Come Again? A Food Flash?
Under the heading "Food Flash," which the Post likes to use as a chest-thumping device to announce its breaking news, Tom Sietsema wrote yesterday:
The area's best-known Vietnamese restaurant—Huong Que, also referred to as Four Sisters (6769 Wilson Blvd., Falls Church)—will be leaving its base in the Eden Center for a larger home in Fairfax County next year, according to Le Lai, Sister No. 2 at the family-owned business.
Hate to break the news to you, Posties, but we reported that fact more than a year ago, in our August 25, 2006 cover story. Here's the pertinent passage:
Ly’s future does not lie with Song Que, however. She plans to join the family at Huong Que’s new location at the corner of Lee Highway and Gallows Road in Falls Church, which is scheduled to open late next year. The plan is to move Huong Que in its entirety to the new spot, a combination residential/retail space, but the family hasn’t decided yet whether to sell its lease at the Eden Center or transform the current location into something different.
It's the same story that explained the conflicted feelings that each of the Lai siblings has toward the restaurant that made their family famous. But you wouldn't have known it from Sietsema's last paragraph, which reads: "Just for the record, Four Sisters is a bit of a misnomer—and has been for years. Lai concedes that she and Sister No. 4, Lieu Lai, and a brother, chef Hoa Lai, are the only siblings who work regularly at the restaurant."
This is the second time that the Post has "reported" details from one of our food-and-wine covers without crediting the little guy. In March, the Post wrote about Montgomery County's stranglehold on alcohol distribution and how it affects fine-wine service. It came a month after our own cover story on the issue.
Oh, and by the way: That attempt at a rhyme in the headline of Sietsema's Food Flash—Pho to Go–it doesn't work. It's pronounced "fuh." As in "pho-king" Washington Post.
1:07 pm
Tim, do you know if Four Sisters makes a pho with a non-beef broth?
I've heard people pronounce it as "Foe", I'm tempted to correct them but it leaves me wondering if I was the one with the wrong pronunciation. But then I remember that I ate Pho in high school at the sketchiest pho establishments in Falls Church. So who am I to question my own confidence in pho?
3:54 pm
Pho Master;
The truth is, I've never eaten pho at Huong Que. I can't get past their seabass in black bean sauce or the lemongrass beef or the hot pots. But if Huong Que really doesn't use beef stock in its pho, it's really not pho, is it?
By the way, the American pronunciation "foe" is accepted, but my understanding is that the correct pronunciation is closer to "fuh."
-Tim
10:49 am
I'm not sure I follow your argument. In the quote from August 2006, you state the new restaurant "is scheduled to open late next year" -- i.e., 2007. Which, didn't happen. Now, the Post reports of a plan to open in 2008. That wasn't your story. Would you have been happier if the Post had said, "A similar fact was mentioned 16 months ago in City Paper, but the article had the date wrong?" Had that line been included, wouldn't you have wondered why the Post had bothered with such a citation.
11:15 am
I think you're missing the point, Mike. The date of the move is less important than the news of the move itself, which we broke. Restaurant opening dates are always pushed back. Sietsema wrote about the pending move as if it were breaking news. It wasn't.
12:37 pm
It seems really silly to be spending blog time saying you're better than the Post. It only makes the David and Goliath thing into an immature sham. In this case you should do as David and let your work speak for you. David never hopped up and down and shouted about his conquest of the lion. The fact is the City Paper does its' thing and the Post does what it does. I'm sure there are stories that you've missed that the Post has covered. I'm not a huge fan of the Post but I'm embarrassed for you here. Much of the City Paper coverage just seems mean spirited and negative. Sometimes I read the Post over CP just to get the knot out of my brow from all of the scowling I do when I read the negative reviews and comments and swear words. I lived in NY for years and never heard the Villiage Voice complain that they scooped the NY Times. Everyone fills their niche end of story.