Happy New Year, and Farewell

Dear Internet People,

Happy New Year! For the Luncher, 2007 was a year of monumental proportion. We ate well, both in Baltimore and in Washington, embraced the under-JFX Farmer's Market, got a new pasta roller. Outside of gastronomic pleasure, 2007 was the year we became a homeowner, reached the half-way mark in the quest for a master's degree, and learned some valuable lessons about life and love.

And 2008 should prove to be even better - the new home is nearly completely painted and decorated (thanks to an ambitious little sister who comes for vacation but really to test her interior decorator/drill sergeant skills), school promises to be engaging and exciting with a summertime study in Bologna, Italy, and a thesis to be written and defended, and life and love continue to be rich and rewarding.

This year also marks the shutdown of The Lunch Blog. Firstly, this blog did not naturally evolve into a high-quality product as I'd hoped and I do not see it as a valuable tool for me or for readers, and I tend to neglect it. Secondly, this upcoming semester I'll take a a class - Intro to the Digital Age - that will require me to establish and keep another blog, and I'd like to have just one blog requiring my attention. Please e-mail me at nora.koch --AT-- gmail.com if you're interested in my rebirth as a blogger.

Cheers to 2008!

Café Isis/Al Pacino Café, Mount Vernon

This place is confusing, from the outset. What's it's name? Cafe Isis or Al Pacino Cafe? And why Al Pacino - Does Michael Corelone own it or did he once grace my humble neighborhood with his presence?

A too-long line at Donna's led Mom and I to C.I./A.P.C. for a mid-Holly Tour lunch on Sunday. Walk inside and you feel like you've been magically transported to the Jersey suburbs, with booth tables and mauve and beige non-descript colors and a flirty waiter with a heavy accent.

Still confused, this place had me from the start. On their menu of Egyptian fare and pizza and pasta, they offer whole wheat pasta and pizza crust as well as soy cheese. We started with some tomato-spinach soup, uncharted territory in my tomato-soup loving life (a quick breeze on Google shows that the recipe is pretty simple - it will be made in a TF kitchen near you very soon). The soup was fresh and delicious, and served with a piece of seasoned flatbread that was ruined by a flash in the microwave. But at $5 for a small cup, it is too pricy. We then split a small "Four Seasons" whole-wheat pizza, topped with spinach, artichoke hearts, broccoli, mushrooms, garlic, tomato sauce, and mozzarella cheese. Pizza was pretty good, or at least tasted healthy, but the crust was undercooked. With Iggie's just a few blocks away, I'll head there for pizza.

I may return to C.I./A.P.C. to sample their Middle Eastern cuisine, as that seems to be their headliner. More TK. So as you've read, I'm still confused. But sated.

Pad Thai, office-style

Contuining the elusive search for an easy, yet healthy and edible take-to-work lunch, I tried the Thai Kitchen product that I found on sale at Giant last night for $1.79.

From the "Noodle Cart" line, I tried Pad Thai. The product comes with a serving of rice noodles in a microwaveable plastic dish, along with a packet of oil, a packet of spices, and - gasp! - a fork. You cook the noodles quickly, in hot water, then add the contents of the packet. The portion is small - 250 calories - but tastes high quality, as rice noodles always do. The peanuts are fresh and crunchy - a delightful natural taste.

It's no restaurant Pad Thai, of course, but for a quick work snack, just fine. But as a noodle dish would, it lacks nutrition - just 2g of fiber and 3g of protein, yet 569mg of sodium and 53g of carbs.

Carma's Cafe, Charles Village

For two years I've passed by an unadorned basement-level shop, apparently a restaurant, just off the JHU campus on 32nd between Charles and St. Paul. The only sign of a food-bearing place are a few cafe tables in front and a hand-lettered sign offering soup and sandwich specials.

I found out last week it's Carma's Cafe.

For those of you who, like me, blindly ignore this little place, I've got to tell you to check it out. Down a set of stairs form the street is a cozy, inviting, and mysteriously crowded little cafe offering a hot drinks, sweets, and sandwich menu that blows me away.

Last week I lunched on a generous - oh, heck, enormous - brie, apple, and honey panini served on a near loaf of french bread, and a cup of 16-bean soup that was as good as my mother's. The ingredients seem fresh and flavorful and while faux creative, the menu is executed well. A highlight are the sweets - homemade cookies, macaroons, and scones.

Try it!

Purdue Oven Stuffer Roaster

At the start of the week - a rare Sunday to myself with no where to be but home, finally - again I took advice from Men's Health and roasted a chicken. In response to a reader who wrote he was sick of turkey sandwiches for lunch every day, the magazine suggested roasting a chicken on Sunday then eating boosted-up chicken salad for lunch, mixing the meat with spinach, apples, salad dressing, nuts, and berries. Brilliant, I thought!

So, post-Farmer's Market, I stopped by the Super Fresh on Charles Street (a sham of a grocery) and picked the most-organic, most-antibiotic and hormone free bird I could find - the Purdue Oven Stuffer Roaster. A few hours and little effort later, I had a cooked bird sitting on my counter.

I got one meal out of it before I was so grossed out I had to toss the picked meat. This chicken - seasoned only with salt, pepper, and olive oil - had a strange, unappetizing taste. I'm very sensitive to additives, so I wonder if, despite technical promises of "all natural," these birds are pumped with additives that make them taste bad.

Thoughts? Anyone else trying to roast chickens but having success?

The 20 Worst Foods In America

I'm fast becoming a fan of Men's Health, for the unobvious reasons.


Check out this month's article, "The 20 Worst Foods In America." Hello!! Cheese fries are my downfall. What's yours?

So Sweet

A shout-out to my new favorite root:



Thanks to the farmer's market, I'm on a a big winter vegetable kick, which includes a lot of squash and sweet potatoes. For lunch, I've found a simple and delicious meal. In the morning, I toss a sweet potato in my bag, and mix up some cinnamon, nutmeg, brown sugar, dried cranberries, and pecans in a bag. When I get hungry, I poke the potato with a fork, throw it in the microwave for 4 minutes, then empty out the baggie of toppings and add a little butter that I keep in the office fridge.

Perfect! And chock-full of vitamins A and C and fiber.

Breezin' and Boozin'

I love Florida for its easy living, balmy breezes, and waterside dive bars that christen drinks with names like "Sex on the Island."

In case you want to mix it up yourself, I brought back the recipe.

Saturday Morning Market, St. Petersburg

Ah, St. Pete.


Most readers know that while I happily dine in the Baltimore-Washington Metro Area, my taste bud of taste buds is in St. Pete. Many is the reason, but today we'll elaborate on downtown's Saturday Morning Market.

This market beats the oft-heralded Baltimore Farmer's Market for a few reasons: fresh-squeezed OJ and cored-while-you-watch pineapple, more artisan foods like this uhhh-mazing salsa and excellent breads and prepared salads, and several kitschy yet sophisticated made-to-order food stands as well as a fair-trade tea and coffee hut (although I am generally a free trader, I can be swayed at times). For $6 you can get an omelette with hashbrowns and toast and sit at a darling little table and listen to local musicians jam, while the sun warms your skin and the atmosphere your heart. (Yeah, I get really cheesey about St. Pete.)

We arrived on a balmy afternoon around one, hungry even after a delicious farewell noshing at The Breakfast Nook in Bradenton. By noontime, vendors were sold out of fair-trade iced tea, homemade meatball subs, slow-cooked bbq ribs, roasted turkey legs. So J opted for the grilled sausage because it was pretty much the only option. Cold off the grill, mealy, dry bun, and poor-grade mustard. Alas.

Lesson learned. If everything else is sold out, there's a reason the grilled sausage is still up for grabs.

But still. Something about it was monumentally delicious. Ah, St. Pete.

Sweet n' Sour

This baby eats lemons. Like candy.

Don CeSar, Thanksgiving brunch

Part I of Thanksgiving day was the brunch buffet on the Sun Porch at the Don CeSar Hotel on St. Pete Beach.



Opened in 1928, the grand pink palace was a hot spot for high society of the Gatsby age before it shut down after the depression and became a hospital for battle-fatigued World War II airmen. It reopened in the 1970s, and is now a family favorite for milestone meals and events.

I'm never one for buffets, and while this one was certainly above average, it wasn't as good as the usual meal at The Don. They offered the traditional turkey, with stuffing, gravy, homemade cranberry relish, sweet potatos, etc. - as well as carved prime rib, a pasta station with lobster ravioli, and other protein items like mahi mahi, chicken, and salmon. Everything was tasty, except for the pasta which kind of seemed like an afterthought. What was a true dissapointment was the desert table, peppered with aluminum foil tins filled with grocery-store quality pies.

Overall, it was a fine experience. But the truth is you can't beat Thanksgiving dinner at home.