Zagat’s updated "2012 Washington, DC/Baltimore Restaurants Survey," is officially released on Wednesday. In it, you'll find D.C.'s most popular restaurants listed as follows: Zaytinya, 2 Amys, Central, Citronelle, Inn at Little Washington. And the city's top rated places for food: Marcel’s (29 out of 30 points), Inn at Little Washington (29) Komi (29), CityZen (28), [...]
Catching lobster in the dead of winter isn’t for the faint of heart. As the temperature dips and lobsters grow hard shells, they migrate to warmer waters in deeper seas, far from shore. Only the most determined fishermen will face open seas and hazardous conditions to bring in a winter catch. Demand for the crustaceans [...]
The first Young & Hungry column I wrote, almost five years ago, was a review of Miss Saigon in Georgetown. I was auditioning for the job of food columnist for Washington City Paper, and these were my marching orders in December 2005: critique a Vietnamese restaurant that no one cared about. I was puzzled, but [...]
By his own estimate, Don Rockwell eats approximately 700 restaurant meals a year, spending nearly $30,000 of his modest computer consultant’s salary at high and low-end establishments alike. Rockwell reviews many of those meals in minute detail on his eponymous food board, which he founded in 2005 and which has become a prime local destination [...]
For the first time in three weeks, the Rogue States trial didn't dominate blog traffic. Instead, y'all favored a mix of subjects, from Starbucks' plan to start selling alcohol to a four-star restaurant that lost its cache to the ongoing fascination with the sale of the Brickskeller. Hmm, I'm thinking the ultimate traffic-generating blog item [...]
WaPo's Tom Sietsema has threatened to kick a four-star performer off his list in the past, but this year he finally did it. In one of his boldest dining guides to date, the critic booted CityZen from the 2010 edition. It was just one of many shake-ups in this year's guide. I've been trying to [...]
Red Hook Lobster Pound truck: street food makes the Dining Guide WaPo's Tom Sietsema released his 2010 Dining Guide online yesterday, and in between other tasks, I've been combing through it to understand how the critic views the current restaurant scene. Before I get to the nuggets that I've mined, though, I should note what [...]
As you might remember, Y&H last year made something of a fuss about Makoto's strange stranglehold on the top spots in the annual Zagat Guide, which really isn't so annual after all. Well, the new 2011 Washington D.C./Baltimore survey just hit the streets today, and guess what? Makoto is nowhere to be found among the [...]
If you want to understand the difference between Meaza and every other Ethiopian joint in the area, just look down at your table. That spongy pancake dimpled with about a zillion little moonlike craters? You know the name: injera. Owner Meaza Zemedu makes her own in house, which, in a certain sense, makes Meaza the [...]
After watching one D.C. nominee after another strike out last night at the James Beard Foundation Awards — from Komi's Johnny Monis in the Rising Star Chef category to CityZen's Amanda Cook in the Outstanding Pastry Chef category — I thought for sure José Andrés would win the Outstanding Chef medal. I mean, Andrés had all [...]
