L’Annexe, the European-inspired cocktail bar located along Georgetown’s bustling M Street, has the hum of a bar that’s been in the game for years. Bartenders greet guests with questions about their liquor and flavor preferences and swiftly prepare drinks from the list of originals and classics. Music weaves its way through the multi-room floor, the volume still allowing for easy conversation. Seating is varied and comfortable, including along the zinc bar top.
It’s a meticulously curated atmosphere, explains owner Fady Saba, at a recent tasting with DCist.
“For me, the bar is an experience,” he says. “I’ve become very picky, so it’s really about so many details.”
He opened L’Annexe, he says, after spending 22 years in the restaurant industry across Paris, Beirut and, most recently, D.C. He wanted to bring a modern European vibe to the city through sophisticated takes on classic cocktails and bar food. L’Annexe is located in the former home of the restaurant Unum, which closed in 2017.
For a prime view of the action, take a seat at the front bar or at one of the small tables facing M Street. A bit further back is a dining room with tables and high tops and a stylized map of Georgetown streets on the wall. TVs are nowhere to be found. Tucked in the back is the library, with comfortable couches, stocked bookshelves and a view of the bar’s many infusions and batch cocktails.
The house-infused liquors provide the backbone to many of the L’Annexe creations, headed up by beverage director Mick Perrigo, who most recently worked at Left Door off 14th street. He took the opportunity to think outside the box, rather than just throwing a bunch of botanicals into a bottle and calling it done.
“Infusions can be very easy to make,” Mick says. “But for me I was trying to find a creative way to make it.”
Some of the liquors are infused individually, while other infusions are more like ready-made cocktails that are mixed with fresh citrus once ready to be served. Combinations range from a French 75 twist made with honeydew-infused vodka and cucumber syrup (the On The Vine) to an old fashioned riff where rye whiskey has mingled with sarsaparilla and birch bark for a dry—not sweet—finish.
In addition to enhanced flavors, the infusions give a visual appeal as well. The Mum’s the Word, a Last Word twist, gets a sunshine yellow hue from turmeric root-infused rum, while the frozen Pushing Daisies is a soft violet, thanks to butterfly flower tequila.
It can read as pretty gimmicky. Perrigo, though, stresses he is careful not to let visual appeal and unique flavor profiles come at the expense of taste.
“I want people to actually experience both the artistic looks of it while also realizing that the flavors of the cocktail are going to stand out as something for you to remember,” Perrigo says.
Fady sees the bar’s infusions as a way to enhance the customer experience and set L’Annexe apart from Washington’s deep roster of cocktail bars.
“You can have the classic cocktails, buy your liquors, and mix it,” he says. “Or you can transform those liquors to have your added value.” The extra work puts cocktails at L’Annexe at $14-$17 each.
The menu leaves room for classic drinks as well, with daiquiris, sazeracs, and others available alongside the house recipes.
Food gets strong attention at L’Annexe as well, with a menu overseen by chef Andrew Markert of Beuchert’s Saloon on Capitol Hill. He took a similar farm-to-table approach here, with dishes made to be easy to eat, share, and pair with drinks. The corn hummus and shrimp aguachile both have spicy kicks, and the vegetarian mushroom toast is a cheesy, umami- and carb-filled bite. And skewers of scallops, pork belly, or steak, make for easy snacks between sips. If sweet is the craving, hit the chocolate caramel tart. Plates are priced between $10 and $21.
All of these elements—the infused spirits, the dim lighting, the chef-inspired small plates—could easily veer toward the Georgetown cliché of over-the-top pretension. It seems though that L’Annexe knows what it wants to be: a balance between hospitality, finesse, and (crucially) actually mixing good drinks.
“Most important to me, at the bar, is to have real cocktails going out,” Fady says.
L’Annexe is located at 2917 M St. NW. Open Tuesdays-Wednesdays 4 p.m.-11 p.m., Fridays 4 p.m.-1 a.m., and Saturdays 12 p.m.-1 a.m. Sunday 12 p.m.-11 p.m. No reservations.
Beverage Menu by Anonymous ISZVAnsZ on Scribd
Food menu by Anonymous ISZVAnsZ on Scribd
