Forget the breakfast bagel. Short Eats, a pop-up café at Ten Tigers Parlour (3813 Georgia Ave. NW), wants to add a little more spice to the morning commute with Sri Lankan street food.
Every weekday from 7 a.m. to 10 a.m., Shorts Eats will take over the Chinese tea house in Petworth to offer a simple menu: a breakfast version of ground sausage, turkey, or veggie roti pockets ($5.50). The flaky pastries, stuffed with poached eggs, ground potatoes, leeks, onion, and a dash of lime, are served warm with optional pol sambol ($1), a crushed chili coconut dish.
The pop up is one block from the Petworth metro, and paper sleeves are ready so commuters can eat on the run. Wi-fi and open tables also allow those with slower mornings to dine in. To drink, there’s Compass Coffee, mango juice, and Ceylon ginger tea over ice ($2.50).
Founder Yohan Ferdinando, along with his co-founder Jonathan Beyoghlow (of JB Marketing Support), set up shop this week. The idea is one that has been brewing between the two friends for more than 10 years, but the pockets—which Ferdinando flips with expertise—date back to his childhood.
Ferdinando, who was born and raised in Sri Lanka before moving to the D.C. area with his family, describes the roti as a quick street food that Sri Lankans eat on the go. The recipes have been passed down for generations; his mother used to cater the same dishes for family and friends. It’s easy to tell the roti runs in his blood. The pillow-soft pocket of dough offset by a rich hint of spices tastes as though it was perfected by years of expertise. Now Ferdinando wants to share them with a wider circle.
“It’s like the Starbucks of Sri Lanka,” he says. “ [In D.C.], everyone’s on their way to work. In a dream world, we’d be able to open the windows and hand them out.”
Short Eats cooks everything out of Union Kitchen, where Ferdinando is also the general manager of warehouse distribution. Beyoghlow draws on expertise from his consulting firm to head operations and marketing. The concept was inspired by Ferdinando’s work as the former operations manager of food delivery startup Postmates. He originally wanted to sell packaged curries, but noticed the demand for quality fast-casual food.
“We’re trying to deliver on one thing: authenticity,” Ferdinando says. “But you don’t have to go without efficiency.
The pop-up only plans to be at Ten Tigers until the end of June, but Short Eats will also serve Sri Lankan curries and the roti pockets at the Petworth Community Market (on the corner of 9th Street NW and Upshur Street NW) from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m., beginning or Saturday, through November.
The “trio of curries” served together—coconut chicken curry, lentil curried daal, and the pol sabol—is a cross between Thai and Indian food, Ferdinando says, made with thicker gravy. If all goes well, Short Eats may add an expanded lunch menu at Ten Tigers. Ferdinando plans to keep business growing throughout the District, with ideas for potential menu expansion and pre-packaged curries.
“I get to do the thing I’m good at, but have my mom next to me, have friends next to me—members of my family that have shaped my life,” Ferdinando says. “It’s nice for us to feel like we have a bit of the island with us.”
Short Eats is located at 3813 Georgia Ave. NW in Petworth. Hours are Monday through Friday, 7 a.m. to 10 a.m. Also at the Petworth Farmers Market on Saturdays from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m.
