Thursday, we attended the pre-opening night of the new Silver Diner location in Navy Yard. After 33 years in the DC area, this is their first Silver Diner in Washington, DC proper. They have a Silver in DC (Cathedral Heights), but it is a different concept (more upscale).
Ype Von Hengst (Right)
Silver Diner co-owner and Executive Chef Ype Von Hengst (a TVFN Chopped and Rewrapped champion) was on hand with his CEO and a huge staff. They continuously checked on the diners that evening (bigwigs and media). So, the service was definitely attentive. The baseball-themed cookies as favors were a nice touch for this event.
We’ve dined at and ordered takeout and delivery at various Silver Diner locations over the years. We even covered the opening of an Alexandria location during the pandemic. And, I’ve even ordered the steak dish many times. The Old Bay Wings with Mambo Sauce are new though.
The food was better than anything we’ve experienced at Silver Diner in the past. The steak was perfectly cooked, the wings were crispy and tasty. We tried nicely executed (and yummy) margaritas which had a shot of Cointreau in a tiny lime rind bowl, and the house made ginger ale. Hopefully, this is the normal level of quality for this location and not just the case because it was a heavily staffed and monitored opening event. If the DC location can keep it up, maybe Silver Diner can bring their other restaurants up to this level, from good to great.
Give the new location a try and comment letting us know if they keep up this really high level of food and service.
Mahal BBQ has been open a few weeks (weekends) at the Sandlot in Georgetown (2715 Pennsylvania Avenue NW). These are really great guys who know their food and work hard, but still need to work a few kinds out after only a couple of weekends of service. Also, the prices are pretty high. This is an outdoor venue, so isn’t open when it rains. Also, there is a bar at the Sandlot.
The Half Chicken was the standout here, and I would stop by for it (and the Chili-Vinegar Sauce) regularly if it wasn’t $24. Try it once, it’s worth it. The Smoked Beef Cheek ($26) was too tough to chew, which is something they need to work out. We did not try the Sausage Platter ($22) or smoked Oyster Mushrooms (20). The Green Papaya Salad didn’t taste like much until I poured the tasty Chili-Vinegar Sauce on it. The Pimento Cheese could have had a better (thicker) texture. Give them some time to work the beef dish out, but get the chicken in the meantime, if it’s in your price range.
Sura (in the old Bangkok Thai space at 2016 P St NW) in DuPont Circle is having a Fat Nomads Popup through June 26th, 4pm-9:30pm with cocktails and Thai Moonshine by Andy T. Reservations are suggested for Friday and Saturdays — you can call (202) 450-6282. The menu is here. No idea why they didn’t call it “One Month in Bangkok.” 🙂
Taqueria Capital is on P street in Dupont, below ChiKo. This small Mexican restaurant is from the same entrepreneur (Elias Hengst) as the Emissary cafes (one of which is across the street).
Assorted Tacos.
Chorizo Quesadilla.
What’s Left of Some Birria Tacos.
Their happy hour is Monday to Saturday 4 to 7pm with $6 beers and $7 glasses of house wine. It’s nice to find a restaurant with a Saturday happy hour.
My dining partner ordered a mescal margarita, which I was assured was quite good, and a tasty Chorizo Quesadilla. I ordered three tacos, with my favorites being the Salmon and the Carne Asada. My Chicken Tinga taco may have been a little over cooked. We enjoyed the the guacamole, which tasted freshly made. The Birria Taco image is actually from the waitress’ dinner. I’ll definitely be going back soon to try the Birria Tacos.
They even serve breakfast and brunch, coffee, tea, and house-brewed chai. I know, all you needed to hear was “brunch.” (It’s a DC thing.) Take a look at their full menu.
This is a restaurant that makes everything fresh (including the tortillas) from organic ingredients, and the food is quite tasty. Plus, the service was great, with the waitress and bartender both being friendly (chatty even). They even have some outdoor seating.
This topic reminds me of my recurring column from many years ago about eating in Arlington when nearly broke. Here are some Dupont Circle specials:
Dawson’s Market free beer tastings on Thursdays (City State are DC Brau are the next two events). Photos of some previous tastings and their event calendar were covered in a previous article. They also have one Friday wine tasting a month at the DuPont location.
Rakuya has Happy Hour (HH) food and drink specials including $3 shishito peppers or edamame, $5 yakitori, $5.50 gyoza, green beans tempura, shumai, crunchy spice salmon rolls, or spicy tuna rolls. They also have $4-8 beer, $7 glasses of wine, and a few $8-9 cocktails on HH.
Firehook Bakery has Buy One Get One pastries M-F 5-6pm, but not cookies, or cupcakes; it’s items like scones and cinnamon rolls.
Across the Pond has a special on Mondays 4-8pm: $6 hamburger and fries ($1 additional per topping).
The Admiral HH features 3 cheeseburger siders for $10.
Specials from our neighbors:
Chef Geoff’s West end (a few blocks from DuPont) has a number of food on their HH menu like $4 mahi tacos, $6 white truffle popcorn, $12 pasta Bolognese, $5 off of burgers, etc. And, a few $8 cocktails and $10 supermug drafts.
Ted’s Bulletin in Logan Circle during their HH Monday – Friday 3 PM – 6:30 PM has $3 drafts, $5 wines, $7 cocktails, and food specials like $6 fried pickles, $6 French onion dip with truffle potato chips, and $7 chicken parm sliders, $7 bacon cheeseburger empanadas, or Rueben tacos.
Restaurants, bakeries, and grocery stores often have food left over at the end of the day that could go to waste. The Too Good To Go app is a marketplace where you can purchase food from business at the end of their day (or meal service). The items in these bags/boxes can be pretty random, even if you pick up two boxes at the same location (or on different days).
Ala
Le Pain Quotidien
The food is usually already packaged as a mystery bag (or box) when you pick it up during the specified timeframe, but there were some exceptions. I didn’t mind waiting a few minutes if a place put a bag together while I waited.
Rose Ave Bakery
Taim Falafel
Purchasing these deals can be competitive, with new mystery bags/boxes usually hitting the website 15 minutes after the current day’s pickup range ends. As an example, The Cakeroom‘s pickup range is 8pm to 9pm, which means that at 9:15pm on Tuesday, the mystery bags/boxes to be picked up Wednesday will populate on the app. There are exceptions such as Rose Ave Bakery that sometimes drop mystery bags/boxes on the app for same day pickup.
Zenebech
The Cakeroom
Below are mystery bags/boxes I tried:
Ala ($3.99) in Dupont Circle has two pickups with different types of items, afternoon and evening (and I tried both). The above image is from the afternoon timeslot, and contained a Halva Croissant, Apple Tea (loose chopped dehydrated apples), an herbal teabag, Meringues, one Thumbprint Cookie, and Crunchy Chickpeas (dried).
Le Pain Quotidien ($4.99) gave me 3 pastries: a Cheese Danish, an Apple Turnover, and a Pan Aux Raisins. PDQ is much more readily available on the app than other baked goods options and has multiple locations (Dupont, 17th Street, Penn Quarter) you can choose from.
Rose Ave Bakery ($3.99) downtown offers fun Asian American-themed pastries. It is located at The Block DC food hall with Pogiboy, which is also on the Too Good To Go app. My Rose Ave mystery box contained green pastries: two Matcha White Chocolate Donuts, a Pandan Donut (green filling), and a Matcha Chocolate Cookie.
Taim Falafel‘s ($3.99) mystery bag included a Falafel Bowl and Tractor Beverage Company‘s Mandarin Cardamom. Their Georgetown and Dupont Circle Locations are both on the Too Good To Go app.
Zenebech ($4.99) is an Ethiopian restaurant in Adam’s Morgan. When I checked in, they put together a Vegetarian Combo for me with injera (spongy flat bread made from teff). I was lucky enough to score bags from both Zenebech and The Cakeroom to be picked up on the same evening, which was nice, because they are on the same street a few blocks from each other.
The Cakeroom ($5.99) put together a bag of mostly chocolate flavored items. There was a slice of Cherry Cheesecake, two slices of Chocolate Vanilla Cake, and two Chocolate Peanut Butter Cupcakes.
I recommend Too Good To Go in DC (it’s in other cities too) but you need to be open to receiving really random items, especially at Ala. If you get something you can’t eat, share it with a friend. Too Good To Go is definitely a good value, since most of the mystery bags I received were worth 3 to 4 times what I paid.
Sweet Hope, Central’s all you can eat dessert event for charity, is back! I can’t recommend this family experience enough! Kids love it! Reservations are staggered and required. This year, there will be live jazz and a balloon artist. This event is $25 per person for those 10 and over.
Previous coverage and a few words about the late Michel Richard are here. The flier for the event is below.
The Rounds sponsored a giveaway though Washington City Paper (and I won). It was random that a food blogger won, but I figured it would be nice to give back with a little publicity.
S’mores Pop-tart from Ted’s Bulletin
Everything Bagel from Bethesda Bagel
Bread from Seylou Bakery
Texas Sheet Cake Ice Cream from Jeni’s
Some wonderful local products/companies that The Rounds carries were featured — you can see the list in one of the above images. They even included a Wick & Paper scented candle, and gift cards from Jeni’s Ice Cream and Le Diplomate. For the record, the Baked & Wired Carrot Cake Cupcake was the first thing I ate. 🙂
The COVID-19 (Coronavirus) pandemic has been especially hard on the restaurant industry, since traffic and seating has been reduced across the country. The use of ghost kitchens may be one way for entrepreneurs to expand their businesses and minimize losses during this difficult time.
Philadelphia entrepreneur Aaron Anderson operates several Original Hot Dog Factory restaurants in Philadelphia. He has partnered with Chef Big Rube, who is known for his immensely popular chicken, to open several ghost kitchen concepts (chicken shack, halal burgers, cheesesteaks, and breakfast bars) through Cloud Kitchens, and a brick and mortar restaurant (steak and shrimp) in Philadelphia. Ghost kitchens like Cloud allow for Anderson to invest in innovation because he can open new food concepts without raising funds for the expenses of a full new restaurant.
“Back in the DC area, ghost concepts are allowing for interesting experiments. Although Foster’s Grill in Vienna is known for its Charburgers, they recently launched a delivery-only ghost concept called Chicken Frenzy from their own restaurant’s kitchen. Chicken Frenzy’s menu includes chicken sandwiches, chicken salads, chicken fingers, and wings, as well as onion rings, plant-based chicken sandwiches, shakes, brownies, and chocolate chip cookies. Some of Chicken Frenzy’s menu items have been added to Foster’s Grill.
On a larger scale, Ghostline DC opened in August in Glover Park. Ghostline DC is a multiple-restaurant professional kitchen (delivery and takeout). Some of the items flowing out of Ghostline DC include ramen, pizza, fried chicken sandwiches, cupcakes, breakfast sandwiches, and pastries.
Hopefully, food entrepreneurs here and throughout the country will continue to find ways to stay in business and possibly even thrive during this pandemic. Don’t be surprised if you see more chicken sandwiches (a recent trend) coming through ghost kitchens in the near future.
Clarity in Vienna, Virginia has specials that change throughout the week. Tomorrow evening, there will be a guest chef cooking the food of Ghana, but the event is already sold out. This Thursday’s specials will be Dry-Rubbed Cherry Wood Smoked Barbecue Grass-Fed Brisket and Heritage Pork Ribs; Balsamic Pineapple Barbeque sauce comes on the side with either dish. I’m keeping an eye out for when Chef Jonathan Krinn makes pho again, since we missed it last time.
Clarity’s Smoked Beef Brisket Chili
We were happy to pick up Chef Krinn’s Smoked brisket Chili special today. It came with sun-dried tomato corn bread. We also got to try three mini breads: baguette, garlic, and herbs de Provence. We didn’t take the sour cream of cheddar cheese, since we don’t use them.
The chili was very good but a bit spicier than we generally eat. We did add onions, scallions, and rice (with garlic) at home, which helped a bit with the spice level, as did the corn bread. I had planned on adding chopped tomatoes, but figured there was already enough going on the plate.
Sun-Dried Tomato Cornbread
Chef Krinn’s father does the baking, and he is extremely skilled. Herbs de Provence was our favorite of the 3 mini breads, although all of them were quite good. The corn bread was tasty too. You should pre-order dad’s baguettes or gluten-free bread (for Thursday pickup), or his stuffed crust pizza when it comes up as a special again. This week’s baguette flavor will be “everything.”
Three Mini Breads
My dining partner pickup up the food, and said Clarity has a great upscale NYC restaurant type of vibe. She was impressed.
