Young & Hungry » Maestro http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/youngandhungry D.C. Restaurants and Food Tue, 14 Feb 2012 15:00:04 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.1.2 The Salad Daze: Farewell, Young & Hungry http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/youngandhungry/2010/12/02/the-salad-daze-farewell-young-hungry/ http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/youngandhungry/2010/12/02/the-salad-daze-farewell-young-hungry/#comments Thu, 02 Dec 2010 13:49:53 +0000 Tim Carman http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/youngandhungry/?p=30054 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 I dutifully turned in a 975-word review.

The editors promptly tore it apart, word by word. I’m not sure how many editors had a say on my first draft, but it felt like management was treating my Y&H debut as the journalistic equivalent of a tackling dummy. I figured it was a test of my mettle, particularly when an editor told me I wasn’t brilliant enough to use metaphors. I couldn’t tell if he was bullshitting, but I knew for certain that if I were to survive as the City Paper food columnist, I was going to need to develop thicker skin. This was no place for wallflowers who want to craft their prose in monk-like solitude, guided only by their “muse” and some arch, overly precious sense of the food world. The editors stood steadfastly against preciousness on all fronts.

Half a decade later, I look back on the edit of that first column (sample comments: “Fuck this; I hate this equivocation. Forget what I said up top about you keeping a strong POV throughout this piece” and “I don’t give a flying fuck what your entrée was!”) with a mix of nostalgia and bile-churning, spit-hurling anger, which was probably the whole point. Editors had time back then to find your pressure points and see if, by pressing them, they could make you a better writer and reporter.

Don’t worry. I’m not going to turn my farewell column into some sentimental, revisionist claptrap about how journalism needs more editors who treat their reporters like Bo Pelini treats his star quarterback. No, I’m just reflecting back on how much things have changed in five years, starting with the very job I’m leaving. Back in February 2006, when I officially became the paper’s next Young & Hungry, I wrote exactly one column a week. I went through at least three drafts on each column. I answered further questions from the copy desk. I didn’t blog at all. We didn’t even have a blog at City Paper. And today? Well, let’s just say I miss the old work load.

The food and dining scene has experienced its own growing pains. Consider that in late 2005:

• Washingtonians had a president who never visited restaurants. George W. Bush was content to sit in the White House, choking down pretzels while watching football. By contrast, Washington now has a president who has stopped at some of the area’s most recognizable restaurants, both high and low end, from Komi to Five Guys Burgers & Fries. In one instance, the president’s visit propelled a popular eatery, Ray’s Hell Burger, into the stratosphere. Owner Michael Landrum was forced to put his planned seafood restaurant on hold and expand the Hell Burger empire. That’s a good problem for a local restaurateur to have.

• The District boasted restaurants by Todd English and Charlie Palmer, but our biggest celebrity chef was a Frenchman, Michel Richard, who dared to base his operations in D.C. In the intervening years, chefs of varying celeb status have decided to throw up a restaurant and drill down into our wallets. On one end you have a TV-generated, semi-celebrity like Spike Mendelsohn who has also made D.C. his home, while on the other, you have a Michelin-star hoarder like Alain Ducasse who thought he’d send some emissaries down to D.C. and start cashing in on his considerable reputation. There are benefits on both sides of this star spectrum, but there are also sinkholes. Some of these culinary carpetbaggers take dining dollars (and sometimes kitchen talent) away from the home team.

Michel Richard

Michel Richard

• Roberto Donna still had his Galileo empire. He not only had the flagship restaurant, but also the Osteria and the Laboratorio. He was also hawking grilled sandwiches on the sidewalk outside of Galileo. Five years and one failed restaurant later, the chef returned to D.C. with a storm cloud over his head. He owes taxes to Arlington County, owes money to former employees, and owes the people a better accounting of his abuse of public money.

• H Street NE was a great spot for fried whiting and a tall boy. No strip has changed as much as this patch of Northeast. The Ohio Restaurant was one of the early pioneers on H Street, hawking chef-driven soul food from a ragged outpost at H and 14th streets. But other dining destinations soon popped up. Granville Moore’s, Taylor Gourmet, Sticky Rice, Liberty Tree, Biergarten Haus, H Street Country Club, The Atlas Room. These (and others yet to come) are turning the street into a dining destination. Imagine what the area will be like once the city completes that goddamn streetcar project.

• Unless you count those motorized hot dog wagons down by the National Mall, the District didn’t have a single food truck. D.C.’s streets have made a remarkable turnaround in the past two years, breaking the death grip of the depot owners who have controlled the city’s curbside eats for decades. If and when the D.C. Council ever passes new vendor regulations, you can expect to see even more variety on our streets. I know for certain that Kushi, my current favorite for Japanese cooking, plans to launch a yakitori truck in D.C. But what the District really needs, as a colleague recently pointed out, is a gourmet coffee truck. Nick Cho, are you listening? Have you paid off your tax bill yet?

Food Trucks

• The craft beer craze was just in its embryonic phase in the District. We had brewpubs, of course, but if you wanted to sample the best of the world’s craft beer, you pretty much had to give your money to Dave and Diane Alexander, whether at the Brickskeller in Dupont or Regional Food and Drink in Chinatown. These days? You can’t wander the streets without running face-first into a Dogfish Head tap. Craft beers are everywhere. Rustico (two locations now, with perhaps more to come), CommonWealth Gastropub, Pizzeria Paradiso (three locations), Meridian Pint, Brasserie Beck, Granville Moore’s, Black Squirrel, Restaurant 3, and the mother of all beer emporiums, ChurchKey, have transformed D.C. into suds city.

• Peter Chang and Fabio Trabocchi were still cooking in area kitchens. At the time, Chang was mesmerizing diners at TemptAsian Cafe in Alexandria, while Trabocchi was blowing away patrons with his gourmet takes on Italian cooking at Maestro in Tysons Corner. Within two years, both Chang and Trabocchi were gone. But after a rollercoaster ride in New York City, Trabocchi is returning next year to open Fiola in the former Le Paradou space in Penn Quarter. And Chang? Well, after forcing his fans to follow him around the country like jilted lovers, the chef has apparently settled down in Charlottesville, where he’s scheduled to open Peter Chang China Grill in January. Has anyone started a pool yet to see how long it lasts?

• The Washington area had only three four-star restaurants, according to Tom Sietsema’s 2005 Dining Guide. They were Maestro, Citronelle, and the Inn at Little Washington. Sietsema’s latest Dining Guide listed five four-star performers. Citronelle and the Inn made repeat appearances on the list, joined by Komi, Rasika, and Restaurant Eve. A previous four-star restaurant, CityZen in the Mandarin Oriental, was nowhere to be found on Sietsema’s 2010 survey. No one can accuse the critic of ratings creep at the top end.

• The boutique pizza market had two main players: Pizzeria Paradiso and 2Amys (OK, and maybe Ella’s). The pie options today are stupefying, a reminder that the recession continues to force many restaurateurs into safe, cheap, and consumer-friendly choices. The new pizzerias are too numerous to mention, but here’s one indication of how ridiculous our pie market is today: Not one but two Frenchmen have opened pizza joints (Pizze in Woodley Park, and Seventh Hill in Capitol Hill), no doubt generating a small forest of raised eyebrows among the Gallic community, which tends to view Italian cuisine as something to feed the family pet.

• There was no Urban Daddy, no Thrillist, no Tasting Table, no TBD, no NBC Feast, and damn few bloggers ambitious enough to fight for every scoop that used to land like a butterfly onto the lap of print journalists. The competition for information today is fiercer than ever.

With this week’s column, I’m ending a City Paper tenure that has had its own mood swings. My beat and responsibilities have had to evolve and expand to reflect a changing media environment as well as a changing culinary one. This is the truth of modern journalism. We must find new ways to look at old subjects. We must venture beyond our usual circles to find the next person who wants to revolutionize what we eat. Anyone in my line of work knows that food can never, ever be treated like something too precious to withstand tough scrutiny. But my time at the paper, from that brutal first edit back in the one-column-a-week days to the radical shifts in job responsibilities that accompanied the old news media’s discovery of the Internet proves that we dead-tree types are more adaptable than you think.

Eatery tips? Food pursuits? Send suggestions to hungry@washingtoncitypaper.com.

Photos by Darrow Montgomery

]]> http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/youngandhungry/2010/12/02/the-salad-daze-farewell-young-hungry/feed/ 5 Changing Tables: The Atlas Room Opens on H Street NE http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/youngandhungry/2010/11/10/changing-tables-the-atlas-room-opens-on-h-street-ne/ http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/youngandhungry/2010/11/10/changing-tables-the-atlas-room-opens-on-h-street-ne/#comments Wed, 10 Nov 2010 15:40:56 +0000 Andrew George http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/youngandhungry/?p=28847

The latest in restaurant openings, closings, and highly unstable target dates.

Coming Soon:

Openings:

Closings:

Photo by Merzi via merzi.com

]]> http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/youngandhungry/2010/11/10/changing-tables-the-atlas-room-opens-on-h-street-ne/feed/ 1 Changing Tables: Michael Landrum Turns to Salads and Yogurt http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/youngandhungry/2010/11/03/changing-tables-michael-landrum-turns-to-salads-and-yogurt/ http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/youngandhungry/2010/11/03/changing-tables-michael-landrum-turns-to-salads-and-yogurt/#comments Wed, 03 Nov 2010 15:16:16 +0000 Andrew George http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/youngandhungry/?p=28480

The latest in restaurant openings, closings, and highly unstable target dates.

Coming Soon:

Openings:

Closings:

Photo courtesy of Uptown Deli via blog.zagat.com/cities/washington-dc

]]> http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/youngandhungry/2010/11/03/changing-tables-michael-landrum-turns-to-salads-and-yogurt/feed/ 0 Changing Tables: District Taco Ready to Open Brick-and-Mortar Location http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/youngandhungry/2010/10/26/changing-tables-district-taco-ready-to-open-brick-and-mortar-location/ http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/youngandhungry/2010/10/26/changing-tables-district-taco-ready-to-open-brick-and-mortar-location/#comments Tue, 26 Oct 2010 21:51:02 +0000 Andrew George http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/youngandhungry/?p=28075

The latest in restaurant openings, closings, and highly unstable target dates.

Coming Soon:

Openings:

Closings:

Photo by Joe Flood (Joe in DC) via Flickr/Creative Commons  Attribution 2.0

]]> http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/youngandhungry/2010/10/26/changing-tables-district-taco-ready-to-open-brick-and-mortar-location/feed/ 1 Changing Tables: Chicago Dogs Headed to D.C. http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/youngandhungry/2010/10/20/changing-tables-chicago-dogs-headed-to-d-c/ http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/youngandhungry/2010/10/20/changing-tables-chicago-dogs-headed-to-d-c/#comments Wed, 20 Oct 2010 13:02:03 +0000 Andrew George http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/youngandhungry/?p=27688 chtowndog

The latest in restaurant openings, closings, and highly unstable target dates.

Coming Soon:

Openings:

Closings:

Photo by Bill Roehl via Flickr/Creative Commons Attribution 2.0

]]> http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/youngandhungry/2010/10/20/changing-tables-chicago-dogs-headed-to-d-c/feed/ 3 Richard Confirms That He’s Opening a Restaurant in the Former Maestro Space http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/youngandhungry/2010/03/22/richard-confirms-that-hes-opening-a-restaurant-in-the-former-maestro-space/ http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/youngandhungry/2010/03/22/richard-confirms-that-hes-opening-a-restaurant-in-the-former-maestro-space/#comments Mon, 22 Mar 2010 23:19:09 +0000 Tim Carman http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/youngandhungry/?p=18258 richard-picConfirming the news that Young & Hungry broke almost a year ago, Michel Richard told WaPo's Tom Sietsema that he will be opening "a good American restaurant with a small French accent" in the former Maestro space at the Ritz-Carlton in Tysons Corner.

The 110-seat restaurant, called Michel, will be more casual than either Richard's Citronelle, that temple to modern French cuisine, or Maestro under Fabio Trabocchi.  The operation is promising no tablecloths and "a good steak and wonderful fries," according to Sietsema's item.

So what will happen to Citronelle? The investor package last year indicated that Tysons would be "Michel Richard’s home,” where the chef “will likely be in the kitchen most evenings."

"Citronelle is not moving," says Mel Davis, PR coordinator for Richard. "I've been saying this over and over again." Nor is Richard moving his office to Tysons.

At least as far as Davis knows, she adds.

Photo by Darrow Montgomery

]]> http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/youngandhungry/2010/03/22/richard-confirms-that-hes-opening-a-restaurant-in-the-former-maestro-space/feed/ 0 NY Post: Older Diners Likely Did in Trabocchi at Four Seasons http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/youngandhungry/2010/01/25/ny-post-older-diners-likely-did-in-trabocchi-at-four-seasons/ http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/youngandhungry/2010/01/25/ny-post-older-diners-likely-did-in-trabocchi-at-four-seasons/#comments Mon, 25 Jan 2010 15:13:54 +0000 Tim Carman http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/youngandhungry/?p=15658

nyp_logo_360x50

In case you missed it, over the weekend, the New York Post ran an anonymously sourced story breaking down the reasons why the Four Seasons and chef Fabio Trabocchi parted ways after just three months. "Chalk it up," the Post writes, "to taste."

Reporter Carla Spartos paints a generational divide between a modern, fine-dining chef who cooks with (gasp!) lard and the Four Season's Old Guard who just want their crab cakes, out-of-season tomatoes, and low-fat, low-sodium lunch plates. Writes Spartos:

"There were issues with [some longtime] customers," says one restaurant insider. "They complained that the food was not the same. They want grilled fish, steamed vegetables — hospital food."

Brought in to add buzz to the menu and return the restaurant to its former three-star status, Trabocchi may have done too much too soon. While the famous crab cakes were never taken off the menu, classic dishes jockeyed for space with newfangled additions like spaghetti with sea urchin or crab and spicy chilis, much to the dismay of regulars.

"There are customers who have been coming in every day for 30 years — they spend thousands of dollars a week — they name their own salad or steak. It's hard to break that," says the source.

At the Four Seasons, if a regular wants endive and tomatoes out of season, the kitchen runs out to fetch them. It is this sort of high-touch service that has made the landmark a destination for New York's rich and powerful for more than 50 years.

"These people expect good food, but they want their crab cake, they want their salad and their billi bi [creamy mussel soup] — they're not looking for eccentric or imaginative food," says guidebook magnate and Four Seasons regular Tim Zagat.

While Trabocchi made a good impression at his audition, with a non-stop parade of haute dishes, the honeymoon didn't last long with owners Julian Niccolini and Alex Von Bidder. "There was always some complaint that an older person would [say] — too salty, too small, too much, I don't get it," says the restaurant insider.

The Post goes on to suggest that food costs and, even more obliquely, "clashing egos" may have had something to do with the split. Y&H has a more concrete scapegoat: the Four Seasons' owners.

Nothing reported in this story indicates that Trabocchi misled them. He's a chef who comes with a long history of preparing food, from Floriana in London to Maestro in McLean to Fiamma in New York. His style of food, his food costs, his quest for perfection, these are all matters of public record or least easily accessed with a phone call to a former manager, an e-mail to the Ritz-Carlton, or even a text message to Tom Sietsema.

It's called due diligence, and it looks like the Four Seasons did little of it. More damning, perhaps, is that the Four Seasons doesn't even seem to know its own clientele. Did the owners not know what kind of stress this would cause its regulars? Did it not solicit their input and comments on what they would like/not like to see in the future?

It doesn't sound like it. It sounds like the Four Seasons marched blindly forward, picking the biggest brand-name chef available, and then hoping it would work out. The miscalculation has embarrassed all parties involved. And more important, it was so unnecessary. Fabio Trabocchi deserved a better return to the kitchen than this.

Speaking of return, Trabocchi is still talking up a return to D.C.

]]> http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/youngandhungry/2010/01/25/ny-post-older-diners-likely-did-in-trabocchi-at-four-seasons/feed/ 1 The Year in D.C. Food & Drink http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/youngandhungry/2010/01/04/the-year-in-d-c-food-drink/ http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/youngandhungry/2010/01/04/the-year-in-d-c-food-drink/#comments Tue, 05 Jan 2010 01:48:59 +0000 Tim Carman http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/youngandhungry/?p=14762 DSCN1852_opt

Tacos took off in D.C. in 2009

Good God, I can even begin to wrap my mind around all the things that happened on the D.C. dining scene during the past 12 months. Fortunately, not all of them were as apocalyptic as the closing of your favorite restaurant or the passing of Ben Ali.

For starters, we had a ton of above-average to good restaurants open in 2009. Last week, in fact, I listed my 10 favorite newbies.

We also had a President and First Lady who actually enjoyed eating out on the town, both on the high and low ends. And let's not forget about the First Family's love for burgers, burgers, and more burgers. The Obamas even made a strong statement about local/seasonal foods, which was heard all the way to Ireland.

Outside the White House, we discovered that gourmet and organic hamburger outlets were sprouting up all around us. These burger joints were practically fighting for space with all the new fro-yo, pizza, taco, and cupcake shops.

D.C. took tentative steps toward becoming a better street food city, including the addition of a cupcake truck and a stand across the river that serves up a killer breakfast taco. Far more aggressive strides were made on the local cocktail circuit, where you could find some of the most creative drinks in the country, not to mention a cool place to imbibe them.

Of course, 2009 was not all wine and Rose's grenadine. Michel Richard planned to high-tail it out of the District for a spot in McLean. Andy Shallal bankrolled a disastrous Top Chef-like contest to hire his kitchen leader at Eatonville. The "dean" of alcohol beverage control lawyers died. Esquire magazine's selection of Barton Seaver as chef of the year caused a small shitstorm among locals. Spike Mendelsohn was evicted from his Capitol Hill rental house.  The RAMMY Awards was a heated mess. And the District of Columbia showed, yet again, why it's so hard to open a restaurant within its borders.

By the way, if you'd like to hear more about the Year in Food 2009, check out my conversation with David Furst on Metro Connection.

]]> http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/youngandhungry/2010/01/04/the-year-in-d-c-food-drink/feed/ 0 The Most Popular Blog Posts from 2009 http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/youngandhungry/2010/01/04/the-most-popular-blog-posts-from-2009/ http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/youngandhungry/2010/01/04/the-most-popular-blog-posts-from-2009/#comments Mon, 04 Jan 2010 14:01:30 +0000 Tim Carman http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/youngandhungry/?p=14668 birch & barley

Today and throughout the week, Y&H will be giving you a glimpse back at 2009, via the blog posts that most captured your attention. First up: the granddaddy of all aggregations, the 10 most-read items of  the year.

The list is after the jump.

  1. Budweiser Launches Select 55, Light Beer Arms Race Gets Absurd. This page, posted by the Beerspotter in August, is the Michael Jordan of Young & Hungry. It performs at peak levels week after week. The page is also the holy temple of search engine optimization; future Web gurus will study its signs and contours to learn out how it has performed so well on Google.
  2. Vintage TV Beer Commercials. I compiled this page as daily blog filler, no more important to me than some random fat dude screaming for his McDonald's chicken sandwich. But the internets has its own way of rewarding inanity.
  3. Spike Mendelsohn Evicted from His Capitol Hill Rental House. The item that forever put Y&H on the burger man's shit list.
  4. Ritz Pastry Chef Jérôme Girardot Found Dead in Cameron Station Park. A terrible, terrible incident that I still think about with equal parts wonder and sadness.
  5. Another D.C. Beer Week? Yes, Please. Because it's always better the second-time around.
  6. Birch & Barley Opens Today. What's Inside? The Logan Circle beer emporium has been a consistently strong performer on Y&H. It is, in fact, the only establishment with two nods on this list.
  7. Nori Amaya's Friends and Fans Express Their Grief on Her Facebook Page. People were so desperate for information on this tragic killing that they turned to my shallow little effort — and sometimes expressed their anger at its lack of real info.
  8. Birch & Barley Slated for Summer Opening. Maybe. More false optimism spooned out by Y&H.
  9. Breadline Busted on 19 Health Code Violations, Ten of Them Critical. Excessive fruit flies! Dirty meat slicers! Operating without a license! Readers wanted to know all the icky details of Breadline's spectacular health inspection failure.
  10. Michel Richard Plans to Move His Home Base to Tysons Corner. The maestro of D.C. chefs hunted for investors last year for a planned move to the former Maestro space in McLean.
]]> http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/youngandhungry/2010/01/04/the-most-popular-blog-posts-from-2009/feed/ 0 Michel Richard Plans to Move His Home Base to Tysons Corner http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/youngandhungry/2009/04/20/michel-richard-plans-to-move-his-flagship-restaurant-to-former-maestro-space/ http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/youngandhungry/2009/04/20/michel-richard-plans-to-move-his-flagship-restaurant-to-former-maestro-space/#comments Mon, 20 Apr 2009 16:08:55 +0000 Tim Carman http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/youngandhungry/?p=4864

Richard: NoVa bound

Note: This story was updated on 4:36 p.m. Monday.

The rumors appear to be true: Michel Richard, the city's most celebrated chef, will shift his "home" base to the Ritz-Carlton, Tysons Corner, where he will open a new, fine-dining restaurant in the former Maestro space. It's not clear yet what the move could mean for Citronelle, Richard's current home at the Latham Hotel and one of D.C.'s most-honored restaurants, and whether the chef would abandon the spot completely.

Michel Richard Restaurants mailed a packet of information to potential investors last week, seeking nearly $2 million to develop the 5,000-square-foot, 110-seat restaurant inside the Ritz. The celebrity chef, according to the document,  "plans to enter into a 10-year primary lease on or about April 30, 2009" for the dining space made famous by chef Fabio Trabocchi, who left Maestro in September 2007. The restaurant has been dark since then.

"Citronelle is not closing...Michel's offices are still there, his kitchen that he loves is still there, and business is going on as usual," says Mel Davis, PR coordinator for Richard. "I have to reiterate, there are no plans to move or close Citronelle from the Latham hotel."

Mark Sherwin, general manager for the Ritz-Carlton, Tysons Corner, emphasized that no contract has been signed for the Maestro space. "We continue to talk to a number of high-profile chefs," Sherwin said. The Ritz has narrowed the list down to three different groups, the GM added, but Sherwin wasn't at liberty to name any of them.

The investor packet, however, makes it sound like a done deal. The working name of the proposed restaurant is, simply, Michel Richard, and it will be considered, according to the investor packet, "Michel Richard's home," where the chef "will likely be in the kitchen most evenings."

Those statements clearly imply either the death or the diminishment of Richard's Citronelle, which has suffered some indignities in recent months. Last fall, the Post's Tom Sietsema docked Citronelle a star in his 2008 Dining Guide; in January, the gastronomic temple laid off a number of employees and cut back on hours; and in March, long-time sommelier, Mark Slater, left Citronelle to work at Ray's the Steaks in Arlington.

The statements also pour cold water on the rumors that firebrand British chef Gordon Ramsay will take over the Maestro space. Ramsay's restaurant group was already facing serious financial troubles, and the chef recently sold his Los Angeles operation, Gordon Ramsay at the London West Hollywood.

Whether Ramsay or not, however, the Ritz was obviously interested in a celebrity chef for the space. The hotel chain has done well with famous cooks in the kitchen, whether Eric Ripert at the Westend Bistro or Dean Fearing at his eponymous place at the Ritz's Dallas property.

In preparation for Richard, the former Maestro space will be "re-designed in its entirety as a modern French-influenced restaurant" and "will change dramatically from its prior iteration, which, while luxurious, lacked a distinctive independent operator feel." The restaurant's open kitchen will be "re-tiled to have a more contemporary aesthetic," while the once-expansive dining room will be broken up into spaces that look, based on preliminary architectural sketches, as if they could be sealed off for private dining. There will also be a chef's table and a bar area with six stools and three cocktail tables.

Group Goetz Architects, the same company that designed Central Michel Richard on Pennsylvania Avenue NW, has been hired to design the Ritz space. No general contractor has been selected yet. Richard's team at his namesake restaurant will include Carl Halvorson, currently the director of operations for Citronelle and director of operations/partner at Central.

The Ritz, according to the investor packet, is providing a "significant build-out allowance" for Richard, but it's apparently not enough to cover all the costs. Richard's team is seeking between $1.7 million and $1.8 million to construct what it hopes will be "Washington's finest restaurant."

Michel Richard is expected to open for breakfast, lunch, and dinner sometime during the fourth quarter of this year.

If the detailed investor packet weren't enough to convince skeptics that Richard is moving his base of operations to the Ritz at Tysons, then the return address on the mailer itself all but confirms it. According to the envelope, Michel Richard Restaurants is located at 1700 Tysons Blvd. in McLean.

That's the address of the Ritz-Carlton.

Photo by Darrow Montgomery

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