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Chicatana co-owners, from left A to Z: Jose Abrego, Hector Flora and Marcelino Zamudio. Photo: Scott Suchman, WaPo. |
Note: This Blog presents this guest article as part of an occasional series of outstanding restaurant journalism from around the world.
Food critic Tom Sietsema [Washington Post] has picked--out of all the restaurants in the nation’s capital—a friendly, enticing Mexican spot in Columbia Heights as his year’s best place to eat:
Welcome to Chicatana. 3903 14th St. NW. chicatanadc.com. 202-481-0511. Indoor and outdoor seating. Mains $13 to $29. Dinner daily and brunch weekends. Takeout and delivery. Sound check: 70 decibels/Must speak with raised voice. Accessibility: No barriers at entrance; ADA-compliant restroom.
[Sietsema:] Marcelino Zamudio has worked for some admired chefs, notably José Andrés, in some of Washington’s most popular restaurants.
Up until a few months ago, his mornings were spent at Oyamel in Penn Quarter, after which he’d race to 14th Street NW to cook for dinner guests at Chicatana, the intimate Mexican storefront he and friends opened during the pandemic.
If you ask Zamudio to identify his best teacher, though, the native of Guerrero, in southwestern Mexico, names his mother. When he was a child, she insisted he learn how to make eggs and salsa in case “your wife doesn’t like to cook,” Zamudio says she told him. Like many immigrants before him, his first job in Washington was as a dishwasher at Rosa Mexicano.
Co-owner Hector Flora, the face behind the bar and a childhood friend of Zamudio’s, learned his craft early, as well. As a boy, he grew up watching, and sometimes helping, his father make mezcal. Back home, he says, the evening tradition was to enjoy a shot of mezcal before dinner (cheers to that).
Flora’s clear pride in the spirit is evident on the drinks list at Chicatana, where most of the cocktails are fueled by mezcal and the shelves are stocked with around 120 varieties.
The third reason for the success of Chicatana is co-chef and co-owner Jose Abrego, the first face I remember from my maiden visit last year. Sitting at one of the stools overlooking his small open kitchen near the entrance, I admired the care Abrego took with everything he touched, including the trompo, or vertical meat spit.
Abrego met Zamudio when the two worked at the Spanish-accented Boqueria in Penn Quarter, where they dreamed of serving polished versions of Mexican street food, or “tapas in a taqueria,” as Zamudio put it.
Focus, and teamwork, meant the trio of friends could relocate Chicatana from small quarters to bigger digs on the same block in just three days in August. On opening week, the new version of Chicatana felt like it had been operating for years.
Follow-up visits find an indoor-outdoor restaurant that’s doubled in size, as friendly and enticing as the original — actually more mouthwatering, since a larger kitchen means a lot more specials.
There are no finer fried potato cakes than the tortitas de papa here, presented on lush epazote aioli, or more compelling shrimp sopes, their golden corn saucers brushed with haunting mole.
One meal begot another at Chicatana, a beacon that I wish for every neighborhood.
As I was eating (and drinking!) here, basking in the charm of owners who also act as ambassadors in the dining room, I was always plotting my next return.
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Beef Tinga from Chicatana |
Chicatana is where I’d happily go on my own time and dime. Which is a long way of honoring Chicatana with my Restaurant of the Year award.
The crew isn’t resting on its laurels. Already, the original workspace has been re-christened La Plaza, with a menu of Spanish and Mexican tapas designed to complement rather than compete with nearby restaurants.
A good D.C. city block is poised to become greater.
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