Our Response to the Washington Post Food Scene Slam

This is a opinion response to the Washington Post Article – What’s missing from D.C.’s food scene? A Lot. Written by Mark Furstenberg.

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I agree with the points mentioned about restaurants with absentee chefs, the rush to open restaurants without concentrating on developing one first, and that it would be nice to have more local groceries and specialty stores.

What I disagree with though is the suggestion that Washington needs more discerning customers. While there are a slew of people that, yes, will want to be the first to show up at the doors of a much-hyped DC restaurant, you can’t deny that this does not happen in other cities mentioned, namely NYC.

You forget that DC has become overloaded in food blogs whose sole purpose is to judge the restaurants, and not by the flare of the opening, but by the food they serve. If a restaurant is not living up the to the hype, you better believe people will respond accordingly, by not showing up.

Nostalgic restaurants are all around us. Every city has them. But do we don’t need an iconic food to put us on the map? Neither Sacramento or Denver falls on the list with “iconic foods”. Washington is a transit city, which we’ll always be. DC is quickly expanding to places that wasn’t available before. See Barracks Row, to H street and now U street.

We are a smaller area and less developed, from a food perspective, than the larger cities you’ve mentioned. That said, I agree that I do hope the local groceries, specialty shops and small business owners prevail because it would be a welcome change indeed.

Side note – Toki Underground opened March 2011.

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