By Tom Sietsema
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, Oct. 18, 2009

At a time when every other new restaurant is flavored Italian and the economy has forced chefs to go easy on the caviar and truffles, it's reassuring to know about Marcel's. Of all the upscale French contenders on the scene, this one, named for the oldest son of veteran chef Robert Wiedmaier, is the one I'm most eager to return to. The service is suave without being stuffy, the lighting erases whatever worry lines exist, and the setting -- picture a barrel-vaulted ceiling and rich banquettes -- marries comfort with beauty. Plump boudin blanc and garlicky Burgundian snails live up to their status as classics. And if you're looking for a stellar steak, you're apt to find it here in the form of bison entrecote: lean, ruddy and enhanced with a heady wine reduction and a delicate marrow custard. Diver scallops treated to a tropical slaw and a bright mandarin orange sauce, and, in season, soft-shell crabs sheathed in tempura show off the kitchen's lighter but no less luscious side. It's easy to spend a lot here (the wine list is a treasure), but that's not necessary. Long before the recession, Marcel's offered a three-course, pre-theater menu that included car service to and from the Kennedy Center. The deal, now $52, still warrants a standing ovation.

Honeyed lighting and a tuxedoed staff set the scene for a night of indulgence. Marcel's is the most expensive of the pre-theater menus I sampled -- indeed, it is one of the costliest restaurants in the city -- but once you experience the details of the deal, the price of admission makes sense.

The breads are baked in-house, and they're lovely. The amuse-bouche might be a demitasse of chive-flecked mushroom consomme that tastes like the distillation of a forest. Elegant meringue cookies follow the dessert course, and a sedan purrs out front, waiting to whisk you to the Kennedy Center at your meal's conclusion.

Then there's the French-accented cooking, precise and fetchingly displayed, of chef-owner Robert Wiedmaier, who presides over Marcel's from a raised kitchen with a view of the richly appointed dining room. Fresh pea soup is poured at the table into a bowl holding a few fine veal meatballs. The liquid tastes of spring. A roseate slab of duck liver pate arrives on a large white plate with flossy greens, diced fruit or a pinch of celery root slaw dressing each corner. I'm fond of an entree of salmon -- its skin as crisp and light as a potato chip, its flesh soft and succulent -- bedded on a buttery potato puree and moistened with a tomato-flecked beurre blanc. But slices of pork, while perfectly proper, are also perfectly unexciting.

The best part of a chocolate chiffon cake is its velvety scoop of rum-raisin ice cream that doesn't stint on the spirit. Marcel's reminds you how wonderful creme brulee can be when it's done right. Here, the silken custard is cool, its thin sugar crust crackles at the touch of a tine, and the dessert is staged in a shallow square with macerated berries in a raised ramekin and with a fragile orange-scented cookie. Throw in service that sees to your every wish, and you've got a pretty grand performance.

--Tom Sietsema (May 13, 2007)

The Deal: Three-course dinner for $52 includes car service to and from the Kennedy Center
The Time Frame: Daily 5:30 to 7 p.m.
Nearby Stages: Kennedy Center
Reality Check: $75 a person with a glass of wine, tax and tip