About Restaurant Openings Around DC
A guide to the newest places to eat and drink.
Pascual. 732 Maryland Ave., NE.
Chefs Matt Conroy and Isabel Coss have turned Georgetown neo-bistro Lutèce into one of DC’s top restaurants. But the couple originally met cooking Mexican food at Empellón in New York, and it was plans for a Mexican restaurant that first brought them to DC. Now, those plans are fully realized: Pascual—named after the saint of cooks—officially opens in Capitol Hill on Thursday, February 15 with a modern, vegetable-centric Mexican menu revolving around a wood-fired hearth.
Conroy was working at Brooklyn’s Oxomoco when he first encountered restaurateur Omar Popal—whose family owns Lutéce and Afghan restaurant Lapis—through a Craigslist job ad, and they started to talk about opening a restaurant together. The Popals had originally hired another chef for Lutéce, but when that didn’t work out, Popal asked Conroy to step in. A month later came the pandemic. Coss, a Mexico City native who was then working as executive pastry chef at Cosme in New York, soon joined him in DC. If you look for it at Lutéce, you’ll notice their Mexican culinary backgrounds through the acid and heat they impart on French cuisine.
At Pascual, the kitchen revolves around smoke and fire, with at least some components of every dish touching the grill. “That smoky flavor is characteristic of Mexican food. It can be hidden. It can be bold,” says Coss. Take, for example, a tlayuda topped with a mole-like sauce called almendrado, plus roasted carrots, Oaxacan cheese, and grilled scallions tossed in a garlicky oil. “That gets all kind of melted and gooey and crispy but still chewy. And that gets cooked over the fire so it picks up some smoke itself,” Conroy says. It’s topped with some market greens and a lime vinaigrette.
The menu is big on vegetables in general. Another highlight: a parsnip tamal that comes with a white mole, smoked goat cheese, endives, and marcona almonds. The white mole is traditionally served at weddings so that the bride doesn’t sully her white dress. “It’s a dish that could be a dessert but it’s savory,” Coss says. “It’s bright, crunchy, creamy. It feels like every tamal you’ve had in your life but also like a completely new tamal.”
The guacamole and tostada platter served on a lazy susan is sure to be a hit. The dip itself is fairly minimalist, with a dusting of charred onions and avocado leaf, but it comes with a variety of salsas, pickles, smoked fruits, and other accoutrements.
Salsa macha—the spicy, nutty chili oil that chefs love right now—makes multiple appearances on the menu. Coss loves to put it on rice with a fried egg. At Pascual, the condiment gets an upgrade atop seasoned Japanese rice alongside Maine uni with fresh and roasted hoja santa leaves.
The menu will have only one taco: al pastor. “We don’t want to become a taqueria, but I love tacos,” Coss says. “So if we’re going to have a taco, the queen of tacos in Mexico City is pastor.” There will, however, be some larger platters—like lamb neck barbacoa or a smoked half chicken—that will come with handmade tortillas and various sides and salsas so you can build your own tacos. While a wave of new Mexican restaurants in DC all seem to showcase whole grilled fish, Pascual offers an adobo-marinated skate wing that’s grilled in a banana leaf.
For dessert, Coss has created giant buñuelos, cinnamon-sugar-dusted fritters, with a Mexican chocolate sauce. There’s also a rich, flourless Mexican chocolate cake with a creme anglaise that has all the flavors of a carajillo coffee cocktail.
Smoky flavors carry over to the cocktail menu, which includes mezcal versions of a negroni and old-fashioned. The house margarita offers choice of tequila or mezcal, plenty of lime, and a touch of orange liqueur made from a trio of fruit from California, Curacao, and Spain. Get an extra dose of veggies with gin cocktail “…And One For The Doctor,” which incorporates ingredients like leeks, peppers, pineapple, and olive oil—with a sidecar of mezcal.
The space, designed by Omar Popal, has a bright, natural feel with wooden chairs and tables milled in Baltimore and black clay coffee cups from a woman who Coss met at a ceramics market outside of Oaxaca city. It’s just slightly bigger than Lutèce with a 45-seat patio coming soon.
A daytime bakery and cafe with a takeout window will open later this spring with Mexican pastries, coffees, agua frescas, and horchata soft-serve. It will be called Volcán—meaning Volcano. “Volcán is very loud, whereas the restaurant is a little more elegant,” Coss says.
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.
