Whether you aren’t leaving your house or just aren’t leaving town, plenty of D.C. restaurants are offering an array of festive meals to fit your holiday plans. Looking for a traditional roast? Prefer to go meatless? Want to travel the globe through your tastebuds? Here’s a look at some of the takeout and dining in options out there.
Keep in mind: D.C. has new regulations going into effect Dec. 14 that affect restaurant hours in the wake of rising COVID-19 case numbers.
DINE-IN OPTIONS
Ambar
Travel might be discouraged this holiday season, but you can still take your tastebuds on a holiday adventure to the Balkans. The Capitol Hill restaurant is serving its unlimited small plates menu, featuring such seasonal specials as orange roast beef, potato and corn au gratin, and a Christmas berry cake. (It’ll be open for Christmas Day brunch, too.)
Reserve your table.
Annabelle
Former White House chef Frank Ruta has created a seafood-heavy four-course tasting menu for Christmas Eve diners at the modern American restaurant in Kalorama. The lineup includes Maine lobster “pot roast” and stuffed panettone—no, it’s not fruitcake!—with mascarpone sorbet. There’s an a la carte menu, too, with a few turf items (like Wagyu sirloin and duck breast) if surf isn’t your thing.
Reserve your table.
The Bombay Club
Fancy a Keralan-style lobster soup, wild boar chops with kadhai sauce, or a duck curry? All are options from the restaurant’s Christmas Eve menu, which can be ordered as a three-course prix fixe or a la carte.
Christmas Eve menu here.
Brasserie Liberte
Looking for a taste of France for Christmas Eve or Christmas Day? The Georgetown restaurant is offering a prix fixe menu that’s loaded with French classics—escargots, beef bourguignon, cassoulet, coq au vin, you get the idea. And you’ll find a few seasonal specialities like beef Wellington and chestnut soup with ruby port and bacon tucked in the lineup, too.
See the Christmas menu here.
Centrolina
The annual Feast of the Seven Fishes, which traces its roots to Italian tradition, is back for Christmas Eve. Per the moniker, expect a lot of sustainable seafood—think cod, yellowfin tuna, octopus, branzino, and sardines, to name a few—coming from chef Amy Brandwein’s kitchen in CityCenterDC.
Reserve a table here.
Stable
Dreaming of a white Christmas in D.C.? Yeah, us too, and we’re not holding our breath. But Stable is channeling the vibe for dinner on Christmas Eve and brunch on Christmas Day with indoor Alpine ski chalets and its cozy Swiss comfort fare, which definitely includes fondue. Prior notice (and a four-person minimum) is required for the raclette experience, in which the icon cheese dish is prepared tableside.
Reservations are available via Resy.
Mintwood Place
Head to Mintwood on Christmas Eve for a three-course prix fixe centered around beef short ribs or a meatless cauliflower tagine with raisins and ras el hanout. The restaurant is also open for Christmas Day brunch, and if you overdosed on rich holiday treats this season, the menu offers coconut quinoa oatmeal with sunflower-chia seed crumble. Didn’t get your fill of luxurious foods? Well, there’s also duck confit hash with a poached egg and hollandaise sauce.
Reserve your table here.
Modena
Chef John Melfi has put together two seasonal Christmas Eve menus at Ashok Bajaj’s downtown Italian restaurant. One is a three-course prix fixe that offers meat options, like polpette (veal, beef, and pork meatballs with dandelion greens and polenta), alongside such vegetarian options as house-milled oat pappardelle with broccoli rabe, cipollini onions, and preserved lemon. The other is a five-course Feast of the Seven Fishes prix fixe, with calamari, salmon roe, monkfish, shrimp, mussels, and more.
See the menu here.
Rasika and Rasika West End
Two of D.C.’s beloved Indian restaurants are offering three-course prix fixe Christmas Eve menus. Choices include masala salmon cake, bison roast, and the wildly popular palak chaat, of course. On the sweeter side, options include a Goan Christmas cake with saffron sabayon.
See the menu here.
Teddy and the Bully Bar
“Endless” seems to be a theme for Teddy and the Bully’s Christmas Day feast, as in endless meats—turkey, ham, salmon, and New York strip—and sides: charred Brussels, whipped potatoes, and mac’n’cheese, to name a few. (If you were hoping for all-you-can-eat everything, you’re out of luck. You get just one first course and dessert.)
See the menu here.
DELIVERY/TAKEOUT
Cafe Berlin
Co-owner Rico Glage, who grew up in East Germany, put together a special menu to honor his family’s traditional Christmas Eve meal—think German frankfurters and curry dipping sauce, sourdough rye bread, and soljanka, a sweet and sour soup with pork, pickles, and sour cream. The German outpost also offers two family-style menus for pickup on Christmas Eve, with braised beef, wild boar, venison, and potato pancakes among the choices. But you’re looking for a showstopper party fowl, check out the whole Christmas goose.
Christmas menu here.
The Dabney
If a hyperlocal appetizer spread is your Christmas Eve jam, chef Jeremiah Langhorne has put together a spread of local cheeses and housemade charcuterie, plus savory warm tartlets, cookies, and more. The Christmas Day dinner kit includes Seven Hills prime rib, glazed root vegetables and sweet potato rolls. Bottles of “Dabnog,” its eggnog spiked with madeira, bourbon, rye, and rum, are also available for order.
Christmas menu here.
Fight Club
The pop up that’s taken over Beuchert’s Saloon is putting its sandwiches down for a night to dish up a family-style Christmas Eve feast. The menu centers around a roasted leg of lamb, and accompaniments include rutabaga mash and rolls with everything butter. Festive drink options include cranberry sangria and spiked apple cider.
Order your meal here.
Hank’s Oyster Bar
Pick up a feast for four in Dupont that includes lasagna as well as a fully brined five-rib pork roast that’s ready for your oven. The restaurant’s namesake half-shells make an appearance in oysters Rockefeller bread pudding, which is included. There are plenty of add-ons available: crab cakes, lobster deviled eggs, peel and eat shrimp, and vegan collards, too.
See the menu here.
Nina May
Celebrate the Festival of Lights with a Hanukkah-themed box delivered on Dec. 10 by Feast, the Shaw restaurant’s meal delivery service. The three-course meal for two includes a spin on matzo ball soup with duck confit, as well as potato latkes and fixings and smoked beef brisket with maple roasted carrots.
Order your box here.
Schmaltz Brothers
A new kosher food truck is launching Dec. 10, and it’s dishing up a Hannukah menu, including sandwiches on challah bread, grain bowls, and cauliflower shwarma. The team is also offering a Hannukah meal from Dec. 10-18 that’ll feed four to six people. Choose between a braised brisket or roasted chicken, and it comes with heirloom carrot soup, latkes, desserts, and more.
See the menu here.
Seven Reasons
Chef Enrique Limardo’s pan-Latin standout is offering a mix of classics and nods to his Venezuelan heritage. Main course options include prime rib and roasted pernil, aka Venezuelan style pork leg. For sides, there’s creamy sprouts, a Venezuelan ham-and-olive bread, and potato and chicken salad, to name a few.
Order your meal here.
Station 4
Choose from two dinner pack options from the Southwest Waterfront restaurant for Christmas Eve or Christmas Day: prime rib (sides include mashed potatoes and veggies) or crisp whole snapper (fries, coleslaw, and potato salad). Dessert’s included—and two bottles of Champagne, too.
See the menu here.
Ted’s Bulletin
The diner known for its Ted’s Tarts is serving up a four-pound prime rib feast with sides to feed four to six people on Christmas Eve. And there’s an optional add-on: two of those strawberry Ted’s Tarts, unfrosted, with frosting and sprinkles so you can decorate them yourself.
Christmas menu here.
Tail Up Goat
Mix-and-match your Christmas feast at Tail Up Goat, which boasts a la carte spread that includes prime rib by the pound, spatchcocked guinea hen, spicy turnips, creamed spinach, and honey nut squash pie. There’s a champagne and French caviar option, too. (Pick up on Dec. 23.)
See the menu here.
