A tripartisan group of Senate lawmakers retreated to the relative safety of Penn Quarter Monday night, gathering around the table for a working dinner at nopa Kitchen + Bar.  

Out tipster counted 10 participants in all, a roster that included: Common Sense Coalition organizers Mark Warner, D-Va., and Susan Collins, R-Maine, along with Sens. Bob Corker, R-Tenn.; Joe Manchin III, D-W.Va.; Kelly Ayotte, R-N.H.; Heidi Heitkamp, D-N.D.; Angus King, I-Maine; Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska; Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H.; and Joe Donnelly, D-Ind.  

Did they need to clear the air about the administration’s proposed crackdown on carbon emissions?  

Were they giving each other friendly odds on which leader might crack first during today’s campaign finance rumble?  

Or was last night all about consoling Manchin after seeing his beloved pepperoni rolls bounced from the Taste of America brackets? Senate sources remained tight-lipped about the agenda. Ditto on the menu selections.  

Leaving us to wonder whether solons elected to dine on Chilean sea bass accompanied by Japanese eggplant, a roasted Amish chicken dish or Southern-style swine (pork chops escorted by sweet-and-sour mustard greens); one can only hope the group heeded Washington Post dining critic Tom Sietsema’s warning and stuck with something fried.