Posted by I think I’ll just let the photos do the talking in this post.
We pinched pennies but still managed to find some good eats in and around the District.
I think my favorite was Founding Farmers–a delicious farm to table, local produce & meat restaurant in the District. I don’t have a photo of our food, but please believe me when I say it was some of the best I’ve ever encountered. Stevo & Jesse threw down chicken & waffles that included some of the best friend chicken I have ever tasted (I stole a nibble of Jesse’s). Coart & I divided a couple entrees — a black pepper gnocchi in a sweet cream sauce (made with amaretto!) and one of their grilled open face sandwiches with prosciutto, marscapone, and fig jam. A-ma-zing. I hear their cocktails are great too, but like I said, we were pinching pennies.
If you don’t make a reservation a while in advance, you’ll never get a table at Founding Farmers. Actually, even with a reservation we waited for a while and service isn’t exactly fast. But it was totally worth the wait.
*****
From the sublime to the simple: One of our other favorite places was a Yelp find: Tortilla Cafe near the East Market by the Capitol district. We were hungry we didn’t want to spend a lot of money, we like little neighborhood places, we had just worn ourselves out in the Library of Congress and needed some food quick. Those factors led us to this delightful El Salvadorean place with wonderful food. Even Guy Fieri says so!
Coart had the pupusas, which are kind of like a tortilla with baked-in cheese and shredded pork. Um, yes please! Amazing. I had their beef nachos — hearty and delish chunks of beef included. Actually, my favorite part may have been the hand-bottled fruit juices available for purchase with my meal. And folks were snapping up their guacamole and chips, which was probably fantastic.
*****
Every good trip deserves a little sweetness, so after catching Joss Wheadon’s Much Ado About Nothing at the local arthouse movie theater (why do I have to travel 8 hours to finally get to see the movies I want to see?!), Coart & I found ourselves tucked into the tiny Best Buns Bakery in Shirlington, VA. No lie — behind the counter is a painting of a construction worker that highlights his “best buns.” haha
Anyway, they’re locally owned and staffed and bake up amazing bread and sweets for sale. Coart picked out his favorite, a coconut confection. I got the English toffee-caramel cupcake. yuuuuuuum. Even the CAKE part was good! (I mean, who eats cupcakes for the cake, right? It’s not hard to make good icing IMHO. Proof is in the cake.
This was our second great discovery in Shirlington after our movie. We’d also wandered through a Greek place called Medi …. Imagine if Chipotle served Greek food and did it well. They offered up something they called gyritos — like taquitos made with gyro flavors and meat, drizzled with a very light balsamic glaze. Throw in some pomegranate sangria and I was definitely in my zone! 🙂
*****
Honorable Mentions:
Bruegger’s Bagels in Old Town Alexandria VA because they were the only people open at 5:30am to serve us breakfast after our overnight drive. Their siracha egg sandwich is actually really good.
Flying Fish Coffee & Tea in the Columbia Heights area, for brewing us some of the absolute best iced tea ever on a hot afternoon (I had pear green tea. Fantastic.)
CakeLove in the U Street area seems to be missing its nice sit down part that I remember from last time, but the cake is still fantastic.
Dogfish Head Brewery has brew pubs in the DC area. S&E took us there for supper after seeing the Air & Space Museum on July 4th – a great end to a great day.
Only Burger in Durham, NC got us home by serving up a great burger made with high quality, local ingredients, a bright & cheery staff and interior, and one of the best root beer floats ever.
Just:Words 