Help! Washington/Pentagon City/Alexandria... narrow down Thai/Ethiopian and get some breakfast!

[pinstripeprincess]

need breakfast! my concept of breakfast is pretty broad, at home i'll easily eat croissants and a hot chocolate or roast dinner leftovers (no qualms with ethnic, encouraged even)... breakfast just describes the time of day i'm eating. anything tasty and open around 8/9am in the Pentagon City and Alexandria area or closer to the Mall (middle)? if you've got a 7/8am open option anywhere in Washington, i'll happily take that too.

i've only got control of my dining locales for 1 full day, during which i'll be spending my time along museum mile. willing to travel away from the tourists, but need easy metro access.

breakfast: your suggestions, ben's chili bowl

lunch: etete seems to be the resounding fave, tell me if i'm wrong.

dinner: dc noodles OR rice (same owners) OR thai square (not ideal location) OR rice and spice (alexandria) OR minibar (if there's a last minute cancellation) - mostly picked for location and that i'm really enjoying northern thai dishes right now

evening beer: birch and barley? am keen on a wide selection of american microbrew

thanks thanks and a million thanks. i thought i could figure it out just by reading old threads but with so many options and so little time, i'm feeling spoiled for choice. if someone tells me a jose garces restaurant is a must... i may just have to find a way to fit in another meal.

[Steve]

Dama Ethiopian on Columbia Pike in Arlington serves breakfast. Ethiopian specialties and, of course, Italian pastries.

Jose Garces is the Philly tapas guy. Jose Andres is DC.

Are you saying that Rice and Spice in Alexandria/Springfield or Rice in DC are ok for location and that Thai Square isn't?

Also, you could try to get into Thai Xing (DC), which now has a very weird system of a fixed-price meal of $40 on the weekends. Chef selection only. Anyway, if you can get in, it is a hoot. Only two or so tables in a funky basement apartment. Some of his dishes are great others less so. If you call, maybe you can beg them for the salmon red curry. usually you have to leave a message and they call you back. Almost surely a worthwhile experience.

I'd go to Thai Square or Bangkok 54 before Rice and Spice. But I don't like Thai Square for everything..... I like the tile fish and the lacy catfish appetizers, the pork knuckle stew, and the duck noodle soup from the Thai-language menu (just ask).

If you go to Etete, you'll be in the same neighborhood as Ben's Chili Bowl. Eat at Etete and poke your head into Ben's Chili Bowl. If you feel you must, get a half-smoke with chili on top. You probably don't need more than one bite anyway, and then you can say you've eaten there.

Oohhs and Aahhs, a soul food joint right in between Ben's and Etete, has my favorite food in the city, so I can't see traveling here for Ben's.

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Etete
1942 9th St NW, Washington, DC 20001

Thai Square
3217 Columbia Pike, Arlington, VA 22204

Bangkok 54 Restaurant and Bar
2919 S Columbus St, Arlington, VA 22206

Dama Restaurant
1503 Columbia Pike, Arlington, VA 22204

[pinstripeprincess]

oh gosh, i really was rushing that post. i did mean, of course, jose andres. i also mistook the location for rice and spice. totally not in a good location at all.

my concern with thai x-ing is that it seems to have time issues with the lone person operating it, at least from what i've read. is it really best to call them in advance to get a meal from them?

thai square and bangkok 54 are back on the list, i'll try to figure out how to get there by public transit. no thoughts on rice and dc noodles (i am a khao soi junkie)?

i do want to go to oohhs and aahhs, but ben's had the advantage in terms of serving breakfast. dama is a great suggestion though. i've never had ethiopian breakfast and what better place to start than in DC.

[Dennis S]

B-54 or Thai Square: There's a bus that goes down Columbia Pike (actually a few routes). The wmata site is very good with routing, though you might need to play with destination. I think the buses still leave from Pentagon City station instead of Pentagon which was the case before 9-11.

Get the route back, or cab it back, but the buses used to run very well.

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Thai Square
3217 Columbia Pike, Arlington, VA 22204

[Steve]

Thai X-ing operates on a new format. I am not completely familiar with it. so it is best to call. On some days they only do a chef's tasting menu ($40 I think) for which you do not have a choice. Other days you can tell the chef how many appetizers or main dishes you want, but even then I *think* he chooses. Prices are on his 'menu,' which are pretty standard for casual Thai food. One day a week - maybe Sunday?- is strictly a vegetarian tasting menu.

Anything you've read previously about the service no longer applies. Personally, I really think you should at least call to get the 411. Dinner only.

[yfunk3]

To get to Bangkok 54 or Thai Square, just take any 16 bus from either the Pentagon City bus stop (you'll see it, on the opposite side of the Pentagon City Mall, right outside the Metro station) or the Pentagon bus depot. Same thing with Dama (Ethiopian) if you want to go for breakfast. I wouldn't recommend walking as it's a weird area with random sidewalks/no sidewalks. Hopstop or the WMATA site's trip planner will tell you the cross streets, though from having lived in the area previously, the Thai restaurants are closest to the Walter Reed/Columbia Pike cross-section.

If you're doing the Columbia Pike Thai restaurants for dinner, maybe you can catch a second-run movie at the Arlington Cinema & Draft House for your evening beer. I think tickets are still $5? It's been a LOONG time since I've been there, obviously!

Oh, and buses run until around midnight. I'm sure they run after midnight on weekends, but I wouldn't chance having to wait on the street for up to a half hour for one to take you back to the metro...

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Bangkok 54
2927 Columbia Pike, Arlington, VA

Thai Square
3217 Columbia Pike, Arlington, VA 22204

Dama Restaurant
1503 Columbia Pike, Arlington, VA 22204

[pinstripeprincess]

hey all!

thanks so much for the directions for transiting! i'm generally a good explorer but i do get a bit leery of neighbourhoods when it gets dark, mostly since i'll likely be on my own.

steve, very good to know about thai x-ing. it sounds like an experience not to be missed. i'll give him a call to get the low down but either way it is a must do now. i was just concerned it would turn into a 3hr meal without giving him advance notice that i was even going to dine there.

yfun3, thanks for the cinema suggestion, unfortunately i won't quite have that much time. i was hoping to drop into a brew pub/beer bar and do a sampler set or perhaps just kick back a few bottled brews i don't recognize yet.

lastly.... so i tried to research more about breakfast and it looks like teaism, market lunch, and johnny's half-shell might all be good options. just depends on where i'd like to start. i hope to also get a snack at the mitsitam cafe but i think at that rate i may have to drop a museum off the schedule.

thanks again all! i'm a bit surprised that there's no push for jose andreas, but hey i'm not a big pusher of the high end chefs in my town.

[sweth]

None of Andres' places are really high-end other than MiniBar. And they mostly engender mixed feelings on this board, so unless someone's given a criterion that makes one of them particularly relevant (e.g. location, cuisine, small plates), they wouldn't be suggested very often.

[woodleyparkhound]

You've gotten a lot of great advice so far, and you'll be happy if you take it. But just to toss in another idea... as a daily user of Metro trains and buses (I don't own a car), I think that for an out of town visitor, using the Metro exclusively is much easier than using the Metro plus buses. With that in mind, you might want to consider taking the red line to Wheaton and walking about two blocks to Ruan Thai. I think it's the best Thai in the area (I haven't tried Bangkok 54 yet, however) and it's very Metro accessible. The problem is that it isn't in the area you want to be in. You may feel differently, but for me, I'd rather spend more time sitting on a Metro train than standing on the street at a bus stop, waiting. If the schedule says that bus comes every 10 minutes, I think you should be fine (you may need to wait 15-20 mins.) If the schedule says it comes every 30 minutes or longer, you could be waiting a long time indeed. Just my two cents...

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Ruan Thai Restaurant
11407 Amherst Ave, Silver Spring, MD 20902

[pinstripeprincess]

just wanted to say thanks for all the advice. turns out i only got about 3 hours to myself which was spent on a museum and, unfortunately, not food. i'll definitely keep all this in mind the next time i'm in town, which should hopefully be quite soon.

your metro system is fantastic btw and the mwata trip planner helped me stick to the metro and minimal walking distances.