(no subject)

[rivka]

Still at Capclave. I'm posting from our dimly lit hotel room, waiting for Michael to come back from his 8:00 panel. Alex is peacefully asleep in the middle of the bed. It's nice here.

This isn't my Capclave report, but I couldn't wait any longer to rave about the fooooood. Yesterday we went to a Moroccan restaurant with kip_w, Cathy, and their 3 1/2 year old daughter Sarah. Despite its location in a shopping center, it had little in common with the average mall restaurant. The walls had been painted to resemble mosaic tile, and we sat on couches strewn with cushions. They brought olives and a tasty flat bread to begin - it tasted a lot like the bread they serve at our local Afghan place. Then I had chicken with green olives and preserved lemons. It was good. I'd never had preserved lemons before. They're like a lemon pickle, so, unsurprisingly, I loved them. We finished with a plate of Moroccan pastries to share (I was unimpressed, unfortunately), and left before the belly dancing - to the headwaiter's distress.

But tonight... tonight we went with selki, stevendj, jonsinger, lisajulie, and Seth Breidbart to Mandalay, for Burmese food. Jon's been trying to get me to Mandalay for years, and now all I can do is mourn the lost opportunities behind me.

I don't even know how to begin to describe the food. Everything was delicious, but most of the dishes had strong, striking flavors that I was completely unable to identify. I don't think I could describe them, either. Ginger salad: shredded ginger and cabbage in a peanutty dressing, topped with crispy garlic and crisp fried yellow peas. Tea leaf salad, made with fermented tea leaves in a similar base to the ginger salad. Fritters made from yellow split peas, deep-fried but impossibly light and not a bit greasy. Pork with mango pickle. Chicken, bamboo shoots, and something completely startling which even Jon didn't seem to be able to name. Tofu with sour mustard greens. Lots of sour, tangy flavors - although not entirely; there was shrimp in coconut curry, for example, a much more familiar flavor. I loved every single thing on the table. And afterward I felt an overwhelming sense of peaceful well-being.

Why haven't we been eating at Mandalay all the time? Why haven't you been eating at Mandalay? Oh my God.

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[telerib.livejournal.com]

There was much wailing and gnashing of teeth when Mandalay moved out of College Park. We used to go about once a week.

Of course, now College Park and Silver Spring are about equidistant for me, so...