Yesterday, as everyone with a honey knows, was Valentine’s Day, one of the busiest restaurant days of the year. After mother nature took a giant snow dump on us last week, some restaurateurs were worried that their V-Day reservations might not be honored or might be canceled altogether (even as they secretly hoped to compensate for several days without business).

So how did they fare?

Mr. and Mrs. Y&H went to two different Valentine dinners, and there was a common denominator to both: It was hard as hell to get there and/or park.

Friday night we hit 2941 at my urging. After a long week of shoveling snow, working late, and dodging icicles outside our front door, Carrie and I deserved a luxurious Valentine’s dinner. And if anyone could do a prix-fixe V-Day menu right, I thought, it had to be  chef Bertrand Chemel, the former chef de cuisine at Cafe Boulud.

2941’s price point certainly gave me the impression the restaurant was taking the greeting-card holiday seriously. The five-course meal was selling for $125 per person, with the option of wine pairings for another $75 per. That’s two Benjamins each for dinner, which proves, once again, that love ain’t cheap.

Read More “My Funny Valentine Dinners” »

Of all the pizzerias scheduled to open soon, none gets me more excited than Pizzeria Orso, the planned project between former 2Amys pie-maker Edan MacQuaid and the owners of 2941.

The problem is, I don’t know how much longer I can sustain this excitement. I mean, this pizzeria has been on the boards for nearly two years now, to judge from this thread on DonRockwell.com. Rockwell even got ahold of the floor plans, for crying out loud.

Despite all of this chatter, however, nobody has a definite opening date, or even a tentative one. The best we have is this comment from MacQuaid on the Rockwell board in early December (that’s December ‘09):

Read More “Pizzeria Orso in Falls Church: Can You Please Open Already?” »

Get Enzo Fargione’s cooking, at discounted prices, through Jan. 24 at Teatro Goldoni.

I know, I know. You’ve got a million excuses why you haven’t been able to do Restaurant Week. Your kid’s sick. You’ve got too much work to do. Your car needs repairs. Your stars are out of alignment.

Well, a number of restaurants are giving you a second chance (and third) to take advantage of the (relative) deals afforded by Restaurant Week. Here’s the list to date (please add others in the comments section as you hear of them):

Read More “Let The Good Times Roll: Places Extending Restaurant Week” »

One by one, we’re running through the 50 restaurants that made the cut on this year’s Young & Hungry Dining Guide. If you have visited the day’s featured restaurant, let us know what you think. If you’re planning to visit for the first time, tell us about your meal when you return.

The dish was described on 2941’s prix-fixe lunch menu in the barest of terms: East Coast halibut, heirloom tomato, tomato gazpacho, basil salad. The early (out of?) season tomatoes did give me pause, but I ordered the entrée anyway. What chef Bertrand Chemel plated was something I never could have imagined: the halibut version of tomato and mozzarella salad. Let me explain: Chemel, former chef de cuisine at Café Boulud, prepared the halibut as medallions, which were laid atop slices of yellow tomatoes, then surrounded with the delicate gazpacho and topped with thin ribbons of asparagus, julienne red peppers, and other garnishes. The medallions were so fresh—and so moist and firm and white—that they took on an almost mozzarella-like quality when paired with the tomato preparations. Each garnish then added these precise little complementary flavors (a woodsy note here, a piquant one there) that only heightened the dish’s sense of freshness. I savored that lunch as if it were my last meal, seasonal tomatoes or not. This is the kind of creative cooking that Chemel has brought to 2941 since he arrived from New York, and he’s not the only master in the kitchen. Pastry chef Anthony Chavez turns out terrific seasonal desserts, while Patrick Deiss produces a wide line of in-house breads, some so good you’re tempted to gorge yourself on them before Chemel’s handiwork even arrives.

2941, 2941 Fairview Park Drive, Falls Church, (703) 270-1500

Photo by Darrow Montgomery

I don’t have strong feelings about interior design. I recognize good interior design when I see it. I even appreciate a designer’s ingenuity in transforming a room basically filled with tables and chairs into something aesthetically pleasing. But for whatever reason, I can feel just as happy at Honey Pig in Annandale, which is little more than corrugated tin and concrete, as I can inside the soaring Adamstein & Demetriou–designed dining room at Zaytinya. When I’m honest, I have to admit that a few of the most “elegantâ€� dining rooms in the area—I’m thinking about you, Inox and Central—actually leave me cold.
Photo of 2941’s actually awesome interior by Darrow Montgomery

The biggest news of the day has been the sommelier shuffle in which Mark Slater, the 12-year veteran at Citronelle, has left Michel Richard’s venerable four-star restaurant in favor of Michael Landrum’s populist meat emporium, Ray’s the Steaks. Former 2941 sommelier Kathryn Morgan has taken over Slater’s old job at Citronelle.

Slater’s move, of course, is the real curiosity. He’ll go from a temple of haute gastronomy with a French-heavy wine list that’s dotted with such bottles as a three-liter 1986 Lafite-Rothschild ($5,600) to a steakhouse with a list that prides itself on selling good wine under $50 a bottle.

Read More “Slater to “Subvert” the Way Wine Programs Work While at Ray’s” »