Jamie Leeds, the chef/owner of CommonWealth and Hank’s Oyster Bar, has been selected to serve as president of Women Chefs & Restaurateurs, a national non-profit whose mission is to promote “the education and advancement of women in the restaurant industry and the betterment of the industry as a whole.”

The post is a two-year commitment that will place a fairly serious burden on Leeds’ time and attention. She will oversee the marketing and membership committees. She will attend quarterly meetings. She will have a say on the organization’s spending and Web site. She will even travel to Chile soon for a sort of culinary fact-finding mission.

“It means a lot of work,” Leeds tells Y&H over the phone this afternoon. “It’s a very challenging, exacting, and very rewarding position.”

How will Leeds manage her three restaurants with such a heavy commitment over the next two years?

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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.

Jamie Leeds, the chef behind the casual seaside comforts of Hank’s Oyster Bar, seems to have no interest in joining D.C.’s fine-dining ranks so that she can, one day, find her name among the short list of Beard Award nominees. Nope, Leeds strikes a more populist pose, which is undoubtedly why she gave her latest project, CommonWealth in Columbia Heights, this deft little descriptor: The People’s GastroPub. Like Hank’s, CommonWealth is a neighborhood hangout, a place so bound up in concrete and human congestion that it virtually demands that you walk, not drive, to it. You could argue that Leeds’ brand of populism precludes patrons who can’t afford $14 for fish and chips or $15 for bangers and mash, but you could also argue that cheaper ingredients would only move CommonWealth toward Logan Tavern–level mediocrity, just with better beer.

 CommonWealth, 1400 Irving St. NW, (202) 265-1400