Two of my very good friends recently came back from their honeymoon in Turkey. I only have vague memories of Turkey, since I visited the country with my parents when I was 11 years old. Listening to their vacation stories and looking through their pictures makes me want to hop on the first United Airlines flight to Istanbul. Unfortunately, a Turkish get-away is not in my near-future and so I will have to settle for the next best thing: the Washington, D.C. Turkish Festival and Turkish Restaurant Week. On October 3rd, the American-Turkish Association of Washington D.C. presents a day-long, fun-filled and cost-free celebration of Turkey, complete with food, Turkish coffee, a Turkish ...
Restaurants
La Fête Nationale Part Deux (or Deel Twee?)
Belgians celebrate their Fête Nationale exactely one week after their French neighbours. Before we moved to Paris, my family and I lived in Lille, France's fourth largest city with subburbs that include a few towns on the other side of the border, in Belgium. We typically celebrated the holiday either by driving up to Brussels or to one of Belgium's many beaches with my grandmother who was born in le plat pays. While I can only claim a small Belgian heritage on my father's side, Belgium is a country that I absolutely adore, where I studied for a while (at the College of Europe in the beautiful city of Bruges) and where I would probably have moved to after graduating from The George ...
We’ll always have Paris Cork
Felicitations are in order for Cork Wine Bar who took home the RAMMY for Best Neighborhood Gathering Place during the 1940s Casablanca themed celebration at the Marriott Wardman Park Hotel on Sunday night. To thank all of their friends and neighbours for their loyalty and support, Diane Gross and Khalid Pitts, the owners of Cork, are inviting you to join them for a celebratory Champagne tasting on Saturday, June 12th at 3pm at Cork Market and Tasting Room. I've been learning a lot about Champagne recently as I prepare for a quick trip to the region with my husband this summer so I really hope to have the time to drop by! Whether I do or not, I certainly want to extend Cork Wine Bar and all ...
Tous au restaurant! (that’s French for restaurant week)
From La Nuit Blanche to Les Journées du Patrimoine or La Nuit des Musées and La Fête du Cinéma, I typically find myself wishing that my adopted city of Washington D.C. would take a few cultural cues from my hometown of Paris. And at time it does... La Fête de la Musique is mildly celebrated here, granted mainly by French hotels, restaurants and other strong-holds of French culture like L'Alliance Française. At other times, Paris finds itself following trends as well. Take the case of restaurant week. Following on the footsteps of New York or London (and DC too) Paris launched its first ever Restaurant Week! Labelled Tous au Restaurant (that would literally be French for everybody in the ...
Eat Out, Do Good!
When food and charity unite, something that seems to happen quite often in this town (and something you won't hear me complain about,) it's a win-win situation for everyone involved! Don't miss an opportunity to eat and do good tomorrow. For Dining out for Life, enjoy a meal at one of the 150 area restaurants participating in the event and a portion of the proceed will be donated to Food & Friends, a Washington nonprofit group that provides meals and groceries at no cost to people living with HIV/AIDS, cancer and other life-challenging illnesses.If you work close-by, why not grab your colleagues and head to one of my favourite French restaurant in town: Bistro du Coin. The Connecticut ...
Bientot: Kushi
CityVista in Mount Vernon Triangle, already home to Safeway and Busboys and Poets, will soon welcome an exciting new resident... D.C.'s very first Japanese Izakaya-style restaurant called Kushi. Izakayas get their names from the word Sakaya which means Sake Shop... they're basically Japanese drinking establishments which also serve food to accompany the drinks. If Kushi sticks to the traditional definition of a Izakaya, popular, casual and relatively cheap places for after-work drinking, then I am going to become a regular! In the case of Kushi, it sounds like more emphasis will be placed on food. The restaurant’s focal points will be its kushiyaki counter with an open fire pit, its sushi ...
Bientot: Buddha Bar
Wow... this is going to bring back lots of high school memories! Initially, Buddha Bar was a Parisian hot-spot known more for its chill oriental vibe, giant Buddha and successful music compilations than for the food it served. The original Buddha Bar opened in the late 90s and is located right around the corner from the US Embassy in Paris and behind l'Hotel le Crillon on rue Boissy-d'Anglas. Following its success, George V Entertainment has expanded the franchise in some of the trendiest cities around the globe: New York, London, Sao Paulo, Beirut or Dubai. Soon, D.C. will be able to add its name to this list as a Buddha Bar is slated to open at 455 Massachusetts Avenue NW at the end of the ...