The biggest Founding Farmers yet opens in Tysons Corner on Thursday, offering everything from preordered juice cleanses to fried chicken doughnuts in a 262-seat space near Tysons II Galleria.
A seasonal American menu is similar to those at the downtown and Potomac locations, but more than a quarter of the items are new and based around Virginian ingredients and traditions. There’s a ton to choose from at all hours, but the morning crowd has a particular bounty.
Weekday guests can pick from Benedicts and Southern biscuits from the in-house bakery, or go the opposite direction with a cold-pressed juice; full cleanses can be special-ordered through the restaurant. There’s also a light grab-and-go menu with Compass Coffee and pastries and, on the other end of the spectrum, a $30 brunch buffet on weekends with a butcher table and full pancake bar.
That’s not to say options are slim among the lunch/dinner offerings. The menu boasts three kinds of deviled eggs—we’re curious about the fried—11 ways to order oysters, eight varieties of burgers, five styles of fried chicken, and one cauliflower steak (because one in this case is enough).
Keeping with the large theme, drinkers can look to the 52-seat bar area in the farmhouse-style space for local beer by the shareable growler. Anyone who likes a little extra protein with their booze can try oyster shooters in flavors like gin-ginger-grapefruit, and vodka-spiked blood orange. Are there only two kinds? Get off the farm—you can pick from six.
Founding Farmers Tysons. 1800 Tysons Blvd., Tysons; 703-442-8783. Open Monday 7 to 10, Tuesday through Thursday 7 to 11, Friday 7 to midnight, Saturday 9 to midnight, Sunday 9 to 10.
Anna Spiegel covers the dining and drinking scene in her native DC. Prior to joining Washingtonian in 2010, she attended the French Culinary Institute and Columbia University’s MFA program in New York, and held various cooking and writing positions in NYC and in St. John, US Virgin Islands.
