First Bite: Simply Home Is Now DC Noodles

Simply Home is simply gone.

The U Street establishment, which was part retail and part (Thai) restaurant, closed after the inauguration so its owners could rethink the concept. Taking its place are DC Noodles (1410 U St. NW; 202-232-8424. http://www.dcnoodles.com) and Stem, which emphasize inexpensive food and fashion accessories, respectively, over $20 entrees and home furnishings.

While "the economy was a factor" in the switch, co-owner Sak Pollert says, "I've always wanted to open a noodle house."

Simply Home's dining room was a study in minimalism set off with a chocolate-colored ceiling, white leather banquette and light fixtures fashioned from silk cocoons. The menu's strengths included a Caesar salad swabbed with lemon grass dressing and chili-ignited chopped raw tuna tucked into bite-size phyllo purses.

DC Noodles opened in February with marshmallow-white chairs framing bare tables, alternating gray and red walls and a mural that trumpets the kitchen's theme. The outsize painting, created by local graffiti artist Tim Conlon, depicts a mustachioed Asian man with a bowl of noodles.

The new menu is all about the obvious: noodles "from the wok," in salads, in soups and swirled into curries. A big bowl of clear broth with floating shrimp, bok choy, cilantro and rice noodles (diners get a choice of thin, wide or even egg noodles) is easy on the eyes but falls flat on the tongue. It needs fish sauce or something assertive to tie everything together.

But every other dish I sampled -- the sweet-then-fiery green curry chicken, the drunken noodles tossed with folds of pork and jalapeño pepper slices -- was something that could easily become a habit.

Only a few staples from Simply Home carry over to DC Noodles. They include pad Thai and flaky, pumpkin-filled empanadas. Big Sriyutthana, who previously cooked at Pollert's other restaurant, Rice in Logan Circle, presides over the kitchen here.

The guy smiling down from the wall at DC Noodles looks a lot like Pollert, so much so that a diner sitting at the bar one night poses the question to the restaurateur. "Is that supposed to be you?"

Pollert laughs, shakes his head and calls it a coincidence. "I don't have a mustache!"

Noodle dishes, $12-$14.