Fiola
Fabio Trabocchi is best known for the white-tablecloth cuisine at his Penn Quarter dining room, but he does blue-collar classics just as well. His grilled buffalo-mozzarella-with-basil sandwich accompanies a steaming bowl of rustic Tuscan-style tomato soup.
601 Pennsylvania Ave., NW; 202-628-2888
Bob & Edith’s Diner
For more than 40 years, this 24/7 roadside diner has been using white bread and orange American-cheese singles to make grilled sandwiches that taste like what you probably had as a five-year-old—and are still good at any hour.
2310 Columbia Pike, Arlington; 703-920-6103.
Founding Farmers
This farm-to-table eatery makes its own wheat bread, which is piled with a cheesy trifecta: Muenster, Gruyère, and white cheddar. It’s even better with a slice of house-brined ham spiced with juniper berries and caraway.
1924 Pennsylvania Ave, NW, 202-822-8783; 12505 Park Potomac Ave., Potomac, 301-340-8783
Quarry House Tavern
Cheddar, pepperjack, and provolone unite in this subterranean saloon’s sandwich, creating loads of gooey goodness. Amp it up with crispy bacon or tomato slices.
8401 Georgia Ave., Silver Spring; 301-587-8350
Rabbit
This Clarendon salad shop serves a Southern-style grilled pimiento cheese laden with sharp cheddar. The cubes of roasted red pepper that dot the cheese give the pressed sandwich a pleasingly piquant undertone.
3035 Clarendon Blvd., Arlington; 703-243-5660
Photographs by Scott Suchman.
This article appears in the March 2012 issue of The Washingtonian.
Nevin Martell is a parenting, food, and travel writer whose work has appeared in the Washington Post, New York Times, Saveur, Men’s Journal, Fortune, Travel + Leisure, Runner’s World, and many other publications. He is author of eight books, including It’s So Good: 100 Real Food Recipes for Kids, Red Truck Bakery Cookbook: Gold-Standard Recipes from America’s Favorite Rural Bakery, and the small-press smash Looking for Calvin and Hobbes: The Unconventional Story of Bill Watterson and His Revolutionary Comic Strip. When he isn’t working, he loves spending time with his wife and their six-year-old son, who already runs faster than he does.
