Brookland's Finest, An American Tavern By The Owners Of The Pug and Solly's U Street Tavern - 12th and Jackson Street NE in Brookland

[New Foodie]

And the neighborhood joints keep coming!

Brookland's Finest in WaPo

Main menu

Brookland's Finest FINALLY opened this past week at 12th and Jackson. From the guys who run The Pug and Solly's. We went for drinks at the soft opening last Sunday, drinks on Saturday night, and finally back for food yesterday for dinner.

The space is pretty nice inside. Not huge, but maybe 6-7 4-tops and a row of 10ish 2-tops along a side bench. The bar is decent-sized, and there's a roll top to the outside with 6 additional bar seats. Once the patio is populated it'll seat about 20 I think.

They're also very family-friendly - plenty of high chairs and booster seats, stroller parking outside, coloring books and crayons, etc. Great news for us since we live 3 blocks away and have a one-year old!

The menu looks pretty good, but we were hoping it would be slightly cheaper (kids' meals for $6-8 seems like a lot...and all the sandwiches are $12+). Also no HH

We started with the Crispy Brussels Sprouts Chips (sea salt, lemon, dill cream sauce - $4), which were addicting. A pretty good sized bowl of leaves that we think had been flash fried. Our daughter loved the dipping sauce. This would be an easy thing to order on every visit.

Then we split the Colonel Burger (certified Angus beef, pickled onions, tillamook cheddar, apple wood smoked bacon, brioche bun, tempora onion rings - $14) and Baltimore Style Pit Beef Sandwich (certified Angus beef, tiger sauce, pickled ramps, brioche bun, hand cut fries - $14). Despite being overcooked beyond the requested medium, the burger was pretty tasty. The brioche left a lot of butter/grease on our hands, but was a good compliment to the burger in both flavor and not being overwhelmingly bready (it's nice to let the burger and toppings shine over a dense and dry bun). There were two GIANT onion rings served alongside that were kind of meh. I'd prefer smaller and crispier onion rings instead. The pit beef sandwich was good as well, but not outstanding. Probably should've gone with a non-beef for one of the sandwiches, but the manager talked us into this one. The fries, however, were excellent. Piping hot and crisp and obviously fresh cut.

Overall I probably wouldn't travel out of my way or across the city to hit it up, but I'm certainly happy to have it a 5 min walk from my house.

[Pat]

Not a happy message, but maybe somebody will know something of his whereabouts:  One of their bartenders, Joe Madden, disappeared at about 10:30 Monday morning on his way to work.  He was last seen about a block from the restaurant.  He also has worked at The Pug and Solly's.  Photo and police contact information included at the popville link.

[DaveO]

Not a happy message, but maybe somebody will know something of his whereabouts:  One of their bartenders, Joe Madden, disappeared at about 10:30 Monday morning on his way to work.  He was last seen about a block from the restaurant.  He also has worked at The Pug and Solly's.  Photo and police contact information included at the popville link.

best of luck.  One of our grads sent a notice into the bartending school for distribution to bartenders about this scary piece of news.  He isn't a grad.  We've already made some distribution of this to some of our contact base.

I'm not one big on praying but this is one of those times.

[saf]

Dan just posted on PoPville that he has been found safe. No details, but there's that.

[Pat]

Dan just posted on PoPville that he has been found safe. No details, but there's that.

That's good news.

[New Foodie]

So despite this being the closest new restaurant to my house, and also being HIGHLY anticipated by us and others, I'm just not super in love with it yet. I like the space. I love that they're kid friendly. I love that I can walk 2.5 blocks there. And the service has been pretty good on my visits. I will caveat my post also by saying some of our neighbors think it's the best of the new places to open and probably go once a week.

Crispy Brussels ($4 Sprouts Chips, Sea Salt, Lemon, Dill Cream Sauce) - I liked these more on the first visit. The sauce is still excellent, but the "chips" seemed greasier and less crispy

 

Pretzel Bites ($5 White Truffle Oil, Sea Salt, Whole Grain Mustard) - were these fried? They were pretzel pieces that were awfully crispy. Ok, but maybe not worth ordering again.

 

Southwest Pork Chop ($18 Local Bone-In Pork Rack, Green Beans, Cumin Spiced Sweet Potatoes, Bourbon Cream Sauce) - This was the biggest disappointment I think. Overcooked and dry chop that didn't have as much flavor as I expected from a "southwest" moniker. Potatoes and green beans were good.

 

Spaghetti & Meatballs ($16 Grandma's Sunday Sauce, Hand Cut Pasta, Sicilian Meatballs) - This was tasty with nicely flavored meatballs and fresh pasta. Our 20 month old liked it as well.

 

Seasonal Fruit Cobbler ($8 Fresh-Baked Pie Crust, Seasonal Moorenko's Ice Cream) - probably our favorite item of the meal. Apple cobbler this night with "campfire vanilla" ice cream (little bit smoky). Ended the meal on a good note! Hot cobbler, cold ice cream. Yum.

[eatruneat]

On Sundays, my boyfriend and I run (literally, we run) to breakfast/brunch. We had been on a breakfast burrito kick and found Brookland's Finest to be our favorite so far. But we have only ordered the breakfast burrito here. I wouldn't say that it is amazing, but it hits the spot after a 3-ish mile slightly up hill run.