Remember my post about NYE at Wildfire? if not, read below and come back. Throw those rules out the window. Andrew came down for the long weekend from NYC and with another friend in town, we all decided to get together Saturday (Valentines Day) and eat. On Friday we got together at Matchbox in DC, and after waiting for about 3 hours for a table, and service that was let's say "less than stellar" we hoped dinner and lunch Saturday would have no trouble at all topping that. On Saturday we met up earlier at had lunch at the epic Vienna Inn, and yes, it's that good. After ingesting enough chili to make our eyes bleed the stuff, we went to the local mall to walk it off. We split up and then later that night managed to find each other again at Oyamel in Penn Quarter. This restaurant, like many others in DC is run by Jose Andres, I believe most if not all of his establishments are in the top 100 DC places to eat according to the Washingtonian magazine. In that area of Penn Quarter, he has at least 4 dining spots, Jaleo, Oyamel, Cafe Atlantico and Minibar.
I've been trying hard to get into any of the above mentioned places, but never had the time, but after seeing the episode of "No Reservations" Food Porn, I knew I had to go. The plan was set earlier in the week, and I had my dinner selection picked out way ahead of time. Oyamel is like Jaleo in the fact that it is a Tapas restaurant, if you are unfamiliar with the term, it is a bunch of small dishes that everyone shares. Prices range from 2.50-15.00 depending on the items that your order. At Oyamel, most of the dishes were in the 5.00-10.00 range with some stuff falling either under or over the range.
Now I would assume most if not everyone reading this blog knows me, and has been out to eat with me once in the past, if you don't know me, identify yourself! Anyway, I was a picky eater, when I was a kid I would only eat un-burnt french fries, and cheeseburgers, only ketchup, no other stuff. However I've had an epiphany in the last couple of months while watching Bizarre Foods and No Reservations, I am missing out on vast worlds of foods that I wouldn't have eaten in the past. This is also one of the reasons why I chose Oyamel, you probably gained from the title on the type of food offered, but it's not all "eww" food, they have braised beef tacos, meatballs, table made guacamole, and the typical authentic Mexican fair. But we came for the odd food, or at least I did. I have to commend everyone in trying everything even if they didn't like it.
We started our dinner off with Oyamel's take on sangria, then moved onto margaritas, we had our waiter prepare table-side guacamole, that pretty much demolished all other types of guacamole I personally have ever had, if you think you've had it, you haven't. Then the fun began, we ordered meatballs in a spicy chiptole sauce, Mexican cheese and chorizo fondue, and tacos. But tacos you say, I can make those at home, no, no you can't. The shells taste as if they were hand made, they were soft, and filled with goodness. The breakdown consisted of, 3 tacos filled with salty grasshoppers, 2 filled with tongue and onions, 2 with suckling fried pig confit, and other bits of pig, and liz ordered the braised beef with potatoes. I have never eaten anything listed above, and I was suprised on how good everything came out. People are probably thinking, ewwwww right now, however if you like pot roast, you will like tongue, if has the same texture, and pretty much the same taste, grasshoppers, those were crunchy and tasted like beer nuts, and the fried pig parts, there isn't anything that is bad deep fried. The true winner of this meal was the corn smut (look it up on wikipedia), we put that on the chips, with some guacamole, and it was inhaled.
Our service was fantastic for a holiday, there was never a down turn, our food was excellent and I commend Oyamel and it's staff for providing me the second best meal I've had in DC to date. I look forward to trying Minibar when/if I can afford it and get a reservation. If this was a prelude to that, my expectations are out of this world. So if anyone can get me into Minibar, please help me!! Flickr set can be found here as usual
