Popcorn is bursting onto mainstream restaurant menus, as a companion to cocktails, as an entree garnish and as an appetiser. Chef Spike Gjerde of the convivial Woodberry Kitchen in Baltimore says “there’s a childlike connection” to popcorn. He goes through about 50 pounds of kernels a month and ranks popcorn as one of his top-selling openers.

His are no ordinary kernels but rather Lady Finger popcorn from Lancaster County. Gjerde says he likes the “unexpected tenderness” of the snack, which cooks into small butterfly-like shapes that are relatively free of gritty hull. While warm, the popcorn is seasoned simply with butter from Vermont and sea salt from Italy. The price: a buck a small bowl. Popcorn has been part of Woodberry Kitchen’s menu since the creative American restaurant opened about a year ago. “We’re not trying to take ourselves too seriously,” Gjerde says.

Appreciating art, beer in hand

At Washington’s Studio Gallery, local artists swish around mouthfuls of stout, hefeweizen and lager while home-brewers admire works in watercolour, oil and acrylic. Volunteers from Brewers United for Real Potables, the Washington area club for amateur beer-makers, are pouring 11 of their beers from bottles, barrels and metal canisters. They dubbed the September 26 event the Art of Homebrew.

Joyce Weinstein, whose mixed-media composition “Made in Havana” hangs above the food table, singles out Pablo Picasso’s Porter by Paul and Jamie Langlie, an ebony-coloured ale full of chocolate, coffee and licorice flavors. “There is an art to doing a recipe,” Bud Hensgen says. Hensgen was the catalyst for this exhibition. He has several works on display.

Cardigans still cute as a button

Lynne Hiriak has a passion for cardigans, with more than 100 variations of the ladylike basic in her closet. So it made perfect sense this fall when the knitwear designer who has worked for Ralph Lauren and Derek Lam launched a label, Cardigan, that makes nothing else.

Her timing couldn’t be better. This fall’s retro Mad Men television moment has brought the cardigan back into fashion for men and women on the Michael Kors runway, at J. Crew and everywhere in between. Cardigans are standing in for jackets and have the design credibility to prove it, with gold buttons, chain details across the pockets and ruffled plackets.

The sartorial staple rose to fame in the 1950s and has since been beloved by dads, golfers and college profs. For women, the cardigan is one-half of the prim ‘n’ preppy twin set—a lightweight addition to any outfit and an easy way to polish any look.

LATWP