Eat Great Cheap 2016 Good Drinks |
 Good for Carryout |
You likely know the Neighborhood Restaurant Group’s trio of butcher shops for their humanely raised meats, vast array of house-made charcuterie, and gut-busting sandwiches. All good things. But Red Apron should get just as much attention for its fried chicken—even at a time when chefs all around town are obsessing over crispy birds. What makes the chickens so flavorful? They’re brined, given a turn in the rotisserie, and fried in beef fat, which imparts a thin, brittle crust (terrific when dunked in hot-sauced honey). The sandwiches are still superb—the Italian sub, for instance, is packed with translucent slices of cured meats, aged provolone, crunchy iceberg, and pickled peppers.
Also good: Roast-beef-and-cheddar sandwich with ranch; cheeseburger; meatball sub; beef-fat fries.
See what other restaurants made our 2016 Cheap Eats list. This article appears in our May 2016 issue of Washingtonian.
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.
