2010 Fall Dining Guide

By Tom Sietsema
Sunday, October 17, 2010

The Tabard Inn and I go back decades, but I still feel a flutter in my chest whenever I see its menu. So many enticements! I want to order one of each when the choices include a fat soft-shell crab garnished with juicy grapefruit and napped with a passion-fruit-accented brown butter sauce; seared scallops accompanied by ricotta-filled squash blossoms and a nest of squid-ink pasta jazzed up with preserved lemon; and a mixed grill that lets me savor plump quail, juicy duck sausages and roseate lamb chops, along with haricots verts cooked just right. The nut-crusted halibut might be dry, but you have to applaud the peach relish and plantain chips the fish shows up with. Named after the lodging place in Chaucer's "Canterbury Tales," the business dates to 1922, but the kitchen, under executive chef Paul Pelt, is very much of the moment. Packaged in a low ceiling and black-and-while tile floor, the main dining room proves cramped and clattery. I prefer the cozier space upstairs or, better yet, the enclosed garden if the weather allows. The inn's address, on a quiet, tree-lined street near Dupont Circle, gives it the air of a well-kept secret. The occupied couches in the firelit lounge tell you otherwise: You'd better have a reservation.