CanY

Your friends at Sushi Capitol are getting ready to open our second restaurant in your neighborhood. Kanji characters mean "sushi" and we look forward to getting to know our new neighbors when we open our doors.

I wish Chef Delgado much success with Ocopa. I went in for the first time for lunch and really enjoyed the cebiche clasico and rotisserie chicken. Nikkei cuisine really appeals to me so I want to return to try other items on their menu. The spacing of the restaurant is interesting, it's hard to settle in and get comfortable but perhaps that was the intend of their design. I hope younger chefs and restaurateurs in DC gets more opportunities, it's fun to see a younger perspective in an old city.

Sundays are my day to eat out. Early October, I was to meet friends for dinner at Kapnos, but I was in area early enough so I tried Compass Rose for the first time. It was around 5 pm and there are few people already inside. Since I was alone, I sat at the bar. The place is beautifully put together, and all the components of the dining room complement each other. (Floors, furniture, color of the walls, and the layout of the space) They had a nice list of cocktails, and I was amused by the names of the drinks. (They were named after different cities around the world, and for each city the corresponding drink had a spirit associated with the country which the city was from) By the end of my stay, I enjoyed three different cocktails: Edinburgh, Moscow, and Havana themed drinks but I believe their drink menu is different now, as I looked up online to remember the exact names to write my post. The premise of the food menu is interesting: international street food. After reading through the menu, I began to think perhaps there is a reason why these dishes are considered street food in their respective countries. From my experience, street food is a small snack to enjoy in between meals. If street food was to be enjoyed as the main meal, you would have to order few items to get full, a lot like meze or tapas. I think I realize what's happening here, so I pick three options, mussels, chicken skewers, and khachapuri. Mussels and chicken skewers were made well and I enjoyed them. Khachapuri was excellent. Even though I`m inclined to call it a variation of pide, combination of buttery egg(y) goodness is too delicious to get hung up on national borders. Since a well made pide is impossible to find in the US, Khachapuri is enough of a reason for me to return. I enjoyed every bite that afternoon and when I showed up at Kapnos, I was way too full to order anything, so I ate a little from each dish that my friends already ordered. Since my first visit, I made the trip out to Compass Rose again. This time Khachapuri was my main goal. It is really hard to pair and match street fare from distinctly different cultures and regions and put together a cohesive meal without feeling like you`re filming a knock-off version of "Parts Unknown". So I based my order around Khachapuri. I ordered cheese trio, chicken skewers, and Khachapuri. Once again everything was well, and Khachapuri was excellent. And I was really inclined to learn more about it. I researched online and called some friends who are from the Black Sea region, come to find out that Khachapuri has it's root in Abkhaz people, and is originally called Khachapur, the -i was added to the end to fit the Georgian language. At this point, as long as Compass Rose continues to make Khachapur(i), I will visit them few times a month. (As the saying "if you ain't Cav..." goes, same applies for balik ekmek "if it isn't Eminöní¼...")

I haven't been inside the restaurant, but they fed me the last two Sundays via Postmates. Everything tasted well and really good portions for I`m-hungry-but-too-lazy-to-go-out-to-eat. Perhaps the best packaged takeaway I received in recent months. The biggest challenge in takeaway is packaging, and our friends over at Donburi has done a great job of it.

My favorite restaurant in DC at the moment. The magic is beyond the food and the drinks, it's the people. Every visit of mine felt like I was home. In a city in which haste is a norm, it's an escape.

Greetings to All, I`m Can Y. Food industry is the reason why I`m in the United States. Born and raised in Istanbul, I enjoyed my days kicking around a worn out soccer ball in my wingtips which I wore for school and then enjoying the simple goodness of a ring-shaped bread covered with sesame seeds accompanied by short and loud sips of black tea from a slim-waisted glass. My days in Istanbul came to a conclusion as my parents decided to move to the United States to assist my Uncle with his restaurant as he was expanding his business ventures. So i traded my days of feeling the Bosphorus breeze for a kitchen located between 6th and Penn. Ave. SE, ESL classrooms, and for an (unintentional) entry to the East Coast rat race. Food industry is the reason why I`m in the United States because one day it will buy my ticket back to my new Bosphorus. Fast forward a few years through the family restaurant being sold, uncle and the parents retire, never ending university days, six years in the Army (active and National Guard), even more food industry experience, other business ventures, and I`m finally back on Pennsylvania Avenue SE. Our restaurant is Sushi Capitol. I strongly believe that titles in the food industry are meaningless and I inspire our employees to feel as a unit therefore I feel like I`m their Pep Guardiola, Michael Young, Piri Reis, Macgyver, and Paul Mooney. I look forward to contributing to the DonRockwell community and flourishing the relationships I make along the way with my fellow members.