Vox Clamantis

Upcoming, as in it's happening right now

East Coasters have one hour left for free coffee at Starbucks. You've paid your fees in the past. Let's face it, you could have had a down payment on a house by now. Don't miss your chance to get a free cup of coffee... it's worth it just for the principle of the thing... [what's with the ellipses - ed? Don't stifle my creativity!] In case you don't know, Starbucks is giving away free cups of their house coffee from 10-12 am today.

[Update: Got my free coffee. Talk about sticking it to the man!]

Upcoming

I frequently post about upcoming events too late. For instance, yesterday was the Idiotarod in WDC. Wouldn't it have been nice if I had brought your attention to this special event ahead of time? So, I just wanted to direct your attention to this March 15th when we'll have two fine events...

First, Michael Munger has declared March 15 "Kill an animal and eat it day." Umm, beef, it's why space aliens steal our cows.

Also, Starbucks is offering a perfect complement to your beef eating: free coffee. Yep, tis true. The WaPo featured full page adds last week from Starbucks alerting readers that March 15 is free coffee day, at least from 10- noon. I can't find any info on their website, so I'm not sure if this is a regional or national thing, but Starbucks Gossip also has a post on this, so it's just gotta be true (though their link to the Starbucks press release does not work.)

The Best Sentence I Read Today

Via 2blowhards, I found this article on Chinese culinary trends. The sentence:

The deer and the Mongolian goat were surprisingly similar: a little stringy, they had the appearance and feel of overcooked squid tentacles.

This is not the most shocking sentence in the article; there was lots of competition in the article. It's your cultural sensitivity zen moment of the day.

Don't Mess With my Bay Blend

Via Barron's:

Caffeine lovers should be on the alert: coffee-futures prices are poised to rise this spring as Brazilian and other supplies tighten. Megaproducer Brazil harvested a smaller crop in 2005, leaving barely enough to meet local and export needs until the next, cyclically larger harvest starts in June, says Rodrigo Costa, vice president of institutional sales at Fimat USA in New York. Hurricanes in 2005 trimmed crops in Central America and Mexico, where harvests are advancing now. And after a drought, inventories are low in Vietnam, a top producer of hardier, cheaper robusta beans, which are often blended with arabicas.

"Stocks held in warehouses certified by the New York Board of Trade fell 200,000 bags last month, since roasters turned to those inventories as the least-expensive source of coffee," Costa says. "Roasters aren't very well-covered for the next few months, and they'll be buying hand-to-mouth for that period," further trimming certified supplies.

The good news, such as it is, is that this rise in prices is for the cheaper blends used in Folgers and the other Colombian blends. Prices for Arabica beans are down slightly from a recent high and demand seems to have slipped, after accounting for regular purchases by Starbuck's and Peet's. Much of the world's arabica beans come from African countries, so the problems in Latin America may not be worrisome. As long as people don't ditch robusta blends for arabica, prices for the good stuff shouldn't change too much. A more worrisome trend might be that coffee growers in Latin America are increasingly selling their lands to developers, so let's hope their productivity levels are high.

It tastes like burning

This is a first attempt to review some of the many Indian restaurants around Dupont Circle. I will add reviews from time to time as I visit more restraunts in the area. But these four should get you started.

Nirvana. 1810 K St., NW, 202-223-5043. Some friends think this is the best Indian restaurant in the city. I have doubts. I have not been able to try their buffet. Their dinners have been unimpressive. Maybe the waiters just don't believe me when I say I want my food to be spicy. Still, the restaurant has items that others don't, so it's a nice change, if nothing else.

Polo India Club. 1736 Connecticut Ave. NW, 202-483-8705. I've enjoyed their buffet more than most area restaurants. Their chicken curry is the thing to get though.

Heritage India. 1337 Connecticut Ave, NW, 202-331-1414. I am conflicted about this place. The dinner is very good, but the real reason to go is their happy hour. They serve authentic Indian street food, without all the hassles of "Bombay belly." The small, tapas style snacks are great. It would be ideal - unfortunately I tend to get bad service here. The staff are not rude, they just seem very busy and don't have much time for you. Even on the weekend, when the restaurant was empty, the service still lagged. This is a shame. Now I tend to go next door to:

Taj Mahal. 1327 Connecticut Ave. NW, 202-659-1544. The title of this post is derived from the vindaloo at Taj Mahal. I find it very spicy. The waiters, who are extremely friendly, tell me that people sometimes order this even hotter. At this point Ralph's quote would kick in - you'd stop tasting anything and your mouth would just burn. I'd skip the buffet and order from the menu, since it is spicier. Great vegetable dishes. The owner, Shashi Chopra offers cooking lessons in her house, when enough people sign up. Try the garlic naan. Go often, this is my current favorite.

Thanksgiving Day

From the Census Dept:

What many regard as the nation’s first Thanksgiving took place in December 1621 as the religious separatist Pilgrims held a three-day feast to celebrate a bountiful harvest. The day did not become a national holiday until 1863 when President Abraham Lincoln proclaimed the last Thursday of November as a national day of thanksgiving. Later, President Franklin Roosevelt clarified that Thanksgiving should always be celebrated on the fourth Thursday of the month to encourage earlier holiday shopping, never on the occasional fifth Thursday.

Can you guess how many turkeys will be eaten this Thanksgiving? How about the number of sweet potatoes, in billions of pounds? Check the Census page for more!

Web of Addictions

I'll keep on my caffeinated posting spree by talking about coffee and photography. One cool thing to do in photography is to create an ongoing project. Maybe it will be something like taking stock of all of the historic buildings in your town and how new growth complements or clashes with the traditional architecture. Or you can take pictures of birds or all of the mom and pop stores in Maine. Whatever your fancy. I thought it might be fun to photograph all of the Starbucks in DC. Luckily, I don't have to. This guy beat me to it. His site is pretty scary. I know I drink a lot of coffee and should drink more tea, but he plans on visiting all 50+Starbucks and is going about it pretty quickly. While Jerry thinks this is meaningless, trite, and generally a colossal waste of time, an economist might look at the spatial location of all those starbucks , Cosi's and Teaism in Dupont Circle alone (3, 2, and 1) and think this is a great example of Hotelling Competition vs. product differentiation. Even more extreme is this enthusiast, who is visiting all the Starbucks in the world.

And for what it's worth, your coffee sucks.

T2

I offered my recommendations about tea earlier. Andrew Weil is an even stronger advocate (not that you should ever trust a man with a beard.) From his most recent book, Healthy Aging:

The least processed form is white tea from parts of China. Often quite expensive, it brews into a beverage that is almost colorless or very pale and has a most delicate flavor. Next on the scale is green tea, which comes in many varieties and qualities from places as diverse as India, China, and, of course, Japan. It is somewhat lower in antioxidant activity, stronger in color and flavor. Next is oolong tea, produced in quantity on the island of Taiwan and on mainland China. Intermediate in color, flavor and antioxidant activity between green and black tea, it ranges from inexpensive, forgettable forms (Chinese restaurant tea) to exquisite brews that are the most expensive teas in the world, $10,000 a pound and more. Black tea, produced in great quantities in India, Ceylon [Sri Lanka], and Argentina, has been the form most familiar to Westerners. It is what we get in ordinary tea bags (usually the cheapest stuff of all) and what North Americans consume as iced tea. Finally, there is the curious pu-erh tea of China, very dark in color, with flavor notes of earth and tobacco and the least antioxidant activity. When brewed it can resemble coffee, and a tea importer friend of mine thinks it's the best form to use when trying to persuade coffee drinkers to switch to a healthier caffeinated drink.

I recommend drinking tea, especially white, green, and oolong, regularly -- up to four cups a day.

If you are going to drink 4 cups, go easy on the sugar. Please. Honest Tea makes a wide selection of organic teas and are my choice (their green tea is good, though "gunpowder" green teas do not agree with everyone.) There are plenty of fancier teas available, if you're a high-end type.

Weil will be on Larry King Live tonight, for any that are interested.

Tea

One of my favorite things Hawaiian is Pineapple tea. While it is not as delicious as the fresh pineapple you get off the side of the road, it is a very fine tasting tea. Here is one type (sroll down to find the pineapple tea.) Here is another brand. While tea bags never taste as good as loose tea leaves, these are fine and both taste delicious.

To make the tea perfect, you can add a bit of sugar. Since it's already semi-sweet, I don't bother, but if you like your tea a little on the sweeter side, you can add two teaspoons. Adding any more sugar is wasteful, since the extra 17 calories per teaspoon will outweigh the additional benefit. Barry Nalebuff, an economist and entreprenuer has a handy graph on the back of his tea, Honest Tea that demonstrates this point. Honest Tea can be found in many stores, including Whole Foods and some Safeway stores. You can find more at the Honest Tea website. I also give this tea a strong endorsement. Grant McCracken and Tyler Cowen both have favorable reviews of Honest Tea. See here, here and here. Then go online and order several bags of tea. Sadly they do not (yet?) make pineapple tea. Just get their green or black teas instead.

Living in the Future

Today I was reminded of the Simpson's episode where Homer slaps the TV while watching A Prairie Home Companion's Garrison Keiller and yells "be funnier." Only today my reaction was "be better." What brought on these feelings of inadequacy (don't be dirty!)? Well, I was watching the Food Network Special: Kitchens of the Future. Or maybe it was Kitchen Gadgets of the Future. Either way, they had way cooler stuff in the mid-1960s than we have today.

See, the show promised things like dining room tables that had special middle sections that would rise to reveal a dishwasher. And shelving units that completely masked the kitchen appliances. In short, it was a futuristic marvel we can only dream of today. Yes, we have microwaves and blenders and other such things that were once considered luxuries, but that's a far cry from the house of the future that was advertised. I don't know, maybe Microsoft is to blame for not creating computers that will cook my dinner. Or perhaps it is government regulation that is strangling innovation and technological change. Regardless, John Prine sounds mighty relevant today:

We are living in the future
I’ll tell you how I know
I read it in the paper
Fifteen years ago
We’re all driving rocket ships
And talking with our minds
And wearing turquoise jewelry
And standing in soup lines
We are standing in soup lines