chris lewis

Old Ebbitt Grill looks good too! The food here, I assume, is good?

Wow, great info, thank you all!! Some more input from me. I wasn't really looking for "quintessentially DC". Sometimes there are must see places in a city. Like in NYC if you were to go there and wanted a memorable, special, romatic dinner you MUST go to the River Cafe in Brooklyn. That's a bad example because that's not what we're really looking for. Maybe a better example would be Windows on the World atop the Wor;d Trade Center (of course that fell the terrible fate of 9/11/01) or Tavern on the Green in Central Park. Now none of these would work for my son and I due to our long day traveling and touring and therefore not being properly dressed. But we have choices here that are more low key, the above are just the more famous in NYC that came to mind. I guess we're really looking for some good dinner suggestions with a few things in mind: 1. We will be driving down from NJ leaving home around 6am and spending the day at the Smithsonian so we will not be very "fresh" or well dressed. 2. I know we can always go to a TGIF (yuck) or Ruth Chris' (a notch or 3 above yuck) but would rather like to try something we can't get here. Ray's looks interesting. It looks like we could go to our hotel in Laurel and freshen up before dinner. How important are reservations? Are walk in's discouraged or just require some waiting? Thanks again everyone. This list is an amazing find!!!!

Mitsitam Cafe it is!! I googled and see that it is native Piscataway Indian for Let's eat. We live minutes away from the town Piscataway in NJ!!! Sounds like fate and a good lunch. Thanks for the suggestion. Now on to dinner. chris

Oh, and we're just going to grab something fast for lunch. It's our first visit to the Smithsonian so we want as much time as possible there. Once it closes we have the evening to enjoy a nice dinner. chris

Sorry, I should have been clearer. We do not have to return to Greenbelt after the Smithsonian. We'll be parking the car in Greenbelt, of course, and at some point will need to get back there so we can drive up to the hotel in Laurel. Other then that we have all of Friday evening. Although that raises an interesting point. We will be dressed in comfortable traveling cloths so we may be dress code challenged. Chris

Hello, I am new to list and have a personal, ulterior motive to joining. I live in Northern NJ and will be visiting the DC area, with my 16 year old son, this weekend (5/16 &17). We will be spending Friday at the Smithsonian and then staying the night in Laurel MD before heading to the air show at Andrews on Saturday. My question for the list is where to have dinner Friday night? Should we stay in DC or is there decent dining in the Laurel area? We will be taking the Metro in from Greenbelt and have Metro passes so we can go anywhere the Metro goes. Also we’ll be driving from Greenbelt up to Laurel. Are there any “must eat at” or “if you go to DC you’ve got to go to” places? My son is well traveled and an experienced dinner. We’re from the NYC metro so prices don’t really scare us. And obviously we’re looking for more of a “guy” place, red leather and steaks maybe? Any ideas would be great! Thanks!