Dish

Edited excerpts from the Going Out Gurus blog, http://voices.washingtonpost.com/goingoutgurus:

The owner of the wine-themed Proof in Penn Quarter has signed a lease for a second restaurant in Logan Circle. Estadio is its name, and Spanish will be its game.

"Everyone else is doing Italian," says Mark Kuller. "I thought we should do something different." Estadio (that's "stadium" in Spanish) is taking the spot vacated by the Garden District store at 1520 14th St. NW (at Church Street); the 100-or-so-seat restaurant is expected to be serving northern Spanish food by late spring or early summer, Kuller says.

The restaurateur has asked his chef at Proof, Haidar Karoum, to head the open kitchen, although Estadio's day-to-day chef will be another member of the Proof team who is yet to be named. Meanwhile, Proof's expert wine and drinks mavens, Sebastian Zutant and Adam Bernbach, will be overseeing all things liquid. Estadio's wine list will be 80 percent Spanish.

Around the time the deal was inked last Thursday, Kuller asked for the blessing of José Andrés, a friend but also the muse behind the successful Jaleo tapas restaurants in Penn Quarter, Bethesda and Crystal City. "Looking at the D.C. landscape," says Kuller, "there's really nothing else that's not old-school." Andrés not only promised to connect Kuller with chefs and restaurants in Spain for a tour Kuller is planning in January but also pledged to show up for Estadio's launch party.

Kuller is looking to Casa Mono, the popular Spanish restaurant created by New York celeb chef Mario Batali, as an inspiration. The Washington space already has the advantage of a high ceiling and big front windows, says the restaurateur.

News of Estadio made us wonder: Does Kuller have other edible projects in mind? "I'd love to do a [restaurant like] Momofuku here, and I'd love to do a breakfast place here. But it's one at a time."

-- Tom Sietsema