Chris Raynal isn’t sure how to identify himself on phone calls these days. “I always would say, ‘It’s Chris from Montmartre,’ but I guess I can’t say that anymore,” he says.
Montmartre and its next-door sister pizzeria, Seventh Hill, closed in March, and the pair say their restaurants won’t be welcoming diners back as states and cities lift restrictions on dining.
Less than three miles up Pennsylvania Avenue, President Trump on Monday boasted in a White House meeting with restaurateurs that he had “saved” their industry, which has been battered like few others by the coronavirus pandemic, leaving millions unemployed and many restaurants on the brink. But for Raynal and Lezla, like many owners around the country, salvation didn’t appear to be in sight.
“You realize little by little what’s coming toward you,” says Lezla, the chef who oversaw the kitchens, while Raynal managed the front of the house. “And we realized the numbers just weren’t going to make sense for us.”
According to a survey by the National Restaurant Association, 4 out of 10 restaurants are closed due to the pandemic, and 3 percent of restaurants have closed permanently. The Census Bureau found that 57 percent of stand-alone food establishments were at least partially closed at the beginning of the month; more than half reported missing payments such as rent or payroll. Those figures are expected to rise, though no one is certain how lasting the damage from shutdowns will be. Chef, TV personality and prominent restaurateur Tom Colicchio drew a collective gasp when he predicted early in the crisis that 75 percent of restaurants wouldn’t survive.
The Montmartre founders’ calculations would sound all too familiar to fellow restaurant owners around the country. Rent was due, utilities had to be paid. They had missed out on the revenue from March, April and May, typically booming months when millions of tourists stream into the city to see the famed cherry blossoms and the monuments in spring. “That’s when you’re like a squirrel that puts his nuts in a tree,” says Lezla, 49. “When you miss that . . .” he trails off, his voice suggesting a resigned shrug.
Things weren’t going to get better soon, or at least soon enough. Even in flush times Raynal and Lezla depended on a full house to turn a profit. But they knew the mayor wouldn’t let reopening restaurants pack their dining rooms anytime soon.
And Washington’s minimum wage is set to rise to $15 in July. For years, the co-owners said, they had tried to manage rising costs without raising prices so high they would discourage neighbors from popping in for a Tuesday-night bite.
“It was a perfect storm,” Lezla says. “Well, not perfect.”
When restaurants do reopen, Lezla isn’t sure if the experience will be something he would recognize. He didn’t get into the business to serve jumpy patrons in an atmosphere of anxiety. “Restaurants are made to be enjoyable — you want to talk, relax, have your cocktail,” he says. “You don’t want to stress out because someone sneezed behind you.”
So late last month they began calling their former employees to tell them they wouldn’t be opening back up. Several of them had been with them since the very beginning, and many others had tenures going back five or 10 years. Last week, they opened again, briefly, but only to sell the remaining stock of wine, beer and whatever food they could.
Word of the closure began to spread this week, with neighbors and regulars reacting with sadness, if not surprise.
In an email to The Post, Sen. Mark R. Warner (D-Va.), who often enjoyed mussels and a salad after evening votes, said he was saddened to hear the news. “I have many fond memories of late dinners at Montmartre, and I’m so sad to hear they are closing,” he wrote.
Raynal and Lezla, both French natives, met while working together at the now-closed restaurant Lavandou in Cleveland Park and later at Georgetown’s Bistro Lepic. They soon started dreaming of opening their own place — a neighborhood spot, small and cozy, a place where people would come not just for special occasions, but for weeknight dinners.
They settled on a spot near Eastern Market and opened Sept. 1, 2001, serving the very same classic bistro fare they were still making almost 20 years later. Ten days after they opened, terrorist attacks paralyzed the city. Still, almost immediately, they were packed; the neighborhood had far fewer upscale options than it does today. They opened Seventh Hill in 2009.
The proximity to the Capitol and the Supreme Court (about six blocks away) meant that members of Congress and the occasional justice mingled with the Montmartre crowds. Lezla says he was sometimes surprised to spot people he knew only as regulars in the news. “I would watch TV and say, ‘Oh, there’s my customer! He was in just last night!’ ”
Boldfaced name or no, Raynal said he relished watching his customers’ lives — through dating, marriages, babies, new jobs, anniversaries. “Eventually, you see them coming with children,” says Raynal, 57. “And little by little they grow, and then you see these children as almost adults. Now they are taller than I am.”
Lezla and Raynal hope to open another restaurant someday. Maybe on Capitol Hill? “I don’t know if we can afford it,” Lezla says.
For now, Lezla is tending his garden in Arlington (“It’s never looked so good!”) and Raynal is enjoying bike rides with his 4-year-old son.
Raynal, who lived in the neighborhood for years before moving last year to Alexandria, wonders who will take over the space. To make enough to cover rising rent, he figures it might have to be a corporate-backed chain. Neighbors who love the area’s quirks and the mom-and-pops worry, too; a Sephora and a Trader Joe’s have popped up across the street. A location of Le Pain Quotidien occupies a prime corner space.
I should mention that I am one of those neighbors. Since moving to Capitol Hill 15 years ago, my husband and I have often sipped cold white wine on Montmartre’s patio and devoured country pâté in its cozy dining room. We brought our parents, celebrated birthdays and consoled ourselves after long workweeks.
As Montmartre’s employees lose their livelihoods and Lezla and Raynal their very identities, it feels selfish to mourn my own loss in its closure. I’ll miss the braised rabbit, one of our very favorite dishes in the city, a rich dish of silky brown meat accented with mushrooms and olives, decadently served alongside a tangle of pasta in a truffled cream sauce.
In our house, both the dish and the restaurant are known simply as “the Bunny.” “Where do you want to eat on Friday?” my husband might ask. If I raised my hands up to my head, forming rabbit ears, the plan was set.
We aren’t alone in loving it. In a 2001 review of the new bistro in town, Post food critic Tom Sietsema called the dish “a meal that seduces the senses” and noted that just seeing it served to other tables was enough to prompt envy among diners. Lezla says chefs from other restaurants around town would often come with their wives on Sunday nights, when many of their own places were closed, just to eat it.
Just last week, Raynal said he was leaving the restaurant when a regular spotted him outside. When he learned it was closing for good, he waxed eloquent about his favorite dish, prompting the once-and-future restaurateur to offer one final bit of hospitality.
“I told him to wait a minute,” he says.
Raynal went to the kitchen’s freezer and fetched four packages of rabbit meat that the restaurant no longer needed. The customer went home happy, one last time.
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