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| Photo by Emily Clack |
By: Mike Pfeifer
Teddy and The Bully Bar, Alan Popovsky’s second
presidential-themed restaurant in the nation’s capital, showed off its goods to
the media last Wednesday and allowed us food critics and bloggers to enter the
arena, although we left happy and content rather than marred by dust and sweat
and blood (to borrow a quote from the restaurant’s namesake).
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| By Emily Clack |
The restaurant, tucked away off of 19th St. next to Mai Thai in Golden Triangle, welcomes guests with gigantic floor-to-ceiling windows and an interior that blends intimacy and functionality to project the feeling that it’s capable of both entertaining while at the same time serving a much needed purpose. An impressive assortment of art and sculpture is featured in the restaurant (some for sale!), each piece trying to capture and represent a different facet of the 26th president’s persona. There is the Monocle Chandelier, the identity of which requires a keen eye to locate, that hangs just inside the front door.
The
walls of the main dining room are full of taxidermy to honor Roosevelt’s
passion for hunting, although none are your traditional fury beasts but rather
take on a unique artistic approach of their own. Perhaps most striking are the real Aspen
trees that border the private dining room on one end. “Speak softly, and carry a big stick” is how
Roosevelt defined his foreign-policy approach, and ownership did not want their
restaurant to be without a nod to this outlook.
The restaurant does a good job of making his presence felt throughout
without having the feel of a presidential library.
The food and drinks certainly carry their own big stick and
do not speak softly. Loudest and most
powerful are the seafood fritters, beer-battered and made with oyster, scallop,
and crab meat. The fritters themselves provide
a novel taste worth coming back for but when combined with the green curry
tarragon sauce the end result is nothing short of presidential.
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| By Emily Clack |
Equally as remarkable are the onion rings
with spicy BBQ sauce. The rings are made
with shallots instead of the traditional red onion and therefore resemble a
fried calamari dish more than anything.
They are dipped in buttermilk before being crispy fried and amazingly do
not have a greasy feel to them whatsoever.
The spicy BBQ sauce finds a balance between having a kick and remaining
conscious of the low spice thresholds that exist out there, much to this food
blogger’s relief. The overall taste of
the combination is satisfying and has a burnt flavor to it, and the modest size
of the onion rings allows you to have no qualms with eating a majority of the
appetizer. Diners beware—the BBQ sauce
will stain if not treated right away.
This blogger learned that the hard way and had to spend virtually the
entire event with a noticeably sized spill on his shirt that screamed, “I have
an eating problem.”
Both of these items will be featured on the happy hour menu
and should be taken advantage of accordingly.
The happy hour offerings, indeed the entire drink menu, have much to
entice those looking to wind down a long day at the office.
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| Photo by Emily Clack |
Successful mixologist John Hogan pays homage
to the Prohibitionist-era cocktails by providing a mix of both classic and
modern cocktails on the menu. Of
particular note is the Strawberry Shrub Julep, a Woodford bourbon mixed with
Gorman farm strawberry shrub and mint and served in a Moscow Mule jar
(chilly!).
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| By Emily Clack |
Also featured is the Sheeny’s Rickey, his version of the native Washington drink, which includes Green Hat gin and Woodford bourbon reduction and is topped with sweet lime foam. Hogan plans to enter the drink into the DC Craft Bartenders Rickey Competition, which occurs throughout the month of July, and his creation stands a good chance. Both drinks provide some serious taste and are indicative of a cocktail menu that will be as bold as the president for whom the restaurant is named after. While it wasn’t provided Wednesday, the appropriately named Ruff Rider Daiquiri, aged for 26 days (not a coincidence) in charred new American oak should tilt some heads back.
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| Watermelon Panna Cotta |
Teddy and The Bully Bar is a fun restaurant that will
delight and satisfy any who make the decision to venture there for a drink or a
meal. It’s visually engaging and substantively
appetizing and satisfying. The service
staff is friendly and prepared to tell you anything about the food that you’re
eating, the drinks that you’re drinking, or the president whose personality
you’re temporarily adopting. One final
unique feature of the restaurant is its own in-house bakery that will be making
its own bread, biscuits (akin to its sister restaurant Lincoln), and cookies
daily.
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