Fusion sometimes gets a bad rep on the culinary mean streets, especially among the purists, regionalists and the more stubborn keepers of convention. While I agree that the grand majority of attempts to fuse two distant cuisines in one plate end in a tacky mess, I do appreciate the effort when research is conducted and…

Integration back into normal society after the “Night at the Museum” type chaos of the Marriott during the Folklife Festival was a process which certainly had its ups and downs. On the one hand, I had grown extremely weary of the hotel’s breakfast buffets and the constant availability of filling yet largely unsatisfying hotel food.…

I’ve made some really great friends here in D.C., ones who have broadened my perspective on the city and its surroundings and made me see it for more than just embassy events and Happy Hour. One place I’ve recently become familiar with is Herrington Harbour on the Chesapeake Bay, where a couple of cool kids…

Brunch is okay sometimes but paying such high prices for what tends to be the cheapest meal of the day gets old. And so do eggs. And bacon. And Hollandaise. I enjoy the culture of brunching, that of slapping on one’s Sunday best – perhaps a wide-brimmed hat and some wide-framed sunglasses – and getting…

A few weeks ago, before moving into this madhouse hotel and dedicating every ounce of my sanity to the participants of the 2013 Smithsonian Folklife Festival, I wined and dined with a new acquaintance of mine and left the “where” up to him. He brought me to a place in Logan Circle (which, I am ashamed to…

You dial a number and catch a key tossed out a window. Based on the relative location of this window, you approximate the apartment number and knock. The door opens to a Pueblan family seated around a single table the length of the small living room, a matchbox-sized kitchenette in the corner. As you walk…

June 3rd had been marked in my calendar for quite some time, from the moment I got home from Graffiato’s May Industry Takeover Night, where Kyle Bailey and Tiffany MacIsaac fed hungry masses of zombies cleverly disguised as food enthusiasts. This time around it would be a Boston kidguydude at the helm, namely Jamie Bissonnette…

It’s true what they say, Georgetown is indeed a picturesque little place. Strolling down some of the cobblestone-paved and quiet residential avenues, tucked away from the more bustling M Street, one feels as though one were strutting straight through a watercolor painting. Lots of neat bars and restaurants pull in both tourists and locals seeking…

A while back I convinced a few friends to join me at the Hungarian Sausage Festival, thrown by the Hungarian American Federation inside of some Ukrainian Orthodox church out in Silver Spring. It was $15 just to get in, which was a bit of a rip off, especially considering how many free festivals happen around…

Last Sunday found my roommate and I wobbling around Columbia Heights at 3 in the afternoon, looking for Mother’s Day brunch scraps to indulge in. It was relatively nice out and we were both clad in sunglasses and sundresses without cardigans, a bit too ambitious considering it was still only in the 60’s. Nevertheless, we…