amanda mcclements

Chef Bryan Voltaggio of Frederick's Volt Melissa McCart of Counter Intelligence goes behind the kitchen line to see what's cooking at DC-area restaurants. Read more posts here . This past week, on a sunny morning post thunderstorm, I joined Volt chef Bryan Voltaggio at Whitmore Farm in Emmitsburg, Md., as owner Will Morrow gave a tour. Voltaggio, a new customer of Morrow's, was checking out the property, just a few miles south of the Pennsylvania border, as a potential spot for a farm dinner in the fall. Voltaggio nodded to a gorgeous, renovated barn atop a knoll as a possibility. On a sunny day with a view of the mountains, we could imagine it the perfect place for an elegant dinner. That day, doors on rollers exposed bales of sweet-smelling hay. The chef headed down the hill toward a chicken coop to inspect heritage hens that provide eggs for his restaurant. This isn't your average henhouse. The curtains framing each coop are denim. It's quaint and white, like...

Soldiers participated in a different kind of boot camp this week at CulinAerie. Photos by Melissa McCart Melissa McCart of Counter Intelligence goes behind the kitchen line to see what's cooking around DC. "What would you like for your last meal?" It’s not some kind of foodie fantasy question . It's Susan Watterson's request of eight soldiers from a US Army Special Forces unit based in Fort Bragg, NC, for their final day of boot camp. Culinary boot camp. Watterson, co-owner of CulinAerie in downtown DC, has been leading an intensive culinary training session for Army cooks for the past two weeks. All eight cooks, whose ages range from 22 to 42, will be deployed to Afghanistan in July. Each of them have been before; some as many as seven times since 2001. Watterson worked with Master Sergeant Arthur Vernon and Staff Sergeant Hunter Blankenship for months to set up a program to hone the skills for these cooks who make meals for 600 to 800 people a day in 12-...

Melissa McCart of Counter Intelligence goes behind the kitchen line to see what's cooking at DC-area restaurants. Rustico 's Frank Morales is busy. In addition to continuing work on DC's Birch and Barley , the beer-centric restaurant set to open this fall on 14th Street, the chef has been baking rustic hearth breads with beer as a key ingredient. And one of his creations goes on sale Friday morning at a sort of bread speakeasy. Starting tomorrow at 7:30 a.m., Morales will start selling "speakeasy bread" — specifically an Achel 8 Degrees Trappist Trippel sourdough — at Rustico's side door, Monday through Friday until they run out. Look for a sign that will indicate where to knock for a boule — $3 apiece, cash only, exact change, please. Why is baking bread in house becoming so popular for restaurants? "It's a natural during an economic downturn," Morales says. "To break bread. Put bread on the table. People gravitate to it. It's inexpe...

Melissa McCart of Counter Intelligence goes behind the kitchen line to see what's cooking at DC-area restaurants. A few hours before dinner service, Haidar Karoum is washing 10 pounds of ramps he's using for the World Cocktail Day dinner at Proof on May 11. As I head into the kitchen, their pungent scent greets me before I see them, dozens of flat green leaves and white bulbs stacked in a bowl. Karoum is prepping to make ramp kimchee, a spin-off of the Korean spicy cabbage condiment. It’s no surprise that he’s interested in kimchee. When I interviewed him for a piece in The Washington Post about H Mart , Karoum said he stopped by his local Asian market for kimchee tastings featuring dozens of renditions on weekends. Proof, the host of DC's World Cocktail Week celebration for the second year in a row, will feature five dishes inspired by different regions around the world, paired with cocktails from some of the city’s most creative bartenders. The kimchee that Karoum is ...

Metrocurean is pleased to introduce this new feature, written by my friend and fellow food writer Melissa McCart of Counter Intelligence . Melissa goes behind the kitchen line to learn what's cooking at DC-area restaurants. She explores ingredients, techniques and trends embraced by the city's top chefs. Patrick Deiss heads up the bakery at 2941 Photo by Sara Poole Several bakers shaped baguettes on a huge maple table, patting and rolling dough into form with their hands. The scent of baking bread wafted from big ovens. It was 8 a.m. last Friday morning. I had found my way into the bakery at 2941, where chef Patrick Deiss welcomed me to an impromptu morning of bread baking 101. "The most gratifying, most frustrating part of bread baking is the sourdough loaf,” says Deiss, baker for 2941 under executive chef Bertrand Chemel. “It's like a marriage. You have to work at it.” Deiss was seduced by sourdough in San Francisco, during a month-long session at the San Francisco...