We crossed off a lot of items from our restaurant wish list this year: a Georgian restaurant, amazing waterfront dining, and more poke than we even want. This holiday season, we’re asking for more. Here are some of the things we’d love to see in the DC dining scene going forward—restaurateurs and Santa, take note!
A proper Korean barbecue restaurant in the District. (Can we get that rumored Honey Pig?)
More mid-priced sushi that’s actually good.
An udon restaurant.
Breakfast food trucks. Specifically, breakfast taco food trucks with delicious coffee.
Real deep-dish pizza.
Good pizza by the slice that you can eat in the daylight without shame or regret. (So no, not jumbo slice).
Real Nashville-hot (hot!) chicken.
Katsu sandos. Because we tried the fancy version at Kobo and just want more.
A modern martini bar that just serves cold, delicious, expertly made vodka and gin concoctions. And maybe some smoked seafood while we’re at it.
A sherry bar (again).
More bar-bars that just serve drinks, no theme, pop-up, or $14 cocktail.
A Polish restaurant for pierogis, kielbasa, and plenty of wódka.
A decent fishmonger in every neighborhood.
More dim sum.
A restaurant that just serves two or three dishes, but does them really, really well (like Il Corvo Pasta in Seattle).
In-N-Out Burger.
More BYOB places.
A legit deli.
Fewer gratuitous bao buns (looking at you, Cheesecake Factory), and more bao buns we actually want to eat.
A great vegetarian restaurant that doesn’t feel like a vegetarian restaurant, like Nix in New York.
Just a bakery. Not a bakery with glittery unicorn cupcakes. Or house-ground loaves of spelt bread that cost $15 and taste like bird seed.
Better service, please?
What did we miss? Tell us in the comments.
Jessica Sidman covers the people and trends behind D.C.’s food and drink scene. Before joining Washingtonian in July 2016, she was Food Editor and Young & Hungry columnist at Washington City Paper. She is a Colorado native and University of Pennsylvania grad.
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.
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.
