Top Chef: Season 5 Premier at Good Stuff Eatery

This post is long overdue, but as many of you know, I'm still trying to play catch-up on my posts. Now, if you haven't realized by now from all my posts on food, I'm a little infatuated with anything culinary and the epicurean lifestyle. (I'm only getting started on register for all the kitchen tools I will actually be using and have expressed a need for in the last 2 years.)

Naturally, I am a major fan of Bravo's Top Chef. You can imagine, therefore, my excitement when Chef Spike Mendohlson opened Good Stuff Eatery on Capitol Hill this summer - so excited, that I went there twice after its opening week: First, my new co-workers drove me there all the way from Ballston to try out the place and check out the space. Second, I met my former co-workers there after a reception on the Hill. It was wonderful and I won't even tell you about how giddy I became when I spoke to Chef Spike as he expedited the orders while I waited in line. He's very charming. Let's leave it at that.

So, of course I watched the premier of Season 5 of Top Chef in style last Wednesday at Good Stuff Eatery ! Spike invited me via email (and the rest of his restaurant's subscribers) as he was on Twitter for the show. Lauren and I arrived super early to fend off the non-existent lines (I mean, it was packed. I wouldn't recommend going ;). We sampled Ryan's Milky Way milkshake (divine). Then we shared the famed Toasted Marshmallow milkshake.

This little beauty was, seriously, a girl scout campfire in your mouth-minus the fire and the mosquitos. Somehow, you could taste the toasted outside of the marshmallow in the milky ice cream concoction - almost like you were slurping off the outside of the marshmallow and it turned liquid in your mouth. Heaven. Milky, marshallowy, heaven.

At 11 PM, Chef Spike offered beer on the house to all of us watching the show (they normally close at 11 M-F), but the premier went until 11:15 PM - super special. It was aroud this time that I summoned up the courage to ask him to sign my Top Chef cookbook that Lauren gave me for my birthday.

And, like the gracious host he is, he greeted all of his guests at the door. I will definitely be back for future showings - but I definitely recommend that you check out his place if you haven't. I'm not sure if the restaurant caters yet, but this would be a great little site to show your visiting friends and family that is unique to D.C.