Last minute non-prix fixe Valentine's meal!

My cunning plan to avoid the prix-fixe silliness by booking a meal on Valentine's day at Saha has been foiled! They called today to tell me they are going to put on a prix-fixe after all. The menu is $50 and sounds ok, but I wanted to be able to go somewhere with their full menu available... Any thoughts on options with something for a vegetarian and non-veggie boyfriend? I'd like to avoid a prix-fixe and would be happy with anything one step up from canteen/diner-type atmosphere!

p.s. I can post the Saha menu if anyone is interested. They emailed it to me, but it isn't on their website yet.

saraindc in San Francisco Bay Area

Questions from a San Francisco first-timer

Thanks. I'll post with all the details.

saraindc in San Francisco Bay Area

Questions from a San Francisco first-timer

Thanks for all the advice. Reading these replies, and more information elsewhere - including PETA's list of top veggie restaurants and a recent NYTimes piece on veggie restaurants - I've gone from leaning towards Greens to leaning towards Millenium. I want the chance to experience exciting food, even if it doesn't always work, without feeling anything on the menu is off-limits. There are plenty of places I can go and construct a veggie meal, but I'm excited about a place where I can eat anything! I've heard and read that Ubuntu is great and I hope to get there at some point, but our trip is too short and we don't have a car, so no luck this time around!

So, I think I'm going to have a meal at Millenium and go to Saha for a Valentine's Day that doesn't involve a ridiculous prix-fixe. I have one other dinner meal spot free to work out either in advance, or as the mood strikes me when I get there!

saraindc in San Francisco Bay Area

I need some mis en place/tidiness advice

I used to have the same problem, and it really handicapped my desire to cook because I hate washing up. The suggestions I have are really all variations on the theme of clean up as you go. Whether it's throwing out the garlic cloves skins and onions ends immediately after chopping, or trying to wash up as much as you can while doing the cooking process, the more you clean up as you go, the better. I find it psychologically easier to clean during the cooking process, when I'm in work mode, than afterwards. I also try to clean up everything but the pot (s) with food in before actually eating the meal because I hate having to go back to work after I've eaten.

My boyfriend is a big proponent of putting all his ingredients out into little bowls, just like in a cooking show! I personally don't do this because I think it increases the washing up left over. I much prefer to try and use what I already have out, so I'll heap ingredients on the chopping board, use one bowl to hold onions and garlic, then carrots, then to crack my eggs into, then to hold my grated cheese (obviously these are just egs. and I wash the one bowl along the way where necessary too).

saraindc in Home Cooking

Questions from a San Francisco first-timer

What was so bad about the meals at Greens? I'm kind of surprised by the division between proponents of Greens and Millenium. I wonder why the split is so strong!

saraindc in San Francisco Bay Area

CSA vs. Washington Green Grocer

So thanks to a little more reading of the board and the contributions of my fellow posters, I've now discovered the possibilities of Washington Green Grocer. I think we'll try them out next week or the week after but I'm wondering if anyone has comments on their experience with WGG vs. a CSA. I'm interested both in the quality of produce, but also in what anyone knows about how Washington Green Grocer sources their veggies. Do they come from local farms, farmers markets? I don't have the impression that the people who run it farm themselves. Any ideas from anyone.

At this point, pending a test run of Washington Green Grocer, they would seem the better option because of the control you have over the process and the flexibility of the ordering. Anybody want to weigh in with an alternate opinion?

Thanks for all your advice

saraindc in Washington DC & Baltimore Area

CSA Reviews

I'm thinking about signing up for a CSA share for the first time this year. We don't have a car, so our options are narrowed to a farm with pickup somewhere in NW DC or home delivery. I'm wondering if anyone can share their experiences, positive and negative, on particular CSA farms.

At the moment, the prime candidate as culled from the WashPo list out today is probably Clagett Farm (http://www.cbf.org/csa), so if anyone has particular experience with them, that would be great.

Otherwise, any thoughts on the CSA experience, from quality to quantity, value for money to efficiency (in terms of the need to buy additional veggies). I'm a vegetarian, my boyfriend isn't, but we tend to cook almost exclusively veggie meals, for what that's worth.

Thanks!

saraindc in Washington DC & Baltimore Area

Questions from a San Francisco first-timer

Thanks to you both, especially susanc, for the replies. The Time description is here:

http://www.time.com/time/travel/cityguide/article/0,31489,1845230_1845062_1845060,00.html

I thought it might be somewhere to grab an on-the-go breakfast. But I'm also open to other suggestions for that.

saraindc in San Francisco Bay Area