Eating out...Reasoning the Restaurant Experience

I think the main draw to eating out for me is the company with which I go. While I do enjoy the solo-dining experience on occasion, I am more likely to go out for a meal with another. It seems to be one of the occasions when I have the acceptable undivided attention of the other person and no excuse or distraction from the conversation—except the food, of course!

Growing up, going to restaurants was a special occasion kind of event for my family. My parents are great cooks and love to do it, so it was always a kind of thing that we only would splurge for the really excellent restaurants, specialty, exotic food, or those nights we were especially lazy. Now that I am on my own, I eat out a lot more. Partly because I don’t always have the best place for entertaining, partly because I don’t yet have my parents’ cooking skills, and mostly because I always seem to be especially lazy…

Last week, I was on vacation and therefore eating out a lot—mostly for necessity’s sake. As I walked away from a recent meal with good friends in a sub-par location, I asked myself: do we care more about the company or the food? Like anything, it really does depend on the situation—and the expectations of the place, for that matter. If I am going out to order something specific, accompanied by a friend or not, I want that meal to be at least decent. If my aim is to spend time with a person, I tend not to worry about the quality of the restaurant as much.

The meal that brought these thoughts to mind took place on Saturday when I went out to brunch with some old friends at a restaurant that I thought looked rather nice. A few hours later, we had played many rounds of cards as we waited for the waitress to take our order, we finally received our food after we watched it waiting on the bar getting cold, there was excessive amounts of cheese smothering the under-seasoned potatoes and my omelet was stuffed with under-cooked vegetables (at least the eggs were cooked through!), the juice was too sweet, the toast too buttery and our waters finally showed up with the check. Does this sound like complaining? Needless to say, it was a pretty shit meal with pretty shit service. But you know, I didn’t mind it. I enjoyed the company of my friends and even though I lost at cards, we had good conversation and few laughs. It was the kind of brunch my hung-over body and fried brain called for at that moment.

So maybe sometimes we do want the classic dining experience with the bells and whistles to enhance the hopefully tasty food. But sometimes, spending that extra dollar in a restaurant is really just an excuse to spend time with others and possibly to drink more… without feeling the guilt of a morning bar trip!

School Lunch Revolution

A chat with Chef Allison Sosna, Part II

“Sourcing local food just makes so much sense,” Allison Sosna explains, there is no reason not to do it—it’s there, fresh, and available. Working at local, sustainable mission-driven restaurants in the city, she realized that sustainable food didn’t have to be something for only people who can afford to eat out, it can be something for everyone. Fresh Start Catering, an enterprise of D.C. Central Kitchen, not only provides students at D.C. Charter Schools with good food, this is coupled with other initiatives such as starting school gardens and education programs to further the children’s knowledge on the subject. And during the winter? “A lot of sweet potatoes,” Allison says with a grin. Preparing produce to store is another tactic, “every big batch of tomatoes we get in is cooked into sauce” because it keeps for longer.

This journey is not without its challenges; one of the biggest hindrances’ is the cost involved with bringing this food to schools. Mitigation solutions are there, Allison explains, through a change in federal policy and subsidies when it comes to public schools. The other roadblock faced is the bureaucracy involved with the day-to-day decisions in the schools. To make these life-changing decisions for the children, all parties and powers need to be on board, which is a challenge when finances are such a delicate aspect of the schools’ livelihood.

Doing this on a small-scale, Allison explains, is incredible because you can see the changes, “the attendance rates are rising because kids are served breakfast and their attention is better in class.” She can walk around and talk to the students during their meal times, get feedback on the food they serve, and see first-hand the difference she makes in their days by providing a substantial meal. “The salad bar is the greatest,” she says, “the kids’ can’t have seconds, but they can go to the salad bar if they are still hungry and so they eat so many more vegetables that way.”

Not alone in her efforts, the hype is growing; thanks to the Obama’s Let’s Move Campaign and other internationally known chef’s jumping on board to change the way we eat. The country may just be beginning to realize the health, obesity, and environmental problems it faces with the current food system. However, the door has been thrown wide open for innovative solutions to change it. Making changes in the schools, Allison says proves that “we can do this at a small scale level—we are doing it on the small-scale,” we just need to bring it nation-wide and show the rest of the country they can do it too.

A Chef’s Road to Sustainability

A chat with Chef Allison Sosna, Part I

The energy exuding from Allison Sosna as she launches into her story is palpable. I met her years ago as a fellow rower at American University, where she was studying and working part-time in the kitchen of a local restaurant. Four years later, I sat down with her to find out what that restaurant gig had turned into.

Allison’s life with food really began when she moved to Italy to study. “That was the game-changer,” she said, realizing then that her passion for food was something could not ignore. Returning to the United States, Allison knew she wanted to make this newfound passion her life.

Working her way through the kitchens of bars to the high quality fine dining in Washington D.C., Allison gained valuable skills not working with food but working with a plethora of people behind the scenes in the restaurant business. After working for a few years, she knew she needed the formal training; so she went back to school and graduated from L’Academie de Cuisine culinary school. But Allison knew that she wanted to bring her passion to something beyond the restaurant scene. She wanted to be a part of revolutionizing the food system—bringing together her passion of food with doing good for the people who consume it.

Finding an incredible opportunity at D.C. Central Kitchen, Allison quickly began to climb the ladder, bring the non-profit organization with her. Managing and cooking with ex-convicts to bring opportunity to the citizens of Washington, Allison found that her passion persevered through the challenges. She says, “it’s totally athletic” to survive in the business you have to have the ability to thrive through stress, long hours, and high-pressure situations.

Allison continues her work with the Kitchen, and now is the Executive Chef for Fresh Start Catering, working in the kitchens of D.C. Charter Schools, sourcing locally and sustainably grown food and bringing to the children. According to her, that is exactly the move that needs to be made, the kids are where it’s at and bringing real food to them will really make a difference to teach them the life lessons they need. “Kids do so much of their eating at school, we need to be teaching them the right things about food.”

To be continued…

American Food?

In the aftermath of the Fourth of July and the World Cup… I find myself asking: Why don’t Americans have a good cuisine??

I find it interesting that as Americans, much of our food is based on international cuisine. When I go out to eat, the conversation usually goes something like: “So what kind of food do you feel like?” “Mm, Italian? Mexican? Maybe Thai? …Etc” I hardly get a response from someone saying, “Oh, I really want American food.” (All right, Disclaimer here: I’m not talking Fast Food here…) And of course we have “American food”—Hello, Bar and Grill! But it is more unusual for it to come up as a nice dinner option.

I don’t mean to sound like I am Anti-American here. I’ll be honest, I am the first to complain when the food in America is not authentic to the country of origin and I just want the “real” stuff. On the other hand, I find it to be exactly what our nation’s about –the American melting pot. The country takes in countless of people and cultures, then melds them all together to create something that is not the original, but something unique and special.

International food in the States exemplifies our melted culture. The food here that we get, while it may not be that authentic dish you had in that tiny village. (but let’s be honest, you’re not going to find that anywhere except that little village) it holds the roots and the essence of that food but it has become something different—which is not to say it is bad by any means.

Walking along my street in Washington DC, I pass by countless Mexican-Salvadorian restaurants. My first thought was “oh come on… those cuisines are nothing alike, and really, isn’t it just typical American to assume that just because the two countries are both Latin American it means they are the same?” And you know, mixing those two cuisines, it is “typical American” but not necessarily with the negative connotation. Rather, it is what America is about, we take in cultures and melt them together, creating something that is unique and furthermore, it is unlikely to occur anywhere else in the world.

So, maybe we don’t necessarily have our own cuisine. Instead, we have everyone else’s cuisine and we have made it our own. And I suppose from there, we can all form our own opinions as to whether we think this to be positive or negative.


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And apparently this is a very controversial and touchy subject for some: Check out TNG readers' responses.

Food Stereotypes

I often wonder what kind of judgments are made every time I order at a restaurant or ring my items up at the grocery store. I am sure that it is not even considered by some, as I am probably the 100th customer of the evening and who really cares if I get the pasta or salad?

But, let’s be honest here, I know there are times you are standing in line at the supermarket, watching that person load up groceries in front of you and deciding what they are going to make for dinner that night. Or even more likely, out on a date and asking that inevitable small-talk question, “so, what looks good?” holding your breath that the other person is not going to say, “Mm, how 'bout that tofu?” (Oh, wait... I have totally said that before…I wonder if that’s why we aren’t still dating?)

Let me not be the first to tell you, not everyone who is vegan is a member or PETA, and not every person who loves the steak house BBQ wears boots and a trucker hat. Just because I tell you that I like organically grown, local food does not mean that I don’t enjoy a juicy medium-rare burger every once in while. And you may love a Coca-Cola and a Mickey-D’s Big-Mac, but that doesn’t make you a tasteless money lovin’ *gasp* capitalist … well, maybe in that case … (I’m just kidding!)

Why do we judge people based on the food they eat? I mean, of course, it is inevitable that we will. Judgment is all around. We LOVE to judge others. I’m not saying it’s necessarily a bad thing, in fact I am an advocate that judgments don’t necessarily have to be negative; sometimes you judge someone in a positive light. And food is one of those things that is easy as we all have our own tastes in food of what we like and don’t like. Therefore, we feel we can consider ourselves well versed enough on the subject to have an opinion on someone else’s tastes.

News flash here, you probably are in no position to hold those judgments about others. Unless Anthony Bourdain or that guy from Top Chef, is reading this right now, I would say the average eater is still discovering new flavors and therefore should try and pass on the forming a solid opinion next time you talk to someone and says they only eat vegan—or, for that matter, only eat professionally cut filet mignon with freshly ground pepper.

I suppose that we can’t help making those quick passing judgments every once in while, especially when it comes down to something that we think we know so well, such as food. But, at the end of the day — don’t knock it ‘til you try it.

"The Greatest Thing Since Sliced Bread"

Really, what is so great about sliced bread anyways?

Every time I hear this common phrase, I think to myself--wait a minute, isn't sliced bread representative of everything that is wrong with out society at the moment? Okay, maybe not wrong, but at least controversial?

The industrialization, the corporate reliance, and the culture of convenience… this is exactly the thing that we are questioning. It’s is all well and good, and makes our lives that much “easier;” on the other hand, it’s not sustainable—meaning that it can’t last, at least not the way we have it now, and in the system we have now.

Sliced bread: made from wheat that most likely came from genetically modified seed, then cultivated using methods of mono-cropping and excessively sprayed with chemicals. The next step is processing with large machines using large volumes of foreign oil, and sent to a large factory to be processed and stripped from the majority of essential nutrients. When all is said and done, the loaf of bread full of preservatives is sliced to uniform sandwich sized pieces and slipped into plastic bags to be shipped across the country.

Now, what is not to love about that? We as consumers can peel off a slice of bread from the loaf at our convenience and we don’t even need to think about any of those steps it took to bring that bread to our plate. We can remove our selves completely from the chain, our part is simply a once a week trip to the store and few dollars.

What happened to making bread—letting the dough rise, experiencing the moment when you just start to smell the bread baking, and pulling that golden loaf from the oven and waiting for it to cool before you (gasp) slice the bread yourself.

With all things considered, it may be possible there are greater things than sliced bread—I’m just sayin’.

Local Food: An age-old alternative to the new world problems?

The weekly farmer's market attendees are quick to tell you the biggest advantage is the low carbon footprint of local food. This is often calculated as food miles and is cut back due to a decrease of transportation. Even when some pesticides are used in the cultivation, the overall environmental impact decreases. Moreover, with the farmer in front of you at the market as you decide what to buy, the customers are able to ask directly about the farming techniques and agricultural inputs used to better make an educated purchase.

As it is the case with Organic food, the other big issue that must be mentioned, is that local food has become a luxury item due to the fact the cheap supermarket food is often subsidized. Not to mention, the people who have the time take that leisurely stroll with their leashed-dog to the local farmer’s market are probably not tight on cash.

Despite the financial concerns, which have a potential to change with a new policy, the biggest drawback to each of us becoming local foodies is the very thing we are trying to protect—the natural environment. The natural seasons and eco-systems tend to be problematic for the New England farmer who, for example, wants to grow tomatoes in the middle of December. The only option in this case would be to grow those desired fruits and veggies in an artificially warm greenhouse as the snow howls outside, which in the end creates just as much environmental destruction from the energy used to heat it, as does the 18-wheeler bringing those tomatoes up from Florida. So, if we want to eat our veggies on a low-carbon diet in the winter, it looks like it’s back to the old days of preserving food by canning or drying—and, hey, now we can freeze it too! However, who really wants to do that when they know there is a decent looking head-of-lettuce at the nearest supermarket?

For me, the best thing about eating locally goes back to “voting with your dollar” and showing the support for the local farmer over the multi-million dollar trans-national corporation. It brings the attention to local businesses, and more than that, attention to where the food is actually from—that burger was once a cow, it did not come from cellophane wrapping. I think many of us sometimes prefer the illusion and separation the modern supermarket offers, rather than face the facts. The idea that our food came from a farm complete with dirt and animal shit can be less than appetizing when we can simply imagine the fluorescent aisles lined with colored boxes and shiny jars. If we begin to face the facts, then we can begin to understand the system and all factors involved. We can further begin to make our own decisions concerning how we want to eat and the impact of our food.