Category Archives: 3) DESTINATIONS — in the U.S.

June 25, 2012 · 9:31 pm

Leaving dc – intown uptown inn, redwood, sweet greens

We found a fantastic bed and breakfast on dc that was almost too good to be true. And sadly it will bson non because it is closing to the public later this week. It’s the uptown intown uptown inn in the upper northwest neighborhood north of columbia  heights. Gorgeous old mansion, red brick, with wood floors, elegant fireplaces and chandeliers, antique furniture and oil paintings. Beautiful Roos, for sleeping, sitting and eating. Delicious breakfast of double-stuffed potato  topped with scrambled eggs, homemade blue berry Danish. The inn owner sandy is gracious and welcoming, the type of person you want to have your photo taken with as you leave, even though you have known her for only an hour.mshemis renting out the entire three story inn to harvard which will make it available to its alums. Bummer for the rest of us.

We had an excellent dinner last night at redwood in Bethesda. $35 price fix for 3 courses. I had grilled shrimp served with cucumbers, red onions  and a jalapeño avocado yoghurt drizzled around the plate. Then crab cakes with grilled peaches, bok Choy and a light orange-colored peach sauce. Ice cream sundae for dessert.

Today we had a tour of the u.s. Capitol led by a fine young man who is an intern for senator Harkin. He’s also my son. That was fun. The new visitors center is a nice entryway. We loved all the wall paintings in the corridors. For lunch we had very good salads at sweet greens on a strip of restaurants behind the Capitol. It’s been a good trip.

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June 25, 2012 · 3:35 am

Eastern market, a dc treasure

What a great place to spend a sunny, no longer sweltering Saturday in june. We had a great time wandering around the market, sampling and then buying blueberries, peaches and plums at the outdoor stands and then eating crab cake sandwiches at a very popular counter inside the elegant old red brick market building. We also wandered around a flea market with some good stuff, past some interesting shops including one with great Turkish kilims And another with excellent gelato and sorbet (pitanyo?) the market is in a lovely old neighborhood just behind the Capitol with old brick row houses, some with turrets, wrought iron fences, lovely gardens, red brick walkways. I will be back!

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June 22, 2012 · 8:39 pm

Hot in dc but very cool at newseum

I usually last about two to  three hours at a museum but I had To force myself to leave after five hours at the newseum. My first visit and it’s nirvana for a news junkie and history buff. The building is gorgeous, with a spectacular view of the mall from the sixth floor balcony. Too many highlights to list but here are a few:

The 911 exhibit which includes a very powerful film with interviews with journalist who covered the bombing as the towers fell.

The Pulitzer prize photographs including interviews with some of the award winners about how thy got their winning shot, including a former dmregister colleague of mine.(it was fun to see several reporters I know pop up in one exhibit or another)

The selection of historic papers

Variousfilms on topics from women in journalism to anonymous sources.

I will definitely be back.

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June 19, 2012 · 6:36 pm

Where to eat in D.C.’s U Street Corridor

515 Florida Ave. NW, Washington DC 20001 | Tues – Sun 5:30pm-10pm, Closed Mondays

The recommendations are many:

My 20-something stepdaughter who lived in DC says her favorite is Cafe Saint Ex.
This from a friend’s 20-something son who lives in DC:
  • I would highly recommend this one Thai X-ing; http://www.thaix-ing.com/though $30 per person is a little pricey but it’s a ton of foodprix. it’s a small rowhouse with a mish mash of tables (though its gotten more professional as its gotten more popular)and the guy cooks you this amazing Thai mealwhich for $30 and BYOB is actually a pretty good deal.multicourse – the pumpkin curry is incredible”
  • Ethiopian is generally affordable and that area is known for that Dukem is good or Zenebech Injera, which is a little further away.
  • Busboys and Poets is also popular and interesting for the atmosphere but food is meh
The  NYTimes recommends: Local 16 (allegedly a Democratic hangout) and cork wine bar. (see below.)
… Head to the always hopping U Street Corridor, and plop yourself on a stool at Local 16 (1602 U Street NW; 202-265-2828; www.localsixteen.com), a popular Democratic hangout. There are multiple lounges and, best of all, a roof deck, where you can see the city lights while you sip your predinner watermelon martini. A lot of Democratic fundraisers habituate the place, so don’t be surprised if there’s a private party in one of the rooms.Have dinner a few blocks away at Cork Wine Bar (1720 14th Street NW; 202-265-2675; www.corkdc.com), which might have the best fries in town. The owners, Khalid Pitts and Diane Gross, are friends of Barack (well, Mr. Pitts is director of political accountability with the Service Employees International Union, which endorsed Mr. Obama, and Ms. Gross has worked with the Democratic political establishment for years). The menu includes both small and big bites, from marinated olives and cheeses to duck confit and sautéed kale. And for goodness’ sake, don’t forget those fries! They are tossed with garlic and lemon. In fact, order two helpings. Dinner for two with wine, around $60.

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June 16, 2012 · 8:15 pm

To do list for Washington DC next week:

Ben’s Chili Bowl, a neighborhood landmark in U Street Corridor

I’m off to DC next week for a family get-together to celebrate my sister’s 50th birthday – and to check in on my son who is interning for a U.S. Senator so here’s my list of possible things to do when/if I have some free time:

– Newseum and Holocaust Museum. Never been to either.

– Martin Luther King statue on the Mall and visit to Vietnam War Memorial, which includes my husband’s brother’s name.

– The eastern market/U street corridor (recommendations from a friend who visited recently). I’ve been to Detroit’s Eastern Market but never DC’s. Didn’t know it existed. It in the Capitol Hill neighborhood and sounds like best time to visit is during the weekend market when there’s crafts, antiques as well as fresh produce.

The U Street Corridor is a commercial and residential neighborhood in Northwest Washington, D.C known as the center of Washington’s live music scene with several old clubs, theaters and jazz venues. Ben’s chili bowl looks pretty cool too. It’s at located at 1213 U Street, next to Lincoln Theatre, in the Shaw neighborhood of northwest D.C. It is known locally for its chili dogs, half-smokes, and milkshakes. (I remember photos of Obama visiting.)

The corridor  runs from from 9th Street on the east to 18th Street and Florida Avenue on the west. Most of the area is part of the larger Shaw neighborhood, with the western end entering the Dupont Circle neighborhood. It is served by the U Street Washington Metro station.

– Politics and Prose, a longtime favorite bookstore (that a friend now owns!)

– ellicott city, Md. I’m visiting a friend who lives there. Sounds like the five-block historic downtown is worth a wander.Fun facts: it was founded in 1772 and has the nation’s oldest railroad station.

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June 6, 2012 · 11:23 pm

Searching for a bed and breakfast in Washington DC – think I found one!

At the last minute, I needed to find one night’s accommodation in D.C. and none of my options looked very attractive – either too expensive/fancy or too inexpensive/shabby. I have a good deal for two nights at a hotel in Bethesda via Expedia – $103 a night (which I got in part by pre-paying way in advance) but a third night jumped up to $240. So I started looking for bed and breakfasts and I think I’ve found a good option: The Intown Uptown Inn in Upper Northwest D.C. (and their prices are even going DOWN in July.) Another attractive, albeit pricier option, was the The Woodley Park Guest House but I had trouble getting a room for just night.

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June 6, 2012 · 2:18 am

New Orleans restaurant to try

The back story on this restaurant is a bit disturbing but Boucherie sounds like a good place to eat in New Orleans.  The chef was shot three times during an attempted robbery, managed to survive and locals rallied to support him and his restaurant which is in the Carrollton neighborhood, where we’re staying.

According to a recent NYTimes story, Boucherie serves “moderately priced, beautifully plated food in a converted wooden house in the Carrollton District” with specialties including ” boudin balls, luscious pork belly served with sweet potato latkes and crème fraîche flavored with Vietnamese 5 spice powder,  blackened shrimp with grit toast, Intense smoked Wagyu beef brisket and mild, subtly sweet local redfish. Think I’d skip the  Krispy Kreme bread pudding.

Boucherie, 8115 Jeannette Street, New Orleans; (504) 862-5514; boucherie-nola.com. Dinner for two, without drinks, is about $50. Open lunch and dinner, Tuesday to Saturday.

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June 1, 2012 · 6:39 pm

Pok Pok and Barbuto in NYC; Frontera Grill in Chicago

Thought of  recent dining adventures in  NYC, Chicago, and Portland, Oregon,  the other day when I read a NYTimes story about where top chefs go on the rare occasion when they don’t eat at their own restaurant.  Chef Daniel Boulud goes to Barbuto for Chef Jonathan Waxman’s roasted chicken, which my brother also has discovered. I had a good meal there with my brother and his wife in 2011. Ike's Vietnamese Fish Sauce Wings

Also on the dining front, is Pok Pok NY in Brooklyn and Pok Pok Wing (see photo above of Ike’s Vietnamese Fish Sauce Wings)  on the Lower East Side.  My husband and I ate at the  original Pok Pok in Portland in 2010. (The chef Andy Ricker was named the Northwest’s best by the James Beard Foundation in 2011 so I bet it’s even harder to get a reservation now.) I see from the NYTimes that the two NYC-based Pok Poks have since opened. (Alas, we didn’t have the chicken wings when we went to Pok Pok in Portland. They look incredible! But it was very good Thai food by a non-Thai guy, which was the gist of the Times story. It also mentioned Rick Bayless and Frontera Grill/Xoco et. al.  in Chicago which I’ve been to many times over the years.)

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May 29, 2012 · 6:40 pm

Conflicted Thoughts about Wal-Mart’s largesse in Bentonville

We drove some backroads home from Eureka Spring, Arkansas yesterday – starting about 10 miles east in the town of Berryville, which turned out to be more down-on-its-luck than my guidebook suggested. Couldn’t help notice the huge and bustling Wal-Mart on the edge of town – a distinct contrast to the struggling town square business district. And couldn’t help but remember that Bentonville, which we visited Saturday, is the unusual small town that has clearly benefited economically from Wal-Mart – and that’s because it’s not a typical small town but a company town, Wal-Mart’s company town no less.  I can’t fault Wal-Mart  for wanting to make its company town look like the perfect American small town, squeaky clean with landscaped gardens and well-kept businesses,  but it’s a tad ironic considering the company’s reported disastrous effect on so many other small rural communities, where it has been accused of helping to shutter local businesses and suck the life out of  many a downtown.  (For details on the “Wal-Mart Effect” see: advocate.nyc.gov/news/2011-01-11/new-study-wal-mart-means-fewer-jobs-less-small-businesses-more-burden-taxpayers)

I don’t recall seeing this issue addressed at the Wal-Mart Visitor Center in Bentonville – although the center’s displays were more interesting than I expected.  (I was impressed and moved by the display recalling Wal-Mart’s aid to the Gulf Coast post-Hurricane Katrina.) One more question came to mind in downtown Bentonville – why so many law offices?  Granted the town square is dominated by the county  courthouse but still…Are they all fighting the good fight for Wal-Mart?

As for the Crystal Bridges Museum, while there,  I couldn’t help but feel grateful to the Wal-Mart heiress who opened it for sharing her stunning American art collection and vision, free of charge, with us little people. But again,  later, I did start to think a bit about the irony of this high-brow, high-culture palace being funded by the profits of a company whose stores are anything but high-brow, high culture;  a company that has not always treated or paid its employees well, and whose overall contribution to our economy, culture, and society is debatable. High-culture largesse is nothing new for corporate titans but sometimes its hard to decide whether what they give outweighs what they take, or have taken.

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May 28, 2012 · 3:26 am

Greetings from eureka springs Arkansas

I hardly recognized Eureka Springs. It was so packed with tourists on this holiday weekend that it was hard to detect its charm. The last time I was here, about 24 years ago, it was in december and the place was deserted.  Fortunately we were reminded why we like this place after we left  downtown with  it’s touristy shops and loud motorcycles . Walking along upper spring street past the lovely Victorian cottages with their long porches and gardens full of hydrangea, hollyhocks,roses and lilies; past stone grottos, steep curving lanes, dense woods; past the strange old  1886 crescent hotel, where we relaxed in white rocking chairs on the balcony overlooking the wooded mountains, I remembered the strange charm of this old town in northwest Arkansas. We are staying in an old motor court in a residential neighborhood. We have our very own one room cottage covered with small jagged rocks. Hence the name — rock garden cabins. Our neighbors are 90 year old newlyweds. No joke. We had a good lunch at the mud street cafe and excellent BBQ ribs at bubba’s and also enjoyed a visit to thorn crown chapel. A stunning glass-walled chapel deep in the woods that was part of the inspiration for the architecture at crystal bridges.

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