Cuisine: Subtle spicing and assured cooking—from vegetable stews to open-faced meat-and-leek-filled dumplings—set a high standard for the area’s Afghan restaurants.
Mood: Afghan textiles and rugs give the white-walled space a gallery-like feel, but when tables fills up, conversation can get lively, transforming one of Bethesda’s most intimate hideaways into a convivial party.
Best for: Families and groups who enjoy sharing; vegetarians.
Best dishes: Fried appetizer pastries such as bulanee (with leeks) and sambosa (with meat and chickpeas); open-faced dumplings known as mantu (with meat) and aushak (with scallions), blanketed with creamy yogurt and meat sauce; quabili pallow, a fragrant heap of brown basmati rice studded with carrots, raisins, and braised lamb; stewed pumpkin with yogurt sauce; melting eggplant; spinach with onion and garlic.
Insider tips: Several dishes are finished with dabs of tomatoey meat sauce and yogurt, which can make for a meal of redundancies; mix it up when ordering. Desserts are not a high point.
Service: ••
Open Tuesday through Sunday for dinner. Inexpensive.
See all of 2010's 100 Best Restaurants
Ann Limpert joined Washingtonian in late 2003. She was previously an editorial assistant at Entertainment Weekly and a cook in New York restaurant kitchens, and she is a graduate of the Institute of Culinary Education. She lives in Petworth.
