It wasn’t a particularly hot day, warm, but not scorching hot, when I needed a place to eat after a long morning at this years AWS DC Summit 2022. I quickly pulled up google maps and started looking at all the restaurants around the DC convention center. There were plenty to choose from, some fast, some not so fast. As I scrolled around the map, Rumi’s Kitchen caught my eye because it said Persian. With Persian, would come one of my top 3 dishes in the world to eat, Fesenjoon. I quickly clicked on the link to look at the menu for Rumi’s Kitchen and was ecstatic to see Duck Fensenjoon being offered. My decision of where to have lunch was made and it was only a couple of blocks down L street. I quickly gathered my belongings and made my way to what I hoped to be a delicious feast.
It was a short walk to RK, less then five minutes from the DC convention center. I was greeting promptly by the staff and given the option of sitting inside or outside. As I said before, it wasn’t that hot outside, so I decided to eat al fresco that day. My beverage of choice was one of the homemade sodas RK had on the meu, mine was mango. It was a simple mixture of club soda and mango puree served over ice. If it were hot this would have been the refreshing drink I would want. Later on in the meal I did have the peach homemade soda, and it was just as tasty and refreshing as the mango.
Looking over the menu, after getting my homemade soda, I found a multitude of dishes I wanted to try and trying to narrow it down was difficult, until I saw Duck Fesenjoon (there are a few spellings for this word, i.e. Fesenjan). Fesenjoon is in my top 3 list of dishes I love in the entire world, so it was a no brainer for me once I saw it on the menu. I’ll talk a little more about the Fesenjoon later, but for my first course, I decided on the Grilled Shrimp. While waiting for the Grilled Shrimp I was presented with a basket of flat bread accompanied with butter, sliced radish, and mint. I am assuming this is traditional as every Persian restaurant I’ve been to I have been give bread, radish, butter, and mint.
It wasn’t long before the Grilled Shrimp arrived. An order of the Grilled Shrimp came with two very large shrimp, a nice slaw, and a jalapeno feta cream sauce. The shrimp are grilled with the shell still on and the shell was very easy to remove. I thoroughly enjoyed this first course with its smokey flavor and slight hint of saffron. I thought the jalapeno feta cream sauce would be too overpowering and cover up the beautiful flavor of the shrimp. It was not, and for that I was grateful. The heat of the jalapeno came at the end and was not aggressive nor did it bully the flavor of the sweet shrimp.
As mentioned, I went with the Duck Fesenjoon for my main course. The only change I made was substituting out the saffron basmati rice for Shirin. Shirin rice is still made using Basmati rice, but it is cooked with orange zest, barberry, pistachio, and almonds. I just thought this would be a great item to have with a dish whose costar was pomegranate. Fesenjoon has been around for a few hundred years, with the original dish using duck. Today you will find chicken being used as a substitute for duck, which in my opinion is a big mistake. The serving size was more than generous, and I will have to confess, I could not eat all the rice, as much as I wanted to. The duck, bone in, is braised in a stew of pomegranate molasses, crushed walnuts, and various spices. This fesenjoon was served with fresh pomegranate over the dish, and it was always a surprise when, during the course of eating the fesenjoon, I got some of the pomegranate as it popped with a sweet and tangy flavor enhancing the deep flavor of the fesenjoon. The duck was tender and flavorful, which I attribute to the fact that it was cooked with bone in. I have had fesenjoon from too many places that used boneless chicken breast, and it always seemed dry to me. I’m not sure I can eat fesenjoon from any other place, that doesn’t use duck, or at least using bone in leg and thigh of the chicken. I must thank Rumi’s Kitchen for preparing a fesenjoon that now is the standard by which I judge all such dishes.
Just when I thought I couldn’t eat another bite, I foolishly looked at the sweet offerings from RK. I always say that dessert is the last impression a diner is left with. Why spend all that effort in preparing delicious a dinner, then make dessert just an afterthought? A restaurant should pay attention to the entire menu from beginning to end, and I’m glad to say RK again fits the bill. I went with a White Chocolate Cardamom Cake that was served with a tarragon strawberry sauce and mascarpone ice cream. Every part of this dessert was made to care and the flavor profile was harmonious. I’ve never had tarragon in a strawberry sauce, and if not done properly the tarragon could easy beat up the strawberry, really the entire sauce. Lucky for us the tarragon is tamed and just the right amount in the strawberry sauce, this was also true of the cardamom. One would think this would be a heavy dessert to have at the end of a meal, but surprisingly it was light and refreshing.
From beginning to end, Rumi’s Kitchen prepared a meal of high caliber. I enjoyed my waitress, Jasmine, as she was an incredible person on all accounts. I hope to return to RK again, and try the many other dishes prepared by the skillful hands, but it will be tough not getting Fesenjoon again. Some of the dishes I look forward to trying in my return trips will be the Lamb Shank, the Lamb Rack, the Cheymeh, and Ghormeh Sabzi. If you are ever in the DC area and looking for a great meal of Persian food, I highly recommend Rumi’s Kitchen.
| Website: | Rumi's Kitchen |
| Address: | 640 L St NW Washington, DC 20001-3615 |
| Phone: | (202)900-9106 |
| Visited: | May 23, 2022 |
