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By Jordan Wright
To get ready for Valentine’s Day you need go no further than our shops right here in town. At La Cuisine, on Cameron Street, a high-end cookware and gourmet specialty shop that caters to the chef in all of us, they are featuring organic and fair-trade chocolates from Cocoavino. Raspberry and Fig, Blood Orange and Fig, and Drunken Fig Truffles made by two master chocolatieres, Alisha Lumea and Avril Pendergast-Fischer of New York. Getting the festivities off to a good start are in-shop tastings on February 7th. Chocolate samples will be perfectly paired with a taste of wine. Continue reading VALENTINE’S DAY IN OLD TOWN
By Jordan Wright
 Looped reach to director Valerie Harper wraps her considerable performing skills around the witty and uninhibited Tallulah Bankhead like a full-swing sable coat and inhabits the former screen star’s persona like a hungry spirit. Her portrayal of the imperious legend is spot on, an hilarious channeling of this Hollywood “bad girl”.
Bankhead was always a fascinating character in the same vein as Dorothy Parker, Josephine Baker and Eva Tanguy, the original “I Don’t Care Girl”. Bawdy, uncensored and drenched in bon mots, Bankhead was a brilliant but controversial leading lady.
Writer Matthew Lombardo’s “Looped” is based on an episode in a recording studio when Bankhead was asked to redo one line to be synced into the classic b-movie, ”Die! Die! My Darling!”.
Like Kathy Griffin (“My Life on the D List”), Bankhead was notorious for peppering her language with colorful four-letter words that would make a sailor blush, and Harper nails it with an uproarious performance in this over-the-top sendup.
 Emotional projection Fueled by cigarettes, cocaine, pot and booze Bankhead quips, “Everyone has their vices. It’s just that mine all come out to play at the same time.” The one-liners come fast and furiously, most too raunchy to repeat. In his role as studio “suit” Danny Miller, Jay Goede, as straight man, is convincing. To his rejection of her advances she declares, “If I were hungry for a man, I would want a meal not an hors d’oeuvre!”
After the show a little old be-pearled lady beside me whispered, “She’s not like me at all. I’m very straight-laced. Oh, I wish I could be like that!” To judge by the audience’s enthusiasm it seems we’d all like to be a little like that.
Catch it before it leaves town. (Harper will be the Celebrity Grand Marshall of DC’s feathered and fabulous Gay Pride March on June 13.)
If You’re Going…
LOOPED
At the Lincoln Theatre until June 28
1215 U Street
Washington, DC
www.thelincolntheatre.org
For ticket information call (202) 488-3300
 Christophe Poteaux, Chef/Owner, Bastille, demonstrates Poulet Basquaise (braised chicken, Basque style) By Jordan Wright
Question: Who cares more than your mother about what you eat?
A. A restaurant chef/owner
B. Two restaurant chef/owners
C. Two French restaurant chef/owners who hands-on work their magic daily in their own treasure of a restaurant.
If you guessed C, then you should be dining at Bastille, a charming Old Town restaurant that feels, as soon as you cross the threshold, as if you have discovered the little French restaurant you have been dreaming of all your life.
The instantly intimate Bastille has it all.
Here you’ll find French classic dishes with a regional interpretation in a farmhouse-style atmosphere of such cachet you feel as though you have driven miles out into the French countryside; traditional dishes that miss only the pastis to start your meal and servers so knowledgeable about the cuisine you might think they had prepared the food themselves, if you didn’t see for yourself the Chefs Madame and Monsieur Poteaux behind the raised counter that separates you from satisfying your discerning palate. Continue reading The instantly intimate Bastille
 President Barack Obama at his Inaugural luncheon Tuesday By Jordan Wright
President Barack Obama’s Inaugural Luncheon for approximately 200 guests was held Tuesday afternoon at the Capitol’s Statuary Hall after the swearing-in.
The inventive dishes, created by Alexandria-based Design Cuisine as a tribute to Abraham Lincoln’s favorite foods, were paired with American wines and American-sourced food products.
First course was Seafood Stew prepared with lobster, scallop and shrimp with a crisp pastry lid. It was paired with a 2007 Duckhorn Vineyards Sauvignon Blanc from the Napa Valley region.
It was followed by a “Brace of American Birds,” duck and pheasant from Wisconsin’s MacFarlane Pheasants farm, served with a sour cherry chutney and whipped molasses sweet potatoes…a nod to Obama’s affection for Sweet Potato Pie. It was delightfully paired with a 2005 Goldeneye Pinot Noir also from California.
The piece de resistance, and who can resist dessert, was an Apple Cinnamon Sponge Cake with Glace Cream which was highlighted by a Korbel Natural “Special Inaugural Cuvee” from the spectacular Russian River Valley.
The bottle featured a commemorative neck label featuring the Inaugural Seal.
How many bottles were taken home as souvenirs is anyone’s guess.
Below is the recipe for the Duck Breast with Cherry Chutney. Do try this at home!
Continue reading Alexandria caterer prepares Obama’s Swearing-in luncheon
 Photo courtesy of Roadside Attractions Behind the Scenes on Alien Trespass with Jenni Baird, Eric McCormack and director R.W. Goodwin
By Jordan Wright
January 4, 2009
R.W. Goodwin, best known as the director/producer of “The X-Files,” was in town last week and Local Kicks Senior Editor Jordan Wright sat down with him to explore his latest cinematic foray into the realms of outer space.
LOCAL KICKS: What is your attraction to the sci-fi genre?
GOODWIN: It was all accidental, if you want to know the truth. Years ago I was a producer on “Star Trek.” They’d given up the idea of a movie at Paramount but wanted to do it again as a series with the original cast except for Leonard Nimoy and Gene Roddenberry. They asked me to do it. I didn’t know much about sci-fi then. I couldn’t call myself a Trekkie.
“The X-Files” was one of those serendipitous things. I was moving our family up to Washington State to get the kids in school up there and we picked a little town called Bellingham, WA. near the border (of British Columbia), and I’d produced a number of shows in Vancouver.
I get a call from Fox and they set me up with Chris Carter who is doing 12 episodes of this show.
“Alien Trespass” came about through Jim Swift who also lives up in Bellingham. I’d known him for about six years, he was an avid “X-Files” devotee, and after a few years he presented me with a story outline. Continue reading The X-Files R.W. Goodwin: Setting Down with Alien Trespass
 The Bavarian Alps
Dec 11,2008
By Jordan Wright
When I imagine my menu for Christmas dinner in Alexandria I conjure up visions of half-timbered houses and quaint villages in the legendary Black Forest of Germany.
Silhouetted against the Bavarian Alps towering evergreens cast their deep blue shadows and the amber lights from cottage windows form haloes across the crisp snow. Curls of smoke rise up from rosy brick chimneys and waft the scent of smoldering coal and pine resin. The fantasy continues…
A little girl, clad in her ruffled lace blouse and dirndl, sweetly hums “O Tannenbaum” or “Stille Nacht”, and helps her “grosmutter” prepare the traditional marzipan stollen. Together they await the visit of the “tomte” or “kobold”, the Christmas gnome who, ancient legend has it, will arrive on this evening for his bowl of porridge. These are the images that inspire my culinary Christmas.
I have no German heritage as far as I know, but that has never dampened my spirits for the holiday dinner I prepare for friends and family each Christmas eve. Here in my home in Virginia it might be 50 degrees and raining, a far cry from the swirling snows of Deutschland, but still I invoke the same dear scene.
 Bavarian Santa Decoration
The old French marquetry table is laid with my grandmother’s Royal Copenhagen china. The annual mystery posited. Why ever did she have so many plates and no soup bowls? There is an assortment of crystal goblets…red with a clear base, clear with a green base and all clear…in a semi-circle, the old mismatched monogrammed silver and embroidered linen napery.
Miniature silver bee skeps hold place cards, which everyone switches up to suit their seating preference, and long tapers reflect off a myriad of crystal facets, spinning light onto the guests. Branches of pine and Nandina berries tumble from vases, and a pair of silver pheasants anchors the tablescape. Everything is in its proper place under the warm glow of the chandelier.
Tantalizing aromas begin to waft though the house as guests cozy up in front of the fire with steaming mugs of Gluhwein, or a Riesling Sekt Brut if the weather is unseasonably warm, and an assortment of herring, salmon and smoked mackerel canapés with apple horseradish and chervil if it can be found. In the kitchen I ladle out the soup and take the roast from the oven. “Dinner is served!” a call that is eagerly awaited.
A selection of German wines has been decided upon. For the first course a Kabinett or Silvaner pairs nicely with our soup, in which little spaetzle float in the clear dill-spiked veal broth. Carefully pacing ourselves, we will linger over the warm liquid, in anticipation of our long-dreamed-of Bavarian feast. Continue reading A Bavarian Christmas Dinner
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