Washingtonian officially drops its 2026 100 Very Best Restaurants on Tuesday, January 20. But here’s one big, early reveal: this year’s #1 spot in our annual ranking goes to Albi—Michael Rafidi’s artful love letter to Palestinian cooking in Navy Yard—again.
The magazine has been ranking our 100 Very Best Restaurants for a long time—since 2007, to be exact—and it’s been more than a decade since a restaurant taken our #1 spot two years in a row. (The Inn at Little Washington and long-gone Citronelle have held the top spot multiple years, but the record holder was the late, great Komi, which was our top restaurant for four consecutive years starting in 2009.)
When it came to Albi this time around, giving it the big crown was an easy decision. Of course, the food is both gorgeous and insanely delicious (just try that hummus with chanterelles). But a few things have improved even from last year. Last spring, Rafidi closed the restaurant for a few weeks, gave the dining room a darker, moodier makeover, and added a sleek lounge space. The coolest part of the reno: all barriers have been removed between the dining room and the open kitchen and its giant flame-spitting hearth, so it feels like one big, communal space. (Try to snag a “hearth table” to get closest to the action.)
Rafidi, who grew up in Maryland, had branded Albi as broadly Levantine since it opened in 2020, a month or so before the pandemic. Now, he’s leaning more heavily and explicitly into his Palestinian roots, and creating wondrous plates inspired by the food he grew up eating. And his Sofra tasting menu is a bit different, too—a little more luxe and ever-changing with seasonal specialties. The meal starts very simply with olives and pickles before moving onto elevated snacks such as ember-roasted mussels with arak butter and caviar; puffs of pita with decadent dips; and a parade of dishes including tiny dumplings with urfa chili crisp. The highlight: a feast of lamb that tops it all off.
Every year, the competition for this list gets more and more fierce. Who snagged the other 99 spots? Check out the full list when it drops online tomorrow, or even better, the beautiful print version when it hits newsstands January 22.
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.
