Maryland Restaurant Week Spring 2013

We discovered that the National Harbor in Maryland is having Restaurant Week from March 4-17, 2013. Its not just a week but I'm not complaining. During this week, restaurants serve three-course meals for just $20.13 (lunch) and $35.13 (dinner). My friends and I had the time to go here because its Spring break this week! cool huh? (honestly, that day was the only day we took a break). We researched all the restaurants and we picked McCormick and Schmick's.

We had a reservation. So we were comfortably seated. For a weekday lunch, they had a good number of tables. The National Harbor is not exactly in the middle of a business center.

There are no signs to show that its restaurant week, so unless you know it, you'll miss out on the good deal. They won't hand you the menu unless you ask for it.

We had the mixed greens, and oysters for starters. Lets say its nothing spectacular. Just alright.

 Mixed Greens

Roasted Virginia Oysters

For the main course, everyone had the Bourbon Glazed Salmon, since everyone is on a diet. It was definitely a treat. You have to enjoy the fish with the side dishes to make it perfect.

Bourbon Glazed Salmon

And for dessert, we tried Creme Brûlée and Walnut Apple Tart. In my opinion, the Walnut Apple Tart was the superior dessert. It was served with a scoop of cinnamon ice cream which had the perfect texture as opposed to the creme brûlée which i feel tasted too egg-y, if there is a word. I know creme brûlée is made up of mostly egg, but I believe that it should be a combination of egg and cream, otherwise, we should just have baked eggs or something like that. Leche flan tastes better than it.

 Walnut Apple Tart

Creme Brûlée

After lunch, we were just too damned full. We felt so sleepy that we decided to walk around the harbor and take pictures, but it was too breezy and cold so we just ended up hanging out inside Gaylord Hotel and home after.

Going Japanese

We just had a very productive day and so my friends and I decided to go Japanese for dinner! Ever since I got here, I haven't had Japanese, and I was already missing it. Back home, I could never have enough Japanese. Every time Lovely and I would dine out, we would pick Japanese, even if we just had it the week before at the same restaurant. We went to Sumo Hibachi and Sushi Restaurant in Alexandria, Virginia. Hibachi means cooked on a hot plate, or simply teppan.  We were lucky enough to be there during happy hour. In the Philippines, happy hour translates to low-priced drinks. Here, happy hour could translate to low-priced sushi and appetizers as well. 

Here's the menu:

They have a special menu for happy hour so make sure you ask for it.

 We shared an order of Pirate Sushi

 Hong Kong-Style Roasted Duck Noodle Soup

Seafood Noodle Soup

Their noodle soups are so big! its good enough for two hungry people.

Overall, I love this place. I would definitely come back. The service is great! But when I go home, I would definitely go to Zensho, where they have eat-all-you-can teppan. 

This one is for Lovely

Its already spring break but I'm swamped with work. I have tons of research to do and seminars to attend. It just does not feel like a break at all. With the single exception that I successfully survived a three-day detox plan that I designed. Anyway, I was able to attend a talk by a professor from Brown University at Georgetown University. Lovely of misslovelytan.blogspot.com made sure that I took photos of Georgetown itself, so I did on my way back to George Washington University, my office. So here's what it looks like on a normal day.

 Healy Hall (Georgetown University)

  Georgetown Cupcakes 

Stores along M Street

 Stores along M Street

 Stores along M Street

 LOVELY!!! Here's your favorite store! 

 Stores along M Street

One of my favorites but I was too tired to shop earlier.

 Serendipity 3 is a branch of the serendity cafe in New York. I love their grilled cheese. 

 Lacoste!

 more food

 Coffee and dessert

 more shops

 relax!

 Shops

 Sprinkles (Another cupcake shop)

relax again...

I'd probably love M Street if I were a tourist. Its the perfect place to walk, eat, shop, eat again, shop again, walk sort of thing. But as a researcher, I feel that M Street is a distraction. Maybe I will have more time to explore during summer time. 

Daylight Saving Time (Spring Forward)

Hello Spring! I thought winter would never end. Finally, the sun is shining. Today is the first day of DST and I'm just so tired. Daylight Saving Time is the practice of advancing time by an hour when the days start being longer. Some realizations/discoveries today:
1. I only have exactly one year here because my ticket is only valid for travel within that period of time! So maybe I should be making more out of this soon.
2. Losing an hour means a lot! I have to wait until sometime in fall, before I earn that extra hour back again.
3. Staying home means eating healthy. I stayed home all day except for my run to the gym, so I only had natural food. Its part of my 3 day detox, and now i'm on day 2.

Kitchen Experiment: alcoholic cuppies (1)

Today was quite an amazing day, I was able to hit the gym and read research related literature. I actually felt like going out for a mojito but I was too lazy to go out since I still have tons of readings. So I decided to whip up my own mojito. I have mint lying around in the fridge but no rum in store, so I substituted it with white wine, and guess what, it actually is a good substitute. Now, I wanted to bake something, and I really wanted to use the mint and white wine combination so I whipped up Chardonnay Cupcakes with Mint-Infused Chardonnay Buttercream Frosting. Remember how I don't like things being too sweet, so instead of using Reisling (sweet white wine) I opted Chardonnay.

This baby is made by creaming 2/3 cup of butter and 1 1/4 cup of sugar together. **Remember to preheat your oven to 350F. ** In a separate bowl, mix your dry ingredients 2 and 3/4 cup flour, 3 teaspoons baking powder, 1 teaspoon salt. Alternately mix this in the butter mixture with 3/4 cup of white wine. Don't worry if the end result is crumby. Its only normal.

In another bowl, whisk 6 egg whites until they have stiff peaks. Fold this in the crumby mixture. You might find that the crumby mixture is still crumby. What I did with mine was whisked them together for a few seconds before transferring them into the baking pan.

Line your cupcake pans and fill them until they are 2/3 full. You have baking powder there so they will definitely rise. Bake them for 20 minutes.

While waiting for our baked goods, it is a good time to make your frosting. Basically, mix 1 cup butter with 3 cups of powdered sugar, and 2 tablespoons of Chardonnay (infused with mint leaves).

Frost your cupcakes after they have cooled down, garnish with a couple of mint leaves and voila!

These cupcakes are light and fluffy, almost like you are on a cloud. When I feel sad and I want to lift my spirits, I normally seek solace in eating tons of marshmallows. I think these may also be a good substitute in the absence of marshmallows. :D

And after this, my hand surprisingly smells like butter. Weird but I love it.

Watch out for other kitchen experiments in the future.

Trip to the grocery

Thanks to four-day university work weeks, I get to do things at my own time on Fridays. Starting the days off with answering emails, and gym, I went to the grocery. I hit two stops actually, Harris Teeter and Costco. I learned my lesson from the last time I went crazy grocery shopping, so I brought my buddy along:

A suitcase!

Its not odd when people see me walking around with a suitcase. First, because I live one metro station away from the airport. Secondly, I also see other people walking around with suitcases. Anyway, I brought the suitcase along just to make sure that I wont have a hard time lugging all my purchases around. Last time I did that, I got sick. Anyway, I couldn't believe that my purchases from Harris Teeter didn't fit. I had to carry a plastic of herbs back. I got myself a couple of good deals. 

This bag of basil actually has the plant with its roots in some amount of water, making sure that consumers get fresh basil all the time. The nice this about this is that its priced exactly the same as fresh basil that has been cut and packed, so I went for the living basil

Buy 1 get 1 free special on Pepperidge Farms Milanos!!! Last week they had the same promotion for Pepperidge Farms cookies. These are my favorite even back home, but I wouldn't buy them normally because they are quite expensive for their size ($3.49 each). I am considering to stock up on these. the promotion only runs until tuesday.

Cling wrap is also in the buy 1 take 1 list, also until tuesday. Although I still have some, it won't hurt to stock. (Gosh, I seriously feel like a hoarder!)

This was also on sale, only $0.97 but I didn't hoard because the promotion runs until April 16 anyway. I will pick this up over time.

This was also on sale.

On my way back home, I dropped by Costco. It was already around 3pm and I haven't had lunch so I went around trying out their samples while doing my second round of grocery. I finally bought the things that I actually want such as honey, pecans, dark chocolate acai blueberries. When I got home, I was so tired but I had to make dinner, yes it took me that long to get home, so I made this:

Salmon tofu burger with edamame pesto

I based the recipe from this link. If you read my earlier post on red velvet cupcakes, I mentioned that I usually get a recipe from the internet, cross reference it with a bunch of other recipes and recalibrate it to my own personal preference.

Recipe for Salmon tofu burger with edamame pesto (my version):
I basically used half a block of soft tofu, a can of sockeye salmon, a can of pink salmon, a few sprigs of cilantro, (I honestly forgot to buy wasabi! It would have added a kick to this), a few rounds of dijon mustard, salt and pepper to taste, 1 egg to bind everything, although i think I should have used more. Make 3 inch sized balls and coat with panko (japanese breadcrumbs), flatten and continue to coat with breadcrumbs. Since I'm cooking for just myself, I kept everything else in freezer bags (2 patties in each bag so I won't have to defrost everything, every time).

For the edamame pesto, I simply eyeball measured everything based on the taste that I wanted to achieve, so in a food processor, combine edamame beans, cilantro, basil, pecans (because that's what I have, but you can easily use walnuts or pine nuts), extra virgin olive oil, garlic, and salt and pepper to taste.