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1509 17th St. NW
(202) 986-2627
Hours of Operation and Prices
Open: M-Th 11:30 am-11, F-Sat 11:30-midnight, Sun 5-11
Entrees: $5.50-$14.50
Other Information
• All major credit cards
• Dress: casual
• No Reservations
• Street parking
• Handicapped Accessible
• For the two other branches of Il Radicchio: 1211 Wisconsin Ave. NW, (202) 337-2627, and 1801 Clarendon Blvd,, Arlington, Va. (703) 276-2627.
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I like the formula here: an endless bowl of spaghetti with the sauce or sauces of your choice bought à la carte from a long list, nicely wood-baked pizzas with a wide variety of toppings, a few sandwiches and specials from the rotisserie. I like the prices: modest. I like the environment: sweet colors and whimsical murals of barnyard animals and outsize vegetables. And now that the lines have abated and reason can reign, I like the service: breezy and efficient.
Il Radicchio is Roberto Donna's restaurant chain, and so far it's spread to Georgetown and Rosslyn. Nobody would compare it with his Galileo or I Matti. The chairs are flimsy, the floors are bare.
The tomato sauces are likely to run thin, the rotisserie lamb (Thursday's special) is dreary, and the pasta is neither homemade nor exotically shaped - it's just plain old spaghetti. The point is that this is Italian almost-fast food - quick, easy and cheap, yet still authentic and good. For less than $10 you can eat admirable, yeasty, puffy pizza with respectable ingredients, or have as much pasta as you can eat, topped with seasonal sauces containing fresh herbs, in-the-shell seafood and reliably virginal olive oil.
© Copyright 1998 The Washington Post Company
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