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Jordan Wright
December 7th, 2009
 striking 12 Valerie Vigoda, Gene Lewis, and Brendan Milburn in Striking 12 at Arena Stage December 2 - December 13, 2009 (photo by Joan Marcus) Groove Lily etched a new groove at Arena Stage last night with their performance of Striking 12. Based on Hans Christian Andersen’s story of ‘The Little Match Girl’ this rock musical, co-written by band members, Valerie Vigoda, on electric violin, keyboardist Brendan Milburn and playwright, Rachel Sheinkin, is an enchanting, heart-wrenching, comedic avenue into the soul.
Set in modern-day New York, with flashbacks to Copenhagen, all roles are played by the three musicians…add blow-out drummer and record producer, Gene Lewin, who channels a Jewish grandma better than Estelle Getty. It’s a knockout show by a rock band with multi-dimensional talents.
I was introduced to Groove Lily seven or eight years ago by a good friend who has now made it a sideline to book acts for Focus Music (an all-volunteer org that presents folk and acoustic music around the DC area). I fell for their tight power-packed sound and well-enunciated lyrics but even more so by the force-of-nature haunting violin strains of Vigoda, who grew up in McLean, VA. If you’ve never heard her play you are missing a piece of your heart.
Around that same time the Army used her image in a recruiting print ad that was featured in every mainstream mag across the nation. There was red-hot Valerie in her camo fatigues and combat boots, wailing on her violin and urging future rock stars to join Uncle Sam. She got some flak for that…not the ammo type.
She was a part timer, ROTC in college, with an 8-year commitment in the reserves as a weekend warrior and then four years with the IRR. She says it gave her the skills and stick-to-tiveness she needed for show biz, though she never once played in an Army band.
I spoke to Vigoda this week as she and husband, Milburn, were en route to New York’s Lincoln Center to receive ASCAP’s Richard Rogers New Horizons Award. (Tiny disclosure here: I am a 40-year member of ASCAP. My sister a 25-year member of New York’s prestigious Outer Critics Circle.)
Jordan Wright – What was the first instrument you played?
 striking 12 Valerie Vigoda in Striking 12 at Arena Stage December 2- December 13, 2009 (Photo by Joan Marcus). Valerie Vigoda – I used to sit on the piano bench with my father [Bob Vigoda, noted jazz musician] and learned to play with him. I wanted to play trumpet but I never could have sung and played had I chosen that.
JW – Do you play any other instruments?
VV – I played mandolin in the Cyndi Lauper band and I’ve just learned the banjo.
JW – I understand you are writing for Disney now. What’s that like?
VV – We have written the theme song for Pixar’s TinkerBell and the Lost Treasure, a prequel to Peter Pan, being released direct to Blu-Ray and DVD. It sold 2 million copies in its first week. It’s our first song for a movie. I can’t believe how big it is! They now have Pixie Hollow attractions at Disneyland and in Disney Paris. All these little girls go crazy to meet TinkerBell and her fairy friends. They love TinkerBell! There will be six of these movies. So now we are writing songs for the second, third and fourth one.
Also we have written the music for Toy Story: The Musical – an adaption for the stage of the movie that came out in 1995 with Randy Newman songs. This new version will be live on stage at the Hyperion Theater at Adventure Park next year where it will be presented four times a day. It’s currently on the Disney cruise ships.
At the theme parks it will have a giant orchestra with puppets made by Michael Curry [who did the phantasmagorical puppets for Cirque de Soleil, The Lion King and the Olympic Opening Ceremonies]. It’s a spectacular multi-million dollar Broadway-type production with a big cast, about 25 people, and we are so excited because we have loved Toy Story since we saw it when Brendan and I first started dating.
JW – Do you record at the Disney studios?
VV – We go there around once a week and work song by song.
JW – Will you perform at Lincoln Center the night you receive your award?
VV – We’ll play “Only a King” from our show Sleeping Beauty Wakes.
JW – Will you be doing any solo work?
VV – Ernest Shackleton Loves Me is my one-woman show. I’m playing the banjo in it. For a long time we’ve been planning to do a show just for me. I love a live audience and get twitchy without it. Whereas Brendan is not as interested in performing. So we’re writing this show together with Joe Di Pietro who wrote the current Broadway hit MEMPHIS and I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change.
JW – Did I hear that you’re doing Striking 12 at Imagination Stage in Bethesda next week?
VV – Well, we won’t be in it. Actually Striking 12 is currently in production on over a dozen stages worldwide. We were able to license the show – adapt it for others to do with larger casts. It will be in Korea this coming year.
JW – What’s on the immediate horizon for you?
VV – Sleeping Beauty Wakes is another show we’re really excited about. It’s in development at the McCarter Theatre in Princeton, NJ. We are very hopeful that we are going to take the show to Broadway. We wrote it but won’t perform it. It’s a fairy tale with a twist about Sleeping Beauty oversleeping for a thousand years and waking up in a modern-day sleep clinic. It’s another collaboration with Rachel Sheinkin who won a Tony award for The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee.
Bob Vigoda, who had initially been apprehensive about his daughter’s career choice, still lives in McLean, VA, no longer afraid of her following in his footsteps.
Conducted, edited and condensed by Jordan Wright. For comments or queries contact [email protected] or visit www.WhiskandQuill.com .
Striking 12 will be at Arena Stage in Crystal City until December 13th.
www.ArenaStage.com
www.GrooveLily.com
www.FocusMusic.org
Jordan Wright
December 7, 2009
 Sarah, The Duchess of York discusses her film, The Young Victoria at Neiman Marcus - photo by Jordan Wright The strikingly disarming Sarah Ferguson, Duchess of York, familiar to us as ‘Fergie’, stood in a black and red wool suit at Neiman Marcus today and told the story of Queen Victoria and her great love, Prince Albert. She called it, “A contemporary love story in an historical setting.”
 The rare and signed Clive Christian perfume 'No. 1' - photo by Jordan Wright In her role as co-producer, along with seasoned filmmakers Martin Scorsese, Tim Headington and Graham King, the Duchess of York was the driving force in getting the film made. The film stars Emily Blunt and Rupert Friend and opens on December 18th.
The Duchess, whose own difficulties are long behind her, described the travails of Victoria before she became Queen of England, “Her mother was extremely strong-willed and kept her in her tummy,” she said, “withholding delivery throughout a six-week drive over unpaved roads, all the way to London, so that she that she could be born in England.
“Oh, I thought that was interesting!” she quipped. “In order to get the Regency from her uncle, the King, Victoria was kept in a gilded cage for 17 years. She never saw anybody, never talked to anybody and wasn’t allowed to read. The King was furious!” she said. She said the story had so touched her that she became committed to making the film which was started six years ago.
“At eighteen she took the throne as the youngest reigning sovereign ever. She and Albert had nine children in 25 years. A very passionate love story!”
I asked her about the costumes displayed around her, “Are they costumes from the film?”
 Emily Blunt as Queen Victoria in The Young Victoria - photo by Jordan Wright “Yes they are and look at that tiny waist! They wore corsets. Albert wore corsets too!” she let on.
 Victoria Christian and Sarah, The Duchess of York at the Neiman Marcus signing - photo by Jordan Wright Accompanying the Duchess was Victoria Christian, there to introduce Clive Christian ‘No. 1’, described as one of “the rarest and most expensive scents ever created”, only 1,000 bottles are produced annually and retail for $2350.00.
Twenty-five years ago a young Victoria discovered an original bottle beneath the floorboards of their family’s Victorian manor home. Her father, Clive Christian, founder of the noted British Design House, was so inspired by its association with Queen Victoria, that he bought the 1800’s Perfumery to the Queen in 1999 in order to revive the line.
Later the pair sat together in the store while the Duchess graciously signed boxes of the perfume and posters of the upcoming film.
No gaffes were sighted and the Duchess appeared to have a splendid time among the excited photo-snapping shoppers.
For questions or comments write to [email protected] and visit www.WhiskandQuill.com.
Jordan Wright
December 2, 2009
 Food Network's Chef Guy Fieri at the Metropolitan Cooking and Entertaining Show - photo credit Jordan Wright I never expected to like Guy Fieri. His edgy, peroxided, spiky-haired style insults my delicate sensibilities. Yet here I was at the recent Metropolitan Cooking and Entertaining Show doubled over, tears pouring down my cheeks and flat out yukking it up with the rest of his die-hard fans. I went because my grandson loves his crazy hip food-as-vaudeville revue and how he jazzes up his Food Network show, “Diners, Drive-ins and Dives”, by peppering descriptions with, “That’s how I roll!” and “That’s money!” when he tastes something he really really likes, which happens on every episode.
My grandson couldn’t be there but I wanted to let him know how cool I could be and take some photos for him. So avoiding the cheek-to-jowl crush on the floor of the exhibit space, I ducked in to see the Food Network stars.
Fieri is not intimidated by a live audience or the glitches that can misfire a smooth cooking demo. (Poor Giada De Laurentis’s stage set was a disaster, with ingredients and equipment that had gone missing. She nearly broke down with embarrassment and frustration. Who wouldn’t?)
After a bout of flinging cheese into the audience, “It’s always a party when you chuck Havarti!” he quipped, an audience member said she’d like to sing to him. He jumped on the offer and invited anyone else to come up to the mike while he prepared pork al fuego. One woman said, “I want to sing for you but all I can think of is if you want my body and you think I’m sexy”. She sang…well sort of howled…the totally inappropriate Rod Stewart hit, but Fieri just cracked up and the place went wild. You had to be there. I’m a fan of his now. The show. Not so much.
The Gaylord National’s new Christmas tradition is a show called ICE! They held a press reception for the event’s opening that was an extravaganza worthy of P. T. Barnum himself. It featured a sixty-foot candy-like glass Christmas tree, indoor “snowfall”, outdoor fireworks display, Northern Lights show, 60-foot dancing water fountain, 75-voice choir and a life-size PEEP! Not a partridge in sight, but over the Xmas holidays these and other events are being held around the resort and spa…Peppermint Patti manicures, anyone?
 Ice penguins from ICE at the Gaylord National Resort - photo credit Jordan Wright ICE itself is a glistening technological wonder with massive three-dimensional ice sculptures, some over two stories, created by 40 international artisans. The huge tented pavilion is kept at 7 degrees! But don’t worry they provide snow parkas a la Maid of the Mist in Niagra Falls. The kids will love it. I found it gaudy, glorious and astounding. There’s something for everyone.
Have I mentioned that local chef Jose Andres has been name “Chef of the Year” by GQ? No surprise to this writer who has been championing his cuisine for a year in Whisk and Quill. Stories on his book launch for “Made in Spain – Spanish Dishes for the American Kitchen” that he co-authored with MSNBC’s erudite and adorable Richard Wolffe in November 2008 and my interview with him as featured chef at the National Gallery of Art’s Garden Café in July for its Spanish armor exhibit, are still archived on the site. This past October I wrote of his “Eat, Drink, Dream” joint venture launch party with Ridgewell’s after he was tapped by Harvard to speak with Ferran Adria and in a Nibbles and Sips item I related his exclusive introduction to the US of the heavenly Iberico de Bellota pork which he prepared for us at his home in Maryland.
With the holidays upon us here’s a hot tip for the Washington area hostess. Conklyn’s Florist, an Alexandria company that has been around for over 70 years and who specializes in Dutch and other European flowers and orchids, has a new location open to the public to purchase their blooms for the same prices as the trade. One of the nation’s largest wholesalers, out of 32,000 florists they have always been in the top ten!
In pots you will find the not-Christmas-without pointsettias of all sizes, amaryllis and paper whites starting to bloom, as well as cut tulips, kangaroo paws, gerberas, sprays of cymbidiums, just like in our favorite four-star hotels, and hundreds of other to-die-for blooms for decorating our homes or as house gifts. Their new address is 4406 Wheeler Avenue in Alexandria. It’s just off Duke Street on the north side of town. Call 703 299-9000 for their special to-the-public hours. Tell owner David Hicks I sent you and don’t say I didn’t share…
 Gerbera daisies at Conklyn's wholesale outlet - photo credit Jordan Wright Little secret: Newly named White House florist, Laura Dowling of Alexandria’s Interieurs et Fleurs, has been sourcing them for ages. To make your own fabulous floral arrangements a la 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, check out her website below for divine inspiration.
The tony Lemaire Restaurant at the Jefferson Hotel in Richmond which I wrote about for the Georgetowner in October has been chosen by Esquire Magazine as one of the country’s “Best New Restaurants of 2009”. Noted food critic John Mariani recognized Chef Walter Bundy’s superlative cuisine and his determination to use locally-sourced provisions.
From my friends in Middleburg – A sweet tale of a hapless pony.
 A better life - photo credit Jordan Wright Molly is a pony rescued by Kaye and Glenn Harris of Middleburg. After surviving Hurricane Katrina she met her match with a vicious pit bull whose damage caused the amputation of one of her legs and a subsequent prosthesis. A children’s book has been written about her journey and the story has traveled around the world. You can meet Molly and author, Pam Kaster, at Books and Crannies Book Store on Washington Street in Middleburg after the Christmas parade this Saturday, December 5th. This beautiful parade with hunters on horseback in full regalia starts at 11am. Molly will be signing books.
 Chef Spike Mendelsohn and Alyssa at the St. Regis bar - photo credit Jordan Wright And finally… Projected to open in late February “Spike” Mendelsohn and his Sunnyside Restaurant Group’s newest endeavor “We, The Pizza”, will offer New York style pizza and ten other more gourmet topped pies. Imagine potato and pancetta and creamed spinach pies. Spike will bring in the old soda fountain concept using homemade fruit purees for his seltzer-finished sodas, natural syrups for his egg creams (I hope he’ll use New York’s gold standard Fox’s U-Bet Chocolate Syrup for all of us purists.) and made from scratch gelatos with ingredients sourced from local Virginia farms.
Spike knows pizza from living in NY as well as his travels throughout Italy and Spain. He told me, “We wanted to put our twist on America’s favorite food.” He also plans on doing flavored jalapeno and truffled “knots” which are becoming increasingly trendy.
The sleek and retro-style restaurant will be next door to Michelle Obama’s favorite hamburger haven…Spike’s wildly successful, Good Stuff Eatery. “It’s been a great ride to be in DC and to be well respected in the Hill area where we’ve made so many friends. And we’re very proud to be opening our second restaurant in a year and a half.”
www.metrocooking.com
www.ChristmasonthePotomac.com
www.JoseAndresCatering.com
www.conklyns.com
www.lauradowling.com
www.JeffersonHotel.com
www.BooksandCrannies.com
www.GoodStuffEatery.com
For questions or comments on this article contact [email protected] or visit www.whiskandquill.com.
Jordan Wright
The Georgetowner and Downtowner
November 2009
 Chef Mesnier with his gingerbread house - photo credit Jordan Wright “And had I but one penny in the world, thou should’st have it to buy gingerbread.”
So penned Shakespeare in Love’s Labours Lost back in the holly jolly days of the 16th Century. But a pretty penny indeed it would cost him when the heady and alluring cardamom, nutmeg, cinnamon, and allspice used to make gingerbread were far less affordable and available to the masses than they are today.
But it wasn’t until its first publishing on December 20, 1812, when Die Gebruders Grimm spun their fable of Hansel and Gretel with its lure of candy cottages in the Bavarian forest that gingerbread houses began to emerge as a symbol for Christmas.
From the Black Forest of Germany to within ten miles of The White House there lies another famous colonial white house with an older provenance—George Washington’s beloved Mount Vernon, an especially enchanting destination over the Christmas holidays.
When I arrived last week I met up with Roland Mesnier, formerly the White House Pastry Chef for 25 years. Chef Mesnier, the uber sweetsmeister and cookbook author who launched the first pastry course at L’Academie de la Cuisine in Bethesda, Maryland, has been called upon to craft a gingerbread replica of Mount Vernon in perfect detail. Chef Mesnier employed the same level of perfection to this house as he did as The White House Pastry Chef. “The White House was a big production place. Everything should be the very best. If it’s not the best at The White House where else is it going to be the best!” exclaims Chef Mesnier.
The grounds of this gingerbread house features the estate’s farmyard animals, a tree with an American eagle roosting in it, and the iconic dove of peace weathervane—even George and Martha decked out in Colonial attire—all chiseled out of marzipan. Here are some fascinating facts about the Mount Vernon gingerbread house replica:
The 5 x 8 foot replica began last month.  Chef Mesnier checks the angles of his gingerbread house at Mount Vernon - photo credit Jordan Wright It took 325 pounds of gingerbread and 70 pounds of chocolate to glue the house together. A full pan of gingerbread is baked and cut, after it cools, according to a pattern.
“Equatorial Noir” chocolate from Valrhona with 55 percent of cocoa solids is employed. Every piece of gingerbread is slathered with melted chocolate over its interior side using an offset spatula. This gives it strength.
To achieve a perfect edge-to-edge fit an industrial band saw is used to cut the gingerbread. In any event, the vagaries of humidity can change the properties of the gingerbread causing it to shrink. “There are so many simple things that can totally change the outcome of your dessert,” he offers. (Sound of forehead slap here.)
No interior support system is employed. No cardboard or underpinnings are utilized whatsoever.
Marzipan roof shingles are first tinted terra cotta and flattened with a rolling pin, then cut with a cookie cutter into small circles. Modeling marzipan is used.
Shredded phyllo dough is used to replicate straw.
Handyman’s tools are de rigeur. A level is used to check the slant of the edges.
The gingerbread is made from scratch using the finest ingredients: flour, butter, eggs, baking powder, honey, ginger, molasses, cloves, and cinnamon. (Long ago rosewater and ground almonds were sometimes added. My tasting determined Mesnier’s gingerbread to be divinely delicious—especially with the chocolate backing.) He exclaims, “If I have to use anything less, I’m not doing it!”
Marlene Roudevush, his former White House assistant pastry chef, assisting him with the Mount Vernon gingerbread house replica, creates her figures using Confiseur D’Or Swiss modeling marzipan and applies the royal icing to the house. For that she uses a pastry bag made out of parchment paper with a little hole nipped out by scissors. “We always make our own, ” she asserts. Her research tells her that President Washington bred American Foxhounds and was fond of camels. Martha also claimed a parrot as a favored pet. All of which Chef Roudevush will add to the menagerie.
Many years ago I designed a gingerbread house for Grandma’s House for a fundraising auction in advance of a gala at the Four Seasons Georgetown. There were twenty or so entrants, the preponderance of them, architects. I decided upon Noah’s Ark, replete with wildlife duos and gummy fish aswim in the surrounding sea. Arriving with my humble ark, I saw gingerbread houses featuring minutely detailed colonial buildings with mullions and cobweb windows that could have been registered with the National Trust for Historic Preservation. It seems my cohorts had chosen a more traditional route.
But it was all about the attempt, I reckoned, and moreover, I learned that gingerbread shrinks…a lot…and buckles with the heat of baking, and no amount of royal icing can cure that. I had a few unresolved personal baking queries for the President of Pastry, and I wanted them on the down low. Monsieur Mesnier was only too delighted to oblige.
I collected a few pearls of pastry wisdom from the master:
“My philosophy on baking is very simple. Measure everything the night before and leave it out on your kitchen counter, even the eggs and the butter. The next morning you will mix your cake in a few minutes because everything is the same temperature, and it will be the best blending you ever had in your life.”
 Chef Mesnier cuts the gingerbread with a band saw - photo credit Jordan Wright “A lot of chefs love to complicate their recipes with unnecessary instructions. Half of it you can throw out. They just put it in there because the more complicated it is the more they think they look like geniuses!”
“So many chefs use all these gimmicks to try to make it seem good. What I have done in my books is simplify the language.”
“Buy the best ginger you can buy and check out the strength. You have to watch out because even from year to year it may change in strength. Make a sample of dough, bake it, and test it. There are so many different kinds of ginger and each type makes a difference in the outcome.”
“If you make enough dough in advance you can roll the cookies out and cut them and freeze them raw. Then, without defrosting, you can bake them off and eat them fresh that day.”
“We made 120,000 pieces of cakes and cookies for Christmas in The White House. Most of our cookies were shaped and frozen raw, and later taken out and baked.”
“We had such a small kitchen and very little staff. We started baking for Christmas in the White House in June. We made half a ton of fruitcake, orange cake, chocolate cake, German stollen and applesauce cake, Italian panettone, and yule logs, too. Our Christmas was based on Old World Christmases, like my Bananas in Raspberry Cream (Dessert University, Roland Mesnier, Simon and Schuster 2004). “People would hunt me down for that recipe.”
“We had a lot of diplomats over the holidays and I wanted them to find their own cakes and cookies from home on the table. We wanted to please as many people as we could. That’s the key…to have that special something for everyone.”
Like families today, the Washingtons were not strangers to the tragedies of war, death, and illness, even over the holiday season. In those days, a trip to rendezvous with loved ones could last days, or even weeks, over rugged hills and rutted roads, and might result in a stay of a fortnight or longer. So it was all the more imperative to celebrate the homecoming of family members and friends from afar. Therefore all hands were pressed into service to welcome the guests. You will find that the Mount Vernon of today reflects the warmth and spirit that emanates from the venerable estate.
Chef Mesnier’s gingerbread house will be on display all day at Mount Vernon throughout the Christmas season. You will need to call ahead for tickets for evening tours.
www.chefrolandmesnier.com
www.mountvernon.org
www.grandmashouse.org
For questions or comments on this article contact [email protected] or visit www.whiskandquill.com .
Jordan Wright
December 2009
 Starting the evening's champagnes with Voirin-Jumel Blanc de Blanc NV Grand Cru Cramant - photo by Jordan Wright This New Year’s celebratory festivities may pose a challenge to the connoisseur…to find a good quality champagne on stifled cash flow. While bumps and grinds to the wallet may crush our choices like grapes in a wine press, we seek to secure an auspicious future by raising a glass of pirouetting bubbles to presage better days. But how to achieve this glamorous tradition without sacrificing the children’s college fund?
 Pan seared Maine scallop with onion puree, ruby red grapefruit and ginger butter - photo by Jordan Wright At a recent dinner at Brabo I was introduced to some wonderful and affordable sparklers from the province of Champagne. Each one of these limited offerings was 100% grower produced and bear the recoltant manipulant code, “RM” on the label, ensuring the grapes come from this vineyard alone. Since only sparkling wines from this region of France, amounting to 86,500 acres of prime terroir, may be properly designated as “champagne”, one might expect they would be gustatorily competitive. I found three to be smart, polished and sophisticated, and two, to precisely mirror my most favorable profile of an excellent champagne.
In his distinguished paean to French regional cuisine, “The Food of France”, gourmand extraordinaire, Waverly Root, claims that, notwithstanding ham en croute, “There is no cuisine of note in the Champagne region.” Therefore it is no minor feat for a chef to pair an entire five-course menu with a selection of champagnes. Who better than a chef with roots in Belgium could prepare a meal representing this historic province geographically located in the north of France beside the Belgian border?
 Flemish Oyster Stew with puff pastry fleurons at Brabo - photo by Jordan Wright Enter Chef Robert Wiedmaier, up to this culinary challenge, creating a glorious menu, beginning with Flemish oyster stew with Swiss chard topped with puff pastry fleurons, sheer bliss captured in a cream-colored bowl nestled in a linen rose fold, and pairing it with Voirin-Jumel Blanc de Blanc NV Gran Cru, Cramant. Known as a Champagne family, not merely a brand, sibling scions Alice and Patrick Voirin Jumel, and Patrick’s wife, Valerie, have been supplying this wonderful wine to the Inn at Little Washington as their house brand. I give it three cheers! A clearly auspicious beginning.
Priced around $48.00 a bottle.
 Venus works the Agrapart et Fils vineyard Our second course, a plump pan-seared Maine scallop was accompanied by red onion puree, morsels of ruby red grapefruit and ginger butter echoing the 90% chardonnay and 10% pinot noir grapes used in the 100% organic Agrapart at Fils Brut Rose NV Premier Cru, Avize. So pretty in pink! This vineyard employs a beloved horse named “Venus” to help around the farm. Think of her sweet demeanor as you sip your way into a rosier New Year.
Priced around $61.00 a bottle.
 The Gatinois Brut 2002 a perfect pairing for the turbot with chanterelles - photo by Jordan Wright From the vineyards of Pierre Cheval-Gatinois, which lies at the foot of the Montagne de Reims, one of the four great vineyard regions, came a Gatinois Brut 2002 Grand Cru, Ay. The property lies beside the hallowed Bollinger estates, whose blends from the late 1980’s can reach an astonishing $500.00 per bottle! Eleven generations of the Gatinois family, dating back to 1696, have produced champagne from their ancestral lands. They use a 100% pinot noir cuvee to make this wine. Priced at around $70.00 a bottle it was le plus cher wine of the evening. Yet how perfectly it escorted a Parmesan-crusted turbot with rock shrimp, potato gnocchi and woodsy chanterelles with an aromatic shellfish emulsion.
The following foray trumpeted my personal favorite from R. H. Coutier, a non-vintage brut Grand Cru, Ambonnay. Our esteemed chef had paired this opulent, well-balanced bubbly with roasted veal tenderloin, crispy sweetbreads, lardoons of bacon and natural jus. At a mere $48.00 a bottle, it is like taking candy from a baby. Miss this winning wine at your peril!
 Three cheers for this selection! - photo by Jordan Wright I always serve champagne with dessert at a dinner party. I feel it revitalizes the festive nature of the gathering, and this bold, slightly floral, champagne with its tiny bubbles from Domaine Dehours “Grand Reserve” Brut NV was an admirable selection to stand up to the tartness of a crème fraiche cheesecake with honey-roasted pineapple. Another 100% organic champagne (those highly sensitive to sulfites will thrill to this news), it is made from 50% pinot meunier, 25% pinot noir and 25% chardonnay grapes. Aged in new and old oak barrels, it develops a timeless bouquet that evokes the notable chalky terrain of the region.
Priced around $42.00.
All these fine champagnes, suitable for ushering in a more prosperous 2010, can be purchased at The Butcher’s Block on King Street in Alexandria. www.butchersblockrw.com.
Brabo, the elegant restaurant, and Brabo Tasting Room, with more informal dining, are on the same street.
Jordan Wright
Georgetowner/Downtowner
November 2009
 The rare white rhino from MSNBC's 100 Heartbeats Setting the stage for extinction: Every twenty minutes a distinct species of plant or animal throughout the world becomes extinct.
 Jeff Corwin speaks about his new book and MSNBC special 100 Heartbeats - photo credit Jordan Wright There is an aura surrounding Jeff Corwin. It is the peaceful intent of a man who has witnessed fierce struggle, mortal threats, man’s inhumanity, heart-pounding danger and crushing heartbreak and emerged to dedicate his life to saving the planet’s rare and endangered species. This is not your son or daughter’s jocular Animal Planet guide tiptoeing through the friendly jungles with weird and eclectic animals, nor the boyish rake abandoning all sensibility to get just a bit too close to an unpredictable viper. This is a man committed through thought, word and deed to altering the predicted fate of our planet’s endangered animals. In my encounter with Corwin I could read the intensity and conviction on his face as he spoke of his up-close-and-personal encounters with the cheetahs and white rhinos whose days appear numbered.
100 Heartbeats – The Race to Save Earth’s Most Endangered Species is Corwin’s paean to the animals. He has found a powerful voice after 15 years of television as an Emmy-award winning producer and host of over a dozen television series for Discovery, Disney, the Food Network, NBC, CNN and the Travel Channel. The two-hour special on the book’s subject is the second program in MSNBC’s epic Future Earth series scheduled for launch this week on November 22nd.
 Chef Robert Wiedmaier, Jeff Corwin and Prime Seafood's Jim Chambers - photo credit Jordan Wright In honor of sustainability the book launch at the Occidental Grill showcased a number of wines that foster sustainable and environmentally responsible practices. Naked by Snoqualmie vineyards, Ste Michelle and Yealands of New Zealand, noted DC Chef Robert Wiedmaier gave their sauvignon blanc the nod. Wild-caught Coho salmon and wild Georgia white shrimp from Prime Seafood, and heritage beef and turkey from Ayrshire Farm in Upperville, VA became luscious hors d’oeuvres in the creative hands of Chefs Rodney Scruggs and Robert Townsend.
 Sustainably-raised oyster stew shooter created for the evening by Chef Rodney Scruggs - photo credit Jordan Wright I had an opportunity to speak with Jim Chambers, manager and owner of Prime Seafood of Kensington, MD who as a marine biologist spent 20 years with the government agency, National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS). While on the board of the Marine Stewardship Council he was instrumental in setting up the standards for the industry. Jim is the only wholesaler in our area selling exclusively sustainably raised seafood to select local restaurants. Poste, 701, Proof, Johnny’s Half Shell, Corduroy, Firefly, Restaurant Nora, Cashion’s Eat Place and the Occidental Grill and Seafood are some of his DC clientele.
From April through December he sells wreckfish that is similar in flavor and texture to grouper, but sustainable through controlled fishing. Only four boats are licensed to capture these fish off the coast of Charleston, SC in deep water at the base of a “wrecked” submarine wall.
Chambers really enjoys way the fish is being prepared sous-vide at Blue Duck Tavern. “They cook it low and slow in a vacuum-sealed pouch and finish it off with a quick browning. It’s so delicious…tender and succulent, ” he said.
 New Zealand's Yealands Sauvignon blanc - photo credit Jordan Wright Science Magazine recently reported that, if we keep destroying habitat, the world’s fisheries will collapse by 2048. “With unrestrained overfishing we are racing pell-mell towards the destruction of our seas. We now catch the top predators, bottom predators and everything in between with massive fishing trawlers equipped with huge drag nets and sophisticated electronics such as sonar and GPS,” Chambers warned. “We are fast working our way through what is left.”
We talked about the interdependency of the species…how the little fish sustain the bigger fish and how bottom-dragging nets take out 100% of the herring leaving the predator tuna without sustenance and faced with extinction along with their tiny friends.
Our conversation then turned to the darker side of farm-raised fisheries. A recent study concerning farm-raised salmon vs. Chilean vs. Scottish salmon sold in US supermarkets, compared their contaminant load…the amount of chemicals measured in the fish. All of them rated poorly.
“Fish are fed with other fish containing PCBs, DDT, and other organic toxic compounds. In fact only one meal per month of farm-raised salmon, often misleadingly labeled organic, poses a substantial cancer threat to the consumer. They receive growth hormones to make them grow faster while being constantly doused with chemicals to keep the disease level manageably low,” he related.
“You’re creating a sewer in the water where they are being raised. And the parasites, like sea lice, that live on the outside of the nets are getting to the salmon in the net pens where they are being fed dyes to achieve the proper color,” Chambers told me.
This is the tragic underbelly of the fishing industry and a real eye-opener. “It takes about four pounds of juvenile species of wild fish to make one pound of farm-raised salmon. It’s totally unsustainable.”
Chambers takes heart with the appointment of NOAA’s new administrator, Jane Lubchenco, who is also in charge of the NMFS. As one of the most highly cited ecologists in the world, Lubchenco is considered a world expert on marine eco-systems.
Chambers suggests that, “Consumers and chefs in particular can become the solution by what they choose to eat and serve.” With the Blue Ocean Institute’s “Guide to Ocean Friendly Seafood”, a copy of which he graciously gave me, and will be my new seafood-buying bible, he hopes that those who enjoy fish will make better and more informed choices.
For more information visit these websites:
www.FutureEarth.MSNBC.com
www.PrimeSeafood.com
www.BlueOcean.org
www.MSC.org
www.ScienceMagazine.org
For questions and comments on this story contact me at [email protected] or visit www.whiskandquill.com .
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