About Minibar
José Andrés’s dining experience is both the most expensive dinner in DC ($275 a pop just for food) and probably the coolest science class you’ve ever been to. At a bar-for-12 fronting a bustling kitchen, you’ll not only eat your way through a set menu of 25 to 30 surrealist courses; you’ll learn how each is made—how, say, a corkscrew, a syringe, gelatin, and liquid nitrogen can create a knockout fusilli with pesto. Many dishes in the lineup these days are more about brow-raising wizardry than deliciousness—get ready for a lot of gelatinous textures—and the whole production feels more rushed than it has in years past. Still, for the food-obsessed, there’s no better show in town.
Don’t miss: Pineapple shortbread; caprese salad; chicken shawarma; grilled monkfish with charred onions; Krispy Kreme–ice-cream doughnuts.
See what other restaurants made our 100 Very Best Restaurants list. This article appears in our February 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.
