Welcome to Monday, which is also the start of
American Craft Beer Week.
There’re a bunch of brew-centric activities around
town, which you can check out on the official site and on the
DC Beer website. Think about kicking things
off at
ChurchKey
tonight, which’ll have two new
brews from Victory Brewing
Company, plus 11 more tried-and-true
Victory beers on tap, and then continuing throughout the week
at Smith
Commons,
where a different craft brewer and special
guests/events are featured
nightly.
If you’re more the hard booze type, head over to
Bourbon Steak, where bartenders
J.P. Caceres,
Jamie McBain, and
Duane Sylvestre are hosting a South of the
Border Seminar104
cocktail class
from 6:30 to 8 PM. The focus is tropically derived spirits such
as rum, pisco, cachaça, and tequila, which you’ll sample solo
and in cocktails alongside snacks. Tickets ($45 per person) are
available
through the Museum of the American Cocktail.
ZooFari,
one of the big-time food events of the year,
is back again at the National Zoo this Thursday from 6:30 to
9:30 PM. Expect lots of activities (as you should for a base
price of $150), including eats from over 100 restaurants like
Equinox,
and many
more,
three “megabars” and
plenty of wine, animal demonstrations, dancing, and an
auction.
Need to brush up on your grilling skills for the upcoming Memorial Day Weekend?
Brabo has you covered, with
a demo on Saturday from noon until 2 in which chef
Chris Watson shows guests how to perfectly
cook a variety of meats in the restaurant’s outdoor courtyard. The
lineup–which conveniently
includes items available for order and purchase at the
Butcher’s Block next door — includes local rib eye, New York strip,
veal burgers, and chicken kebabs.
Wine down the weekend on Sunday at the newly opened
Maple,
with a late-afternoon
class on Italian vino ($35 per
person). The folks from Fowney Selections,
a family-run purveyor, are hosting the course, and will lead
guests through seven varietals paired with several antipasti.
Call 202-588-7442 for reservations, or just swing by, check the
place out, and put down your name.
Make Sunday feel more like Saturday by hitting up
Sound Bites at 5
PM, a music and food fest at the 9:30 Club, benefiting the DC Central
Kitchen. Rock out
to Bone, Fur, and Feathers, Nappy Riddem, and a deejay set by
nightlife guru Eric Hilton of Thievery Corporation. For fuel,
try eats from 25 trucks and
restaurants, including Taylor
Gourmet,
Pepe,
BlackSalt,
and
Jackie’s.
Tickets ($40 per person) are available online.
Finally, two “taste of” neighborhood events are going down Sunday afternoon:
Taste of Arlington in Ballston and
Taste of Wheaton
in Maryland. Both are family-friendly happenings with live music and
kids’ activities, so you may want to pick by the lineup of
restaurants (Arlington
here
and Wheaton
here). Wine and
cocktail lovers, take note: There’s a special
pairing
at the Wheaton festivities
from specialists like
Julie Dalton of Michael Mina’s Wit & Wisdom and Libations Bar School
owner
Jesse Dean.
Anna Spiegel covers the dining and drinking scene in her native DC. Prior to joining Washingtonian in 2010, she attended the French Culinary Institute and Columbia University’s MFA program in New York, and held various cooking and writing positions in NYC and in St. John, US Virgin Islands.
