We Just Updated Our Washington, D.C. Dining Guide
I was born and raised in the D.M.V. — the D.C., Maryland and Virginia area — and I've always bristled when people talk about D.C.'s reputation as a 'steakhouses for senators' town. That characterization ignores the abundance of diverse, independent restaurants that are, and have always been, part of the city's dining scene. I can still remember my first bite of injera and tibs at an Ethiopian restaurant in Adams Morgan, or jerk chicken sandwiches at Negril in Silver Spring, or sweet-and-sour pork at a Chinese restaurant near the Gallery Place Metro station.
Those restaurants, among others, created fertile ground for the dynamic dining scene in D.C. today, which includes deeply personal cooking, like that at Pascual, where the chef Isabel Coss showcases her love for her native Mexico City in several dishes. But dining here is also fun, as evidenced by the playful baked Alaska at Providencia on the busy H Street corridor, or the Taylor Swift songs you'll hear blasting at Moon Rabbit, or the surprising Japanese American mash-ups you'll find at Perry's in Adams Morgan.
Here are three dining options worth considering on your next visit to the nation's capitol.
Sometime during your meal at Pascual, you will get the feeling that you're not only eating delicious and modern takes on Mexican cooking, but also that you're getting the chef Isabel Coss's most beloved and personal tastes of home. All of your senses are engaged here; snapper aguachile with tart lime and heady lemongrass accents snaps the room into focus, while the char on the lamb-neck barbacoa makes you acutely aware of the open wood-fire grill. Reservations can be hard to come by, but dropping in on the early side, around 5 p.m., is always a good bet.
732 Maryland Ave NE, Capitol Hill
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Eater
an hour ago
- Eater
U.S. Open 2025: What to Eat During the Big Tennis Tournament in Queens
The U.S. Open is nearly here. Come late August and early September, tennis fans will gather at the sprawling USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center in Flushing Meadows-Corona Park, Queens, to cheer on their favorite tennis players, potentially like defending champions Jannik Sinner and Aryna Sabalenka, as well as Venus Williams, Novak Djokovic, Taylor Fritz, Coco Gauff, and others. And since so many people will be flocking to Queens for all things tennis, Eater is here to help you figure out what and where you should eat and drink. Choose among plenty of big-name chefs operating pop-up restaurants, familiar New York City food businesses, and plentiful cocktails and wines. First-time restaurants to the U.S. Open dining grounds include New Jersey Italian Japanese restaurant Pasta Ramen and José Andrés's Manhattan Mexican restaurant Oyamel. Then there's returning favorites like fancy chicken nuggets and caviar-slinging Coqodaq, the socially minded Migrant Kitchen, and chefs Kwame Onwuachi and Masaharu Morimoto. (Alas, no churros so far, so you can't reenact that Challengers scene.) The U.S. Open takes place from Sunday, August 24, through Sunday, September 7. Before that, there's the U.S. Open Fan Week from Monday, August 18 to Saturday, August 23, which is open to the public for free, where people can watch the exciting Open Mixed Doubles Championship. Coco Gauff at the U.S. Open in 2024. Angela Weiss/AFP via Getty Images Where to Eat at the U.S. Open The best of the food options at the tennis tournament grounds. Oyamel at Dobel Tequila Club The tequila brand tagged José Andrés's new Mexican restaurant Oyamel to cook at its U.S. Open bar. Expect porky tacos with cochinita and chilorio, alongside cocktails. Location: Arthur Ashe Stadium, near the President's Entry The Montclair, New Jersey restaurant is making its U.S. Open debut with its wafu Italian specialties by chef Robbie Relice. The Japanese Italian menu will include the temomi shrimp scampi ramen, made with ponzu and garlic. Locations: The New York Post reports that the restaurant will pop up at random sites on the grounds during the tournament. Empanadas from the Migrant Kitchen. The Migrant Kitchen The NYC restaurant is focused on feeding New Yorkers, where a portion of its proceeds — including this tennis restaurant — funds its initiative. The menu highlights its blend of Middle Eastern and Latin American dishes. Expect chicken mole bowls; empanadas with chicken tinga or mushroom-spinach-cheese; a braised beef sandwich; falafel bowls; and hazelnut doughnuts. There are vegetarian, vegan, and gluten-free options. Locations: Food Village; Louis Armstrong Stadium main concourse The CQDQ food stall in the Food Village will offer those nuggets alongside the new crispy chicken sandwiches and sides. The Arthur Ashe club level location won't have those sandwiches, but it'll have the fancier nuggets paired with caviar. Locations: Food Village; Arthur Ashe Stadium club level Aces This on-site restaurant operates only during the U.S. Open with a bunch of notable chefs on board. Iron Chef Masaharu Morimoto will be offering sushi, naturally (his New Jersey restaurant will have just opened too by then). Caribbean chef superstar chef Kwame Onwuachi will be cooking as well. The two chefs will collaborate on the Laotian wagyu rib-eye skewers with maitake mushrooms and a pineapple chile jam. And then chef Ed Brown will serve seafood dishes too, such as jumbo lump crab cakes. There will be vegan and vegetarian options. Keep in mind it's only open to people who have Courtside Box and Luxury Suite tickets. Reservations are required. Location: Arthur Ashe Stadium, Club Level, Near Gate 4 Summers are for lobster rolls, especially from the Brooklyn seafood restaurant. In addition to the ones available in the Connecticut and Maine styles, there is also a lobster BLT, fish and chips, fish sandwiches, lobster fries, shrimp citrus salad, and more. Locations: Food Village, Louis Armstrong Stadium upper concourse The New York taqueria chain will serve up tacos, burritos, and bowls with fillings like carnitas, pollo asado, and vegetables, alongside loaded nachos, queso, and guacamole. Locations: Food Village; Grandstand Food Village A Neapolitan pie from San Matteo. San Matteo The Upper East Side pizzeria will be slinging its Neapolitan-style pies with toppings like the margherita-pepperoni and the prosciutto, plus the option to add fresh burrata. There are vegetarian, vegan, and dairy-free options. Locations: Food Village; Grandstand Food Village; Arthur Ashe Stadium loge on the promenade Gates 25 and 36; and Louis Armstrong Stadium main and upper concourses Celebrity chef Josh Capon is bringing two outposts of his seafood restaurant within a private members club to the tennis grounds. Expect East and West coast oysters, Bay scallop ceviches, lobster rolls, shrimp cocktails, and crab cakes. There are gluten-free options. Locations: Between Court 7 and the Grandstand; Arthur Ashe Stadium club level at Gate 4 This outpost of the classic New York restaurant is the best for out-of-towners who don't have the bandwidth to explore outside of the U.S. Open grounds. There are hot pastrami sandwiches, hot dogs, and cheesecake. Location: Food Village The growing New York ice cream company will be offering up scoops of its frozen sweets in cones, cups, and milkshakes. It'll offer an exclusive flavor too — the honeycomb fudge slam, where the sweet cream ice cream is studded with honeycomb candies and fudge swirls. There are vegan and dairy-free options. Locations: Backyard x 17, Food Village, outside Louis Armstrong Stadium, the stadium's main concourse, Arthur Ashe Stadium loge on the promenade level's east and west sections U.S. Open attendees at the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center in the rest of the dining options One of the men's singles matches at the U.S. Open in to Drink at the U.S. Open The Italian coffee brand will churn out many caffeinated options, from iced coffees to cappuccinos to cold brews to boozy espresso martinis. Location: Grandstand Food Village and Food Village Get spritzes and small plates from the apertivo brand's bars and carts. Food-wise, there are vegetarian and gluten-free options. Where to find it: Multiple places Draft beers from the Dutch brewery brand, including light and nonalcoholic versions. 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Where to Eat and Drink Elsewhere in New York City Hop on the subway and explore the rest of NYC. A sunset at the Arthur Ashe Stadium during the U.S. Open 2024. Kena Betancur/AFP via Getty Images Things to Know While Attending the U.S. Open The Queens tennis grounds include the iconic Arthur Ashe Stadium, the Louis Armstrong Stadium, and the Grandstand Stadium, as well as several courts. So, yes, wear comfortable shoes to walk around and get to and from the matches. Per the wonderful Queens summer sports tradition of baseball meets tennis, the New York Mets will be playing home games at the nearby Citi Field from Monday, August 25, through Sunday, August 31. Take the 7 train to witness the swarm of sports fans splitting off to either the stadium or the tennis grounds. It'll be hot — hydrate and wear sunscreen. And bring a light layer if it gets chillier in the evenings. No glass containers or outside booze. Metal and plastic water bottles are okay. People can bring in only one bag — no backpacks or coolers — that is 12 inches by 12 inches by 16 inches. Drawstring bags are okay. No on-site businesses will accept cash — there are loadable card machines on the grounds dubbed reverse ATMs. Eater NY All your essential food and restaurant intel delivered to you Email (required) Sign Up By submitting your email, you agree to our Terms and Privacy Notice . This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
Atlantic
4 hours ago
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What's Really Behind the Cult of Labubu
A furry fiend with rabbit ears and a maniacal grin has recently been spotted twerking next to the singer Lizzo, baring its teeth on the former soccer star David Beckham's Instagram, and flopping against a woman's Chanel bag while wearing its own Tic Tac–size Chanel bag. The creature in question is Labubu—a soft-bellied plushie that the Chinese company Pop Mart began distributing in 2019, and that has, in the past year, gained hordes of admirers. In 2024, Pop Mart reported a more than 700 percent increase in the stuffie's sales. People have been doling out anywhere from about $30 to $150,000 a toy. At Brooklyn raves, adults hop around under neon lights with Labubus clipped to their belt loops. The devotion, at times, has turned almost ferocious; Pop Mart decided to suspend in-person sales of Labubu in the United Kingdom after reports of chaos at stores. Commentators have offered all sorts of theories as to why Labubu has become a sensation. One factor might be scarcity: Each new Labubu release on Pop Mart's online store tends to sell out in minutes. Another might be surprise: The plushie arrives in a blind box. (It could be pink or gray; wear overalls or hold a Coke.) Some people have suggested that the Labubu hype is a product of a trickle-down celebrity effect, or that the toy has become a gay icon. But the way I see it, the cult of Labubu is simply an extension of the phenomenon known as ' kidulthood,' in which the boundary between childhood and adulthood keeps growing fuzzier and fuzzier. In the past few years, more American adults have been buying stuffed animals—some, researchers have told me, in an effort to reject staid versions of adulthood and inject more play into grown-up life. These adults have usually kept their plushies at home, relegating them to bookshelves and beds. Labubus, though, are 'public displays of cuteness,' Erica Kanesaka, an Emory University professor and cute-studies scholar, told me in an email. Devotees carry Labubu into subway cars, office cubicles, and dental schools. They clock into shifts at KFC with the toy literally attached to their hip, and take it along for their workdays as football players or airline pilots. Adults in other countries—Japan, perhaps most notably—have long worn objects featuring cute characters, such as Hello Kitty, out and about, hooked to bags and key chains. In the 1990s, it wasn't uncommon to see white-collar Japanese salarymen with Hello Kitty accessories dangling from their phones. The trend, Simon May, a philosopher and the author of The Power of Cute, told me, might have been born of a postwar rejection of overt aggression: After World War II, cute aesthetics were one way that Japan revamped its public-facing image. The country, May said, changed its self-presentation '180 degrees from militarism to pacifism.' But in the United States, loving cute objects has historically been written off as escapism at best and a worrying swing toward infancy at worst. Adults who embraced childlike things were 'seen to be irresponsibly regressive, morally immature, and refusing to play their full part in society,' May said in an email after we spoke. As recently as 2020, in an article about plushies, one writer self-consciously described her stuffed hound as her 'deep dark secret.' Yet, as I've previously reported, this defensiveness about loving cute objects has been gradually dissipating, part of a century-long evolution in which childhood has come to be seen as a protected life stage. Nowadays, May said, 'to be childlike also has an increasingly positive connotation in terms of openness to ideas and freedom from dogmatism.' At the same time, attitudes about what it means to be an adult are shifting. Many have assumed that children are supposed to 'grow out of vulnerability' when they become adults, Sandra Chang-Kredl, a professor at Concordia University, in Montreal, who has studied adults' attachments to stuffed animals, told me. But more and more, people are pushing back on that idea. Years ago, 'it would have been hard to admit that, let's say, Oh, I have anxiety,' Chang-Kredl said. 'Today, there's no shame involved in it.' Pop Mart has capitalized on this transformation, marketing Labubus—and its other collectibles—specifically to young adults. The company's social-media posts seem to be aimed at Monday-hating, coffee-drinking workers who might log in to Zoom meetings from disastrously messy rooms or prefer to be outside, playing with buddies (or toys), rather than reporting to an office. Evidence suggests that this approach has been successful; one analysis of Pop Mart's web traffic found that 39 percent of visitors to the online store in April ranged in age from 25 to 34. Shame dies hard, though, which might be another reason Labubu has gained traction. Within the realm of cute things, a demonic-looking stuffie is more 'ugly-cute'—adorable, monstrous, deliberately weird. (Ugly-cuteness is also by no means a new phenomenon; think of the pygmy-hippo sensation Moo Deng, toys such as UglyDolls and Cabbage Patch Kids, or the eternal appeal of the pug.) People 'feel that they themselves are a little bit edgy,' Joshua Dale, a cute-studies professor at Chuo University, in Tokyo, told me, 'for liking something that some people don't like.' As with any popular trend, Labubu does have its haters—or at least some tongue-in-cheek provocateurs. People have suggested (semi-jokingly) that the toy is possessed, possibly by a demon called Pazuzu. The singer Katy Perry, at a recent concert in Australia, used her mic to smack a Labubu out of a fan's hand. 'No Labubus!' she commanded sternly. Still, Labubu's creepy-cute duality does feel very of this moment, in line with a certain strain of the culture that seeks to undercut anything that feels too buttoned-up. Consider the popularity of 'brat'—an irony-tinged aesthetic that embraces the messy and ugly-cute over the prepped and polished. Last year, my colleague Spencer Kornhaber described the 'brat' mood as 'a little immature, a little selfish, a little nasty.' He also noted that the singer Charli XCX, whose songs affirm that the party-girl life has no age limit, and pop artists such as Sabrina Carpenter and Chappell Roan seem to be making music offering 'the assurance that growing up, in the conventional sense, is just optional.' Wearing Labubu, especially on a designer purse or a backpack meant for grown-ups, is a choice that speaks in a similar register. It signals a 'playful attitude to life,' May told me, 'a winking at the world.' Monday will come around again, with its dreaded wake-up alarms and emails. But according to the logic of kidulthood, you might feel a tiny bit better if you bring a devilish tchotchke to that 9 a.m. meeting.
Buzz Feed
a day ago
- Buzz Feed
Renee Rapp Criticizes Fan's Labubu Doll
This is Reneé Rapp — icon, pop star, truthteller, and queen of saying the quiet part out loud. Like on Friday, when she got really honest with a fan about what she thought of their Labubu doll. Labubu, if you don't know, is a line of collectible monster toys designed by Chinese illustrator Kasing Lung. They're usually furry and colorful, with rabbit-like ears and jagged, mischievous smiles. They originated in Lung's 2015 series The Monsters, but surged in popularity this year, with many fans wearing them on their belts and bags. Reneé was at a release party for her new album, Bite Me, when a fan approached her and asked her to sign their doll. Reneé looked visibly taken aback as the fan encouraged her to "just sign its face." Taking the doll, Reneé said, "Bro. These are so fucking ugly." The fan laughed, "No, you love it." "I don't," Reneé replied, laughing. Still, she signed the doll, and when the fan playfully apologized for interrupting her event, Reneé replied, "It's okay. It's nice to meet you." But she still couldn't get over the doll's odd appearance because she then repeated, "This shit is so ugly to me." The clip of the moment quickly went viral online, with many praising Reneé's unfiltered comments — and echoing her thoughts. One Reddit user called her so "honest and real." Another confessed, "This kinda made me stan her." "I appreciate how she made it clear she wasn't criticizing the person filming - just the doll itself," someone added, while another fan praised this "age of celebs being relatable with fans." But not everyone enjoyed the exchange. Some viewers thought Renee's comments were a smidge rude. "i agree but she could've just signed it and moved on. she didn't need to make the person feel bad about something they were excited about," one critic said. Another added, "I mean… isn't that the whole point, that they're supposed to be ugly? It's still kinda rude to be so snarky about it to someone who clearly enjoys it…" A third chimed in to say, "They ain't for me— I'm a lifelong Sanrio gal— but can't we just let people like what they like? I find it especially awkward to say something is ugly to the person who clearly loved it enough to buy it and carry it with them." "People allergic to joy," someone else wrote. "If collecting them makes people happy, who cares what you think? Nobody judges people who collect Pokémon cards or Funko Pops. We're going through a hellish time right now. People are dying. Who cares what little toy people are obsessed with? Let people live." And this last person didn't hold back on their thoughts at all, writing, "Theyre ugly, but idk why people bitch about others liking them. The world is burning let them have their ugly dolls." What do you think of Labubus and this fan exchange? Tell me in the comments.
