You expect a restaurant that’s been around a while, and has gotten fairly good reviews, would be at least moderately good. Especially at $9 a sandwich. 15 Ria raises a few questions here.
Some time back, the Doubletree hotel folks were out in Dupont Circle, dressed as cookies, handing out cookies and coupons for free dessert with an entrée at 15 Ria, the Rhode Island Avenue Doubletree’s trendy restaurant. Doing what summer interns do best – scavenging and Xeroxing – our interns collected their cookies and coupons, and made copies for everyone in the office.
Fast forward a few weeks, and it’s time to redeem these coupons. Friday was intern T’s last day, so five of us joined T and the other intern, G, at 15 Ria for a farewell lunch. Six of us arrived time for our noon reservation, and were seated immediately in the almost-empty dining room, with one straggler arriving maybe fifteen minutes late. After sitting, we were asked at least five times if our seventh guest was indeed coming. Our straggler, Coworker L, arrived, and 15 Ria is still not crowded; I wonder why they were so concerned over Coworker L’s tardiness.
The restaurant is very pretty, with warm yellow and ochre, and the chairs are arranged around the tables, alternating one big-ish comfy chair and one more traditional dining chair. Some tables had couches. This I like. I do not, however, like whoever is butchering “Somewhere over the Rainbow” on the restaurant’s sound system.
We ordered drinks and bread arrived. The breads were a basic French bread and a very nice fig and pignolia bread. The bread was tasty, but I was a bit disappointed that they never offered more: the seven of us polished off the two small (5 or so slices each) quickly, and more would have been nice while we considered the menu. A good portion of the menu is available on the Restaurant Week special, but none of us want that much food, so we refrain. The food came, and trouble began.
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06Aug
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04Aug
The chef at Belga Cafe is pretty accomplished. Lots of noteworthy “palmares” to use a cycling term. It’s advertised as a Belgian restaurant complete with a proper Vlaamse chef. Having spent some time living in that part of the world, I am always anxious to eat at a place that is properly European. They offered a limited selection for Restaurant Week (RW):
Lunch
Red & Green—Tomato confit stuffed with baby grey shrimps and Salade Roulade with goat cheese and fresh herbs
Mussels—Mussels with Rodenbach beer, asparagus and bacon
or
Steak—Grilled hanger steak with béarnaise-beer sauce, farm vegetables and Belgian fries
Red Fruit Soup—Cherry and peach beer soup with fresh berry’s, home made vanilla ice cream
Dinner
Tomato, Sushi & Cigaar—Tomato gelee with seafood and curry-creme, a Chinese salad with Belga’s Cigaar and ‘Belgian Endive Sushi’
Rabbit and Crawfish—Rabbit fillet and sausage with sautéed Girolle mushrooms and crawfish tails, accompanied by a lobster and béarnaise sauce
The Belga Dessert Sampler—Belgian chocolate, summer fruit, home-made ice cream and Belgian Waffle
Nothing particularly struck a fancy with me, plus I wanted some good Belgian mussels, so I forewent the RW menu and went straight for the normal menu. I had:
Lauwe Aspargesalade: a baked asparagus salad with frisee tossed in a simple vinegarette topped with slightly cooked pieces of salmon. I have to note here that they totally forgot I ordered this. As I reminded them after one of my dining companions had already finished her salad and they were setting down the flatware for the next course, they finally brought it to me. Time was about 40 minutes after we sat down at the table. I’ll revisit this issue later. The salad itself was perfectly done otherwise. The salmon was fresh and just the right combination of seared on the outside and pretty much raw on the inside.
Mussels with Rodenbach Ale, bacon, and asparagus: Nothing really to say except this was exactly what I was looking for. Served with Vlaamse frites, this really hit the spot. Not a bad thing to say about this and you get exactly what you think it is. The mussels themselves were perfectly done.
Ice cream with waffles and chocolate sauce: Simple, exactly what the name of it is. The waffles were soft and tasty, the chocolate sauce was the consistency of Nutella, but good nonetheless. It reminded me of getting waffles at this corner pastry shop on the Leidsestraat in Amsterdam. Not Belgian, I know, but they were good waffles.
So I have to mention that the service was flat out bad. Between them forgetting my salad, LONG delays in service, I was really ready to hate this place. I really wanted to hate the aspargesalade but, damn, it was good. I just couldn’t get myself to do it. The place was packed, and we even had to wait quite a while to get our seat even though we had a reservation. The staff was trying though, and I think RW just really pushed the limits of the small space and the small staff. I’m not quite sure I could hold that against them in good conscience. I definitely would like to go back when it’s not RW and see how different things are then. I’m definitely going back for the mussels.
Belga Cafe
514 8th St SE
Washington, DC 20003
(202) 544-0100 -
04Aug
Yeah, yeah, DcFud has done its share of talking about Ceiba, but we feel it’s a moral imperative for us to share any and all of our Restaurant Week experiences, so we feel we’re on at least moderately solid ground here.
The popular restaurant from the Ten Penh, DC Coast family doesn’t skimp when it comes to Restaurant Week. Though appetizers and dessert selections are partially limited (offering only one of their famous ceviches along with all their soups or salad, and three dessert choices), the restaurant allows patrons to choose any entree off the restaurant’s extensive menu for the $30.05 deal (there’s a justifiable $7 surcharge for the Ribeye steak).
My best decision for the evening: the golden tomato gazpacho, served over a crab ceviche with a tomato gourmet. This was a delightful surprise; I’d ordered it after wavering between this and the ceviche, and seeking our friendly waiter’s advice. The delicate flakes of crab added a richness to the cool broth, and the real treat was the sorbet – tomato sounds like a less than appealing flavor, but it added a lovely sweetness to the dish.
For dinner, it was crab two ways – a crabcake over avocado, and a lightly-fried softshell crab over a shredded jicama salad. The salad wasn’t my favorite part of the meal, though I enjoyed the crisp jicama, but the crabcake was hearty and tasty. This was my first softshell experience, and I’m sure it won’t be my last.
Not much of a dessert person, none of the three selections interested me too much. I went with the key lime panna cotta, served with what was either papaya or mango. The overall effect was too sweet for my palate, though I enjoyed the dish’s creaminess.
With dinner, inspired by a recent Dcist post, I had a Spanish rose, which was an appropriately light accompaniment (I couldn’t tell you the label, though, and it seems inaccessible on the website). A friend had less success with her choice of a Riesling.
Companions were pleased with halibut, black bean soup and scallops, though a friend’s salmon dish had a strangely sour purple-colored sauce that none of us found particularly impressive.
Sure, we ate at 9 p.m., but the restaurant still deserves credit for giving us attentive, unrushed service during this busy time. As we were celebrating a birthday, they added nice touches like personalized menus and a candle in the birthday girl’s dessert. We also were given a beautiful table near the window.
Our incessant promotion aside, Ceiba’s a great bargain when RW comes around. -
31Jul
There are a million reviews of CityZen out there already, so I won’t be writing about how great my pork cheek salad was. Rather, I’m going to talk about what I didn’t order.
The thing that struck me is that CityZen really does an excellent job of telling a culinary story. Every course builds upon the previous one and at the end, you kind of feel like you’ve been taken to a different place and have come back. It’s trite, I know, but it’s really the only way I can explain what it’s like to eat there. And to be honest, I can’t recall ever having an experience like this eating anywhere else.
The thing they don’t tell you is that our three-course meal was actually a six-course meal because of the amusées that came before the salad: a stem of sauteed mushroom with a wild mushroom purée, followed by an olive-oil custard topped with a Spanish-spice butter sauce. During the meal, they brought a small wooden jewelry box of twelve miniature Parker House rolls that were heavily brushed with melted butter and liberally salted with fleur de sel. These were unbelievably good; once you have one, you and your dinner companion will fight over who gets to eat the rest.
After the entree and before the dessert came a small scoop of watermelon sorbet floating in a hyssop liqueur, and after the dessert came two little madeleines with a single blueberry in each, two tiny, TINY vanilla rum cakes (about the size of a Rolo each) and a plate of assorted sweets ranging from cherry jellies to chocolate truffles. Amazing.
That’s all of the stuff we DIDN’T order.
To get the obligatory information out of the way, you can either get the six-course tasting menu for $125 per person, or you can do the three-course menu, from which you pick an appetizer, entree, and dessert, for $75 per person. I had the aforementioned pork cheek salad which was grilled pork cheeks served on top of a vinagarette of parsley, coriander, and a demi glaze; it was all topped with some microgreens and wild mushrooms. For the entree, I ordered the wild king salmon which was served rare and topped with a type of green bean and morel mushrooms. Finally for dessert, I had their take on the famous Nestlé Drumstick ice cream. I know their menu changes regularly so if you don’t see something you like one day, go by the next week to see what’s up.
To sum up: transcendental food, service and atmosphere. If you can go, you have to go. Don’t even bother thinking about it. Why are you still reading and not on the phone making a reservation?
CityZen
1330 Maryland Avenue, SW
Washington, DC 20024
(202) 554 8588 -
27Jul
I don’t really think of myself as a fan of Mexican food. Burritos pretty much disgust me; enchiladas underwhelm me. Sure, I like a good homemade guacamole as much as the next girl, but you won’t catch me ducking into a Mexican joint when there’s Thai (or Italian, or Japanese…) to be had instead.
Then I went to Oyamel.
Now, I’m not trying to say Oyamel’s cuisine is in a different league than any other Mexican cuisine on the planet. But it is a restaurant that proves Mexican food doesn’t have to be about large globs of refried beans, or overly cheesy but ultimiamtely bland concoctions.
The Crystal City restaurant, founded by José Andrés of Zatinya, Café Atlantico and Jaleo, draws its inspiration from the small plates craze, this time in the form of antojitos. The friendly, patient and knowledgable wait staff recommends 2-3 antojitos per person. My companion and I each got two, contenting ourselves to fill up on the compilmentary chips with two types of salsa (including a creamier-than-usual salsa verde) – and saving room for dessert in the process. -
19Jul
There is really very little that isn’t tasty when battered and fried in oil, and many foods are also inexplicably improved by skewering.
Sarah’s friend Yuki made a reservation for us at Kisui, which means “native,” in Hyuga, a place where my hostess has never eaten except with Yuki. We had a private room, with table and floor mats to sit on. We sat down, at place settings each set with a tray of four sauces in a row, a larger bowl of a fifth sauce, a bowl of cabbage and a cup of vegetable strips (2 daikon, 1 carrot, 1 cucumber) in water, and in the middle of the table the pot of oil began to bubble.
Yuki ordered beer for herself and me, and Sarah had orange juice (she was driving – they’re amazingly strict about that here). Yuki also brought her bottle of Shochu out of the keep (you buy a bottle of something good and the restaurant or bar keeps it, with your name literally written on the side, for you).
The food for frying arrives shortly, beginning with pre-fried asparagus shoots wrapped in bacon and squid bits. Onna stick. I loathe asparagus: see Line 1 and add bacon. I love squid anyway, this was yummy. Once we’d devoured these, the oil was at a full boil – whenever I think of hot oil, a voice in the back of my head always says “boil’em in oil!” in a pirate accent, but I have no idea why – and other battered bits of food were laid out before us. Onna stick.
There was so much and I have no idea what much of it was, but it was all really good and yes, Onna stick. We had fish (basic, relatively light, but tasty), chicken with peppers, and bacon-wrapped leeks (really delicious). There were ridiculously tender pork cutlet bits, and probably my favorite, a ham-wrapped scallop with texture like it’d been raised in a sea of butter. Onna stick. There were big, flavorful shitake mushrooms. The grand finale was a giant, scallion-covered king crab claw (one for each of us). Onna stick.
Dessert came in the form of a surprisingly refreshing banana ice cream (not at all overpowering, as banana flavor things tend to be) and a rectangle of wine-flavored gelatin. Why doesn’t Jell-O make that kind?!?! Along with two pints of beer and one lemon-enhanced serving of shochu, the bill came to about 3200 Yen a piece – not bad for so much delicious stuff! Onna stick.
(This all happened back in March, during my trip to Japan.) -
19Jul
DCFud hasn’t really been in the habit of reviewing too many super-expensive restaurants, considering the budget of its writers (and likely, the budget of its audience). But that doesn’t mean we don’t walk wistfully past such restaurants as Ceiba, Vidalia or Tosca, wishing we were wealthy executives who could afford dinner there more than once a millenium.
But two weeks each year, we get our chance. That’s when DC hosts Restaurant Week, where the area’s finest (and even some of its mediocre) restaurants get together and offer great prix fixe meals at affordable costs. For $30.05 at dinner and $20.05 at lunch, you get a three-course meal at places like Charlie Palmer Steak, Colvin Run Tavern and Zola.
The event will be held August 1-7, and reservations are already starting to fill up, so make yours ASAP if your choice is more popular. Reservations can be made through OpenTable.Com.
Some argue the crowds and often-subpar service make Restaurant Week something to avoid rather than embrace. Our staff doesn’t tend to fall into that mindset. MAW checked out Vidalia last time around and enjoyed his experience. What do you think is Restaurant Week’s best deal? -
14Jul
How far are you willing to go for free food? Are you a stand-in-line-for-hours-at-Krispy-Kreme kind of person? Or do you want your free deals as no hassle as possible, like when you accidently stumble into Ben & Jerry’s on Free Cone Day?
If you fall into the former category, you may be in luck. Tomorrow is Cow Appreciation Day at Chick-Fil-A, this Fud-writer’s favorite fast food restaurant. In honor of the restaurant’s “Eat Mor Chikin” slogan, patrons who enter the restaurant dressed HEAD TO TOE in cowprint gear get a free combo meal.
Think you can squeak by in only a cowprint hat or something? Your efforts will be rewarded, but only slightly – patrons in “partial-Cow” attire get a free single entree.
So head to Chick-Fil-A tomorrow before I have to make some sort of “Get Moooving” pun. Oops. Too late. -
12Jul
This entry was written by new contributor CZ
Mark and Orlando’s is very similar in atmosphere and layout to Komi, if you’ve ever been there. It’s a converted flat with exposed brick, simply decorated with an open window to the kitchen in the back where Orlando stands and keeps an eye on the floor. It’s unpretentious and very comfortable. I will say it was a bit confusing when you walk in because there is no host/hostess stand. You walk into the bottom of the stairs and you can either go straight into the dining room, or upstairs. Luckily, one of the waiters saw us from the bar and told us to come on in.
The menu was extremely diverse, but simple. There weren’t an overwhelming number of choices, but it had something for everyone. One thing I did notice, however, was that there weren’t any of what I call “standards,” things like NY strip teak with Bearnaise or sesame-encrusted tuna with wasabi-mashed potatoes. So if you are someone who is expecting something like that, you will be disappointed. -
11Jul
Many have surmised that Chipotle burritos very well may contain crack, or some similarly addictive substance. But while Chipotle isn’t about to tell us what they put in those things to make them so irresistible, the company has gone further and refused to post the nutritional content of its undoubtedly-unhealthy menu. Have you ever wondered what they’re hiding?
Center for Science in the Public Interest, formerly discussed here for its focus on Splenda, took matters into its own hand one day, and sent some of the dishes to the lab for independent analysis. The results may be disheartening (though kind of obvious) to the chain’s die-hard fans. If ignorance is bliss when it comes to your fast-food splurges, DCFüd encourages you to stop reading here: you have been warned.
[Webmaster’s note: To be fair to the giant evil corporation that keeps us all addicted to their Burritos, Chipotle did finally start providing nutritional information in late 2003. You can view their version in the pdf document here — amg]
