Krik's Picks

Dec. 31 is my grandson’s birthday. He turned 1. We babysat while our daughter ran some errands, buying preparations for his birthday party, which will be on New Year’s Day. After she returned to our house to pick him up, we suggested going out for lunch. We picked Rice Paper in Edina. The restaurant is highly rated. They call themselves ‘contemporary Asian’ and the server said ‘Asian fusion.’ I think of it as basically Vietnamese. They used to be located in Linden Hills . My wife went there for lunch in those days. I’d never eaten at the Linden Hills location. They relocated to Edina, 50th & France, this fall. So this was a great opportunity to see what all the fuss is about. I was very impressed. Our server offered tea when she came to our table. She told us about a couple of specials. My daughter and I ordered the special spring roll which featured pomegranate seeds, rice, and cilantro. My wife is very sensitive to cilantro, and the server said that this was the one dish tha...

So it’s the last four working days of the year. Nice opportunity to enjoy a casual lunch with coworkers and commemorate (if not celebrate) the conclusion of 2010. Not to cast aspersions. It’s just that it was a challenging year. So it felt more like survival than celebration. We went to Spill the Wine .  I’d been there one other time. Also a lunch with a business friend. Here’s the link to my previous post. I do like the ambiance of the restaurant. It’s bright and airy. The service is laid back, but still attentive. it just has a nice feel to it. One of our group ordered the vege burger. When it arrived, it looked very interesting … also very red. So I asked: “Is there a lot of beets in that vege burger?” Yup. Ok, so my coworker who ordered it said it was very good. But thanks anyway, I’ll pass on the beets. The second person ordered the banh mi sandwich. I thought that the description on the menu sounded very intriguing. I was tempted myself. When it arrived, the sandwich...

I don’t usually write about a particular course or menu item, except in the context of the whole meal. But earlier in December, a colleague and I had lunch at the Occidental. Lunch was good. The Occidental is a reliably good place to eat with classic décor and a fabulous location. Still, I hadn’t planned to write a blog post about it … until dessert. It was December after all, and my last trip to DC for the year. I looked at the menu for my favorites – either carrot cake or apple pie. They did have a nice apple tart on the menu. It was a classic French preparation, and I was about to order it. But then another item caught my eye. It was a chocolate roulade with pistachio cream filling served with a scoop of ice cream. Now, I don’t normally order chocolate desserts. But I do love pistachios, and there was just something about the description that compelled me to give it a try. I’m glad I did. It was great.

I met some colleagues from the National Milk Producers Federation for lunch at Ris. When I arrived at the restaurant, there were guards at the door. Everyone was getting security ‘wanded’ before they were seated. For all the times I’ve been to Washington, DC, that’s never happened to me before. We were seated, and we ordered. Our server was very friendly and we asked him who was the VIP. ‘Can’t tell you,’ he replied. But when the VIP leaves, his entourage will use the side door, he pointed out. Your table is ideally located to be able to see who it is when they leave. During lunch, we speculated about who it might be. Maybe the Vice President? Maybe Hillary Clinton? Maybe Bill Clinton? As we finished our lunches, we noticed a flurry of activity around the private dining room in back. Sure enough, suddenly the side door swung open. A gust of wind blew in and the curtains billowed out. At that moment, the VIP was whisked out the door. We didn’t see who it was! But the people at t...

Early in 2010, after dining at one of Chef Jose Andres restaurants in DC, I set a goal of trying all five of his DC venues. I did minibar in February, Jaleo in March, Café Atlantico in May, and Zaytinya in September. Oyamel was the last one, and I was part of a fairly large group that ate there in early November. Oyamel is very much in the ‘small plates’ theme of Chef Andres other DC restaurants. Jaleo is Spanish tapas. Zaytinya is Greek mezzas. Oyamel is antojitos (or Mexican street snacks). I wondered how it would work for a group. What they did was bring out three selections at a time that were passed family style. We started with the tableside preparation of guacamole. It was a very good guacamole. But you know what? When my wife and I eat someplace that does tableside preparation of guac, we usually don’t order it. There isn’t really that much different that you can do with mashed avocado. The first round of items included a beet salad (which I didn’t try because I don...