2007 Fall Dining Guide
By Tom Sietsema
Washington Post Magazine
Sunday, Oct. 14, 2007

Dupont Circle isn't as delicious as it used to be -- remember the heyday of Obelisk and the original Johnny's Half Shell? -- yet certain restaurants pull me back to the neighborhood, and one of them is Mourayo. Its Greek name (which means moor) is alluded to in a subtle nautical theme of faux portholes on the walls and sailor's caps on servers' heads; in good weather, a table near the open window up front is almost like sitting outdoors. Mourayo is not your papa's Greek restaurant. While it's possible to find phyllo-wrapped cheese pies and lamb chops on this menu, such common traditions are outnumbered by the likes of squid-ink soup, duck moussaka and (in winter) a goat stew that wards off any chill with chunks of soft meat served with a drift of tart yogurt in a vegetable-laced broth. Keep the restaurant's name in mind when ordering: Seafood -- shrimp in a sauce of tomato and feta cheese, a whip of salt cod and potatoes, whole fish kept moist in a crust of salt -- is a better course than meat. And anything that sounds homey (beef-and-lamb meatballs over rice, walnut cake moistened with honey) is apt to make you happy to have spent an hour or so on what could pass for a docked yacht.