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A Second Meal at
Obelisk
2029 P St. NW
202-872-1180
I approached dinner at Obelisk with some
trepidation and doubt. I’d eaten there a year earlier and proclaimed it
one of the best meals of my life — so obviously, the potential for
disappointment the second time around was high.
I didn’t need to be worried, as it turned out.
Obelisk is Peter Pastan’s small Italian restaurant on P St., a block
away from Dupont Circle. It’s an intimate setting, with only about 30
seats, and serves a five course pre fixe menu for $65. The experience,
which can stretch out for almost three hours, is a great value. The food
just seems to keep coming, the service is smart and efficient, and
everything just seems balanced.
Your meal begins with a series of Italian antipasti, five or six small
dishes that are brought to your table for sharing, and a large hunk of
bufaletta cheese. Among the antipasti: smoked swordfish, roasted
almonds, stuffed squash blossoms, grilled lamb shoulder and a tuna cheek
“mousse” served with anchovy.
While all of these were delicious, the smoked swordfish really stood
out. It arrives as five thinly sliced pieces of fish, like a carpaccio,
drizzled with a sweet citrus dressing. The smokiness of the fish is in
perfect harmony with the dressing, which was made with shallots and
almonds and what I think was meyer lemon. It’s an amazing balance of the
hearty, meaty smoked fish and the essence of citrus.
For the first course (which is almost tongue in cheek because by this
point you’ve eaten quite a bit), we got the gnocchi with lamb ragu and
the eggplant ravioli in a tomato sauce. Both were excellent, but the
gnocchi were perfect. These gnocchi seem to melt in your mouth, and the
ragu is a mix of lamb’s hearty game-like flavour and a sweetness derived
from allspice. It almost seemed like a holiday dish, with the essence of
nutmeg and clove cutting through, but it was light enough that eating it
in the middle of summer never seemed strange. I could have eaten several
plates of this.
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Your secondi is a choice of meat done very
simply. We chose the duck breast with artichokes and potatoes, and the
culotte with filet beans (culotte is a relatively lean piece of meat
that comes from the sirloin.) Both were very simple, which seems to be
Pastan’s style for this course. Both were very good, with little done
except to let the meat shine through. The culotte was almost buttery,
and the duck's deep flavor was made richer by an aged balsamic glaze on
the skin.
The cheese course arrived next, three types
served with a green tomato marmalade that cuts through the mustiness of
a soft goat cheese. The marmalade is sweet and tangy, brown from being
cooked down and caramelized.
Finally, dessert: a pillowy chocolate cake with a mint crème angleis,
and a tart of fresh peaches and almonds. Both were nice, but the mint
sauce really overshadowed everything else. It was light and creamy, and
tasted purely of mild, fresh mint. Being so used to more artificial and
“beefed up” mint tastes — peppermint patties, hard mint candy, mint
schnapps, mint bubblegum — to taste the flavour so mild and fresh was a
revelation.
Overall, a fantastic meal. The experience completely lived up to my
first trip to Obelisk, which in a way really surprised me. What Pastan
does in his restaurant is really amazing, and it’s a shame he doesn’t
seem to get more recognition for it. Obelisk is certainly a well known
and classic Washington restaurant, but because it’s been around so many
years I feel like it gets shorted in conversations that often center
around the newest and most hip destinations. The two meals I’ve eaten
there have been among the best I’ve had.
If I were to make on criticism, it’s that the wine list doesn’t seem
very value-oriented if you want a fuller bodied wine for your meal. We
asked the server to suggest a bigger wine, and from seven or so
suggestions only one came in under $50. On the other hand, the wine we
selected (a 2001 Amarone from Valpolicella) was fantastic: round and
lush with great aroma and cherry tones. But at $85, it’s definitely a
special occasion bottle. On the other hand, eating at Obelisk in and of
itself is a special occasion for me.
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