Here’s what’s going on in DC today: The ongoing Occupy DC protest at McPherson Square is still ongoing, so stop by and say hi and whatever, and also the long-planned “Stop the Machine” rally against TEN YEARS OF WAR IN AFGHANISTAN is also going, and going big. Here’s a live feed NOW CORRECTED WITH A BETTER FEED THAT’S ACTUALLY LIVE FROM DC:

Free live streaming by Ustream

Freedom Plaza is where people are set up in the video above, assuming the video above is still streaming live. And Freedom Plaza is that rectangular concrete/grass park that’s hilariously in front of the “Ronald Reagan Building,” and just southeast of Treasury and the front (south side) of the White House. The Metro station is Federal Triangle, on the blue and orange lines. Or use Metro Center on the red line and walk down two blocks. Easy!

The weather’s beautiful — sunny and 64 right now — so go have a picnic lunch with the protest, get out of the office and the chain sandwich shop.

Our Wonkabout editor, Arielle Fleisher, packed up and fled D.C. for the fun lands of Europe and then the not-so-fun lands of Michigan (for grad school), but she managed to pop up in the Washington CityPaper before this vanishing act. Did she make the news section for doing a political crime in a neighborhood ward district or whatever? No! She wrote about “Groupon Etiquette,” which is apparently what is involved when you use the online coupons from that pyramid-scheme website instead of just paying for your food:

A friend and I trekked out to the dubious dining destination that is Bethesda to take advantage of a LivingSocial deal I had obtained for Robert Wiedmaier’s Mussel Bar. Once the check came — and I was over my disbelief that a bottle of Allagash White could possibly cost $9 — I found myself confused as to how much I should pay for the meal. It’s one thing when you go in on a deal with another person, but in this case, I had invited a friend along to enjoy the spoils of the deal I had purchased: $20 in exchange for a $40 discount.

The answer probably turned out to be “one person performs a sex act on the other person, as payment.” But you’ll have to read it, to find out! Also, is someone going to start writing Wonkabout blog posts again, about the food and the bars and the events and the music and such? Maybe this person should write to the Wonkette editor. [CityPaper]

Well hello! After two years of eating and drinking her way around this city so you could know which small plates, pork, hamburger or pizza establishment is worthy of your hard-earned disposable income, it is time for your Wonkabout to leave the playground that is D.C. She is off to learn things in grad school, after which she’ll probably be unemployed, burdened by debt and unable to afford her pork habit. Wish her luck! But really, it was all fun and games until tattooing a dead pig for charity became an acceptable D.C. springtime activity … and then she knew it was time to go.

What a better way to end than with a listicle of Arielle’s D.C. musings. In first person, of course:

• Eat breakfast: Every once in a while, on Saturday or Sunday, indulge in the esoteric art of eating breakfast, as opposed to brunch, that is. Sure, mimosas are great, but there’s nothing wrong with the long lost meal known as breakfast. If you want to enjoy a simple, easy, no-frills, inexpensive, alcohol-free morning meal out, I (I!) recommend Point Chaud Cafe and Crepes, Pica Taco, Sova, or the Dupont Market.
• Jewish deli: Someone, please build a real, good, authentic Jewish deli in the District of Columbia. Please. Maybe instead of another dimly lit, nondescript bistro we could have just one good Jewish deli?
• Do not be afraid of eating inside: D.C.’s food trucks serve great food, but it’s okay if you don’t want to stand around like a dumb idiot in the freezing rain and instead choose to enter an actual building to eat, just like they do in Real America! My (my!) favorite indoor eating places include: Rosemary’s Thyme, Red Rocks Pizzeria, Thaitanic, Zaytinya, Potenza, Bar Pilar, Hank’s Oyster Bar, Granville Moors, and American Ice Company.
• The New York-ification of D.C.: Resist the urge to find the “New York aspect” of every new bar/restaurant that opens. One, because it’s not like New York cares, and two, because you don’t get a free cookie just because you ate somewhere that was deemed “New York-like.” D.C. is a great city in and of itself. Period.
• Do things other than eat and drink: D.C. may have tons of great restaurants and bars, but it’s also home to many great non-food-based establishments that are worthy of your disposable income, including the Woolly Mammoth Theater, Arena Stage, Theater J, HR-57, and West End Cinema.
• Tattooing a pig is not a good idea: It’s self indulgent. It doesn’t matter if the pig was college educated or got to frolic on organically harvested grass or even listened to the soothing sounds of Jewel’s greatest hits while it was being slaughtered. Have we reached the point in D.C. where eating has become such an overly-gluttonous activity so far removed from why we eat in the first place that when someone said, “Let’s tattoo a dead pig for the laffs and then eat it” no one felt a need to object? And even if, as it turns out, this is accepted as “job training” in the tattoo industry, do we really need to have five-course $65 dinner that flippantly exploits this and removes any dignity the pig once had? Why is culinary innovation in D.C. limited to never-ending pig roasts, gimmicks and turning unhealthy foods like doughnuts into absurd gourmet eats so that they can become more than appropriate for the culinary dignified among us? Anyone? Whatever happened to eating healthy food?

But on a better note: Thank you times a billion to Ken, Jim, Sara, Josh, Jack, Juli, Liz and Riley for everything! Here’s to craft beer, small plates, pork, table taps, cheese plates, and expensive cocktails. It’s been fun! THE END.

Happy third day of Passover to all our Jewish friends and a hoppy almost Easter to “everyone else!” Jews eating matza and the celebration of when Jesus returned to say “howdy” to all his followers before going away again are two exciting occasions that mark fertility, horny rabbits, and most importantly, spring. Before we enter the sweat feast that is D.C. in the summer when thousands of young impressionable political science majors will come to D.C. to flaunt their stapling skills and flocks of fanny-packed tourists will roll around town in their Segways, we get D.C.’s most enjoyable season, spring. This means there is pig to be eaten and patios to be enjoyed.

A refresher on springtime in D.C.:

You’re really fooling yourself if you think that being outside in the summer in D.C. is an enjoyable experience. Even if D.C. is slowly becoming a city that caters to more than the craft-beer-loving crowd, it will always, always be a swamp of despair and misery in the summertime. Seeing as how nasty summer will be, here’s some ideas for how to enjoy these nice spring days:

Washingtonians love drinking outside and eating brunch. These restaurants allow for both:

• Local 16 (this wasteland that caters to the quintessential Bridge and Tunnel crowd happens to serve a great, inexpensive brunch on their upstairs patio)
• L’Enfant Café
• Vinoteca
• Hanks Oyster Bar
• Belga Cafe
• Agora
• The Argonaut
• Art and Soul
• Leopold’s Kafe

Upcoming pig-focused events:

• Wednesday, April 20: Tonight, Poste will be roasting a happily raised (though now unhappily very dead) pig to celebrate the opening of their courtyard. A plate of pig costs $20 and comes with a beer or a glass of wine. [Poste]
• Wednesday, April 20: Jackson 20 is hosting an all-you-can-eat “Pig-A-Palooza” (this is why your Wonkabout hates alliteration) in its courtyard. The event features, in addition to slow roasted swine, BBQ ribs, pulled pork, potato salad, cold slaw, smoked corn, cornbread, green bean salad and pies for $35. [Jackson 20]
• Thursday, April 21: The only acceptable way to welcome spring is with a Pig Party. On Thursday, from 4-8PM, Restaurant 3 will be celebrating the opening of their patio with… fresh-off-the-pig pulled pork sandwiches as well as bacon–stuffed waffles with bacon ice cream. Oh hey, here’s something that makes this lavish consumption of pork slightly more acceptable: proceeds from the event will benefit the Ronald McDonald House. [Restaurant 3]
• Saturday, April 23: If you happen to have an $100 laying around and can’t imagine living another day unless you know how break down an entire pig, here’s your chance: This Saturday afternoon BLT Steak will be teaching the “art” of breaking down a pig as well as how to create “inventive” pork dishes. The class includes a four-course lunch and cooking demonstration. [BLT Steak (PDF)]
• Sunday, May 1: But spring really officially begins in D.C. when men don sundresses in a celebration of mumus, cheap beer and freshly roasted pig at Wonderland’s Annual Sundress Fest Fundraiser. [Wonderland]

Spring also means Nationals games and D.C. United games, kayaking, the Sweetlife Festival which is May 1, and Jazz in the Garden, which starts May 27. If you are desperate and have no friends — or, conversely, if you have lots of friends and care to round them all up on a weekly basis — there’s always spending spring playing kickball on the Mall.

Post-no-government-shutdown blues? Everyone was all excited for the anarchy and lawlessness, that is, until they came after the hoohaws of D.C.’s low-income women. Even if D.C.’s mayor did go to jail to protest the Republican Riders, short of throwing fetuses on Boehner’s lawn, it seems like Washingtonians are just going to have to go back to doing what they do best: indiscriminately disposing of income at a food and beer establishment. Which takes us to H Street NE, where, for its newest act, it has unveiled a Mongolian restaurant where food is consumed under the faded glare of multiple flat screen teevees. D.C. at its best!

The Mongolian restaurant, Khan’s Bar and Grill, which once employed young a Riley Waggaman, until he suddenly stopped showing up for work, is reminiscent of a college cafeteria’s stir fry station, only it also has a 110 inch HD projector and a full service bar.

Unlike most of the new places on H Street, Khan’s offers good food at fast-foody prices. A nice-sized bowl of fresh vegetables, noodles, and chicken or shrimp, which you get the pleasure of creating all by yourself using whatever sauces you desire, is just $8. Though the restaurant isn’t a part of The Great D.C. Tradition of Food and Booze Free-For-Alls  (see: the all you can eat and drink brunch at Cuba Libre, Masa 14, and Ping Pong Dim Sum), meaning this is not all you can eat Mongolian BBQ, you do get to watch the cooks stir-fry your meal on a giant skillet. For a town full of people who were monumentally excited by the prospect of parking in front of a fire hydrant during the shutdown, we can’t even imagine the amount of joy that watching noodles and vegetables be warmed on a large skillet will bring to Washingtonians.

The good news is that at Khan’s, you’re not dining in a bizarre, low-lit, New York-ified Carnival Wonderland. That doesn’t mean the place isn’t without its own oddities: the restaurant is awkwardly Mongolian BBQ to your right and full bar to your left. Soon it will also have a la carte Asian Fusion small plates menu, because, as we’ve learned when it comes to dining in D.C., why not?

If you’re looking for less gimmick-y dining experience on H Street, before you go play blingo, eat tater totz, spend $6 on slice of pie, or try out the new underground, much hyped, above ground Ramen noodle emporium, Khan’s is the place to go. And, have no fear, they have PBR on tap.

Khan’s 1125 H St NE, Washington, DC 20002, (202) 399-6010
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Washington is usually such a lively place, with its rats and whores and millionaires and non-essential government employees. How will D.C. change when the Federal Government actually shuts down forever Friday at Midnight? Maybe you like the socialist safety and security of your paycheck and don’t care for this unpaid, forced spring break? Or maybe you’re excited that this has the potential to be as much fun as snowmageddon, only without the snow and the paid time off? The reality for D.C. is rather unpleasant: No trash pick up,  no fixing the potholes, government workers struggling to survive without their BlackBerrys, and thousands of tourists on Segway tours to nowhere because all the attractions are shut down. Other than dumping your trash in front of Boenher’s house, here are some suggestions for how to make it though the Shutdown.

About 11 percent of the Washington metropolitan area workforce is employed by the U.S. government, and about a third of D.C.’s economy is dependent upon it. This shutdown will be the closest D.C. has come to feeling the great recessions. It’s also a great excuse to enjoy some booze-y free-for-alls.

• Shutdown Specials: The main difference between this shutdown and the snow days isn’t the desire to drink heavily, it’s the lack of a paycheck to fund the drinking. Recognizing that furloughed employees will only be able to waterboard themselves with vodka if the drinks are cheap, many restaurants are offering Shutdown Specials. If a shutdown actually happens, you can expect discounts at the Pug, Room 11, Radius Pizza and Lounge 201 — if you can show your government ID. Union Pub will be offering penny house drafts, Monday through Friday from 5PM-6PM with your Congressional ID and Pound will be offering a “Keep ‘em Fed” discount of 25% off of all food for government employees.
• Happy Hours: Most happy hours in this city start at 3PM and end by 7PM, leaving only an hour or so after work to be “happy.” But now furlough employees can enjoy happy hours that have previously only been accessible to night-shifters and unemployed alcoholics. Try the Happy Hours at the Mighty Pintstarting at 11AM, Firefly at 4PM, Masa 14 at 5PM, Laughing Man at 3PM, and Iron Horse at 4PM.
• Food trucks: Employed people have to sacrifice precious time at the office downloading porn to wait in line to be served cheese, tacos or pasta from a truck. But now that you’re non-essential, you can meet the trucks right when they park, so as not have to waste your day waiting in line for food.
• Walk around the Mall and the Tidal Basin: The Cherry Blossom parade and Kite Festival will probably be canceled if there’s a shutdown, but the Mall and the Tidal Basin will still be “open.” And you can fly a kite on the Mall on Sunday, even if it isn’t a Cherry Blossom sanctioned activity.
• Farmers Market: Without a paycheck you may be tempted to forgo buying organic, locally grown whatnot from the Farmers Market and settle instead for genetically modified vegetables and cheese clusters, but this is letting the Republicans win. Besides, wandering around the Farmers Market is a free activity and you should be able to have enough samples to hold you over for at least a little while. The Dupont Circle Farmers recently expanded and now opens at 8:30AM on Sunday.
• Corcoran Gallery of Art: If the government shuts down, the Corcoran will offer free coffee and refreshments in its cafe, as well as free admission for government employees with ID. If the shutdown is an excuse for you to enjoy D.C. culture, try the Agony and Ecstasy of Steve Jobs at the Woolly Mammoth Theater — there are often cheap tickets available for those under 35.
• There is a bar in the Reason magazine offices, and libertarians love anarchy and violence. So invite yourself inside and help yourself to whatever looks good … booze, computers, people’s wallets, etc.

Sure, no one will have any money, there will be trash everywhere, the city will smell, and the tourists will be bored without monuments to erratically circle. But the impending anarchy and lawlessness that will soon overwhelm D.C. could be great! At least there will be cheap booze! During this trying time, if you see a government worker, buy him or her a drink. If they start complaining about life without a BlackBerry, go ahead and hit them. Total anarchy!

Apparently, in our little small-plates metropolis it is possible to have a simple, non-pork-based meal in a nice, modestly decorated restaurant. For a while there we had resigned ourselves a life where we would get all our nutrients from bacon-covered doughnuts and to drinking beer only from mason jars in dimly lit restaurants. This is why we’re excited that we can use the words “good value” and “simple” to describe Medium Rare, a new steakhouse in the semi-revived Cleveland Park. Maybe you’re of the rare breed that likes to eat well priced, decidedly undercooked, tender, succulent morsels of meat?

With the opening and then the abrupt closing of the Cereal Bowl, we figured there was no hope for Cleveland Park. We assumed that the neighborhood would continue to lose people to Eastern Market and Logan Circle, where there’s a better ratio of lattes and organic apples to people with disposable income. But Cleveland Park is managing to revive itself and the area is now home to the Medium Rare, a restaurant that offers a prix-fixe menu of bread, salad, and a decidedly large portion of steak, all for just $20.

Here at Wonkette, we do not do gimmicks. That is, unless said gimmick involves a second helping of steak. You see, at Medium Rare, after your bread and salad, they bring you the main course: tender, prime, dry-aged, sirloin cap steak, cooked to order and smothered in a creamy secret sauce, served with a side of overly salted fries. Once you’ve taken a few bites of the meat, they come around and give you a second helping of both the meat and the fries. This is not inconceivable. This is amazing and makes you wonder why we consistently settle for anything less in this city.

There is no meat on this plate. While the brunch at Medium Rare is also a good deal — $16 for bread, a yogurt parfait, salad, or fruit and then an Egg Benedict with portobello mushroom and sliced steak, Steak Frites (with an egg for $3 more) or 3 Poached Eggs with fries — we were dismayed that that the poached eggs did not come with meat. Everything should come with meat in a steakhouse.

Correction: Everything should come with meat in a steakhouse except for the vegetarian option, which is a grilled portobello mushroom marinated in a red bell pepper sauce, and the desserts, all of which are big enough to be split.

At Medium Rare you get a great, large meal for a reasonable price, at least by D.C. standards, anyway, and you get to consume it in a simple, well designed, cozy space, not in a gas station, a parking lot, or a prison yard. We’d like more of this trend, please.

Medium Rare, 3500 Connecticut Ave NW, Washington, DC 20008, (202) 237-1437
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