With five months of city-living under my belt, it was time to explore one of the tastiest events a city has to offer: restaurant week. DC’s winter restaurant week kicked off January 25th, and is a week-long blessing of restaurant deals. Essentially, you pay a fixed price ($22/lunch or $35/dinner), and then you get to choose three (or sometimes four) courses from the restaurant’s restaurant week options. Trying to select a restaurant can be an overwhelming task (I had about 20 menu tabs open at one point), but restaurant week is really a great opportunity to try places you may not ordinarily think to go to.
After being cooped up at home from the after-effects of winter storm Jonas, my roommate and I decided to check out RW options in our area. We decided on the Grill from Ipanema, a Brazilian restaurant located along Columbia Road in Adams Morgan. It was pretty quiet when we arrived around 6:30pm, probably due to the snow, and we were seated immediately.
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| Abacate Maraja |
I ordered the
Abacate Maraja to start (our waiter jokingly made us try to pronounce our order), which was a shrimp and avocado salad. I enjoyed the salad, a mix of greens, tomato, shrimp, and avocado, loaded in an avocado peel. I know Brazilian food is known for being meat-heavy, but I’m not a big meat-eater. For my entrée, I opted for the
Salmao grelhado (salmon in a white wine sauce with veggies, rice, and potatoes), while my roommate got the Brazilian paella.
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| Salmao grelhado |
While it may not have been on the adventurous side of the menu, I have to say: my salmon was AMAZING. Actually, my whole meal was wonderful. Everything was well-seasoned, and I had so much food I was able to save half of my meal for lunch the next day (as was my roommate).
We each finished with a Bolo de Chocolate, a chocolate mousse cake, which was rich and delicious. Afterwards, I was so ready to sink into bed and sleep for 12 hours. The Grill from Ipanema kicked off restaurant week on a high note, and I’ll definitely be back again.
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| Bolo de Chocolate |
We also visited Kramerbooks & Afterwords Café, located across from the Dupont Circle Metro’s north exit. Kramerbooks is a pretty cool spot, since it’s a bookstore, restaurant, and bar wrapped up into one venue. I’ve been to the café before, but they have a lot of enticing seafood options so you can’t go wrong. Also, unlike some restaurants that make you choose from a list of RW options, you could choose from the whole menu for your three courses.
I went with the scallop pasta this time, which was nothing to write home about. The Crab Cake Pasta is still my top choice as far as entrées are concerned.
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| Mini Crab Cake Duo |
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| Scallops with Pasta |
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| Apple Crumb Pie |
Restaurant week is technically over this weekend, but some restaurants are extending through February 3rd. We’ll see if my stomach (and wallet) can handle another food excursion until then.
For more info:
http://www.ramw.org/restaurantweek
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