Dinner at Komi

(Pictures will be added soon)

I came to DC for the weekend to visit with friends. Phyllis, being a big foodee like me, immediately suggested place it eat. It is call Komi and is a short walk from the Dupont Circle stop on the Metro (1509 17th St; www.komirestaurant.com), but you may want to wander a bit further after dinner to walk of a bit of the food.

We decided that we would treat ourselves to the degustation, or tasting menu. There were no suggestions on the menu as to what we might be eating or drinking. It simply said “degustation.” The pictures are a bit blurry because I did not want to use the flash. We were silly in that we did not note the wines or take pictures of all of the courses, so you will just have to stop by and see for yourself. A new wine would come every few dishes, starting with a lovely sparkling wine to cut the richness in the first few courses, followed by a few whites, proceeding through to some carefully selected reds with the meat courses and finally to some interesting dessert wines. We were impressed with how carefully the pairings had been made, especially with the red wines that came with the later courses that just did not taste as good with the other dish of the course. At the end of the meal I told the sommelier that he made me want to quit my job and go to sommelier school.

The courses were (not in order, but as close as we can remember):

House cured green olives with fleur de sel
Little slices of white halibut like fish with olive oil and some other tastiness
Warm Medjool dates stuffed with mascarpone and yogurt, again finished with fleur de sel
Small pieces of radish with butter and salmon roe (see picture)
Grilled baby (potentially hot) green chilis with a sunchoke panna cotta with quail egg, topped with small caviar (the waitress said that about one in 10 of the peppers were hot)
Deep fried foie gras balls that were coated in something that seemed to include ground almonds. We were encouraged to eat these meltingly wonderful balls of tastiness in a single bite.
Octopus, quail egg, and avocado on a bed of lentils with pig’s knuckles (see picture)
Sardine filets on carrot ribbons, currants, pine nuts, and capers (see picture)
Deep fried taramosalata balls a red pepper aioli (see picture)
Oxtail gyro with lemon tzaziki and winter squash on warm pita (see picture)
Slow cooked egg with home made yogurt
Celery soup with deep fried sea urchin and sweetbreads (I tried to convince myself that it was sea urchin with sweetbread crumbs)
Foie gras baklava- rounds of foie gras and phyllo dough, wild arugula, caramel, hazelnuts, and fleur de sel

Then Phyllis and I each got different dishes that we would eat half of, then swap wine glasses and plates, and eat the rest.

Some lovely crackers showed up at the table at this point. They had herbs and cheese and tasty things in them. We could not tell. They kept trying to take them away, but we eventually took them home.

Scallop ravioli (see picture—so dainty and cute) with cauliflower and house made chorizo; Baby lamb cooked in milk on pepperadelle

Squab with figs, some kind of interesting sausage, croquette, mushroom (see picture); Rare venison with fennel pollen, petit mousakka, and spicy fennel and red pepper slaw (see picture).

Cheese course – some firm, aged cow cheese from New Jersey, Mt. Tam, and a very strong blue cheese with toasted brioche and meyer lemon marmalade

Dessert #1- blood orange granita home made yogurt that must have been made from heavy cream.

Dessert #2- again, Phyllis and I got different dishes, flourless chocolate cake with olive oil gelato and an olive oil crisp; panna cotta on chocolate crumbs with fruit compote and other tasty fruit gelato (we were in a food stupor by then)

They also gave us some lollipops to take home with us. We forget the other flavor, but one is saffron-banana.

The dessert wines were lovely. I had asked the sommelier about a spiced red dessert wine that I had tried in Italy but could not find over here (for lack of knowing the name and a few other small technical problems). What he brought was a bit too much like sweet vermouth, but it was tasty.

We should have taken notes on the wine, but now we have an excuse to go back. There was a wonderful Reisling that was from Western Germany near Strassbourg/ Alsace. It had a rich, Muscat-like mouth feel, but not the cloying or lingering in anyway. It was a lovely clean finish. We think that it was paired with the egg through to the baklava.

If you want to go, you should make reservations. There are about a dozen tables, and most of the people were there for the tasting menu. It seems that they have seatings at 6:15 and 9:00, but it took us over three hours to eat, so it was not a bad idea to start early. Although it seems like an insane amount of food, it really was not. Most of the courses were just a few bites. We were full at the end, but not unreasononably so. Each course was a surprise. The evening was an incredible, and completely worthwhile, indulgence. Unquestionably the most interesting and best food that I have ever had.