Few weekends ago, I followed my friends, M & P, down to Virginia to visit their parents. It’s always nice to get out of the city, too bad I don’t do it enough. M’s mom was super nice enough to make an apple pie just for us! On Saturday night M’s parents took us to Hard Times Cafe for dinner. They specialize in chili, a Texas chili, a Cincinnati chili, a Terlingua Red chili and a vegetarian chili. What’s great about Hard Times Cafe, besides the name, is that for newcomers they offer a little tasting of each chili. My favorite was the Cincinnati chili because it was slightly sweet. I got the Hard Times chili dog with the Cincinnati chili. It was really good and messy to eat. Fork and knife were used. Yum.
- Hard Times Cafe, 4069 Chain Bridge Rd Fairfax VA 22030. They have other locations.
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Despite growing up in what is nominally the South, I’ve never even considered making a pecan pie. Sure, I’ve eaten my fair share of it; in fact, the grandmother of one of my cousins makes the best pecan pies I’ve ever eaten (sometimes she adds chocolate chips to the pie, which is pretty mind-blowing). When I went to visit my parents recently, a friend of theirs (who happens to live in South Carolina) had given them a huge bag of pecans from the tree in her yard. My mom suggested making a pecan pie with them, and so we went for it.
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I had just finished complaining about all of the lousy falafel I’d encountered in NYC when I spent a week in VA with my parents. On my last full day there, my parents suggested we go to a falafel place with the unlikely name of Moby Dick. My first clue that this place would be better than expected was the server rolling out fresh flatbreads for baking right at the front counter. And I have to admit it: a Northern Virginia falafel chain pwned the last couple of falafels I’d eaten in New York City. Warm, thick flat bread (not pita), a creamy yogurt sauce, and super tasty falafel all make this an unexpected treat. Don’t be put off by the fast-food vibe; falafel is supposed to be fast food.
Moby DIck House of Kebab — 5900 Kingstowne Town Center, Kingstowne, VA
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l’auberge chez francois
Though I’ve eaten at tons of different restaurants featuring cuisines from around the world, I’ve never really had a meal at an old-school French restaurant (hereafter referred to as OSFR). In fact, OSFRs (once the vanguard of high cuisine in America) seem to be going the way of the dodo. I once ate at the now-closed Provence, and I was treated to a meal at Tocqueville, but at both French restaurants the vegetarian entree was risotto, which is (of course) Italian. I know that French cooking doesn’t lend itself to vegetarianism, but still. So when my parents started telling me about a great French restaurant near them in Great Falls, VA, I was intrigued. Then my friends Jeff & Eva raved about their trip to a French restaurant in… Great Falls Va. What was this place? L’Auberge Chez Francois (as Jeff points out, perhaps the most generic name for a French restaurant ever is Chez Francois) has been serving Alsatian inspired French cooking to the Washington, DC area for 50 years.
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My sister and I knew we were going to have a morning on our own during my recent trip to VA, so we decided to go out to breakfast. This proved to be more difficult than it sounds; even a Google search for the best breakfast in Northern Virginia yielded nothing but IHOPs and Bob Evans. A most emphatic “no” to both of those, thank you. Then I tried searching for best bakeries, and up came The Swiss Bakery + Pastry Shop, less than 15 minutes by car from my parents’ house.
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Do you believe in coincidence? The Washington, DC episode of “No Reservations” aired about a week and a half before my visit to my parents, who live just outside of DC. As luck would have it, Anthony Bourdain paid a visit to a Vietnamese shopping center on the show, a place called the Eden Center. And the Eden Center is very near to my parents’ house. My love of vietnamese food has been mentioned on this blog before, and I emailed my parents and told them I wanted to check out the Center when I was in town. It turns out my folks had already been there. I couldn’t believe it.
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