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By Morton Hochstein
With soul in the name, you might figure that Art and Soul DC restaurant, just a few blocks from the Capitol in Washington, would be a soul food restaurant. You could be right, for there’s corn cake, grits and fried chicken on the menu, but there’s also salmon and caviar with dill crème fraîche, blackened scallops and other offerings more haute cuisine than down home.
The Art part comes from Chicago chef and TV personality Art Smith, best known for appearances with Oprah Winfrey, and as a judge on Iron Chef America. Smith, who was raised in the Deep South along the Georgia-Florida border and the Executive Chef, Travis Timberlake who grew up in the DC area, have created a menu that blends their regional upbringing.
Art and Soul tosses convention aside. Rather than flowers, small bowls of apples greet diners on bare tabletops. Soon after the menus arrive, a waiter delivers hot, brioche-like, pull-apart rolls in a cast-iron skillet. Then it’s a matter of choosing from a list of tempting appetizers which, excepting spice-rubbed ahi tuna, are spiced with sophisticated touches that embellish the luster of normal Southern comfort food.
Ruefully turning away from the Maryland crab bisque and chipotle-marinated shrimp, I selected a Chesapeake Bay fry, a huge plate brimming over with oysters, clams, calamari, shrimp, okra and hush puppies. The seafood was fresh, plentiful, and satisfying, but the hush puppies, dry and surprisingly flavorless, were disappointing. My partner, more mindful of diet, elected to start with a Capitol Hill salad, local apples with blue cheese, pecans and a tangy apple cider vinaigrette.
Mains here were decidedly Southern comfort food, and it was tough choosing from temptations such as blackened scallops with a sweet potato mash, sautéed chard and crispy ham in a cane syrup reduction, braised pork shank with a black-eyed pea stew and spicy greens, pecan crusted chicken with an apple sausage stuffing dressed with a bourbon fig sauce. I settled on something only slightly less down-home, local rockfish served Chesapeake jambalaya style, with a spicy charred tomato sauce and crispy okra, while my partner, again mindful of diet, chose an Atlantic salmon with braised apple, green cabbage and roasted red beets.
What I enjoyed in sampling both plates were the vegetables, definitely a departure from the norm, particularly the okra which helped sway me toward the rockfish. The menu here is one I would love to return to many times and just work my way through all the goodies. Unfortunately, I am not in Washington that often.
For dessert, I opted for something I envisioned as light and small, but the baby cupcakes were hardly miniatures, but adult-size carriers loaded with nuts-and-fruit and similar exotica. A threesome of the not-so- baby cupcakes was more than satisfying for both of us. With its proximity to the Capitol, Art and Soul attracts both the politicos and visitors and though it is a bit off the normal tourist path, is busy throughout the day. I’ll be back.
© January 2010 LuxuryWeb Magazine. All rights reserved.
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