Before he ever opened Rose’s Luxury, chef Aaron Silverman hosted a number of preview pop-ups in the Capitol Hill row house where he lives. With a second restaurant set to open next door to his Barracks Row hotspot, he wants to open the doors to his home yet again. Beginning later this spring or early summer, Silverman will host monthly dinners for eight to 10 people in his personal dining room. The menu will be a chance for him to test out dishes that he wants to put on the menu of the new place. The pop-up dinners will last until the restaurant opens in about a year and possibly after—”because I really fucking love it,” Silverman says.
The Post first reported news of Silverman’s yet-unnamed restaurant, which will be located where Homebody is now. The fine dining establishment will serve a prix-fixe menu during evenings four times a week and operate as a cafe during the day. Best of all for those who begrudge waiting in line for a seat at Rose’s: It will take reservations.
Silverman tells Y&H the restaurant will be like Rose’s “but super fine-tuned.” It’s fine dining but “our version of fine dining,” he says. There will be no white tablecloths, but “a lot of things are going to be plated with tweezers. A lot of things are going to be presented tableside. A lot of things are going to be one slice of beef with your garnishes on a big white plate,” he says. “But it’s going to be our fun take on that.” Among the tableside presentations: carts featuring Champagne, seafood, or something else.
The kitchen at the new restaurant will be roughly four times the size of that of Rose’s Luxury, while the dining room will have about a quarter of its seats (around 30). The prix-fixe menu will likely include somewhere between five to seven courses plus “giveaways.” He says he will probably charge less than Minibar but more than Komi. “I don’t think I can feel comfortable charging what Minibar charges or more than that,” he says. “And I don’t think you can make it work charging less than Komi does for what they do and that level.”
At the same time, Silverman is planning to have discounted bar seats where guests can get mostly the same menu (minus the tableside preparations). The catch: Those seats will be offered first to friends, family, investors, colleagues, and industry peers. If there are extra seats, they will be opened up to the public at the last minute. Silverman says he got the idea from Alinea in Chicago.
The details of the daytime concept are still being ironed out, but there will definitely be coffee. Beyond that, Silverman is playing with a bunch of possible ideas: sandwiches to-go, baked breads, French pastries, or even a small sit-down breakfast. “It’s kind of all up in the air right now,” he says. Whatever it is, it will likely open before the fine dining part of the restaurant.
Among the other things to look forward to from Silverman is the May 1 reopening of Rose’s Luxury’s roof garden, which features an all-you-can-eat family-style menu for $125 per person. The chef says the roof garden will remain pretty much the same except with a beverage pairing option and more dishes that aren’t on the regular menu. The restaurant wasn’t able to get the permit in time to be able to enclose the outdoor patio, so they’ll have to wait until next winter to start construction.
In the meantime, stay tuned for details about tickets to Silverman’s home pop-ups. As for having strangers in his living space, he says he has no issues. “We’ve done it before,” he says. “Who’s going to cause a problem? Hopefully not. People who are interested in this, I assume they’re probably relatively cool people.”
Photo by Jessica Sidman