Restaurants

“It is with a heavy heart that we announce that scratchDC will cease dinner kit delivery operations on September 22nd”

By Prince Of Petworth

scratchdc

Thanks to a reader for passing on: “Well this sucks.”

For those that use meal delivery services – who’s your favorite?

From scratchDC:

“It is with a heavy heart that we announce that scratchDC will cease dinner kit delivery operations on September 22nd, 2016 in order to focus on our other recently launched ventures, TinyGrocery and TasteLab.  

The past four years have been a remarkable adventure for me and my team. With very little cooking experience, we set out to make making dinner easier and more delicious for home chefs like ourselves.  With you, we grew from renting space in a tiny bar kitchen to opening our very own commercial facility that we now get to share with over forty incredible food companies. 

(more…)

“Brookland’s Finest hosting Back to School happy hour on Sunday”

By Prince Of Petworth

Brooklands-Finest
3126 12th Street, NE at Jackson Street

From an email:

“Brookland’s Finest is hosting a Back to School happy hour on Sunday, September 11 for families, kids and neighbors. Throughout the happy hour, the restaurant will be offering drink specials and providing kid-friendly outdoor activities, including sidewalk chalk, coloring books and bubbles. Special door prizes including gift cards for a free cocktail, dessert, kid’s meal and more, will also be up for grabs for happy hour guests. The activities and drink specials, which include $4 rail drinks, $5 draft beers and $6 glasses of house red and white wine, will be available on the patio only from 3:30 to 6:30 p.m.”

“ANXO Taps Kegs of Foraged Ciders and Introduces To-Go Bottle Sales” Tuesday the 13th

By Prince Of Petworth

anxo
300 Florida Ave, NW

From a press release:

“ANXO Cidery & Pintxos bar is excited to debut Foraged Ciders #1 and #2 next Tuesday, September 13th. These ciders are made from apples foraged entirely by the ANXO team. Both use apples from various sources, including apples foraged in New Jersey, New York, and Crabapples foraged here in DC. 13 different batches of apples totaling 30 gallons of juice were fermented individually. Only the best batches were saved and then blended together to create the perfect balance of acid, tannin, and fruit. These are simple, dry, rustic ciders that focus on the apples. They underwent a wild, native yeast fermentation, have no additives, and are unfiltered. They are bright, high-acid ciders with pleasant tannin that comes from using high-tannin DC Crabapples in the blend.

Of the initial 30 gallons fermented for this trial, only 12 gallons were good enough to make it into a blend. Each Foraged Cider is limited to one keg – one 5-gallon keg of #1, and one 7-gallon keg of #2.

DC CRABAPPLES were foraged from several trees around Mt. Pleasant. Harvesting is very labor intensive as crabapples are about 1/5th the size of normal apples and yield 1/10th of the juice. We had to harvest close to a thousand of these crabapples to yield just 2 gallons of juice. The arduous process is worthwhile as crabapples are incredible for making cider. They have intense acidity and tannin which are essential for good cider, and blending small amounts can have a profound impact on the flavor profile of the cider.

ANXO FORAGED CIDER #1 – The base is GoldRush apples from Glaize Orchards Virginia, as well as wild apples foraged from a 100 year old tree in Southern New Jersey The driving element behind this cider is the high proportion of foraged DC Crabapples. It is rustic, driven by woodsy red berry flavors that the crabapples contribute.

ANXO FORAGED CIDER #2 – The base of this cider is Black Twig and Arkansas Black, well known Southern apples. It was then blended with cider made from wild apples foraged from abandoned trees in New York as well as a small portion of cider from DC crabapples. This cider features good acidity and fruit, with slightly less earthiness and tannin than #1.”

anxo bottles
Photo by Farrah Skeiky

Additionally, September 13th is the debut of to-go bottle sales. This means that DC can now buy our harder-to-find Basque ciders by the bottle. The entire 50+ ANXO bottle list will be for sale, ranging from $5.99 to $29.99. (more…)

Cafe Paradiso Closed After 27 Years Last Month

By Prince Of Petworth

cafe paradiso
2649 Connecticut Ave, NW

A reader reports:

“The long time Woodley Park Italian restaurant was totally dark and had a closed sign on the door tonight. It appeared all fixtures and furniture were removed and the menu was removed from the display case.”

On August 7th Cafe Paradiso shared on their Facebook page:

“Today Sunday is the our last day at Cafe Paradiso after 27 and half years in business, we had wonderful time and met wonderful people, made lots of friends, got married and had kids, my brother Samer and I saw our business flourish, it is very hard to walk away and say good bye to our wonderful staff- family some been with us for over 20 years, I thank them all, also our customers and neighbors many thanks.

Cafe Paradiso was a great place to come to work every day for 27.5 years and it will be missed by Samer and I we tried our best every day to make a great environment to work and for our customers to enjoy.

For all of this we are blessed and grateful.

Thank you Cafe Paradiso.

Samer Zeitoun
Salim Zaytoun”

World of Beer Looking at Recently Closed Union Social space in NoMa?

By Prince Of Petworth

world of beer
100 Florida Ave, NE

Last week we learned that Union Social had abruptly closed in NoMa. Now I’m hearing that World of Beer could be interested in the space. A few things, first, I think that would be awesome. Second, World of Beer scuttlebutt hasn’t panned out in the past. Third, this is a different source with a higher accuracy rating than the previous scuttlebutt. Fourth, you still never know with these things. Having said all that – think a World of Beer would do well here?

Check out their Arlington menus here. And stay tuned.

Update: Open!! &pizza “closed until further notice” on Connecticut Ave

By Prince Of Petworth

&note

In more curious pizza news – a reader reports:

“Any idea what happened to this &pizza? Never seen a closure sign quite so uninformative.”

I’ve sent an email to &pizza and will update if they’re able to share more. This &pizza opened up in the former Current Sushi space back in April 2015.

Update: (next time maybe I should check twitter…head smack) thanks to a reader for passing on from their twitter account:

“Small plumbing issue at Dupont today. Working to fix it ASAP and we’ll holler when we’re back up and running. Until then, hit up K Street.”

“Dupont is back up and running. Come ‘n get it.”

&pizza
next to the now open Buredo at 1215 Connecticut Avenue, NW

At Long Last Little Coco’s Opens Thursday – Just What the Doctor Ordered for Upper 14th

By Prince Of Petworth

IMG_5829

From the owners of Bar Charley, El Chucho, Slash Run (and more) comes Little Coco’s opening Thursday! I was lucky enough to get an early taste and I’m happy to report that we have another jaw dropper. Both in aesthetics and deliciousness.

Have a look at the menu:

Little Coco’s_Menu (PDF)

A mini look inside – with perhaps the most comfortable bar seating in town:

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And don’t forget the roof deck:

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I had to take a taste immediately:

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And to be expected from this group – the drinks were top notch too!

Here’s “a lovely lineup of the vintage Amari we’ll be serving.”

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courtesy Little Coco’s

Outdoor signage wasn’t up when I stopped by but just to orient you – the former Rib Pit Lounge and current Little Coco’s in the middle (on 14th Street just north of Randolph and Red Derby and Lyman’s):

IMG_6860
3907 14th Street, NW

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