The picture to the left, believe it or not, is my recipe for two pounds' worth of pizza dough. It's based on a recipe forwarded by Mark Furstenberg, the master baker late of G Street Food. He suggested I reduce the hydration by five percent so the dough would be easier to work with. I felt like I was back in algebra class, trying to figure out the baker's math on this baby.

My headaches didn't stop there, either. Once I did the math, I had to convert it into ounces, since my home scale doesn't weigh in grams. Then I had to find a place in our old Takoma Park bungalow that was warm enough to let the dough rise — but near enough to a TV set so I could watch college football and occasionally fold the goddamn dough. My chosen spot, the basement, was not ideal.

Oh, the compromises of a home baker who grew up in Nebraska.

The Y&H pie in all its salty and crispy glory.

The next day, I pulled the dough from the fridge, let it warm and rise some more, and then shaped the ball into the closest thing to a pizza round. (This is when I learned about "resistant" dough and how to deal with the reluctant bastard.) I ladled on the home-cooked sauce (long cooked to sweeten the sauce and cut down on tartness) and applied the basil leaves, fresh mozzarella, Italian sea salt, and olive oil.

I took the prepared round to some friends' house for New Year's Eve and baked the thing on a stone. Ten minutes later, I practically had to pry the pizza off the stone because it had sat too long before we popped the pie into the oven. My fellow partiers said they enjoyed the pie; they marveled that it was my first pizza ever made from scratch.

My own review?

I loved the thin, crispy crust, which remained horizontal even when held aloft. I didn't love its lack of flavor, which I blame on the cold basement and my addiction to college football. I also wanted more chew to the dough; it was crispy, all right, but not chewy the way all good crusts are.

Finally, the whole thing was too salty (though not absurdly so). I made the classic rookie mistake: I salted everything to taste, not taking into account the pizza as a whole, how the salt would become too overpowering when I brought the dough and the sauce together and shaved a little umami-loving Parm over the top.

This is why superb pies take weeks and weeks (months and months? years and years?) to perfect. My hat is off today in humble recognition of D.C.'s best piemakers.

Cupcakes. People love to eat 'em and love to read about 'em, too. The little frosted cakes devoured two of the top five spots this week. Well, I should say that subjects tangentially related to cupcakes took two of the top five spots.

Take a look:

1. Furstenberg's Departure from G Street: What Does It Say About D.C.? (*)
2. The Georgetown Cupcake Range Rover
3. Savour/Sutra to Open This Week in Adams Morgan
4. Hello Cupcakes. Goodbye Profits?
5. Brasserie Beck to Open Second Location in Atlantic City

At least that was Furstenberg's current idea as to why G Street started so slowly.

Y&H asked for your thoughts on this theory, and you responded with all manner of opinions, some even related to the original theory.

Karly, obvious a good listener, wrote in:

I don't necessarily disagree with the statement that people don't want to think about their food during a stressful workday, but my one and only experience at G Street Food was stressful, regardless of the food I ate. It was busy, confusing, and the staff weren't helpful. Furstenberg admitted that the food he served was not your typical DC lunchtime fare, but the menu offered little to no explanation of what you were ordering or getting. It is sad that he left, I think the place has (had?) a lot of potential, but it just needed some time and some tweaks.

Mike, on the other hand, wasn't buying any theory other than the one that postulates this: G Street sucks. Writes Mike:

I think that if you check Yelp's reviews of the place, you will note the consistent comments on the average food and exorbitant prices. Any other theory is just bullshit.

[Y&H Note: Mike is correct about the constant complaints on Yelp about price, but a number of folks also mention how much they like the food at G Street. This is classic blogger-commentary subterfuge from Mike: Ignore the material that doesn't suit your argument.]

Both Ron and Jim wrote in to express their admiration for G Street and to support the idea of stretching one's palate at lunch. Writes Ron:

I really liked G St and was amazed how slow the place was. Perhaps it was lack of publicity, a somewhat sleepy location? I like trying new stuff for lunch, I've become a fan of bulgogi after trying it off the cart at 14th and L and I had my first bahn mi at G St (I can't believe I'm 46 and can say that)

Jim was even more effusive for G Street:

I have been eating at G Street Food every week since it opened –usually two or three times per week precisely BECAUSE it allows me to stretch the limits of my palate. After working in downtown offices for 30 years, why would I want to go somewhere where my choices are the usual tuna or deli-meat sandwiches? Even the chinese buffets introduced in the 90's are now "old hat." The success of Breadline (for almost 15 years) and G Street Food must be due at least in part to being unpredictable.  While you can get a real carved turkey or egg salad sandwich, if thats what you really want, when you enter you never know if you might end up with something completely
different that you love–like a Vietnamese pancake with shrimp, a spicy lamb pizza, an oyster po-boy, or peanut soup.  Even his new takes on the sloppy joe and meatball sandwich are worthwhile because of the step up in quality ingredients.  D.C. is one of the few cities where this can succeed–you wouldnt try it in Pittsburgh.  The truth is, its expensive, and office workers are notoriously cheap–they pay $6.50 for Sysco chicken-cube sandwich at Cosi, or $5.99 for a Mcdonald's meal deal, but
then balk at paying an extra $1.50 for food that is truly top quality.

You can also read the comments from the original blog post here.

We all know how hard it is to get a good, gourmet sandwich in this town. Well, it got a lot harder yesterday with the news, via WaPo's Tom Sietsema, that master baker Mark Furstenberg has decided to leave G Street Food, the once-and-former street food operation that turns out an excellent banh mi.

Y&H caught up with Furstenberg yesterday morning to ask him if selling street food from a brick-and-mortar building was a concept doomed to fail from the start — or if Washingtonians just aren't into street food. My question is based on an unavoidable fact: not enough people are eating at G Street, which has forced the owners to start looking for ways to cut costs, a situation that did not always sit well with a perfectionist like Furstenberg.

"I just think that at G Street,  we needed more time to get this established," the Bread Line founder told Y&H. "I don't know if there's any reason that this can't be moved inside."

Furstenberg has an alternative theory as to why G Street Food hasn't attracted the numbers it had originally envisioned: People don't want to think about food during lunch.

"I think I underestimated the degree to which people want comfort food for lunch," Furstenberg says. "They don't want to be distracted by food."

People, in other words, don't necessarily want to ponder (or luxuriate in) their meal during lunch time. They want something familiar and something quick.

Furstenberg may be onto something here. What do you think, Y&H Nation? Do you want to stretch the limits of your palate during lunch, during a potentially stressful work day, or do you just want comfort foods? E-mail me and let me know your thoughts.

Photo by Darrow Montgomery

This fascinating segment, from Al Jazeera English, doesn't really explain why the foods were lost, but it does look at contemporary Beijing street foods, which date back centuries. That's right, centuries. One vendor says his family has been selling street food for "234 years."

But the wide-ranging segment also looks at the Chinese diet and how it has been affected by the country's massive economic growth. In short, as China has opened its borders to Western fast-food chains like McDonald's and KFC, the citizens have opened their mouths and gobbled down the American junk food. Their waist lines, like ours, are suffering from it.

Mark Furstenberg

The master baker says that revenues at G Street Food, in the first few weeks of operation, are down at least 40 percent from projections.  It's enough to cause concern for the owners of the place, the Choi family, who "expected it to do well from the beginning," Furstenberg tells Y&H.

Furstenberg doesn't quite know how to explain the slow start for G Street Food. He takes part of the blame. He thinks he opened with too few items on the menu and the ones he did offer were not familiar enough to the professional set who crowd these downtown sidewalks looking for lunch options. He has literally seen people walk into G Street, look at the menu, and walk right out.

So he has done what he really didn't want to do: He's expanded the menu beyond street foods. Along with his banh mi and socca and merguez sausage, Furstenberg now sells a muffuletta, sloppy Joe, meatball sub, and even an egg salad sandwich.

Furstenberg's not selling anything that he's "embarrassed about," he says. "But it's not what I intended to do. Hopefully I will one day get back to street food."

Hey, look, a celebrity chef!

We're all slaves to celebrity — or at least celebrity chefs. This week's top item is devoted to a freakish coincidence: I happened to be at G Street Food right when Rick Bayless popped in for a sandwich to go, to take with him for his flight out of town.

How powerful is Bayless' draw? Powerful enough to knock Select 55 out of the top spot. Here are your faves from the blog this week:

1. Rick Bayless Drops by G Street Food This Morning
2. Budweiser Launches Select 55, Light Beer Arms Race Gets Absurd
3. Terrible Restaurant Names: We Can't Live Without (Mocking) Them
4. Secret Fast-Food Menus: Truth or Myth?
5. Barton Seaver to Be Named Esquire's Chef of the Year, Controversy Ensues
   

Bayless and Furstenberg: Men of the street

Imagine Y&H's surprise when he stopped by G Street Food, baker Mark Furstenberg's new operation inspired by international street foods, and saw Rick Bayless casually walk in the door.  As if the celebrity chef lives just across the street, not half way across the country.

Bayless, fresh off his victory on Top Chef Masters, no doubt wanted to chat with Furstenberg about his new project, since the Chicago chef recently launched a similar street-food restaurant in the Windy City. The two toques spoke for awhile; I tried to leave them alone, save for the picture above, but when Bayless finally said he had to go, I button-holed him near the exit.

Bayless told me he was in town for a private event yesterday and decided to stop by G Street after he read Furstenberg's announcement e-mail (best line in the baker's note: "I hope to see you soon. I will try hard not to be cranky.") and noticed that the place was only two blocks from where he was staying.

Bayless arrived between the breakfast and lunch services, which for mere mortals meant that you couldn't order any freshly prepared foods. You'd have to wait 'til 11 a.m. for one of Furstenberg's sandwiches or tartines or sausages or even a Roman flatbread pizza. But, of course, Furstenberg made sure Bayless left with a sandwich for the trip home.

What did Bayless want?

A banh mi, he told me. "I love Vietnamese food," he said.

And with that, he said politely excused himself to catch his plane.

G Street Food, 1706 G St. NW, (202) 408-7474

The logo on the entrance.

These giant loaves were only for display.

The G Street team prepping for lunch, which runs til 2:30 p.m.

One of the Montreal-style bagels available at G Street.

What a week! We here at Y&H Central started it off with a bang — or more like the pop of a bottle top. We introduced the Lagerheads, who immediately chimed in with posts on Dogfish Head's new Sah'tea beer and D.C.'s ultimate suds map. But we also spent a good amount of energy chasing down Spike Mendelsohn and trying to find out the story behind Hollywood East Cafe's pending move. All of these posts attracted a lot of eyeballs to the blog, for which we are always grateful.

This week's most read blog items:

1. Spike's New Pizzeria Is Coming to Cap Hill. But First: Souvlaki!
2. Hollywood East Cafe OUT of the Boulevard. New Mall Location Coming.
3. Furstenberg's Street Food Restaurant Will Stretch Far Beyond Bread-Based Snacks
4. Andy Shallal's Eatonville to Symbolically Reunite Hughes and Hurston
5. The Latest from the Streets: The Fojol Bros. and Zola's Cart
   

Much to Y&H's surprise and delight, more of you clicked on the item about Mark Furstenberg's forthcoming street food restaurant than on Obama's much overhyped (guilty as charged!) visit to Ray's Hell Burgers. Congratulations on being so damn cool. The top posts of the week:

1. Furstenberg's Street Food Restaurant Will Stretch Far Beyond Bread-Based Snacks
2. President and VP Waited in Line at Ray's Just Like Everyone Else
3. Spike Mendelsohn Set to Open Pizzeria in D.C.
4. Everyone's Squeezing the Juice Out of Obama's Visit to Ray's Hell Burgers
5. Obama and Biden Order One "Hell" of a Burger

Photo by Darrow Montgomery