Posts Tagged ‘Maple Ave’
Posted by Warren Rojas / Wednesday, February 23rd, 2011
(spots shivering cheese salesman) “Yep.”
(wolfs down a sample slice) “Awesome. We’ll take a pound,” one ecstatic shopper proclaimed after seeking out, and successfully finding, the Everona Dairy display he’d been instructed to target while making his rounds at the farmers market.
Mission accomplished, artisan cheese hound!
The smooth, delicious sheep’s milk cheese the aforementioned shopper gleefully snatched up was Dr. Pat Elliott’s signature Piedmont–a creamy, Manchego-style cheese that coats the palate in nuttiness and salt.
Elliott has been perfecting her craft for approaching two decades, spinning her one-time hobby–”It started because I got a border collie and I needed something for her to do,” Elliott said of the serendipitous route she traveled to full-time sheep-tending (current herd stands at 500-600)–into a self-sustaining cottage industry capable of producing 500-1,000 pounds of cheese per week.
“We milk and make cheese every day,” an Everona aide assured me.
While the Piedmont remains her flagship culture, Elliott has branched out with over a dozen other specialty cheeses including: the wine-soaked Pride of Bacchus blend, blue cheese (seasonal offering), herbs de provence, Stonyman (Pecorino-style iteration that’s much saltier and drier than the Piedmont), cracked pepper, Marble, Skyline (soft, Brie-like cheese), Shenandoah (Swiss-style cheese) and ricotta (available as of March).
Not to mention the growing roster of side items, including: shaved Piedmont-laced olive tapenade, hand-rolled butter crackers, breakfast sausage and assorted membrillos (cranberry-pear, almond-fig, peach).
Everona is participating in the Columbia Pike, Purcellville, Dupont and Palisades farmers markets this winter.
The cheeses are also available at the Vienna Whole Foods or direct–”We ship all over,” Elliott asserted–from Everona. Or you could always take a chance and wait to see if they pop up on featured cheese boards around town (Restaurant Eve, Maple Ave, Delaplane Cellars and Linden Vineyards have all showcased Everona products in the past).
Meanwhile, Elliott said she’s still refining her slow-aged cheddar and pasta filata (coming this spring).
–Warren
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NoVA’s Winter Farmers Markets
Old Town Alexandria Farmers Market • 301 King St., Alexandria – Sat, 5:30-11 a.m.
Arlington Farmers Market • N. 14th St. & N. Courthouse Road, Arlington – Sat, 8-noon
Clarendon Farmers Market • 3100 Wilson Blvd., Arlington – Wed, 3-7 p.m.
Columbia Pike Farmers Market • S. Walter Reed Drive & Columbia Pike – Sun, 9-1 p.m., (summer); Sun, 10-1 p.m. (winter).
Del Ray Farmers Market • E. Oxford & Mount Vernon Ave., Alexandria – Sat, 8-noon
Falls Church Farmers Market • 300 Park Ave., Falls Church – Sat, 9-noon (Jan-Mar); Sat, 8-noon (Apr-Dec)
Farmer Girls • 8769 Old Dumfries Road, Catlett; 540-272-7839
Fredericksburg Farmers Market • George and Prince Edward Streets, Fredericksburg – Mon-Sat, 7-6 p.m.; Sun, 12:30-4 p.m.
Leesburg Farmers Market • 20 Catoctin Circle S.E., Leesburg – Sat, 8-noon (May-Oct); Sat, 9-noon (Nov-Apr)
Loudoun Flavor • 39363 Stevens Road, Lovettsville; 703-350-2790
Old Town Manassas Farmers Market •9431 West St., Manassas – Sat, 10-2 p.m.
Purcellville Community Market • 130 E. Main St., Purcellville – Sat, 9-1 p.m.
Smart Markets • 2854 Hunter Mill Road, Oakton – Sat, 10-2 p.m.
Smart Markets • 13297 Gateway Center Drive, Gainesville – Sun, 10:30-1:30 p.m.
Winchester Freight Station Farmers Market • 315 W. Boscawen St., Winchester; Tue, Sat, 10-2 p.m. (Jan-Apr); Tue, Fri, Sat, 8-1 p.m. (May-Dec)
Or click here for our full list of local farmers markets.
Posted by The Editorial Desk / Monday, January 24th, 2011
Maple Ave team proves handy with exotic eats, longs for more elbow room
By Warren Rojas / Photography by Kate Bohler
Ma works his magic on sous vide veal cheek and grilled rapini.
It’s really easy to run out of space on these small tables,” one server sheepishly jokes while struggling to clear away extraneous menus and place settings in time to drop off our battery of dishes before they tumbled from his grasp.
Maple Ave chef/owner Tim Ma can certainly relate.
The one-time engineer cum French Culinary Institute grad bucked the advice of friends and family who warned him against launching his small plate-themed project in late 2009.
He’s been rewarded with a cadre of local followers who regularly file into the oddly shaped and tightly knit location—serviced by nine tables up front, with four more tucked away in the far rear—yet remains frustrated by his inability to properly capitalize on the rising popularity.
“It’s tough to make money here,” the recession-defying restaurateur grouses—though he clearly appreciates his unique predicament. “We’re lucky that we do need more space,” Ma offers.
The main dining room could have been assembled by someone attempting to illustrate the definition of “cozy,” its sage walls adorned with local art (most of it on loan from the neighboring Soundry) while bare wooden tables and chairs are reconfigured at will to accommodate whoever strolls through the front door.
What the location lacks in aesthetic charm the kitchen more than makes up for in culinary artistry.
Maple Ave GM Joey Hernandez taking a well-deserved break.
Ma and his trusted companions, sous chef Nyi Nyi Myint, a Burmese native who spent some time behind the burners at Busaba Eathai while in the UK and is rumored to have cooked for Britain’s royal family, and Nick Seo, a Culinary Institute of America grad who Ma maintains does “a little bit of everything,” are as non-traditional as you can get. The rag-tag trio embraces daring and surprise in lieu of the familiar or formulaic, mining their personal experiences to help compose each carefully orchestrated—and occasionally jarring—dish.
Their carte has run the gamut from caramelized okra drizzled with Thai chili sauce to foie gras-stuffed figs wrapped in duck prosciutto to a sandwich of pulled Polyface pork capped with pickled slaw to a sublime torte sporting alternating tiers of chocolate mousse, homemade peanut butter, chopped pretzels and roasted peanuts. Not to mention the fun they had—think: spicy fried cauliflower, sous vide tuna salad sandwiches and bulgogi banh mi—on their short-lived food truck, Maple Avenue Express (on hiatus until further notice).
“Foie gras and funnel cake don’t [usually] go on the same menu. But somehow, it works,” Ma suggests.
And for the most part, he is right.
A southern standby goes international in a shrimp-and-grits makeover that includes spice-crusted jumbo shrimp, their puffy white flesh studded with freshly cracked black pepper, piquillo peppers-laced grains and crumbly, blueberry-spiked venison sausage.
Surplus pork jowl (a benefit/consequence of getting chummy with local pork baron Steve Baker) was alternately too fatty or tough, proving jerky-like along its thinnest expanses but more luxuriant where the piggy stored its generous padding. A pile of cinnamon-sprinkled, slow-cooked apples offers some TLC to the seared jowl.
Maple Ave’s tightly-knit front dining room.
Bulgogi lettuce wraps, the pork soaked through with orange juice, ginger ale and soy, a la Ma’s mother’s recipe, teeters on the verge of cloying—until bedecked in the caramelized kimchee salvaged from the aforementioned pork jowl platter. The pickled cabbage kicks in just enough sour to cut through the marinade and cements the Korean-ness of the dish.
Melted cheddar seeps into every thirsty crevice of a panko-crusted chicken sandwich that delivers a cocksure, bread-backed crunch that gives way to a juicy-to-the-core breast. Briny pickle chips, truffle mayo and a buttery roll round out the sandwich experience, with herb-flecked fries contributing salt and starch to the dining equation.
A quartet of deep-fried, chocolate-filled dumplings is too cute to deny—at first. Each palm-sized pastry is lightly bubbled on the outside and oozes bittersweet ganache when pierced, eliciting “oohs” and “ahhs” from those who’ve been raised in the era of the omnipresent lava cake. But just a few bites in, I was already wondering why the obviously experimental kitchen didn’t choose to unite the dumplings and side dish of plain vanilla ice cream (dumplings a la mode?). Or perhaps drizzle them with dulce de leche or honey (sopapilla-style) or something?
The sugar-dusted funnel cake, on the other hand, is an undisputed winner. Each mound of fried knottiness— think: giant apple fritters pumped up with helium—slice easily, revealing an extra fluffy, wonderfully flaky interior that you’d swear would go airborne if separated from your fork. The very vanilla bean-y ice cream adds just the right touch of the exotic to the classic carnival fare.
Ma’s passion for creative cooking is matched only by his commitment to sustainable dining. Even though he’s not entirely convinced that the evangelism is worth all the headaches.
“These products don’t come cheap. And the time investment is kind of ridiculous,” he says of the energy he’s expended scouting out regional producers like Polyface Farm and Tuscarora Organic Grower Cooperative.
“Do people come in for that? I think most people don’t. But those who do know [how to] appreciate it and thank us for it,” he says. “The moment you say Polyface … the locavores perk up.”
Still, Ma seems optimistic.
At press time, he was seriously weighing his expansion plans/relocation options.
Ma pointed to the recently shuttered Panjshir II spot right down the road in Vienna as an ideal location, but suggests that the financials haven’t yet lined up to claim that specific parcel. So he’s also scouting locations in Falls Church and near Virginia Square.
If determination alone were enough, I suspect we’d be seeing Maple Ave 2.0 much sooner rather than later.
But until reality catches up to his ambition, Ma will wait. And plan.
Perhaps he’ll go a tad tonier the next time around. Just don’t expect anything too fancy.
“We’d want to make it a little more fine dining than it is here. But not so we couldn’t put a funnel cake on the menu,” Ma predicts.
Maple Ave
147 Maple Ave. W., Vienna; 703-319-2177; www.mapleaverestaurant.com
Hours: Open for lunch and dinner Tuesday through Sunday.
Prices: Average entree: $13 to $20 ($$).
(January 2011)
Posted by The Editorial Desk / Wednesday, October 13th, 2010
(Image: Simply Local Food)
For those who don’t know, we’re in the middle of yet another theme dining week: American Farmland Trust’s inaugural “Dine Out for Farms” initiative.
The plan is simple enough: patronize those restaurants that support your local farms and help perpetuate the circle of sustainable agriculture/conscientious dining while getting a fabulous meal in the process.
We tried (unsuccessfully) to glean any DOfF week specials from the AFT, but were able to cull the roster of participating local restaurants:
*American Flatbread – Arlington, Ashburn;
* Clyde’s – Reston;
* Cock & Bowl;
* Open Kitchen;
* Wildfire; and,
So, if you’ve got some coin to spend and are looking to put your money where your mouth should be anyway, why not add these eco-activists to this week’s dining rotation?
It might even become a habit…
–Warren
Posted by The Editorial Desk / Wednesday, July 28th, 2010
The first family of hospitality crowd-sourcing, Nina and Tim Zagat, have released the results of their 2011 Washington D.C./Baltimore survey, an all-too-familiar litany–the Inn at Little Washington continues its decade-long streak of ping-ponging back and forth between the #1 and #2 spots for food; Restaurant Eve remains firmly entrenched in the food top 10–which I highly doubt will surprise any fine dining aficionados or even casual gourmands.
I was, however, interested to see how the D.C./Charm City surveyors stack up against other markets and how often they hit the streets in search of a good meal.
According to Zagat’s, there are roughly 6,500 surveyors actively evaluating 2,400 meals per day across the D.C./Baltimore corridor. While that sounds like a whole lot of eating, our area ranks second-to-last in surveyor meals per week (2.6).
Texans, on the other hand, have gorged themselves into four of the top five spots (Houston – 4 meals per week, Austin/Hill Country – 3.8, Dallas/Forth Worth – 3.6, San Antonio – 3.5).
The economy, of course, is partly to blame.
Approximately 40 percent of local surveyors admitted to eating out less because of forced belt-tightening, while another third of those surveyed copped to more carefully eyeing menu prices when they do step out.
On the upside, over half of the surveyors said lean times have prompted restaurants to beef up their dining deals while approaching 45 percent said the downturn has rekindled a passion for home cooking.
Amateur food sleuths might also be interested to know that Zagat’s stable of local food spies skews female (51 percent) and relies heavily on retirees (60+ year olds comprise 25 percent of their core constituency)–though Gen Xers (30-year olds) and late Boomers (50s and up) account for 23 and 22 percent (respectively) of the roving reporting crew.
Rankings-wise, NoVA restaurants seemed to do pretty well.
We claimed six of the top 20 food slots:
* Inn at Little Washington (2)
* Restaurant Eve (7)
* L’Auberge Provencale (10)
* L’Auberge Chez Francois (15)
* 2941 (16)
* GoolDaeGee (19)
Seven of the top 24 cuisine categories:
* New American: Inn at Little Washington
* Chinese: Peking Gourmet
* Classic French: L’Auberge Provencale
* South American: El Pollo Rico
* Southwest/Tex-Mex: Sweetwater Tavern
* Thai: Thai Square
* Vietnamese: Four Sisters
And scored a handful of entries in the 20 “Key Newcomers” list:
Would love to hear what you all think of the current crop of popularly appointed dining champs AND/OR the Zagat’s scouts among us.
–Warren