Banh Mi—in D.C.?
Mark Furstenberg's quest to liberate the classic Vietnamese sandwich from Falls Church
By Tim Carman
Past Perfect
The area's last bastion of classic French cuisine?
By Tim Carman
Gourd Is Good
Pumpkin beers: Not just for candyasses!
By Orr Shtuhl
Home Cooking
When Orthodox Christianity and Ethiopian cuisine collide
By Tim Carman
Restaurant Finder
Restaurants, Briefly
Hello Cupcake
Cafe
Dupont Circle: 1363 Connecticut Ave NW, Washington, DC
$$$$
My wife, Carrie, really wanted to go to Georgetown Cupcake on Saturday after we had wolfed down a few slices at a neighborhood pizzeria. I liked the idea, except for one thing: The thought of going to Georgetown made me want to lop off a body part. I convinced my beloved that there were closer cupcakeries than Georgetown and, besides, it’d be good to visit a place we hadn’t been to. Sometimes it’s a bitch to be married to a food writer. You rarely get to eat where you want. The pain became more acute once we sampled our two treats from Hello Cupcake. Carrie ordered this tart concoction made with a pink-lemonade cake and lemon frosting. I ordered a classic black and white, with chocolate cake and what the clerk described as vanilla frosting. Both treats had issues. Carrie found her cupcake dry and dense; I found it slightly gummy and dense, which didn’t immediately turn me off. We both, however, made faces after sampling the black and white. The cake itself was moist, rich, and chocolate-y. It was the frosting that was off. We couldn’t put our finger on it exactly. Yes, the frosting had hardened a little. But Carrie also thought it had a chemical taste. I thought it might be some dairy product gone bad. Whatever the case, we didn’t finish either cupcake, which tells you everything. I apologized on the way out the door for not taking Carrie to Georgetown Cupcake in the first place.
(Washington City Paper review: Tim Carman)
The Big Hunt
Pizza, Burgers/Bar Food
Dupont Circle: 1345 Connecticut Ave. NW, Washington, DC
$$$$
Not the lesbian bar you might think, the Big Hunt is the bar that defines happy hour in this town. The Dupont Circle stalwart is great for its wide selection of draft beers, its fine renditions of all sorts of bar food, and its amusements—pool table upstairs and Big Buck Hunter downstairs. There are few better places in town to spend a few hours after work, and the Friday evening crowds prove it. Safari theme aside, this is a place of few gimmicks—that extends to the cheap, quality house beers (available in addition to a plethora of upscale drafts), the surprisingly decent bar pizza, and the superb buffalo wings (order them well-done). The roof deck offers a nice spot to commiserate with work pals and down your Big Ass wheat ale on a summer evening. Also: A great place for a low-rent private party—the upstairs area can be yours for the evening for a small fee.
(Washington City Paper review: Mike DeBonis)
Marvelous Market
Deli/Quick Bites
Dupont Circle: 1511 Connecticut Ave. NW, Washington, DC
$$$$
The heavy wooden beams and exposed red brick at the Marvelous Market on Dupont Circle give the place the kind of warm, rustic vibe that you want from your neighborhood bakery. The spell, however, is broken the moment you open your mouth and ask one basic question: Do you bake your own breads? Marvelous doesn’t. It gets daily deliveries from Baguette Republic, which is co-owned by Dahmane Benabane, who worked as executive chef for Marvelous Market for 15 years. The Republic plies this shop—and every other in the local Marvelous chain—with all manner of product, from pastries to muffins to loaves of various shape and size. Many of them, despite their transit from Northern Virginia, are fresh and delicious. Tops among them is the chocolate croissant, a bronzed buttery purse of puff pastry filled with a thin strip of rich chocolate and lots of air, which helps to create a false impression of lightness. The baguette is decent example of the breadmaker’s art—crusty and airy and far superior to that bread wad over at Firehook. The sourdough boule gives you a blast of sour all right—somewhere just south of old wine—but its crust has an off-putting texture that I’d place somewhere between plastic and old cardboard. The truth is, Marvelous Market has strayed far beyond the European breadmaking roots of its founder, Mark Furstenberg. It has, by its own admission, morphed into something that blends “Panera, Starbucks, Potbelly, Dean & Deluca, and Seven 11 [sic]” under one roof. As such, it can get pretty crowded in the narrow aisle inside the Dupont store, as customers elbow for fruit-juice blends, pre-made sandwiches, pates, cheeses, coffee, hell even pre-cut flowers. The sandwiches, particularly the fresh-as-a-Mediterranean-breeze caprese, are a fine option for those who want a quick lunch without sacrificing their soul (and their arteries) to the practitioners of fast-food sorcery. But can you ever expect to wrap your mouth around something as deliriously tasty as the sandwiches that Breadline turned out during its Furstenberg heyday? Get real. Marvelous Market figured out long ago that artisan ambitions don’t pay the bills.
(Washington City Paper review: Tim Carman)
Obelisk
Italian
Dupont Circle: 2029 P St. NW, Washington, DC
$$$$
Peter Pastan not only runs 2Amys, the District’s best pizzeria, but he also oversees what is, to my mind, the most underrated dining room in town. Perhaps that’s a hard argument to make, given the generally high marks that Obelisk earns from the city’s professional eaters, but I believe Pastan’s name should rank right up there with D.C.’s signature chefs, whether Michel Richard or Frank Ruta. The thing that prevents Pastan from entering the upper echelon is the critical world’s bias for sheer creativity over simple purity of expression. Course after course after course, Pastan and Esther Lee, his long-time head chef at Obelisk, turn out exquisite bites of rustic Italian cooking. Eggplant caponata on crostini with anchovy. Smoked duck breast with caramelized-onion sauce. Arugula ravioli with walnut butter sauce. Ravioli in brodo. Grilled mullet with asparagus. Nothing too fancy, but everything executed for maximum flavor. The most impressive thing about Obelisk, though, may be that Pastan and Lee design a new tasting menu each and every day.
(Washington City Paper review: Tim Carman)
Saigon Bistro
Vietnamese
Dupont Circle: 2153 P St. NW, Washington, DC
$$$$
If you live in the District and suddenly get a case of the Pho Shakes—that weak-in-the-knees condition that will be cured only with a bowl of rice noodles, fatty brisket, raw round steak, and veggies drowning in beef broth—your remedy requires a long Metro ride to some gray strip-mall outpost in the ’burbs. Fortunately, a few noodles houses have now popped up in the District to satisfy our cravings for pho, including Saigon Bistro off Dupont Circle, which features not one but two chefs who recently emigrated from Vietnam. Huong T. Van handles soup duties here, and her offerings include not only pho but also hu tieu (a rice noodle soup with seafood or pork stock) and mi (an egg noodle soup with seafood or pork stock). Her bowl of egg noodle soup with shrimp and pork is an acquired taste for one reason—it includes a last-minute sprinkling of dried pork skin before serving, which releases its trapped oils onto the surface of the liquid. You feel like you’re eating a bowl of melted butter. I’m told this is authentic, but I can’t seem to confirm it via online recipes. Van’s pho has been, in my experience, hit or miss. My first bowl of “Special Beef Noodle Soup,” with well-done brisket, rare beef, and tripe, emitted a wan yellowish glow and barely registered on my internal beef-o-meter. Even the usual fragrances of pho—star anise, cloves, and cardamom—were so faint that you’d need a bloodhound to sniff them out. But subsequent bowls have fared better, combining a satisfying fragrance with a big, buttery richness that made me wonder if the chef hadn’t sprinkled her dried pork on top again. (I’m told that’s a no-no.) Regardless, every bowl of pho I’ve had at Saigon Bistro has been accompanied by a plate of garnishes that looks like last week’s leftovers at Pho 75. I’m afraid that, at this point, I still feel the need to hit the ’burbs for my pho fix.
(Washington City Paper review: Tim Carman)
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