100 Very Best Restaurants 2013: PassionFish

Cost:

The dining room at PassionFish restaurant in Reston, Virginia. Photograph by Chris Campbell.

About PassionFish

Cost:

Location(s)
11960 Democracy Dr
Reston, Virginia 20190-5624
7187 Woodmont Ave
Bethesda, Maryland 20814

A spirit of largesse drives this light-filled dining room in
Reston Town Center, where ceilings are hung with trailing glass bubbles.
Meals begin with crab dip and French bread and end with
marshmallow-studded fudge, both on the house. In between, Chesapeake
oysters and Wellfleet clams make a showing on the lavish raw bar, sushi
arrives in a roster of offbeat rolls, and
Mad Men-era classics
such as a wedge salad and lobster bisque are done with smart twists. The
$17 express lunch gives new meaning to fast food. Three courses—on Monday
it’s chowder, a lobster roll, and Key-lime pie—are served on a single
plate for those who have to eat and run.
Don’t miss:
Fried clams with zucchini chips; crabcakes; whole branzino with olive oil
and lemon; lobster in red curry; crispy flounder with tamarind-chili
sauce; spiced-pear-and-chocolate sorbet. Open: Monday through Friday for
lunch and dinner, Saturday and Sunday for dinner.
Expensive.

100 Very Best Restaurants 2013


Ann Limpert
Executive Food Editor/Critic

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.