L'Ardente, David Deshaies's Glam Italian Restaurant in Capitol Crossing

[eatruneat]

@MichaelBDCand I went with our personal trainer to L'Ardente just before Christmas to thank him for keeping us relatively in shape throughout the year. He can also put down a lot of food so as a bonus, we got to order several dishes to try. 

Highlights were the Duck Hunt (four individually served duck ravioli in foie gras and truffle), Vitello Tonnato & Tonnato Vitellato (veal carpaccio w/ tuna sauce and raw tuna w/ veal sauce), and the sausage ragu pasta. The duck ravioli was my favorite dish of the night. It was very luscious and just melted in my mouth. When the other two hesitated a little too long about who should get the fourth ravioli, I happily claimed it for myself. the veal with tuna sauce and tuna sashimi with veal sauce was a close runner up. The kitchen really let the ingredients shine, which I really appreciated. And the sausage ragu pasta was the favorite pasta dish of the night. It definitely tasted like what you imagine sausage ragu pasta would taste like, except it was the best sausage ragu with the best pasta. 

Other dishes of the evening were the panzanella di funghi with oyster mushrooms, veal osso bucco pasta, and the famous 40 layer lasagna. Honestly, the lasagna was our least favorite dish of the evening. It was way too rich and there was nothing to cut the richness of the combination of short ribs, truffle mornay, and rich cheese. It was the only dish we didn't finish. 

Overall, we loved our meal and can't wait to go back to try more of the menu. 

[Mark Slater]

I had a wonderful holiday lunch this week at L'Ardente. Calamari couldn't have been better, with lots of legs in the mix. Fried cauliflower was crispy and delicious. Even the green salad was extraordinary. We then had Margherita pizzas, which we should have shared instead of each getting our own. Lots of leftovers. The showstopper was the Tiramisu. A chocolate globe is doused with flaming rum which melts it over the custard and cake. Its dramatic and utterly delicious. 

[eatruneat]

We went to L'Ardente for a birthday dinner last week and it was fantastic. We started off with the Duck Hunt (duck ravioli with foie gras and truffle), which was perfectly luxurious. Four bites was all we needed, but we wouldn't have minded more. Next was the Venetian "Risotto" (riced calamari, lobster stock, king crab), my favorite dish of the night. I could really taste the lobster stock and there was also a good hunk of king crab. Fortunately, I got this all to myself due to my dining partner's shellfish allergy. @MichaelBDC ordered the grilled octopus with patatas bravas and a romesco sauce. The octopus was cooked perfectly but the potatoes were pretty bland unless you made sure to grab some sauce with it. We ordered a similar dish from Convivial a few weeks ago and enjoyed that one a lot more. For the mains, we shared the rigatoni alla carbonara, pappardelle with white ragu, and grilled vegetables. We had a few bites of the vegetables because we felt we needed something green, but quickly focused on the fantastic pastas. To finish we had the caramel apple, which was great.

We went on a Friday at prime time (7:30pm) because it was my birthday and the restaurant was beyond packed. When we left a little past 9:30pm, people were still waiting to get seated. Restaurants need to make money but I felt we were packed in there like sardines, which is fine for certain restaurants but it felt wrong at a high end place like L'Ardente. Our table was so close to the booth behind me that servers kept bumping me to pass by and the person behind me could have easily rammed into me getting out of his/her seat (or I could have bumped into them!). Compare that to my usual birthday dinner spot, Kinship, where there is space between tables and parties have some sense of privacy. It wasn't bad enough to keep me from going to L'Ardente again, but I would just go on a weekday or less busy time. Food was great and maybe I'm showing my age, but when we are spending that kind of money, I would rather have a more relaxed and special occasion feeling than our experience. 

 

[DonRocks]

L’Ardente was a LOT better than I thought it would be, cuisine-wise.The dessert was a miss (pre-prepped, soggy rice, brûlée cold to the touch), and I wouldn’t mind if the service traded some friendly enthusiasm for more efficiency and synchronization, but those were the only two things that didn’t meet expectations.

[reedm]

We celebrated a birthday a couple of weeks ago, and all 6 of us were impressed by the quality of food and drinks. We enjoyed a sizable portion of the menu, to include the florentine steak, the cabbage dish, and many other items. All were delicious. Try the cabbage--trust me! Our service was similar to Don's--it was hit or miss at times, but overall, all of us would return!

[The Doctor]

If you want to treat someone to an entertaining (but pricy) dessert, I've gone twice to sit at the bar and order their Tiramisu flambe. A plate arrives with a chocolate shell sphere, onto which they pour a blue flame until the shell melts away, revealing the tiramisu. Their Negroni Fumo cocktail is also interesting, accompanied by smoke and a negroni jello shot molded to an orange rind.