Wednesday, July 30, 2008

MEATY MATTERS: California chef Michael Mina is joining forces with the Four Seasons Hotel in Georgetown (2800 Pennsylvania Ave. NW) to open a steakhouse, Bourbon Steak, in December.

Yet another meat market in a city that's packed with them? Mina is betting that Bourbon Steak, with branches in Detroit, Miami and Scottsdale, Ariz., can set itself apart from the competition by relying on technique: The restaurant's beef is slow-poached in clarified butter and herbs before it's grilled over a wood fire. The chef says the warm marinade makes for tender and more flavorful eating.

Homage in part to the establishment's rich bourbon selection, Bourbon Steak will replace the luxury hotel's Garden Terrace lounge on the ground floor; it will be designed by New Yorker David Rockwell. A popular Washington figure, Mark Politzer of City Zen in the Mandarin Oriental Hotel, has been hired to assume general manager duties at the future restaurant. (His last day at CityZen is Sept. 6.) A chef has yet to be appointed for Bourbon Steak, although Mina, best known for his eponymous four-star dining room in San Francisco, has narrowed the choices to two candidates, neither of whom is in the Washington area.

Mina says he based his decision to open in Washington in part on "who else is there" and the large number of Washington area diners he encountered in his 13 restaurants across the country. Plus, "Georgetown and the Four Seasons seemed like a good fit."

He likes the city enough to plan to be here on New Year's Eve, when he expects to be cooking at his latest project.

-- Tom Sietsema