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June 30, 2003

I. Can't. Breathe.

I am laughing so hard, I am crying.

Go. Read. Do not have liquids in your mouth. You have been warned.

Posted by Samer at 10:19 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

June 25, 2003

WWDC: iSight and iChat AV

Right off the bat, I just want to say that the iSight is probably the worst named product that Apple has ever put out.

OK, got that off my chest. Now listen up people: iSight is another step in Apple's desktop video move. In addition to being DV compliant (or so it seems as it plays well with apps other than iChat), this thing is tiny and light. Perfect for taking with you everywhere.

So is the iPod. Rumor has it that a new iPod will be out in January. Likely new feature is an screen to replace the LCD. Lighter, cheaper, consumes less power, and color to boot. Why would Apple do this? To let you view all those albums' cover art embedded into your music. At first.

My guess is that soon after, Apple will create a connector that will let you plug the iSight into the iPod. The iPod will be able to record the audio or video (or both). And you'll be able to see it all as well. Remember that you heard it here first. Not quite the replacement for a DV camcorder, but pretty cool.

iChat is also new. A public beta of iChat AV is available for download, and it seems pretty rock solid. Sadly, it seems my trusty laptop does not have the horsepower to do video conferencing, but audio would be good too.

I'm always happy with iChat's features, particularly the ability for it to use your picture and your friend's pictures from the Address Book as icons. I like that it uses my friend's names instead of the screen names if I have them entered in Address Book.

I do wish that iChat's notification sounds could be made louder without boosting the system sound. I'm often away from my machine when messages come in and would like to hear them.

I also wish that it had support for other IM servers and allowed multiple screen name logins to the same service.

Posted by Samer at 10:36 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

WWDC: Safari 1.0

Well, Safari 1.0 is finally out. Once again, Apple have done a really good job with it.

Solid, fast, and more standards compliant than most browsers these days. I really wish more sites would do the right thing and design to standards. But that's another rant for another day.

On a related note, Dave Hyatt, one of the developers of Safari, has turned comments off on his Safari blog. This is mostly because people are just rude and can't figure out that he is not the bug database for Safari.

He does say: "About the best we can do from release to release is demonstrate forward progress, and I think it's clear that we have accomplished this." Yes, there has been tremendous progress, and this is a v1 release. Having said that, there are bugs that were squashed in the previous release that seem to be back. One bug on my bank's pages I've reported using the bug reporting menu item, the rest (all minor) I can't figure out if they are Safari bugs or if the site did something new.

Still, a heartfelt thanks to Dave and the rest of the Safari team. Most of the other bugs are gone, most sites render correctly, and did I mention this thing is fast? One of my favorite things is that "check spelling while typing" is now remembered between launches. AND it recognizes HTML markup and does not mark the whole thing as misspelled any more. Good news for bloggers.

Posted by Samer at 10:14 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

June 23, 2003

Start Saving People, Start Saving

Apple's done it again. I can't believe the specs for the new G5. This thing rocks.

This is a dream machine in many ways, but there is just too much horsepower there. This is not a normal machine for normal people. This is a computer for those who like to live on the edge: fast, new technologies, up to 8 GB of RAM, etc, etc. The low end starts at $2000 and the top end at $3000. That's a dual processor G5 at 2 GHz.

Also out today is the poorly named iSight. I really don't like the name, though this is one cool looking webcam. Not cheap either -- $149. To be used with iChat AV. More on this in the next few days.

Lastly, and mostly because of when it comes out, is Panther. Another $129 update, and this time it looks like it is worth it.

I'll be posting on the various announcements over the next week. Stay tuned.

Posted by Samer at 11:31 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

June 19, 2003

Dogfish Head Soul Food Old School Throwdown

Well, that's the name that Beer Guy Dave gave this beer tasting at the most excellent RFD. And the name accurately reflected what we got on Tuesday night. This was an aural treat and a tour de force of big brewing's tastiest beers.

The Dogfish beers are ones I have admired for ages: from the big bold World Wide Stout to the unbelievable India Brown Ale, the Chicory Stout to Raison D'Etre, these guys know how to brew.

They also know how to entertain, as they have a hip hop act they call The Pain Relievaz. No, really. Grandmaster I.B.U.1 is none other than Dogfish owner and president Sam Calagione. DJ Lil Guy is head brewer Bryan Selders. No, really -- even with their unnaturally big beers, I could not have hallucinated the whole thing.

If you've ever been to a Brickskeller beer tasting (also run by the duo of Beer Guy Dave and wife Diane), you know that they tend to be a little silly. As you can probably tell, this blows anything they've ever done at the Brick to a higher level of silliness.

The other thing they do at the Brick is concentrate on the beer. The food that you get as part of a tasting is often an afterthought, except on Belgian beer tasting nights. One of RFD's signatures, though, is the food. Cooked in beer. Cuisine de bier is how the Belgians refer to it. This tasting also concentrated on the food with the beer. All the courses were matched to the beers and the ribs were cooked with the Raison.

While the Pain Relievaz were bringing down the house with such tunes as "I Got Busy with an AB2 Sales Girl" and "Worst Brew Day" with such memorable lines as "... stuck my brewer's hose inside her heat exchanger ..." and "... we get more tail than a labrador retriever ...", we were having our taste buds and brain cells pummeled with their brews and RFD's food.

Here's what I had, in order, and what I thought:

I picked up a pint (14 oz actually, and RFD is good enough to state that up front as opposed to bars that call them pints) of the 60 Minute IPA3 as I waited for my friends to get there. This is a 6% ABV4 beer brewed with Warrior and Amarillo hops5 for about 60 IBU rating. It is light in color with a strong hoppy aroma and very nice bitter aftertaste.

Once my friends got there, we were served the Shelter Pale Ale. A solid pale ale with a nice earthy aroma delivered by the Willamette and Columbus hops. This beer clocks in at 5% ABV and 30 IBUs.

While waiting for the show to start we all ordered a pint of the India Brown Ale. This is one of my favorite recent finds -- I discovered it at Hard Times Cafe a couple of months ago and have had it a half dozen times since then. This is a big beer, a cross of a brown ale and an IPA with a touch of sweetness left over. It is dark brown in color with a nice hoppiness and a roasty taste. With 7.2% ABV and 50 IBUs, this is big bold beer by most brewer's standards. Dogfish are just scratching the surface, though.

After the India Brown, it was kind of difficult to appreciate the more subtle ApriHops. That was brought out with fried green tomatoes, and they did complement each other. The ApriHops was the disappointment of the lot, even though it certainly was a nice beer. 6.6% ABV, 45 IBU and 65 lbs of apricots go into this beer. The apricots add a smoothness to this beer, and that is rather disconcerting after the boldness of the India Brown.

When you think lager, you generally don't think of big beers. Sure, there are bocks and double bocks that can knock your socks off, but they are hugely malty events. The next beer to come out was Dogfish's first lager, Prescription Pils. A fine example of a Pilsner, this is nice and clean with a bit of domestic noble hops. They refer to it as an Imperial Pilsner, and at 9% ABV and 40 IBUs, this is Imperial in every way. Fantastic.

Another of my favorite beers was up next, served with ribs that were cooked with it. The Raison D'Etre is a fantastic concoction brewed with beet sugar,
green raisins, and Belgian yeasts. Did I mention it is fantastic? Don't take my word on this: go buy a six pack and try it. Go ahead. I'll wait.

It was good, wasn't it? I told you. And at 8% ABV and 36 IBUs, it is a damn good thing that you are back home reading this. The ribs were finger licking good, too.

Just when you thought they could not go any further, out comes the 120 Minute IPA. Some stats:

Let me repeat those last two figures: 120 International Bitterness Units -- this is an extreme amount of hop oils. 20% Alcohol By Volume. 20% people. This beer should be nothing more than sugary sweet. While it has quite a bit of residual sugars, it is so well balanced by the massive amount of hops. At one point Sam said, "thank god for sadomasochistic yeast strains!"

This beer was married with a sweet potato pie, and I just cannot describe how well the tastes melded. The sweetness of the beer and honey that was drizzled over the pie complemented each other amazingly well.

That was it for us. Plenty really. More than plenty. But, just for the record, Beer Guy Dave also had available for purchase the Old School Barleywine (15% ABV), Raison D'eXtra (stronger version of D'Etra) and (in bottles) Immort Ale (11% ABV).

That makes 10 of Dogfish's beers in one place, nine of which were on tap. Dave, I salute you for injecting some life into the DC beer scene and for introducing us to some twisted old school beer focused hip-hop.

1 IBU: International Bitterness Units. A measure of the amount of bittering compounds found in the beer. A beer with a 100 IBU rating would be undrinkably bitter if not balanced with malt or other flavors.

2 AB: Anheuser-Busch. The big bad boy of tasteless "beer".

3 IPA: India Pale Ale. A style of beer created by British brewers back in the day when India was a colony. To get their beers to India before they spoiled (a four month journey), they increased the amount of hops used in brewing. The hop oils, in addition to giving many beers their bitterness and aroma, also act as a preservative. The tradition of this beer continues today but without the long journey and rest times, the beers wind up being quite hoppy and tasty.

4 ABV: Alcohol by Volume. This is a measure of how drunk you are going to get. Double this number and you have the "proof". Most beers lie in the 5%-6.5% range.

5 Hops: A plant related to the cannabis plant. Brewers use its flower to add bitterness, flavoring and help preserve their brews. Hops are usually done in two additions, with bittering hops going into the brew kettle early to leach them of their oils so that their acids (see below) can contribute their bitterness and flavoring hops going in late to add their aroma so their oils can contribute flavor and aroma. Some brews are also "dry" hopped by adding the hops to the fermenter.

6 Alpha and beta hop oils acids: Hop oils acids come in various designations, but the most common are the alpha and beta oils acids. Hops high in alpha oils acids produce huge amounts of bitterness in the finished beer. Particularly when tossed into the boil for two hours.

Thanks to Thomas Cizauskas for the corrections.

Posted by Samer at 07:47 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

June 15, 2003

QotD: Success

Erik asks "If you were to be successful in another profession, what would you want to do?"

Anyone who knows me probably knows the answer: brewer, chef and publican.

I want to open a brewpub in Reykjavik, with a cool techno/electronic/blues/jazz beat, some kick ass ancient brews, food from the small plates of the Mediterranean to the delights of Belgian cuisine fused with Icelandic game and ingredients and cooked in beer.

I even have the design in my head. I'd be a damn good publican -- I'm jovial, I like love beer and food, and I was born to discover Iceland. But I suck at financial things, so getting this off the ground will likely remain a dream.

It is good to dream.

Posted by Samer at 10:15 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Harry's Tap Room

A new restaurant has opened in Clarendon, but it isn't just any restaurant. This is the newest creation of the fine folks who brought you Sam & Harry's.

Called Harry's Tap Room, this wonderful looking steak house and lounge has a decent selection of beers to enjoy with your food -- or separately. Unfortunately, the list of tap beers is rather short. The famed Sam & Harry's ~14 oz martini did not make it out here, but smaller sized martinis did.

The bar area is quite large, despite the restaurant looking kind of small from the outside. There are several comfortable looking tables and chairs, and the lounge area would be a fantastic place to spend an entire evening.

There are two dining areas, one to the left as you enter and the other upstairs. The decor is a nice earthy colored space with solid tables and nice looking booths. The chairs are comfortable, despite their spare looks. There is an open kitchen in the upstairs dining area, as well as a nice looking wine cellar.

The service and the steaks also made the trip from Sam & Harry's. The service at the main restaurant is second to none, and a similar -- though more laid back -- approach to service exists here. Water glasses are filled (and kept filled) and a small basket of breads (a roll, some cranberry mini-muffins and lip smackingly good cheddar herb biscuits) is brought out. There were a couple of opening week jitters (not knowing the different beers, etc) but nothing near what I've seen in other places. As for the food: steak, steak and more steak.

The steaks here are fantastic. We started off with the beef Wellington appetizer. Do you know how much work beef Wellington is? To make it as a tiny appetizer and still be able to cook it to a perfect medium rare really is astounding. The horseradish dipping sauce that accompanies it is so smooth and nice. This was so good, I was disappointed that I could not get the Wellington as a main dish.

I was also disappointed that a renowned steak house does not have steak tartar, but our waitress said she would pass along my suggestion for a special. The steak I did get, the Harry's Stuffed Steak, was an amazing meal. I asked for it medium rare, and was told that it might be difficult to get that level of doneness because of the stuffing, but that the kitchen would do their best. The kitchen came through with a perfectly cooked steak wrapped around Portabella mushrooms, fresh basil and horseradish cheddar.

I felt the accompanying vegetables to be a tad undercooked and the carrots a bit tough, but I'm not one to eat my veggies anyway. The mashed potatoes certainly did not make it from the downtown restaurant. These potatoes were rather bland with a hint of butter and little else. They were also quite thick as if they mashed them only lightly. The fried onion strings on top saved the potatoes and gave them a satisfying crunch.

While Harry's specialize in steaks, there were quite a few seafood items on menu. One of my fellow diners ordered the Trio of Shrimp which includes
the grilled teriyaki shrimp, the marinated shrimp seviche, and the Calabash fried shrimp. This was a big filling plate of shrimp and a delight on the tongue.

We decided to skip desert, but the few deserts that made it by our table on their way to someone else, looked good.

Overall, the price was quite reasonable for the quality and service. We paid about $50 per person including drinks and tip.

If this is the way this place launches, then it should get only better with age. A wonderful new addition to the neighborhood. I hope to try their burgers in my continuing quest for the great burger.

Posted by Samer at 01:35 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

June 14, 2003

Broken Down

Went to a Bowie Baysox game last night. It took an hour and a half to get to the stadium from Roslyn. In the middle of the game, the skies opened up and the game was called due to swimming in the outfield.

On the way home we saw no less than 11 cars broken down and abandoned at the side of the road. Eleven cars! It was a mighty storm, but I can't believe that was the reason for these cars being left like this.

Posted by Samer at 05:47 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

June 11, 2003

Indique

Finally got to go to Indique, a well liked Indian restaurant in Cleveland Park.

We shared an appetizer and then I had the lamb vindaloo. The food was good, the service great. The food was quite good, with a more subtle approach to the spices. My one problem was the lack of heat in the vindaloo. Frankly, a vindaloo is not meant to be eaten by people who can't handle the heat.

The skies opened up while we were sitting on the balcony, but after we had eaten. We moved to the bar, where the bar tender told us that I should have asked for the vindaloo to be made extra spicy. I shall remember that, because this place deserves a second trip.

Next time I will make sure to make a reservation. Damn was it busy.

Posted by Samer at 11:22 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Cheesecake Takes the Day

I won the company bake-off. Apparently by a landslide. And there were 12 others in the competition, including one of my boss' entries, a sumptuous four layer chocolate cake.

I was lobbying hard, my theory being that you gotta be in it to win it, but I was impressed with how good this cheesecake was, despite not ever having made one before. For that, I thank the $DEITIES of cooking, particularly the fine folks at Cooks Illustrated. A fantastic magazine that belongs in every cook's home.

Posted by Samer at 11:01 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

June 10, 2003

Cheesecake Is Not Easy

I'm making a lemon cheesecake for a "bake off" we are having at the office. I intend to win, so I'm not playing fair at all. Who can resist a light and airy cheesecake with a nice lemon curd on top?

But let me tell you, making a cheesecake is not easy. I've been at it for almost an hour and a half. It still has to finish baking (15 mins) and then it has to cool for three hours(!!!) before I can top it with curd. Then it has to set up over night.

In the morning, I will cut it. Then I have to safely transport it to the office, where it has to remain safely untouched until lunch time.

Tune in tomorrow for news of the winning entry.

Posted by Samer at 09:18 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

June 08, 2003

We're Cooking Now

I haven't been cooking much lately and I decided that this weekend is the weekend to remedy that. The kitchen is back into usable shape, and my skills are still sharp.

Last night I made a simple meal of lamb and eggs, served with tabouli. I had to spice it up a bit and tossed in some garlic and a jalepeno with the lamb. Is it me or are jalepenos no longer that hot?

I had bought some strawberries and had some chocolate on hand. So I went back and looked through The Art of Chocolate for some hints and tried to make decent dipped strawberries. They turned out fabulous. Yum. Something about the bitterness of the dark Belgian chocolate giving way to the sweetness of the strawberry...

Then, in anticipation of a BBQ I'm going to shortly, I made my world famous hummus. I must say that I topped myself with this one. It is, by far, the best hummus I have ever made.

Posted by Samer at 04:37 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

June 05, 2003

iTunes, Piracy and Apple

I'm a bit late coming to the "iTunes gets crippled" game, but I read two very good articles about why people are just out of their minds for going ballistic on Apple.

To a large extent, I agree that people are over reacting. Hugely so.

For those that don't know: Apple had introduced the ability to stream music from one instance of iTunes to another. This was a wickedly cool service, as I mentioned before. But then they went and released a new version which, while still allowing local network streaming of music, disabled the ability to stream across the whole Internet.

And it was like Apple had taken out a hot poker and shoved it down people's eye sockets.

Now, don't get me wrong, I think Apple blew this one. It just is not as serious or deadly as others make it.

Firstly, it is not so bad because there are a ton of tools you can use to stream your collection across the web. It just is not going to be using iTunes' very nice interface and it is not going to be integrated.

Secondly, Apple was (over-)reacting to a real problem. People had decided to publish their libraries and were allowing everyone to stream them. That's not so bad in and of itself (after all, libraries are meant for sharing -- books, videos, magazines; this is not all that different). But then some folks figured out a way to create local copies of the streamed music. Now that's just theft. Granted, RIAA blow donkeys, but answering their greed by being exceedingly greedy yourself is not going to make matters better.

The problem I have with this change is that the ability to stream over the net is a valuable one. To be able to listen to my music while 3000 miles away in London or at my neighbor's (who happen to be on another network) would be fantastic. Apple blew it by not considering a different way to make this work while plugging the hole.

I think the solution is a simple, two pronged approach. Instead of treating your customers like children, unable to make a reasonable decision, guide them toward a decent and right decision.

Here's how: make sharing a bit more complex. When someone checks off the preference for sharing music, there should be another tick box for streaming across the net. And once you select that, an admin password should be required.

This forces the user to think about the choice they are making. And a record of that choice can be made.

If further restrictions are warranted, then they could easily make it so that you have to authenticate as the user who is running iTunes on the remote machine. Do you want to share your music so much you are willing to give everyone your password?

The best part would be that people who want to listen to their music everywhere could, and everyone who wants to give their music away would have to use something other than iTunes.

Come on Apple: This has got to be a better solution than just saying no, particularly with your record of doing the right thing by your customers.

Posted by Samer at 12:05 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

June 04, 2003

On Sorrow

I was lucky to talk to Skarlet today before she went off to Florida. Her father passed away yesterday, and I've been thinking how mere words cannot do justice to the pain and sorrow that we feel.

I always look to the amazing Khalil Gibran and his phenomenal work The Prophet, for my words pale next to his in times that try my soul:

Then a woman said, "Speak to us of Joy and Sorrow."

And he answered:

Your joy is your sorrow unmasked.

And the selfsame well from which your laughter rises was oftentimes filled with your tears.

And how else can it be?

The deeper that sorrow carves into your being, the more joy you can contain.

Is not the cup that hold your wine the very cup that was burned in the potter's oven?

And is not the lute that soothes your spirit, the very wood that was hollowed with knives?

When you are joyous, look deep into your heart and you shall find it is only that which has given you sorrow that is giving you joy.

When you are sorrowful look again in your heart, and you shall see that in truth you are weeping for that which has been your delight.

Some of you say, "Joy is greater than sorrow," and others say, "Nay, sorrow is the greater."

But I say unto you, they are inseparable.

I'm saddened and pained by your loss Skarlet, I hope these words help you through the days ahead.

Posted by Samer at 10:31 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

June 01, 2003

One Month

So it has been one month since this journey started. One month of on-again, off-again blogging. I know I have at least two readers, at least those that comment.

But, as we bloggers tell our selves, it is not about the readers, it is about the writing. This gives me a chance to write and unload my opinions, and if someone should read it, particularly on a regular basis, all the better.

Blah. I want people to read and enjoy what I've written. I want them to become addicted to my blog. There are number of blogs, some that I read regularly, others not so much, that I feel let down by when I go there and there's nothing new. It blows when I hit four or five places in one sitting and nothing has changed on any of them. Yeah, I gotta get out more.

Of course, I am just as guilty. I rarely post more than a couple of items a week. Part of the problem is I have no vision for this site, unless you think my ranting about things is a vision. I hope to address this in the coming month.

Meantime, hope you'll leave a little hello in the comments section so I can get to know you.

Posted by Samer at 10:58 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack