Tabard Inn

I had lunch at the Tabard Inn with methodologist extraordinaire Don Dillman on 5-10-2017. I just love this place. It’s such a classic D. C. restaurant and the food was really, really good.

Atmosphere: 4 out of 5
Food & Drink: 4 out of 5

The restaurant is housed within an historic hotel and it’s such a treat to walk through the common spaces–they are so cozy! A while ago I had brunch here and we camped out in front of the fireplace while we waited . Like the lounge at Kinship, I could have hung out there all day long!

Upon entering the actual restaurant you come upon the bar.

The bar opens into a larger dining room with one of the most iconic floors in town. This is the view all the way across the dining room looking back at the bar and entrance.

From there you walk out onto a great patio that I didn’t even know existed.

I’ll be honest, it was pretty noisy due to nearby construction. Obviously that’s not the restaurant’s fault; it just made conversation a little difficult at times. Clearly we were all willing to brave that though as the place was packed.

Not pictured: really good bread! There were three kinds: a raisin-nut bread, focaccia, and a crusty white bread. I tried the first two and they were great. The raisin-nut was obviously a little sweet but not overly so. The focaccia was amazingly buttery but still had a nice crunch to the crust.

Seared tuna (balsamic baby heirloom tomato medley, arugula vinaigrette, crispy wonton strips). This was fantastic. The tuna was delicious with a great spicy crust. The real star, though, was the tomato salad–wow! It had an onion/garlic/basil flavor that somehow at the same time tasted like tabbouleh. It was out of control good.

One more picture of the tuna just because I can’t decide which I like better.

Lamb burger (feta cheese, arugula aioli, tomato, onion, arugula, tzatziki sauce). Doesn’t this look amazing?? According to Don it was excellent. The only drawback was it was cooked more medium rare than medium as he ordered, but that wasn’t stopping anybody.

Apple rhubarb crisp (vanilla ice cream). This was AMAZING. Like, I almost ate the whole thing and I pretty sure it’s meant for two people. It was huge and it was delicious. I mean, it’s an apple crisp with rhubarb and strawberry–how could you go wrong?! It was tart but sweet with a great crumble topping. I highly recommend this.