Restaurants

Laughing, from the insidious truth, tagged me to list my five favorite restaurants:

1) The best meal I ever ate was on a cruise in Alaska. My mother-in-law and her cousin each arranged for their children and significant others, grandchildren and a couple of great-grandchildren to all spend a week on a Celebrity Cruise from Seward to Vancouver. Altogether 37 folk, many who'd never met. It was wonderful.

As anybody who's been on a cruise can tell you, the food is unbelievable, bountiful, beautiful and delicious. On the first day you walk on as a passenger. On the last, they roll you off as cargo.

This particular ship had a special restaurant with food one cut above that. RFB's siblings and significant others took her mom out for dinner at this special restaurant one night in the middle of the cruise. Eight adults in all.

The service was royal and the food was simply the best I've ever eaten --- from appetizers through dessert. Everyone ordered different things at every course and everyone shared. I wish I remembered the name of the restaurant.

2) If you're ever in D.C., find your way to the Adams-Morgan neighborhood. Georgetown is for tourists. Adams-Morgan is for locals. It's full of ethnic restaurants, taverns, boutiques and it's hopping til 3:00 am. On 18th Street, across the street from one another, are the Amsterdam Falafel Shop and, M'Dawg Haute Dawgs.

They're owned by pals of mine, a couple who are 1st-class human beings and who deserve every success. So in part, this is a shameless plug for friends.

But the other thing that makes these a favorite is that when I need to force myself to follow my pshrink's advice to take a full lunch hour as often as I can manage, Scott and Arianne's restaurants take me exactly an hour to drive to, order, eat, read a newspaper column and get back to work. Hot dogs and falafel are not exactly a prescription, but they do help me retain my sanity.

3) America. When I first got to DC, in 1980, the old train station was a dump. The roof leaked, pigeons roosted in the rafters and the place had become an ad hoc homeless shelter. But in the 80's the place was refurbished. In addition to bookstores, a movie theatre and a food court, the place is home to several restaurants. One is a Pizzeria Uno just like the one Laughing ate at in Georgetown, except even more overpriced. But another is wonderful place called America.

Dress is casual, and the menu is vast. They have full entrees, sandwiches, salads, specialties, a PB&J sandwich and you've just gotta love a menu that actually offers green eggs and ham. If you ever go to Capitol Hill, plan to eat lunch or dinner at Union Station.

4) Fortune: Dim sum heaven and less than half a mile from home. RFB and I go there for a late breakfast/early lunch treat whenever we both have the day off and Monkeyboy doesn't (His idea of restaurant heaven starts with a "Mc" and ends with a "Donalds").

I can't get enough of the shark fin dumplings. The shrimp in a noodle crepe. The sticky rice served in a lotus leaf. I'm getting hungry just thinking about it.

5) City Diner: Every neighborhood should have one. They serve breakfast all day, everything in the dessert case makes you want to save room for it and the Greek family who own the place make you feel like family once you're a regular. Which takes about 2 visits.

They serve a little bit of everything.

The Latino waitress who knows Monkeyboy is in a Spanish partial immersion class at school (math and science in Spanish for half the day and the other subjects in English for the other half) makes him order in Spanish and praises his vocabulary and accent.

And when I want to be especially bad about cholesterol, there's no place I'd rather order a platter of steak and eggs.

Hey Ash: any way I can coax you back to blogging by tagging you with this meme?