T. Scott

Matters of Taste

It's always a dilemma when I come to DC -- where do I want to eat on that first evening?  I've been coming here a couple of times a year since I moved away back in '87, so I have lots of favorites that I like to go back to, but it's also become such a restaurant town that there's always new places that sound extremely inviting.  So what to do?

This morning I see that a previous occupant of my hotel room has helpfully checked a number of establishments off in the Official Visitor's Guide -- Hooter's in Chinatown, Haagen-Dazs downtown, Brickskeller Down Home Saloon, Gifford's Ice Cream & Candy Co., Haagen-Dazs again (in Penn Quarter, this time), and Ben's Chili Bowl.  Somehow, I don't foresee myself crossing paths with him (the first choice inclines me to believe that it's a "he").

Of course, I could have gone into any of the billion sites that now enable people to comment on their experiences at local restaurants.  Zagat's, for example, would have told me that Al Tiramisu has "great food and atmosphere" with "attentive service", while simultaneously being "overrated" with "food that is completely bland" and a menu that is "average".  From "yelp" I would've found out that Bistrot du Coin (another of my favorites, and the place I finally ended up) has "mediocre food," "very good French country cooking," "top-notch mussels," "colorful and fun waitstaff," and "incredibly rude waiters."  Sigh.  The wisdom of the crowds, I guess.

All of those opinions are valid, I hasten to add.  They're just not particularly useful, because everybody is going to a restaurant for different reasons, everyone's experiences and expectations are different, and without knowing more of that background, I have no way of knowing how their experiences might inform my own.  What an experienced professional restaurant critic does is attempt to provide context and background and consistency in their opinions.  You may not agree with them all the time, but they'll give you a baseline against which you can measure your own tastes and interests.

I'm here in DC to participate in a Library Advisory panel for the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences this afternoon.  There are ten people in the group -- nine librarians and a consultant -- from quite a variety of settings.  In preparation for the meeting, we've received a series of questions gathered under four topical headings:  Trends in Use and Accessibility of Scholarly Content, Transitioning from Print Subscriptions to Online Site Licenses, Copyright Ownership and Open Access, and Usage-Based Pricing/Collaborative Consortia Based Pricing.  The questions are the kind that you'd expect to hear from a reasonably progressive scholarly publisher and accurately reflect the kinds of struggles publishers are engaged in these days as they try to plot their future.

It's not likely, of course, that we'll be able to give them consensus opinions, any more than the diners at any local restaurant are going to agree on the menu's hits and misses.  But the conversation will no doubt be lively and I am as eager to hear the differing views of my colleagues as I presume that the PNAS folks are.  I do hope, though, that we can provide enough context and background for our opinions for them to be useful.

Solitude in the City

I'm typically quite eager to get on the plane headed to wherever.  Even in these days when the papers are full of complaints about overcrowded skies and delayed flights I'm happy to be traveling.  So I was a little surprised yesterday to be feeling so blue as I drove out to the airport for my flight to Chicago -- particularly since Chicago is one of my very favorite cities.

It's largely because this time Lynn isn't going to come up to join me.  Back when she was on the MLA Board, I would come to Chicago following the February & September board meetings.  We'd stay until Sunday and go to museums & galleries, out to a show, try out new restaurants.  When I was elected to the Board, we set up the same pattern, and so she was initially planning to join me tomorrow.   But then, with all of the chaos surrounding the opening of Gymboree, she thought better of that plan and decided to skip this one.  I don't disagree with her decision at all, but it just doesn't feel right to be up here without her.

My reaction is particularly unexpected because generally I relish solitary travel.  I like being able to explore cities, to get lost in them, to find my way into unexpected places, on my own schedule, without having to deal with the long list of compromises that are usually part of the experience of traveling with someone.  But then, compatibility in traveling is one of the hallmarks of my relationship with Lynn.  I remember, very early on, during one of the first trips we took together, we were walking along having such a good time, and I blurted out, "Being with you is almost as good as being alone!"  As soon as the words were out of my mouth I was aghast, because it sounded horrible, but she just laughed and knew exactly what I meant. 

So I should have been glad for the chance to have an extra day on my own in Chicago, but the fact is that I identify this city so much with her now.  It's where our romance began, although neither of us knew it at the time.

I felt better once we landed and I was in the cab heading to the hotel.   The weather was ugly -- drizzly and hot and very humid, but weather never makes a huge difference to me.    It's the energy of the city, that particular informal, brash confidence that Chicago has no matter what the weather, that I admire.  This is a place where people are used to coping with months of those icy winds blowing in off Lake Michigan -- they're not about to be slowed down by a little late summer heat & rain.

Before I left home, I'd picked out the restaurant that I wanted to go to for dinner.   I've been to Bistro Zinc several times and only taken Lynn there once, but I've written letters to her there, written in my journal about her there, so I associate her with it even so.  It's the perfect type of a French bistro that I seek out in whatever city I find myself.

I get a table by the window and look out over the bustle of State Street.  I write for a bit, sip my wine, and feel myself relax.  I've brought along MFK Fisher's The Gastronomical Me to read while I eat -- what can be better than reading superb prose about great food while I'm sitting in a favorite restaurant having an excellent meal of my own!  It's almost as good as being with Lynn.

I call home as I walk back to the hotel.  "Did I have a good time?" Lynn laughs.  Oh yes, I say, and tell her what we had to eat.  I'm feeling much better now.  I'll read for a bit more before sleep, and in the morning I'll work for a few hours.  The magic of modern travel is that I can get just about as much done from my hotel room as I can from my office.  Then in the afternoon the board meeting starts and for the next two days I'll be too busy and occupied to miss her too much.    Come Saturday afternoon, when the meeting is done, I'll seek out a restaurant for lunch that I think she'd like.  I'll take out fountain pen and stationery to write her a letter.  Years from now, when I remember the afternoon, I'm sure I'll see her sitting right across from me.

Making The Best Of A Bad Day

"So when was it that you realized you were going to be having a really bad day today?" I asked Tony the maitre d' when he stopped at our table at Gibson's.

"Oh, probably about an hour and a half or so ago.  We'd done all of the prep work and had everything ready to go, but then..."  He gave a smile of weary resignation, but didn't go into the details of the "technical difficulties" that had caused RL to close their dining room for the day and start calling people who had reservations to offer them alternatives.

This was at about 1:30, and we had met Tony half an hour before.  What was remarkable about the conversation is that Tony doesn't work at Gibson's, and we hadn't been expecting to be eating there -- he's the maitre d' at RL, where we'd had a reservation for lunch.

The staff at RL had begun calling their customers as soon as they realized they had a disaster on their hands, but I'd missed the call, which apparently came into my cell at about the time I was sliding out of the cab at the Duke of Perth to retrieve the moleskine that I'd left there the night before (another superb service story, by the way).  So we had gone ahead on schedule checking out of the hotel, storing our luggage and walking up the street to the restaurant.  This is our general pattern when we have a weekend in Chicago -- book a late afternoon flight so that we can take our time and have a good lunch before heading home.  Evelyn has had positive things to say about RL, and since she's never steered us wrong on a restaurant recommendation we decided to give it a try and booked a 1:00 reservation.

When we walked in, there were people sitting in the bar and lounge areas, but the dining room itself appeared to be empty, the tables all set and pristine.  This seemed odd at what should have been the peak of the brunch rush.  I gave my name to the hostess and suddenly Tony appeared, calm and smiling, looking completely unrushed and unhurried, but deeply apologetic. 

"I'm afraid we've had a technical malfunction in our kitchen and we've had to close our dining room for the day," he said, and rolled his eyes up with a "these things happen" shrug.  "What I'd like to suggest is that you try either Gibson's or Lux Bar -- they have tables just waiting for you, and then I'd like to buy you lunch here at RL the next time you come in."

Of course, we were a bit startled and taken aback, trying to take this information in.  We probed a bit about the choices -- Tony described the places and we thought that Gibson's would probably do.  "Yes, Gibson's is what I would recommend.  John Coletti is there just waiting for you.  I can get you a cab or, if you'd prefer to walk, it's just a few blocks up Rush...   Now let me give you this gift certificate for the next time you come in and here's my card, with my cell phone number -- please call me directly for the reservation and I'll be sure to take care of you personally."

He pointed us in the right direction, apologized again, shook my hand, and by this time we felt like we were all in this together and were on an adventure, rather than being inconvenienced.

Sure enough, when we walked into Gibson's and said, tentatively, to the maitre d' there, "Tony just sent us up from RL...," he grinned and replied, "Oh yes, we were expecting you.  I'm John..."   We commiserated about what a lousy day Tony was having.  Our coats were whisked away and we were led to our booth.

"Let me see that gift certificate," I said to Lynn once we were settled in.  She handed it to me and I opened it up.  More than enough to cover lunch for two the next time we were in.  Impressive.  And as we were sitting there marveling at how they had so smoothly moved us from feeling disappointed that our plans had been knocked askew into feeling that we were being treated extra-special, Tony appeared at our table.  "I just had to walk up the street to see how my customers were doing.  Is everything okay?  Are they treating you right?"

We assured him that we were having a fine time, and were looking forward to coming back to his restaurant the next time we were in town.  He shook my hand again, and moved off to the next table of displaced diners.

"Now, that was over the top," we agreed.   Hard to calculate the financial hit that RL took that day -- an empty dining room that would usually be packed, all that food that had been prepped and would have to be given away to the food banks, and the gift certificates to the people holding reservations.  Many thousands of dollars to be sure.  But there was Tony, five blocks away from his own restaurant, as if there was nothing more important in his world than making sure that we were having a fine Sunday lunch.

We, in libraryland, talk a lot about customer service.  Oh, that we could be half this good!

Rilke Would Have Loved It

I woke Saturday morning wanting most of all to see some Whistlers.  I'd ended Friday night the same way I'd ended  the night before -- up the block from my hotel, sitting at Al Tiramisu's bar sipping grappa with Luigi, under Adriana's watchful eye.  A little grappa goes a very long way, and I was cautious, but Luigi loves the stuff as I do, and he's always got something new to try.  So when I rose to consciousness, and called down for my pot of coffee, I still had a bit of a pleasant buzz around the ears.  And I knew the best thing for me was to spend an hour with Jimmy Whistler.

Friday had been a very long, and quite wonderful day, and frankly, I wasn't sure what my energy level for the rest of Saturday would be.  I'd come to DC strictly on holiday, for the express purpose of seeing the completed expansion of the Phillips Collection, and the newly (and finally!) reopened Smithsonian American Art Museum.  I'd taken a late flight on Thursday, so that I could put in a full work day, and it was after 10:00 when I got to the hotel and considerably later when I got back from Al Tiramisu.   But I'd gotten up eager to get into my day and cleared my head with a long, brisk walk through Georgetown, and then a light lunch of mussels and frites at Bistrot du Coin.  I'd spent hours at the Phillips, thrilled with what they'd done, making repeated stops in the renovated Rothko Room.  Then I'd walked down to American Art for a brief overview before heading back into Georgetown for supper at Bistro Francais, and then ending up for that grappa nightcap with Luigi.  Like I said, a long and wonderful day.

I had a ticket for the Saturday evening performance of Richard III, and I knew I wanted to spend some hours at American Art, and I really wanted to try to pace myself -- but I needed to see some Whistlers.  Ever since that revelatory retrospective back in the late eighties (one of the few art exhibitions that I can truly say changed my life), he's been among my pantheon of painters (the others being Goya, Daumier, and Rothko), and I knew exactly where to go.  For several years now, the Freer has devoted their long lower gallery to rotating exhibits of small Whistler works.  I wasn't sure what was currently up, but I knew I'd love it and that it would fill me with that sense of astonishment and wonder and delight that Whistler always gives me.

It turned out to be a series of his small oils, most of them from the 1880s.  These are remarkable pictures, mostly seascapes, punctuated by some wonderful urban scenes.  I've been looking closely at Whistler paintings for most of my adult life, and even the ones that I know well leave me breathless, thinking, "How does he do that?  How, in such tiny spaces, with just a handful of confident, seemingly careless, brushstrokes, does he evoke whole worlds and the deep and complicated hearts of the people who live in them?"  As usual, the placards emphasize that Whistler was all about art for art's sake and was only concerned with composition and color and line.  I suppose it's true to a point, but it's also an excessively academic way of looking at the work.  He is among the most deeply human painters I know, and to claim that in a painting like the little red glove, for example, all he cares about is composition, is to willfully ignore the life that he has put into that young girl's eyes.  Sometimes art historians annoy me to tears.

After filling myself up for awhile with those paintings, I was ready for some lunch before continuing on to the major event of the afternoon (I had another french bistro in mind, of course), but wanted to take a quick stroll through the rest of the Freer first, and that's when I came across the most unexpected revelation of the entire trip --  Gwyn Hanssen Pigott's  Parades.   I'd never heard of Pigott, but she turns out to be a well known Australian ceramicist, who, in her own work, arranges her pieces in very precise still lifes, so that the relationships of one to another creates a whole that is much more than the individual pieces.  She was invited into the Freer's ceramic storerooms to see what she might do out of their collection.  I find the results absolutely astonishing.  Because she was looking at the pieces from the standpoint of an artist, looking to create a new work from what she found, she wasn't interested in provenance or history or type of piece (all of that stuff that the art historians dote on), but on how the forms could relate to each other.  The beauty of what she has accomplished brought me to tears.  (The online exhibition is useful, by the way, but it doesn't give a hint of how powerful the arrangements are in real life).

I walked out of the Freer about noon and headed across the mall, feeling, quite literally, as if my feet were barely touching the ground.  That hour or so would've been worth the trip to DC all by itself, and my Saturday was barely underway.  As it turned out, it wouldn't end until some fifteen hours later, when I'd walked back to my hotel from the Dubliner,  after a long talk with the bartender Joel and the guitar player Conor Malone, but that, as they say, is another story...

 

Fried Corn

I didn't even know there was such a thing as deep-fried corn on the cob!  What a great idea -- you'd think you'd see it all over the place.    We were driving across Mississippi, having left the interstate just past Meridian.  It was just after noon, and I wanted to angle up a bit and catch the Natchez Trace  north of Jackson.  We were driving  along  US Hwy 80, passing through little towns like Chunky and Newton and  Hickory and Forest and Lake.  I thought for sure we'd pass some local little diner or barbecue joint.  But nothing. 

I was beginning to fear that I'd have to break one of the road rules (#2: Never eat in a chain restaurant).  We hadn't had breakfast and the Sonics and Hardees and Burger Kings that we were passing were starting to look pretty good.  Then Bruce and I both saw the sign at the same time -- "BJ's Cajun Cooker.  Chicken On A Stick $3.99".   I scanned the parking lot -- a couple of pickups and three or four cars.  Somebody was having lunch.  So we turned in.

Inside the door there was a high counter.  The menu selections were listed above the order windows.  Catfish po' boys, (and shrimp and oyster and clam po' boys too), grilled fish, fish & shrimp, etc., etc...  A tall, thin, slightly pinched looking woman swayed up to the window and looked down at us just a little sceptically. 

"Hello!" I said brightly.  She gave a nod.  "What do you think we should have?  My friend here is from England." 

A pause.  "Don't know what he wants," she drawled, making me feel like I'd breached some local protocol. 

Bruce gulped & grinned, "There's so many choices...!" 

She allowed a slight smile and said, "Some say the catfish is pretty good."  Another long pause.  "The plates come with two sides..."

So I ordered the grilled catfish plate with coleslaw and corn.  Bruce picked the fish and shrimp, with the same sides (I haven't asked him about this, but it was clear he was looking at the list of sides and thinking I have no idea what these things are.  Better to be safe and pick what Scott has...)

Miz Lean gave me the order ticket.  "Sit wherever you like.  I'll call out the last three numbers."  She gave me another stern look as if she wasn't quite sure I was following her about the last three numbers. 

"This is the real thing," said Bruce as we sat down at our little table, looking out the window at the pond in the back.  It took a while (she'd warned me that "it'll take a bit for him to grill that catfish") and then she leaned out the window, looked straight at us, and called out the last three numbers of our ticket.  I leapt up and went to get the paper plates, cups for our soda fountain drinks, plastic forks & paper napkins.  She softened a bit (I guess because I did the number thing right) and asked if we'd like tartar sauce or lemon juice.  Yes, to both, we said, and took everything back to the table.

It was no surprise that the food was superb.  This is the kind of place that John T. Edge would love.  But I was baffled when I got my plate and saw the golden brown cylinder that I at first took to be some kind of biscuit or corn fritter.  And then realized that nowhere on the plate was the mound of cooked corn that I'd been expecting.   What was before me was a half-ear of corn that had been very lightly battered and dropped into the frying oil.   The crust was paper thin, just enough to protect the kernels from the oil, so that they cooked up wonderfully juicy and full of flavor.   The fish was delicious, but the standout was that corn!

The Natchez Trace was beautiful, and we stopped off to see an Indian burial mound, and we wound our way down through the middle of Louisiana, listening to music and watching the life of the little towns, until we finally made it to our motel on the edge of Lake Charles.  It was a great driving day and we saw many wonderful things.  But I'll remember best the deep fried corn on the cob.

 

A Grappa Celebration

Wasn't it at that little wine store in the North End, where Mark took us to buy some grappa, that we first heard about the Jacopo Poli miele?  It's a honey-flavored grappa, and the owner had just come back from Italy where he'd tasted some for the first time.  He'd ordered a case but it hadn't arrived yet.  Mark said he'd try to get a bottle before his next visit to Birmingham, but that didn't work out.   Good things have their own way of coming around, however, and when we finished our splendid dinner at Al Tiramisu Tuesday evening and went up to the bar to tell Chef Luigi that it was time for grappa, his eyes twinkled at Lynn (as they always do) as he said, "Ahh, Senora!  What I have for you!  Miele, from Poli!"  It was every bit as delicious as we'd imagined that it would be.

We really do have to come here with Mark some time.  For the true grappa afficianado this is a heavenly spot.  I don't think I've ever actually selected a grappa here -- I just ask Luigi what he'd like to pour for me and it is always something wonderful.

We were in a celebratory mood after taking in the show of small Whistler paintings at the Freer,  strolling through Montmartre with Lautrec at the National Gallery, paying homage to Julia Child in her kitchen at the National Museum of American History and finishing the afternoon with oysters and whiskey at the Old Ebbitt Grill.    In the morning I'd done my talk for the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors -- the culmination of a series of conversations I've had with Sheldon over the years since the notorious Human Immunology incident.  NLM was the host site for this year's meeting of the committee, and Sheldon had asked me some months ago to come speak to the group.  Ostensibly, my purpose was simply to highlight a number of areas where electronic publishing presents us with new challenges that they might want to address in the Uniform Requirements for Submission of Manuscripts to Biomedical Journals.  What I was hoping for is that they would amend the section dealing with retractions and corrections to include a statement that it is never permissible to remove an article from the electronic database once it has been published.  And by the end of the discussion, that is exactly the point they reached.

They still need to agree on the specific language, and sometimes things can get gummed up in the transition from what seems like a clear concept to the actual words in which the idea takes form, but I am hopeful that they will be able to come to consensus on the phrasing over the next several weeks.   The URM isn't enforceable, even among those journals that agree to comply with it, so it can't prevent nervous lawyers from persuading the publishers they work for to continue to expunge articles in certain dicey situations, but it is a very signficant step to have this distinguished international body go on record with the principle, and it will give editors something with which to push back at the lawyers.

It was a day when I felt that I had really accomplished something worthwhile.   Definitely worth a grappa.

Road Rules

I thought, at first, that I'd just grab a burger somewhere along the drive.  It was ten-thirty, and I was expecting a five hour trip to Destin.  But once I turned onto Hwy 331 in Montgomery, I started to relax and enjoy the beautiful day.  It's been several years since I've been able to take one of my long driving trips, and I won't get another chance until the summer of '06.  And I remembered my driving rules -- avoid the interstate at all cost; never eat in a chain restaurant; and when you see a sign pointing in a different direction that looks interesting, go there.  That, plus the fact that I had a copy of the Oxford American's Southern Foods issue in the car with me made the thought of a fast food burger seem pretty sacriligeous.

There were a couple of interesting barbecue joints in Luverne, but since I was headed to the Gulf, I decided to hold out for seafood.   I ended up at Pompano Joe's, down the beach road from my hotel.  I know there was a time when a beachside seafood shack didn't have seating for 200, t-shirts for sale at the door, and half a dozen TVs in the bar, but those days are over.   At least, they are on the redneck riviera (oh, sorry -- they call it the "emerald coast" now).  But it was suitably rustic, and I had a little table right next to the brightly painted windows that looked out over the beach.    It was windy, but the sky was clear and brilliantly blue.  The sand looked almost silver and the water was ribbons of white and half a dozen hues of blue.

I was slightly disappointed to see that the oysters were Ameripure, but I'd been craving oysters for the last couple of hours so I went ahead.   This was the third or fourth time I've had them, and maybe it's my imagination, but they just don't taste quite as good as I'd expect oysters down here to taste.  Ever so slightly mushy, and a little too mild.  I think maybe I'll stay away from them in the future.   The fried shrimp sandwich, on the other hand, was quite good.  Small shrimp, breaded & fried and heaped on a soft hamburger bun.  Impossible to pick up and eat, so I went at it with knife and fork.

It's been a long time since Miss Lynn first introduced me to the joys of simple gulf food in a dive looking out over the water.   Pompano Joe's wasn't one of the great such experiences, but it'll do.

Bringing Up Baby

Josephine was squalling and fussing some when she was at the house while we were getting ready to go.  But she settled down on the drive and when Marian brought her into Fox Valley she was brightly awake and being adorable.  What a fuss everyone makes over her!

We were at a corner table and Marian set Josie, in her cradle, on the floor between the table and the wall, where she'd be out of the way.    It certainly seemed to suit her.    She seems to like it when there's a lot of commotion.  Maybe it's all the adoration cascading her way.

It was her second visit.  Lynn said, "You know, by her tenth birthday, we should be about celebrating her 100th meal here."   That's the plan.   Marian was eight when her Dad started bringing her to Fox Valley.  Josie made her first visit at six weeks.  The restaurant is the thread that will tie Josie to the grandfather that she won't get to know.   I think Ed brought Marian about once a week.  We're not going to be able to manage that -- but we are shooting for once a month.  Which, as we realized last night, makes the evening of Bruce's arrival in Birmingham in a few weeks the perfect time to come again.   

We most definitely do not do this for sentimental reasons.  When Mikey came by we asked him what he particularly liked this evening.  (Always a tough question for a chef -- his dishes are his babies -- how could he prefer one over another?!)  "But if it was me," he finally said. "If it was me, I'd probably have the pompano with the soft-shell crab -- only because we don't have it that often."  That was one of the items on my short list, so the decision was made.  And it was, of course, magnificent.

Southern Hospitality

There wasn't a parking place to be found on the narrow street leading up to Son's Place.  At the stop sign I looked in both directions, trying to decide which way to turn to see if there was something further down the block, and heard a horn honk.  I turned to see a guy in a beat up van parked just across the street from the restaurant.  He grinned and motioned that he was leaving.  I looked in my rearview mirror and saw an elderly woman crossing the street behind me.  He was waiting for her.  I turned around in the intersection and pulled into his spot as he pulled off, and we waved at each other and grinned again.  Welcome to Atlanta.

I think of him as the icon of the charmed weekend that we had.   The ice storm had shut Atlanta down more than we'd realized, as we discovered when we made our way gingerly across the ice to the Lenox Square mall.  Only about a third of the stores were open, and most of the restaurants (including the French place I'd been looking forward to) were closed.  But we ended up having a fine meal at the Zodiac inside Neiman Marcus.   Not likely a place we would have put near the top of our list, but a serendipitous find indeed.  My Szechuan shrimp was superb and Lynn couldn't get over how perfectly prepared her lamb chops were.  Our waiter was as polished and professional and gentle as could be, and came chasing after us into the store when we left, just to thank us for coming in.

As evening fell, and we became more aware of how much of the city was shut down, we decided to throw ourselves on the mercy of the hotel concierge to find us an open restaurant.   We had a short list of places that looked interesting, but weren't sure that any of them would be open.  I mentioned Joel.  He called, and sure enough, they were open.   We went out to the front, got a cab after just a few minutes, and were on our way.

The decor was marvelous, and the food was superb.  We ordered the tasting menu with paired wines and every dish was exquisite.  I'd told the sommelier that Lynn preferred reds, and so he came up with a perfect match of reds for her, rather than the whites that he started me with.  It began with chilled shrimp arranged around a light potato salad (shrimp perfectly done) -- one of those exceptional matches of flavors that comes as a surprise when you first see it and seems so obviously right by the time you're done.  On to scallops, and a john dory, and lamb tenderloins -- each dish perfectly proportioned, no extravagant flourishes needed, the chef obviously confident that the food needed nothing fancy to call attention to itself, beyond the brilliance of its preparation.  For dessert the pavlova for me, while Lynn substituted the coffee tart with whiskey ice cream.   We've had tasting menus in many places, including Trotter's and Emeril's and the French Laundry, and this sequence was as finely balanced as any of them.   If the chef had wandered out at that point, we would have applauded.

But what will always give that evening a special spot in memory is not the meal, but what happened after.  As we got our check, I asked that a cab be called.  Shortly after, one of the hosts came over, smiling, but I could see he was slightly worried.  He said he'd called the company and they were only running three cabs at that point, but "the company knows us well, so I'm sure that one will be along shortly."  We were in no hurry, so I wasn't concerned.  We went out to sit at the end of the bar so we could see the street while we waited.

And waited.  There were only two tables still seated after us, and as they finished and headed out (having sensibly arranged their transportation ahead of time), and the staff started into the closing routines, the host became more concerned.  The staff consulted with each other.  They called other cab companies.  The host gave us drinks on the house.  One of the bartenders, who was going through the flower arrangements pulling out those just past their prime, made up a bouquet for Lynn.  The other bartender chatted pleasantly, and commiserated with us over the absence of cabs.  And after an hour and a half, when it became clear that a cab was not coming (they even tried calling our hotel to see if the hotel could send a car), they arranged for one of the waiters to give us a ride to our hotel.   Every person in the place seemed quite determined to be sure that this didn't spoil our evening -- they were going to make sure that we got home okay.   When they apologized, we'd shake our heads and laugh, "It's not your fault!"  But we were in their restaurant, and I guess that made us their responsibility.

It was well after midnight when we finally got back to the hotel, after driving through long stretches of streets where all the power was out.  It was no surprise that many of the cab drivers had decided to just give up.   It was a very tough day for much of Atlanta, but when we look back on that evening, it won't be the storm we'll remember so much as it will be each and every one of the marvelous people at Joel.

Snow In Atlanta

When the birthday girl paused in her dancing to place her tiara on the head of the slender southeast Asian-looking man sitting next to us with his boyfriend, Lynn leaned over to me and said, "Someone from New York would never understand how normal this is here."  We're in Georgia.  We start 'em out with tiaras.

We were at Eclipse di Luna in Atlanta, a trendy tapas restaurant, tucked way back in a cul-de-sac in Buckhead.  The place was jammed.  We were sitting side-by-side at a low table, facing the bandstand, where the Latin jazz groove was keeping more than birthday girl moving to the rhythms.  We took our  time, Lynn ordering one dish whenever we'd finished the last -- a little cheese plate, some ribs braised in balsamic vinegar, roasted asparagus with shaved machengo, lamb meatballs, spicy potatos, a dish of ginger ice cream at the end.  From time to time Lynn would look at her cocktail glass in wonder, "This is best mojito I've ever had!"

We'd driven over from Atlanta that morning, so that Lynn could bring her red Jag to the dealer that she'd bought it from for its 10,000 mile service.  We'd decided to take advantage of that need to do an Atlanta weekend, which we've been talking about ever since I moved to Birmingham nine years ago.  We arrived around 1:00, and went straight to Son's place for lunch -- a classic southern meat-n-three that John T. Edge claims might have the best fried chicken in Atlanta.  John T. is the finest food writer of his generation, and his judgment is impeccable.  Son's grandson, toddling around the place (they said he'd been walking just two weeks), took a shine to me, and started to wail when I left.  Lynn was highly amused.

The sleet started up as we left Eclipse di Luna, and when I looked out the window this morning the streets and sidewalks and lawns were lightly covered with snow!  The forecast claims there'll be more freezing rain through most of the day.  Suits us just fine.  We took care of the car yesterday afternoon and have no responsibilities today at all.  We have a lovely room in the Grand Hyatt, with a great view towards downtown.  We bought a couple of interesting whiskys at Tower liquor on our way into town.  There's a little french brasserie down the street that's run by the same folks who do Le Bernadin in New York.  It'll do nicely for lunch.