Journeys Close to Home

** Seoul House

11272 James Swart Circle, Fairfax

703-934-8250

Open: lunch Monday through Friday 11:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m., Sunday 11:30 a.m. to 3 p.m.; dinner Monday through Saturday 11:30 a.m. to 10:30 p.m., Sunday 11:30 a.m. to 10 p.m. All major credit cards. Smoking at dinner only. Free parking. Prices: lunch buffet $7.95 to $13.95, dinner entrees $9.95 to $24.95.

SOUND CHECK: 73 (decibels)

Must speak with raised voice

Gas is priced as if it were liquid gold, and airfares have shot through the stratosphere. But that doesn't mean you have to forgo a summer vacation abroad if you want one. Here are three restaurants that demonstrate that you don't always need a passport to travel.

Half the menu is Moroccan, half is Greek at Casbah Cafe in Georgetown. So I turn to my waiter for some direction. Go with what you like, he encourages me. If you don't see anything you like, we'll try to make something for you.

That won't be necessary, because lots of dishes are calling to me: chicken tagine, moussaka, kefta, spanakopita -- indeed, the choices read like a greatest hits list from the Mediterranean. And what follows from the kitchen proves my waiter right. Herby falafel (made the Egyptian way, with fava beans instead of chickpeas) on a drift of garlicky hummus and cinnamon-spiced ground beef wrapped in cabbage pay nice tribute to Greece. Fat phyllo cigars of shredded chicken and almonds -- a twist on the famous bisteeya -- and a fluffy pyramid of couscous with chicken and artichokes do Morocco proud. There are even pizzas that speak to the two-cuisine format, with toppings of artichokes, feta and tomato (the Mykonos), or chicken and eggplant, a.k.a. Casablanca. Lamb souvlaki is tough and underseasoned, but shrimp on a chunky bed of tomato is bright with preserved lemon and wine.

You can tell the regulars from the newbies here; the former frequently don't bother to look at the menu, because the staff knows their preferences.

The dining room -- long, mirror-lined and sharing a side door with Ledo Pizza -- is neat and tidy, but not particularly reflective of either Morocco or Greece. The soundtrack, on the other hand, places us in a sun-drenched somewhere, feeling as if we're eating the efforts of a good home cook -- who, it turns out, is also the owner, Egyptian-born T.D. Diab. Hehints that the menu might change down the road. I don't like people to get bored, he tells me on the telephone, after I've eaten there. Fat chance, I think to myself, hoping to find more of the same foreign intrigue the next time around.

Let's go to Bavaria! implores a framed travel poster on the wall of Schmankerl Stube. Yet to look around the 20-year-old restaurant, whose waitresses are costumed in dirndls and whose music could accompany Oktoberfest, is to suggest we're already in Germany. And once the drinks and food start hitting the table, there's no doubt that this warren of cozy dining rooms, 70 miles from downtown Washington in western Maryland, is what Germans would rightly call echt -- real or genuine.