wails on the trombone. Though Andrews’ style gallivants around the musical map, there’s a bottom line Chicago horn sound going down, especially on power numbers like Ray Charles “I Got a Woman Way Over Town”.
There’s been a fine kettle of fish brewing in Del Ray. Raw fish, that is. Jilted by the adults-only restrictions at a new sushi bar, horrified moms lit up Twitter and the Del Ray Patch’s Facebook page with blistering comments, accusing the restaurant of discriminating against their little paragons of politeness. Others claimed they were just fishing for publicity. One writer challenged the unique name of someone’s child on the comment board. While another retorted, “One day some family is going to pull a Rosa Parks on this place!” Good heavens! What was going on in hipster Del Ray, the sweet little burb where Gen-Y parents queue up with their little angels at The Dairy Godmother for soft-serve on steamy summer nights?
Here’s the skinny, if you haven’t already heard. Six weeks ago restaurateur Mike Anderson of Mango Mike’s and Pork Barrel BBQ, opened a sushi and sake bar for adults. That’s all. If you saw the miniscule size of the place you’d realize that even one stroller could get in the way of service. There are sixteen seats at the sake bar, six stools at the sushi counter and a few banquettes along the back wall, accommodating a grand total of 45 guests who will enjoy its pleasures on weekends between 5pm and 1:30am and during the week from 5 till midnight. Get the picture?
From left – tuna tartare, yellowtail & jalapeño, salmon carpaccio and sea scallops with mango salsa and tobiko — Three Kings – toro, salmon roe and uni — Tuna, yellow tail and salmon with a quail egg shooter in iced shot glass
The Sushi Bar’s jewel box size is its charm. It’s an intimate and relaxing spot with exceptional sushi and a well-chosen sake menu. Momokawa, from Denver, Colorado, is one such sake in the nigori style. It’s the first sake ever to be produced in the US. I enjoyed its Moonstone Asian Pear, a delicate fruit-infused sake with the unmistakable floral sweetness of the fruit that dovetailed nicely with the raw fish and smoky seaweed flavors. My partner opted for the Momokawa Pearl, an unfiltered sake that was both sharp and sweet. Other sakes are in the ginjo & daijinjo, junmai and nama styles.
Moonstone Asian Pear Sake
We sat at the sushi counter with sushi master, Peter Kannasute, an abundantly cheerful fellow who delights in describing his craft. Omakase,meaning “chef’s choice”, is an option that allows the chef to dazzle the diner with a seven-course dinner that showcases his creativity. For Kannasute, that’s the highest compliment.
Fourteen years ago Kannasute came to the US from Thailand, where his family owned a restaurant in Bangkok. While attending college on Florida’s East Coast he made the decision that becoming a sushi chef was his true calling. “I asked myself what I really wanted to do,” he remembers. “I knew of one master sushi chef with his own Japanese restaurant. He hired me on and began to teach me the art of sushi. Ten years later I was the head chef.”
Master Sushi Chef Peter Kannasute with some of his creations
At age twenty-three Kannasute entered an Iron Chef-style competition at the Morikami Museum and Japanese Gardens in Delray Beach, where he went head-to-head with local leading chefs, including Jeb Bush’s private chef. “I was the only entrant who hadn’t gone to culinary school!” he recalls. “Ginger was the main ingredient. I prepared lobster rolls and won!”
Later on in his career Kannasute opened the Atlanta branch of Sushi Ra, a well-known chain of sushi restaurants, where he established himself as head sushi chef. At The Sushi Bar the young master has achieved his dream of teaching others about sushi. He expresses his philosophy in the restaurant’s logo – the Japanese symbol for ‘dream’. “I want our all our guests’ dreams to come true too.”
Red bean & green tea mochi with strawberries and yellow raspberries
Gin Takes Center Stage in Summer Cocktails
Central’s Gin Program
Summer says G&T to a lot of us, but who knew we could keep it local? In DC New Colombia Distillers is making it the juniper-based elixir the old-fashioned way in a copper pot still, launching Green Hat gin – the city’s first gin since Prohibition. The distillers even craft seasonal gins like their Spring/Summer offering with floral notes of cherry blossoms. We’ll want to serve this during next year’s Cherry Blossom Festival.
At Central Michel Richard they’ve jumped on the gin bandwagon with both feet offering US made gins and those from as far away as France, England and Scotland and using over twenty varieties in surprising concoctions to highlight its glories.
Cucumber Mint Gimlet at Central Michel Richard
There’s California’s DistilleryNo. 209 Napa Valley Gin, a citrusy gin made from an original recipe from the 1860’s and distilled five times. Or try Greenhook Ginsmiths gin out of Brooklyn, NY whose product is made from organic wheat using Tuscan juniper, elderflowers and chamomile in the blend. Berkshire Mountain Distillers, the first distillery in the Berkshires since 1911, is in the town of Great Barrington where my family had a country retreat nearby. This summer Central presents a cocktail made from the company’s “Greylock” gin. It’s called ‘Gin Blush’ and uses Campari, Chinotto, orange and lemon to enhance its charms.
The bar at Central has a rotating menu of four cocktails that are indelibly creative. Try a ‘Lavender Gin Rickey’ made with FEW American Gin and lavender turmeric syrup, or this one that sounds particularly appealing, ‘Summertinez’, made with the UK-based Hayman’s Old Tom Gin, VyaSweet Vermouth, Triple Sec and house made strawberry rhubarb bitters. General Manager David Hale partners with the staff to come up with new concoctions every week. Cheers to that!
Clyde’s Turns 50
Clyde’s CEO and partner, John Laytham, is reveling in half a century of success. “I don’t know of too many restaurants that have been around for fifty years or too many restaurant companies who haven’t closed a restaurant,” he remarks in his book How We Do Business, Clyde’s Primer For Beating The Odds In The Restaurant Business (Brick Tower Press).
Scheduled for August release, the book chronicles the history of the company’s fourteen restaurants and is broken down into vignette conversations with the company’s founding partners who reflect on the restaurants’ proud history and their modus operandi. The lateStuart C. Davidson quoting the 4th Earl of Chesterfield, espoused the business’s core philosophy by once remarking, “Anything worth doing is worth doing well.” The company has proven that adage beyond a shadow of a doubt with an enterprise that has continued to grow and prosper.
Pages are filled with photographs of Clyde’s formative years in Georgetown. I checked to see if I was in one of them, but didn’t see myself, though I lived around the corner on Cecil Place and misspent a good bit of my reckless youth downing Bloody Marys and ripping into steak tartare amidst its red-and-white checkered tablecloths. Oh, the memories…
Clyde’s in Georgetown – Stuart Davidson hanging from fire escape; John Laytham in the bib overalls holding straw boater
There are beautiful images of Old Ebbitt’s Grill and the group’s newest outpost, The Hamilton in downtown DC, a spectacular 37,000 square foot entertainment venue, restaurant and bar that had its first incarnation as Garfinkel’s luxury department store. And even Clyde’s famous chili recipe has here been revealed. Unfortunately no photos of The Tombs tare provided, though my initials might still be carved in one of the tables.
Local writer, Food Network producer and documentarian, J. Garrett Glover, does a fine job of capturing the owners’ personalities with an ear for humor and a keen perspective on the history of Clyde’s and its many outposts.
