Welcome back to the Inner Circle!

This is where I give you the BTS on where I’ve been, answer the question you asked me, and spill the tea, unfiltered.

It's no secret that I love Marcus DC. It's one of those restaurants that feels really fancy but somehow unpretentious.

Sometimes I like to go sit at the bar with crazy hair and a hoodie on, so nobody recognizes me. I get to be free and still get my serving of Mel's Crab Rice.

So when their PR team asked if I wanted to host a supper club there, I was in. Even better, it landed on the night they were hosting a collab with H3irloom Food Group.

I had just released the Baltimore episode of Our Block, featuring David and Tonya Thomas of H3irloom. They host dining experiences and pop-ups, the kind that always tell a story and make us really think about where our food comes from and what it means to us.

David and Tonya are also two of the founders of the Muloma Heritage Center in the heart of the Gullah Geechee Heritage Corridor, a 38-acre project to preserve and advance African American and Afro-Atlantic foodways.

In short, they're the real fucking deal.

So, the supper club. On a beautiful night in August, we filed into Marcus, all glittering light, wood paneling, and printed fabrics. Our group sat around a long table in the private dining room, which was a surprise, because I didn't know that's where they'd put us. Then came a multi-course collab dinner celebrating Maryland.

And what a fucking dinner it was.

We had a savory tres leches with multiple types of mushrooms. I know it doesn't sound like it works, but we were licking those bowls.

There was a crab and crawfish salad with pickled chow chow and collard green oil, and a grilled tiger prawn. But somehow, my favorite was the smoked oyster tart. So savory and light. To me, it felt like the essence of oyster in the best way.

Even better, as people in this community always do (from Supper Club to our trips in Morocco), folks showed up ready to lean into the awkwardness of meeting strangers. We laughed for damn near two hours around that table.

That's why I love Supper Club. It embodies everything I love about sharing a meal.

Which brings me to the next one!

I'm putting it together now for November, outside of DC. Tentatively (not confirmed!), in Richmond, Virginia, at one of my favorite Black-owned spots that challenges so much of what we know about food and beverage.

Tickets are only open to paid subscribers, so keep an eye on your inbox.

Our desire to go somewhere, exploit locals, make it as cheap as possible for ourselves, while also recreating our own comfort zones in someone else's country? That's giving colonizer.

And yeah, I mean us too. I'm speaking as a Black American here, though I see these threads in other communities as a traveler. My full unfiltered take on how Black folks can absolutely be colonizers is in the voice note below.