Verizon Center - Washington Capitals

Loyal readers will have noticed that we've had a recent string of bad luck when eating out. Fortunately (or unfortunately for those people would prefer our rants), we've also found a few pleasant surprises in unlikely places.

The Verizon Center is the home to the Wizards (NBA), Capitals (NHL), Mystics (WNBA), and countless other events. The complex features a fantastically central location that is surrounded by recent business growth that is largely due to the Verizon Center's completion 10 years ago. Sitting at the Metro's hub (at the Chinatown stop and walking distance of Metro Center), Verizon Center anchors a bustling area of downtown that drew us to the neighborhood. Within one block of the arena you can find restaurants, bars, shops, museums, a movie theatre, a bowling alley, a hotel, a playhouse, and just about anything else you can think of... While this urban revival has relegated DC's Chinatown to "Chinablock," in the end, it is a marquee win for the city.

Now that we've described the neighborhood, join us for a look inside theVerizon Center. Once inside, it is much like any other recently completed multi-use facility. There may be nothing iconic about it but if you go to an event primarily for the architecture, there is something amiss. Think of Verizon Center as a referee that is only noticed when he gets something wrong. This is to say that the arena gets out of the way and lets the experience dictate the quality of the event.

J is fortunate to work with people who have really great season tickets to the Caps. When they can't use their tickets, she is usually the first to volunteer to take them. While not a big hockey fan, she loves arenas/stadiums and sitting a few rows from the ice makes hockey come alive.

As for me, I was indoctrinated as a hockey fan 10-15 years ago in Los Angeles, which means two things. I'm a Kings fan and I must really like the sport since winning tends to not be in the cards. The Caps, on the other hand, have been Stanley Cup contenders for the last 2 years and should continue to be among the elite for a while considering their crop of young talent. Locals have taken notice, too. With the other major sport teams suffering through lean times (need I go through it?), the Verizon Center is consistently "Rocking the Red."

On this particular night, we were lucky enough to see the Caps vs. the Devils. I'll skip the game analysis but I will say that we can someday tell our kids that we saw Ovechkin vs. Brodeur in a shoot-out. And if that doesn't grab you, throw in a good ol' fashion brawl...

So that was the fighting for the night, what about the love you ask? Well, surprisingly, we loved the food (maybe not so surprising considering who we're talking about). But seriously, most arenas serve up overpriced bar food and for the most part, Verizon Center is not different. A couple of chain restaurants and generic grills offer the usual burgers, dogs, and chicken tenders. In short, grab a meal in the surrounding neighborhood before you enter. However, we recently uncovered a few hidden gems for those looking for a quick bite between periods.

J's Favorite Big League Eats

One of my favorite parts of a night out at the ballpark or arena is the food! There's something about grabbing a hotdog or soft pretzel, and eating it at a game that always makes me smile. As we explained in our Nationals Park posts (read here and here), stadium food has been called up to the majors with local restaurants opening up shop and supplementing the standard fare.

While the Verizon Center doesn't have as many interesting options, you can find some treats mixed in. We decided on the sampler platter approach and went to 3 different non-traditional stands.

First up was The BBQ Pit and Carvery, which dishes up a special hand-carved sandwich for each game. Tonight's pick was the carved BBQ beef topped with sharp cheddar cheese. Unfortunately, I got stuck on a conference call at work and arrived at the game late. By the time I got to the Carvery, I was left with the ends of the carved roast. Nevertheless, this was a tender and juicy sandwich. The bun and potato chips were kind of blah, so I recommend sticking to the meat.

B stopped by a different BBQ cart and picked up a pulled pork sandwich served with coleslaw. This didn't do much to stand out from typical pulled pork. Nothing amazing, but pretty solid for a sports arena.

As we made our way back to our seats, we saw that local Penn Quarter restaurant D'Acqua was serving up Italian fare. According to the Washington Business Journal, they opened up shop at the Verizon Center in April of this year. Though we've never been to the original D'Acqua, we thought that an Italian-style sandwich would be a nice supplement to our sampler platter. We chose the chicken parmigiana sandwich, which was much tastier than it looks in the photo. I recommend skipping the BBQ stands and heading over to D'Acqua for a little slice of Italy - arena style.

I think B is excited that I'm getting more interested in hockey. I don't know whether it's the hockey or the promise of fun food options that will keep me coming back. The energy of the Caps faithful is pretty contagious though. By the end of the game I was cheering for fights and found myself chanting "Let's .... go ..... Caps!" Still no mullet though...

Wok and Roll - addendum

Our post on Wok and Roll concluded with a brief mention of the bizzarro "fight" for the leftovers. Basically it ended with our friend offering us the leftovers bag with $20 in it (an inflated payment for his part of the meal). We refused, much to his dismay, thus "paying him to take home the leftovers." As it turns out, we've just learned that while on his way home, he gave the leftovers to a homeless man... no word on the $20 though.

Tastings Journal

A few months ago, one of our friends tipped us off to the Tastings Journal. The Tastings Journal isn't really a journal at all but claims to be "Washington DC's Premier Prix-Fixe Dining Society." The concept is simple: a fixed price menu (usually $40 to $50) at a different D.C. restaurant every month. The menu is 4 to 5 courses and includes a glass of wine.

You sign up for their email list or Facebook group and they send you an email every month to let you know what the featured restaurant is. You can make your reservation by phone or on Open Table, but you don't get any Open Table points for these reservations.

We've tried the Tastings Journal menu at two different restaurants (Mio - review here and Odeon - review here) and weren't blown away. We might just be getting off to a slow start, so I think we'll hang in there and try it again. I like that the Tastings Journal takes care of setting the menu and finding a new restaurant every month. It's a way for us to try new places that we might not otherwise think about.

The drawback for me is the lack of two-way communication. If this is a dining "society," shouldn't there be a forum to discuss the restaurant experience? The Facebook group doesn't seem to allow wall posts (or at least I didn't see any) and there is no forum on the Tastings Journal website. I think it would be a nice addition to let people exchange ideas and thoughts on the restaurants or the DC dining scene in general. As it is, it doesn't feel much like a society at all.
To their credit, I did use the feedback form on the website and received a response very quickly. I explained that we were not impressed with Odeon, and the Tastings Journal guy (who, by the way, has the longest name ever: James Augustus Seymour Gregg Van Wynen) emailed me back and said that he was going to share our blog post with Odeon's owner. I appreciated the quick reply.

So, while I'm not sure I get the "journal" part of Tastings Journal, I look forward to seeing where it takes us next.

Second Thoughts From B

We're all about exploring new restaurants and we both love a deal, so it seems that the Tastings Journal is right up our alley. But as J mentioned, the destinations have been less than impressive. Personally, I think this is a result of short-sighted management. Any restaurant owner who signs on to a deal like this must see the immediate benefit of the inevitable influx of new business. However, it concerns me that in both of our experiences, it has been painfully obvious that we are not seeing the best that these businesses have to offer. Whether it is perplexingly odd service or sloppily prepared dishes, there has been no observable effort demonstrated to make us want to be return customers. Instead, I feel like they know we'll be paying our $45 and will cut any corners necessary to just make it through our visit.

I'm sure that whenever the arrangements are made that restaurants fall all over themselves to impress. Case in point, look at the Tasting Journal website's photos from Odeon and compare them to the ones we took. Even putting aside the studio lighting, the dishes are completely unrecognizable.

Looking past the fact that we're not getting these restaurants' best efforts, I'm still not convinced that J and I would be getting our $45 worth. Neither of us are big drinkers, and it is not uncommon for us to enjoy fine dining without wine (they are rather short pours too...). Also, we seldom both get an appetizer and both get a dessert, preferring instead to share one of each.

Basically, the Tastings Journal looks great for us on paper but it has yet to fulfill its potential. I'm cheering for it to come through on our next experience but as our esteemed former President once said, "There's an old saying in Tennessee — I know it's in Texas, probably in Tennessee — that says, fool me once, shame on — shame on you. Fool me — you can't get fooled again."

Wok and Roll

I don't know if Wok and Roll's food tasted better going down or coming back up. Seriously. To be fair, since this wasn't the only thing I ate all day, it might not have been the cause of my stomach misery, but I'm going to go out on a limb and assume that it was.

Wok and Roll is located on ChinaBlock in a building most famous for being the boarding house where John Wilkes Booth and company stayed while conspiring to kill Abraham Lincoln. Now, it's a combo Chinese-Japanese restaurant that conspired to kill my intestines.

We started our adventure with steamed dumplings which looked promising enough until we took a bite.

Inside it was about 90% dough and 10% filling. If you're wondering if your eyes are deceiving you, they aren't. That really is corn inside the dumpling. For those who like boring American veggies in their Chinese dumplings, there were peas too!

Next up was the Szechuan Chicken which promised to be spicy but lacked any real kick.

We also tried the Chicken Chow Foon which had pleasantly thick and hearty noodles but was missing flavor.

Sorry Wok and Roll, I don't think I could return after the rough "wok" home I had. For those of you with a cast-iron stomach who are looking for cheap eats late at night in a historic building, good luck, but don't say I didn't warn you.

Second Thoughts From B

Paired with our recent trip to Odeon Cafe, which you can read about here, this was a less than stellar culinary weekend. Thankfully, J salvaged it by cooking the tried-and-true childhood favorite, chicken broccoli casserole, for Sunday night's dinner. But back to Wok and Roll...

So I'm the one with the cast-iron stomach but even putting aside J's time praying to the white porcelain god, I still wouldn't advocate for a return trip. You might be thinking that this is just my Chinese food snob coming out again, but it isn't. Truth be told, I do enjoy Americanized Chinese food. As long as no one is trying to say that the Orange Chicken at Panda Express is authentic, I'm cool with it. I've even come to accept that Chinablock serves Americanized Chinese food no matter what language the street signs are written in. However, Wok and Roll is just not very good food. Take your pick, Americanized Chinese or authentic Chinese... either way, it was bland, uninteresting, and just plain bad. Our friend who guided us to Wok and Roll summed up the experience thusly, "This was much better when I was drunk." We summed it up by paying him to take home the leftovers.