Sprinkles for Lunch

Metro ride downtown: $2.10
Dinosaur stickers, dinosaur penny and photo booth prints at National Geographic: $18.57
Krispy Kreme chocolate iced donut with sprinkles: $0.75
Letting your inner mommy nutritionist I-am-what-my-kids-eat bullshit go for the day: priceless

And they call this a family establishment?

Dessert at Buca di Beppo.

Notes from Wine Club: Red and Rusty

Inspired by a recent article in Food & Wine about Washington State Reds, we drank a few the other night when I hosted this month's wine club. Out of the 10 or so members, it was a low but cozy turnout as 5 of us ladies tasted some great blends from Hedges vineyards.

The first was the 2004 Hedges Three Vineyards (~$22), a blend of mostly cabernet and merlot from three of their vineyards in the Yakima Valley. Described as 'firm yet supple' with deep red fruit, this wine is your classic, curvy, sultry movie star - think Sophia Loren. Around town, you can find the bottle at the Tenley Whole Foods or at Calvert Woodley Liquors.

The second was the 2004 Hedges CMS Red, which at $12 bucks we decided was a very nice buy. With less tannin and softer fruit, it is the younger sister to the Three Vineyards bottle. It could also be a wine you could bring to just about any dinner party and everyone would love -- from the wine snob who didn't know it only cost $12 to the newby who's just learning to like red wine. This one was picked up at the P Street Whole Foods.

As for the actual "theme" (see previous post from January), this wine club will always be remembered as the Rusty Trombone wine club. Thank you, Wikipedia for enlightening and educating us on the intricacies of the rusty trombone. Since I'm not sure I want this blog to become X-rated, I'll just leave you with the link and sign off for now.

When Infamy is Fame

So the other day I saw some item in the Washington Post about Kim Kardashian...and then on Monday there was a Keeping Up with the Kardashian's marathon on E! And, I have to admit, I let my curiosity get the best of me. I found myself watching the show like a Beltway fender bender rubbernecker.

Is it just me, or are reality shows getting really bad? Besides the alarmingly inane events on the show -- manager mom pimping out her daughters for Playboy shoots and brokering deals with Girls Gone Wild founder Joe Francis (who's in jail), 12-year-olds pretending to do pole dances, yay-I'm-not-pregnant-inspired Vegas family vacations, etc .-- the most troublesome aspect is, Who the fuck are these people?

I mean, I consider myself fairly up on celebrity happenings. I indulge my shallow self by perusing through People magazine while waiting in line at Safeway...and always buy an US Weekly, OK! or Life & Style when traveling. (Make no mistake, though, I'd NEVER actually subscribe to any of these magazines. Still, finding comfort in a trashy magazine is a lot less fattening that finding comfort in a pint of Ben & Jerry's.) I even find myself watching E! News while I'm feeding the baby. So why don't I know who these people are, and why they'd qualify to get their own reality TV show? Don't you have to be somewhat famous to have a reality show?!

Well, I broke down. Yesterday, I went and Googled the Kardashians. I found out (thank you wikipedia) that the mother, Kris Jenner, used to be married to Robert Kardashian, who was lawyer and friend to O.J. Simpson (nice!), and is now married to Bruce Jenner, some Wheaties Olympian athlete from the 70s that my husband has heard of but I haven't. Kim Kardashian is infamous famous for a sex tape she made with Ray J. (Nice!) Her sisters and step-brothers are some mix of Hollywood socialite, celebrity stylist and reality show "star" -- Kourtney Kardashian of Filthy Rich: Cattle Drive and Brody Jenner of The Hills. Even worse, the show's executive producer is Ryan Seacreast. Blech!

So now I feel dirty. Dirty like I need to take a hot shower. Hopefully I can feel better and get back to watching more wholesome shows...like Girls Next Door.

Good Wine, Good Times

Appetizer of steamed lobster tail accompanied by Veuve Clicquot Brut Yellow Label. Filet au poivre, double-baked potatoes with mushrooms and cheese, and steamed asparagus served with Stag's Leap 2004 Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon. Dessert was of the single malt variety - Aberlour.

This was our Valentine's Day menu, served fireside chez nous. It's been our tradition for the last couple of years to stay in, spending what money we'd throw away to babysitters and 3-star restaurants on great ingredients and good wine. We finally realized that the worst time to go out for a nice meal is when EVERYBODY else in the city (and the bridge and tunnel crowd) is jockeying for that same bar seat, cozy window table or seared scallop special. (New Years Eve is also a bad time to dine out -- unless you like over-priced, sub-par food prepared by disgruntled kitchen staff.)

So, here's to another low-key but thoroughly enjoyable Valentine's Day...and to remembering that I'm a wife, not just a mother.

Lessons from Chuck

Our culinary outings the last few days aren't going to impress any of you foodies out there. On Friday we took the Jackal to Chuck E. Cheese's.

Chuck E. Cheese's has been our go-to idle threat since Santa came and went. So finally, after granting and denying the reward and privilege of a trip to Chuck E. Cheese for everything from peeing on the potty to 'make that noise stop!' we got on Google maps to plan our route out to the 'burbs.

If you ever went to Showbiz Pizza or Chuck E. Cheese's as a kid, you'll be happy to know that not a fucking thing has changed. I'm pretty sure even the carpet is original, complete with about 20 years of kid urine. The arcade games are still there, as are the animatropic characters. I'm still a horrible skee ball player and an even worse video game player. The Chuck E character still looks like a rat and scares me. And I still want to drop-kick the fat kid running around with his miles and miles of prize tickets.

And the whole "prize ticket" concept still turns a generation of kids into greedy little bastards with no sense of value. By my calculations, we spent about $20 on a cup full of tokens and ended up with 50 or so prize tickets. When the Jackal cashed in his tickets for the requisite trinkets he came back with a sheet of Chuck E. Cheese stickers and a Tootsie roll. A fucking Tootsie roll! I don't even want to think about how many tickets some loser kid is going to trade in for a dusty old Beanie baby that will sit in the back window of his parent's Corolla.

As for the grub at Chuck E. Cheese - I should have heeded my intuition and steered clear of the $6.99 all-you-can-eat salad bar. Come to think of it, is there ever a gastronomic delight to be had near an all-you-can-eat offer?!? Probably not. So I think this experience has given me another item to add to my "Eating/Drinking Rule of Thumb" list:

3. If a place says it's all you can eat, don't.

2. If a restaurant "has the best bread", the actual food probably sucks. (Seriously, how many times have you heard, 'Oh my god, I love Olive Garden, they have the best bread sticks.'?)

1. If, according to the label, a wine "goes well with food," it's probably not the best drink.

So anyone out there have any to add to the list? (Thanks for #1, E.)

Snoopy Has a Home

We are now the proud owners of a brand-new Snoopy Sno-Cone machine. The Jackal was very pleased when daddy brought it home after a dutiful trip to Linens-n-Things.

When I was growing up our family was poor so I got my first Sno-Cone machine at a garage sale. I was always a little pissed that I didn't get the "full experience" because it was second-hand and missing the paper cups and colored sugar syrup.

It's nice to know that the Jackal will get to experience Snoopy Sno-Cone making in all its fullness -- especially since the package included a whole friggin' three paper cups. Why three? Why not four? That's only enough for Snoopy, Charlie Brown and Lucy -- poor little Woodstock is shit out of luck.

The Man Cold

A friend sent me this in remembrance of hubby's recent hernia surgery. Hilarious.

Wine Notes: Girls Night Out

Last night the hubby was a gent and watched the kiddos so I could have a girls' night out. I squeezed into my one pair of jeans that fit now, put on some lip gloss, kissed the babies goodnight and gleefully headed out for a long-awaited night of freedom...perhaps a little too gleefully. Nine long months of sobriety did have it's one plus: no hangovers. Oy vey!

The destination was Veritas Wine Bar on Florida Avenue. I'm a huge wine bar fan and am glad that DC is getting more of them. Really, do we need another Irish bar or sports bar selling the same Miller Lite in a bottle and greasy buffalo wings? No. But could we use a place where you can taste something like 70 different wines and sample dozens of different cheeses? Yes!

We started with the Paraiso 2006 St. Lucia Highlands Pinot Noir which was a scrumptous balance of fruit and spice, heft and velvet. If you Google the wine you'll find all sorts of tasting notes that tout the "rich cherry/plum fruit accented by nuances of nutmeg, pepper, smoke, and vanilla" flavors. I've been drinking wine for a while and like to think of myself as fairly knowledgeable about the stuff, but when it comes to describing the taste of the wine I'll often think of it as if it were a woman. For example, the Paraiso pinot would be a sexy brunette with nice curves. She'd wear knee-high boots and always reveal a good bit of cleavage but you'd always think she was classy.

The next wine was the Worthy Sophia's Cuvee (the 2003 I think). As the cuvee in its name would suggest, it's a lovely blend of cabernet sauvignon, cabernet franc, merlot and petit verdot. This might be one of my favorite wines at the moment. I had it for the first time at Sonoma (where Veritas' general manager, Mick, used to work) and get excited every time I see it at a liquor store or on a wine list. Supposedly the grapes come from lots where Napa cult wines are grown. Rich, dense, lush and bold, this wine would be a buxom blues singer in a deep purple dress - earthy, sensual and dark.


In other random "wine news" that I've run across the last few days:

• The 30-something gagillionaire Google founders are getting into the wine business. Seems that one of the Google founders is going to be investing in Mebus Estate winery in New Zealand. Remind me to make a fortune in the tech industry so I can buy a vineyard and lead a charmed life of wine making.
• The Australian wine, Penfolds, holds special "recorking clinics". If you happen to be the lucky owner of any of their wines 15 years and older, you could attend one of these clinics -- in New York or Chicago, or if you're lucky enough - in several cities in Australia. The article I read in Gourmet about this made the company sound pretty damn cool. The "ultimate in after sales service" -- or as we'd say at the agency, the ultimate in creating brand loyalists -- Penfolds experts will uncork your vintage wine, taste it and either deem it okay or not okay. If it's good, they'll top the bottle off, re-cork it and bless it with a special seal. If it's not okay, there is still the silver lining that the owner gets to drink the bottle and doesn't have to worry 'should I cellar for another five years or just drink it now'.