My audience is national, so in addition to addressing local queries, I try to include rants, raves and comments of broad interest - like how much to tip on takeout, which I decide will kick off my Q&A today. There are so many questions about where to eat outside Washington, I could easily host a travel chat. Show day! I’m logged on at 6:30 to review dozens of posts waiting for me ahead of my live online dining discussion. We decide it’s time to stop including pandemic protocols at the end of my reviews, since the Biden administration has declared the end of the public health emergency for the coronavirus pandemic. Joe and I cover a lot of ground between bites: story ideas, enhancements to my online dining Q&A and a possible theme for the fall dining guide, for which I start eating in earnest in June. As happens all too often, everything we order arrives pretty much at the same time, crowding our small table, where the most successful dish is a riff on pad Thai, a heap of shredded green papaya, kelp noodles, coconut and peanut sauce. The restaurant is a branch of the vegetarian-themed Planta that I reviewed in Bethesda, and while the menu tilts Asian, Planta Queen comes with a similar splashy interior and eye-catching presentations. Dinner tonight is at the new Planta Queen in Dupont Circle, where I’m catching up with my editor, Joe Yonan, who’s been away on parental leave for four months.
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