Capital Diary: Nathans Celebrates Its 40th

Last week’s 40th-anniversary dinner at Nathans, the much-chronicled pub/restaurant at the prime Georgetown location of M and Wisconsin, was a funny, friendly evening, packed with fans. Many of them told nostalgic stories, some touching on owner Carol Joynt’s unending struggle to keep the bistro afloat. After her beloved husband, Howard Joynt III, died of pneumonia twelve years ago, grief-stricken Carol―reeling from the sudden onset of his illness, from her three-week vigil as he lay on life support, and from explaining it all to their five-year-old son―again faced new shocks.

Emmy-winning Carol’s world was television. She worked hard as a TV producer for Larry King. Busy with her own career, she was not involved in Howard’s business affairs. His lawyers told her the IRS had been investigating him for tax fraud, with a bill that would run into the millions―and he had no life insurance. “Give up and let it go,” his lawyers advised. But she wouldn’t hear of it. “I could just hand over the keys to the IRS and walk away,” she said, “but Howard founded this Georgetown institution. Marriages have begun here, and children have been named after it.”

She paid off his bills but watched as their houses, cars, and more went to the IRS. Carol faced a tough lease, a mountainous rent, and an obsolete restaurant kitchen that needed overhauling, but she persevered. It has been a cliff-hanger: Her lease is up in April, and her sympathetic but intransigent landlords had put the building on the market for $18 million. Recently, they have made her some concessions. With the possibility of a continuing lease, Nathans may yet survive. The watering hole is still a hangout for the hip and the well known, the brunches are great, and her “Q&A Cafe” Wednesday interviews with notables are usually wait-listed. Read her fascinating, very intimate blog, “Swimming in Quicksand,” in which she recounts the daily details of her life; it is like a far-reaching conversation with a close and witty friend.

Plan Ahead: Mami Wata Exhibit

Beautiful and seductive, dangerous yet protective, the legendary African water deity Mami Wata is sometimes depicted as a mermaid, sometimes as a snake charmer, and sometimes as a combination of the two. Her name is pidgin English for “Mother Water,” and she will star in an exhibit from April 1 through July 26 at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African Art.

“Mami Wata: Arts for Water Spirits in Africa and its Diasporas” will feature headdresses, masks, bronze objets d’art, and masquerade figures. Lectures, films, storytelling programs, and hands-on workshops relating to mermaids and other sea creatures will complement the show.

Plan Ahead: Pink Tie Party

On March 11, mingle with some of Washington’s brightest achievers at the trendy Liaison Capitol Hill Hotel. The celebrity host for the National Cherry Blossom Festival’s Pink Tie Party is genial chef and cookbook author, Art Smith of Art and Soul. At this sneak preview, you’ll enjoy special cocktails, as well as “Cherry Picks”―tastes of dishes by top D.C. chefs.

The evening benefits the National Cherry Blossom Festival’s free cultural and community events. Sponsors include Shiseido, Washington Life, The Liaison, and WMAL. On the host committee: Kara Kennedy, Senator Ted’s daughter, WJLA’s Alison Starling, Sissy Yates and TV and film producer Angus Yates, journalist Jeanie Theisman, corporate VP and blogger Pamela Sorensen, events consultant Jayne Sandman and The Examiner’s Jeff Dufour, Children’s Law Center member Mariella Trager and lawyer husband Michael, and Linda and John Donovan.

Bonus on the Web site for the organization: a bloom watch for the cherry blossoms at the Tidal Basin.

Travel Talk: Trump in Waikiki

Just after flying in from Palm Beach and Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago, where I covered the Red Cross Ball (see the recap below), what loomed up on my first stroll out of the hotel in Waikiki but a mammoth new Trump project.

The soon-to-be-completed Trump International Hotel & Tower neighbors the Waikiki Beach Walk, the brainchild of the Hawaiian-based Outrigger Enterprises Group. The hotel company championed the revitalization of Lewers Street. Once ugly with decaying buildings and tired stores, this lovely curved avenue and surrounding area is now a local attraction, with fine shops and restaurants, live music, and a thriving nightlife.

Three years ago, all 464 units planned for Trump’s luxury condo/hotel combo were put on the market in what was to be a two-day sale. No second day happened. All the units sold in a mere eight hours, for $700 million, a record-breaking event, with almost 600 would-be buyers disappointed. Lesson: the value of a brand name.

At the Table: Hawaiian Treats

In the heart of Obamaland, Oahu, the T-shirt you see most often shows our 44th president’s face with the proud phrase “Homegrown.” Barack Obama was raised on the island by his Kansas grandparents. Mainlanders and Hawaiians alike line up for “shave ice” (no “d” at the end). Obama raised questions worldwide when he announced he was looking forward to having it on his vacation in Hawaii last August. No, it isn’t the syrup-covered snow cone we’re familiar with: ice ground to the consistency of small hail. Shave ice is made of ice shaved by the knife blade of a machine until it is fine snow, then packed into a cup mold, with exotic syrups poured over it.

Doug Gibson, a pal with encyclopedic knowledge gleaned as a 41-year Oahu resident, saw to it we sampled shave ice at Island Snow in Kailua, one of the stops Obama made with his family (photo by Alex Brandon, AP). The photo appeared in a USA Today article posted at the shop.

The shave ice was great, with a duo of mango and passion fruit syrups over it, the way Obama likes it, the “shavers” at Island Snow told us. As a schoolkid, Obama dished up ice cream part-time at a Baskin-Robbins not far away.

My cousin Will Brown showed us the Punahou School, Honolulu’s expensive, top-rated college prep that Obama attended on a scholarship. Punahou’s annual carnival was in full swing, a mammoth affair where funds are raised for outstanding but needy students, such as Barry Obama, as he was then known.

The school served one food you won’t find at a school fair in D.C., malasadas, sugared, fried dough rounds originally brought to the islands by Portuguese workmen homesick for their native dishes. The Punahou School carnival has served as many as 300,000 of these treats during its two-day celebration.

Another Obama fave is spam musubi. Don’t shudder; it isn’t bad. Spam is highly regarded in Hawaii, but since the 1970s, this sandwich invention has helped raise the canned pork meat’s image so high that well over 6 million cans a year are consumed in the Hawaiian islands alone.

Spam musubi is made of a fried slice of the meat pressed between two slabs of vinegared rice, wrapped in nori seaweed. Sounds weird, but it’s a rather interesting, portable snack.

Japan’s influence on the local cuisine is also evident in the popularity of mochi ice cream. The Japanese dessert is a favorite in Hawaii, which has many visitors from Japan and a large population of Japanese-Americans.

Washington hostess Isabel Ernst has put a delicious version of it on the map locally. Encased in a delicate but crisp wafer of rice flour, the mochi ice cream she serves at her mansion enchants her guests, and her children call it their favorite dessert. She gets it at Trader Joe’s. I expected the mochi ice cream in Honolulu to be equally good. But the one time I bought it, at the food court in the huge Ala Moana shopping center, I waited in line for half an hour for a version that, to me, seemed vastly inferior. The ice cream had a pasty covering that tasted like an uncooked egg-roll wrapper.

Nevertheless, this style has its fans. The Japanese couple ahead of me spent 20 minutes discussing which flavors to choose, and ended with a dozen of the little frozen cakes ensconced in a gift box that could have been used for jewelry.

Biggest culinary surprise in Oahu: to discover an America’s Classics Award-winning restaurant in a nondescript storefront in an industrial district of Honolulu. The honor―the Oscar of the American food world―was bestowed in 2000 by the James Beard Foundation, an organization inspired by the legendary TV personality and gourmet author. (Jim Beard was a longtime friend I had the nerve to cook dinners for on a Pibigas grill, when he spent a summer in a pied-à-terre my former husband and I had located for him near us in Provence.)

The award-winning spot is Helena’s Hawaiian Food, on North School Street. The 63-year-old restaurant was made famous by Helen Chock, a remarkable Chinese woman. It is now run by her grandson Craig, aided by her daughter, Elaine, a fourth-generation Hawaiian who lived for several years in Silver Spring.

On the wall, you can see a photo of Helen, lei draped and flower crowned, as she accepted the award at the foundation’s headquarters, housed in the home in Greenwich Village where Jim lived.

My order from the brief but classic Hawaiian menu included luau-style, smoky kalua pork and excellent ribs, but where was my order of squid? And what was this marvelous, dark green vegetable dish with morsels embedded in it?

Mirabile dictu, it was pureed taro leaves with bits of squid, the tenderest squid I’ve ever tasted.

The food at Helena’s is authentic, the prices are minuscule, and the walls are covered by the works of noted painter and printmaker Jean Charlot. A good friend, he was a devotee of Helen’s cooking. He earned her a mention in the Congressional Record, when he was quoted speaking of the meals she catered at his home.

Capital Diary: The Red Cross Ball

Many Washingtonians make their way to Palm Beach in winter, especially for the annual International Red Cross Ball. The D.C.-based foreign ambassadors invited each year are one of the ball’s most colorful features (photo by Lucien Capehart, courtesy of the Red Cross Ball, Palm Beach Chapter).

The ball starts with formality―the receiving line of ambassadors standing before their respective flags as they greet guests, then their processional down the red carpet to the ballroom―and ends with fun. As always, everybody danced to the Peter Duchin Orchestra, the ball’s favorite band.

This year, the countries represented included Switzerland, Portugal, Oman, Afghanistan, Luxembourg, Romania, Monaco, and Liechtenstein (the latter’s lively ambassador, Claudia Fritsche, could easily have won the cup for best dancer, if one were given).

The first woman chairman of the national Red Cross (and former U.S. ambassador to Finland), Bonnie McElveen-Hunter, down from Washington, spoke of the evening’s serious purpose, the ball’s role in raising funds for the work of the Red Cross, whether it be battling hurricanes in Florida or floods in Ecuador. She presented the Chairman’s Award to Michele Kessler for her commitment to fighting measles as well as the scourge of malaria in Africa, which has been reduced by 90% since the Red Cross effort began.

The night before the ball, Michele and husband Howard Kessler, the magnate who pioneered the idea of affinity credit cards, hosted the glamorous Ambassadors Dinner at their 25-acre estate, with every beautifully appointed room holding art treasures.

Washingtonians were again a strong presence at the ball. Seen: the ball’s chief of protocol (and former U.S. ambassador to Denmark) Stuart Bernstein and wife Wilma, and two former State Department protocol chiefs, Marion “Joe” Smoak and Nancy Brinker, who just finished her stint on that job. Others present included Smoak’s wife Francie; Susan Eisenhower and Bucky Carlson; our former ambassador to the U.N. Esther Coopersmith, wearing decorations awarded her by Thailand; Mary Ourisman, until the week before our ambassador to Barbados and the Eastern Caribbean, Judy and Ahmad Esfandiary; Mary Mochary and Dr. Phil Wine; Dr. Mary Frances Smoak and husband Bill Walde; and developers Al Pierce and Lola Reinsch.

Also in attendance were two couples who split their time between Palm Beach and Washington, Bill Tiefel and his beautifully bejeweled wife, Norma, and Brad and Denise Alexander, she sporting the loveliest parure of the evening, a shower of turquoise and diamonds adorning her neck and ears.

The ball’s warm and hospitable co-chairs for the last three years, Nancy and William Rollnick, said this is their last year as chairmen; they will be a difficult act to follow. Nancy is an award-winning Broadway producer and an acclaimed photographer with a dozen books to her credit, and Bill Rollnick is the retired president of Mattel, who helped guide Barbie to fame.

Donald Trump flies the diplomats down from D.C. on his private plane. For many years I have been aboard, too, but lost my spot this year because there were more ambassadors than usual. Often, diplomatic dropouts happen because of events in their country, or illness, but this year, there weren’t any crises and the ambassadors were all disgustingly healthy, so no room for me.

Trump is continuing the tradition begun by the late cereal heiress Marjorie Merriweather Post, who lived in Washington and flew ambassadors from D.C. to Palm Beach in her private plane. The ball is held at her 62,000-square-foot vacation mansion, Mar-a-Lago, which Trump bought and has redone as a private club.

He has given Palm Beach new life since he began investing there, but not without irritation and legislation. Palm Beachers were irked by some of the changes The Donald hath wrought.

The sight of the American flag waving high above the club as I walked into the ball reminded me of one such dispute. Trump had erected a no-no in front of Mar-a-Lago: an 80-foot flagpole. The limit is 42 feet, said the town council. Six months of legal wrangling and the threat of fines of $1,250 per day followed. Trump contributed $100K to charities for war veterans and VA hospitals, moved the pole back from the waterfront, and dropped his $25 million lawsuit against the city. His flagpole is now at a tall 70 feet. Everyone made nice.

That standoff was settled amicably, with benefits for all, a way Trump often handles such things (after he applies some muscle, natch).

Because it was Palm Beach, there was of course the usual scandale du jour, this time Laurence Leamer’s latest, Madness Under the Royal Palms: Love and Death Behind the Gates of Palm Beach, which had just come out, skewering some well-known islanders and madly embarrassing a local playboy, who is banned from one entire country because of his antics on its national airline.

Larry’s latest was being printed as an even bigger and farther-reaching scandal broke, seasonal Palm Beacher Bernie Madoff’s Ponzi scheme. The official, 163-page list of his victims named 569 residents of the Beaches, including some of the town’s most generous charitable donors.

These financial wounds raised concerns that this year’s ball might suffer, but it rolled merrily along, still the high point of the Palm Beach Season, just as it has been for the last 52 years.