The Best Tasting Menus Near Peerce's, by the Record

A tucked-away tasting menu for about 20 people in Blagden Alley, Causa fuses Japanese technique with Peruvian ingredients in a cuisine called Nikkei. The chef structures the meal as a journey from Lima's coast up through the Andes to the Amazon, so the menu moves with a logic you feel before you understand it. It holds a Michelin star and a James Beard Award for Best Chef: Mid-Atlantic. Bring someone you want to impress, or just go alone and take notes.

1. Michelin Guide 1 Star
2. James Beard Awards 2025 · Winner · Best Chef: Mid-Atlantic · Carlos Delgado
3. James Beard Awards 2023 · Nominee · Best New Restaurant

A nine-course vegetable tasting menu in Shaw where the chef holds a James Beard Award and a Michelin star, and still manages to make a beet taste like pastrami. Rob Rubba's kitchen treats local farms as the whole point, not a selling line, and the results are the kind of thing that makes omnivores quietly reconsider their priorities. The bread alone, enriched with "garleeks" and served with sunflower-marigold butter, gets talked about for days afterward.

1. James Beard Awards 2023 · Winner · Outstanding Chef · Rob Rubba
2. Michelin Guide 1 Star
3. Food & Wine The Top 15 US Restaurants

A moss wall and a foie gras "negroni" topped with Campari gelée tell you pretty quickly that this is not a low-key bistro. Ryan Ratino's contemporary New American spot on 14th Street holds a Michelin star and earns it with cooking that is quietly surreal without being smug about it. The room is warm enough that you forget you're at a special-occasion restaurant until the check arrives.

1. AAA Four Diamonds
2. Michelin Guide 1 Star
3. The New York Times The 25 Best Restaurants in Washington, D.C., Right Now

A corn broth that quietly dismantles everything you thought about corn broth is a good sign you're in the right place. Elcielo is a Michelin-starred fine dining tasting menu restaurant near Union Market where the Colombian-born chef turns his home country into a deeply personal, course-by-course argument. The chocotherapy dessert has become a thing people mention unprompted. The room runs warm in a way that doesn't feel managed.

1. Michelin Guide 1 Star
2. The Rammys Finalist · Service Program of the Year
3. The Rammys Finalist · Formal Fine Dining Restaurant of the Year

The neon hallway cuts through the dark room like a sign that you're not at a standard chophouse. Beloved BBQ is a Japanese steakhouse where central circular grills anchor each table and A5 Wagyu is the main event, cooked tableside. The fried rice, finished by the server so every grain catches the fat, is the kind of dish that quietly upstages the headliner. Find it inside Capitol Crossing.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
2. Eater The Best Tasting Menus in D.C. Right Now

1. Eater Where to Find the Best Sushi Around D.C.
2. Eater The Best Tasting Menus in D.C. Right Now