Tom Sietsema Wishes The Servers at City Perch Would Step Off

In the Washington Post magazine, Tom Sietsema gives Bethesda's City Perch a single star and makes it very clear that he is not a fan on the service. "If you’re the kind of diner who likes bonding with the staff, have I got a restaurant for you!" he writes, and then catalogs exactly how clingy the waitstaff is:

For the hour or so we’re under her torture, er, watch, Tiffany is on us like white on rice. How’s the cocktail? How’s the bread? How’s the appetizer? How’s the first bite of the entree? Can I get you anything else? When she reappears for the Nth time, I wonder what else she could possibly inquire about. So I play defense and let her know the table is perfectly square and the ice is well chilled, thank you very much. (Now please, can we just eat our food?) [WaPo]

The good news for City Perch is that Sietsema thinks the restaurant has the best bread service in Washington.

The critic also visited B Side in Merrifield and Thip Khao in Columbia Heights for his First Bite column.

For his $20 Diner column, Tim Carman tried the fresh, house-made pasta at Del Rey's Rosemarino d’Italia, to mixed results. "It’s a rare and often lovely experience, dining on these fresh noodles and such. It’s also, at times, overkill," he writes. The fettuccine alfredo and the spaghetti are sure bets, and maybe the gnocchi:

Okay, maybe Castro’s gnocchi can’t compare to the cumulus clouds over at Rose’s Luxury. But his potato poppers possess a personality all their own, both lush and lusty, their slight chew providing a palpable foil to the garlic-breath urgency of the bolognese. They’re not, in other words, the definitive dumplings, but they do the job asked of them. [WaPo]

Carman also visited Namaste in Arlington, and raved about the Nepalese restaurant's lamb korma kashmiri, Raj kachori, momo dumplings, tandoori lamb chops, kukhura ko sekuwa, and more. He writes:

The plain, mango-colored dining room, tucked into a strip center on the outskirts of Alexandria, requires no intellectual curiosity to savor the plates produced in Paudel’s kitchen, other than a willingness to order something besides butter chicken when confronted by the sheer otherness of Nepali cooking. [WaPo]

Tyler Cowen advises diners to get the momos at Momo’s Indian and Nepalese Food in Springfield and calls DGS Delicatessen "one of the best places to eat in Dupont Circle, which is somewhat of a dining desert." [TC]

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