White Tiger Restaurant, Washington, D.C.

After attending the fund raising reception for presidential candidate Mike Huckabee last night, Robert and I stayed on Capitol Hill long enough to have dinner in that fun area just northwest of the Capitol. After walking around the neighborhood and looking at our options, we picked a place where neither of us had ever dined before, White Tiger Restaurant.

White Tiger has a great location on the corner of a busy intersection with enough space for a large, L-shaped patio outside. Inside, the dining room (and especially the upstairs dining room reached by a wooden, spiral staircase) is paneled in medium-hued woods and has a slightly British feel to it, the Indian bric-a-brac everywhere notwithstanding.

Robert started with the keema samosa, a pair of pastries encased a lamb and vegetable mix. I had the murg dhingri shorba, a hot and peppery cream of mushroom soup heavily scented with chicken stock and with little cubes of chicken in addition to tiny pieces of mushroom. It wasn't what I expected, but it turned out to be really tasty.




For our main course, Robert chose a dish called dalcha, that appeared to be a mild curry of lamb, lentils, and onions, served with rice and raita yogurt sauce. He said it was good, but once he'd fished all the "good stuff" out of the bowl, there was half a bowl of sauce left, and he would have liked a little more lamb in his dish.



I had the kitchen take the patiala saag on the menu and substitute lamb for the original chicken (making saag gosht?), creating a thick, rich, spinach curry with lamb. We had a plain naan from the tandoor for our bread.



One of the things that caught both of our attention was the silver being used for serving pieces. The flatware, the bowls, and the serving plates were all surprisingly substantial pieces, and gave a nice luxe feel to the evening.

We'd planned on dessert, but the waiter brought our check without asking if we wanted any. The service, otherwise, was typically Indian and attentive, though they did do that unfortunate thing of asking Robert to keep his knife and fork from his appetitzer course to recycle for the entree.

The White Tiger was a surprisingly good place, though, and I'm sure we'll be happy to come back when we're again in the neighborhood.

Here's Robert's Kody Pose™ with a bottle of Taj Mahal beer: