Chef Nicholas Stefanelli built his career celebrating his Italian heritage at the Michelin-starred Masseria by Union Market and at Officina — the Wharf’s three-story market, restaurant, and bar. Now, he’s delving into his Greek roots with the debut of Philotimo, a chic downtown restaurant with a tasting menu.
His mother’s family is from Trabzon, a city on the Black Sea that was once part of Greece and is now part of Turkey (his father’s is the Italian side of the family). He learned about the region’s culinary traditions when he was growing up thanks to his grandmother’s cooking but wasn’t able to visit until four years ago. “It opened my eyes and made me want to delve a little more into the foodways there,” says Stefanelli, who decided on that first trip to open Philotimo. He went back to Greece several times before COVID-19 lockdowns, making a point on one of his trips to stop across the border in Trabzon.
The restaurant was announced in 2019 and was originally set to open in October 2020, but the pandemic has upended plans multiple times.
“We’ve been fighting through everything,” says Stefanelli, who finally opened the restaurant in late January. “We’ve had some ups and downs. Hopefully, we’re through it.”
Today, diners are hit with the scent of sweet smoke from the wood burning hearth at the center of the open kitchen when they walk through the restaurant’s front doors. The dining room has 62 seats under its cathedral ceiling and massive windows with views of downtown D.C. Eucalyptus branches adorn the walls and woven rope light fixtures hang from the center of the room.
A small bar near the kitchen is decorated with floral printed tiling and suspended shelving to hold a variety of spirits. Upstairs, there’s a large private dining room, a small private room with a private bar, and semi-private balcony seating, which can all be rented out for private events.
The tasting menu (starting at $108 per person) begins with a table full of seasonal nibbles. Recently, this included two-bite kounoupidi tiganites (cauliflower fritters), spanakopita (phyllo dough stuffed with spinach and feta), tiny triangles of feta, vinegar cured olives shipped from Sparta, and a savory loukoumades — a beignet-like puff of fried dough that is stuffed with creamy taramasalata (Greek fish roe dip) and topped with a crown of caviar.
For the meal, guests choose three courses from several seasonally minded selections in the menu’s four sections: pasta, vegetables, fish, and meat. One recent pasta dish was manti (daintily folded, purse-like dumplings packed with ground veal) topped with brown butter and tangy yogurt. A farro stuffed onion was a highlight of the vegetable section and wood grilled octopus paired with black eyed peas was an oceanic highlight. Meatier fare included local lamb from the Shenandoah Valley paired with whipped sunchokes and tzatziki sauce. Desserts included a deconstructed candied kumquat meringue and sweet mignardise (a one-bite dessert).
The wine program embraces Greek tradition with equal fervor. For the last two and a half years, Stefanelli has been squirreling away wines purchased during his travels to the region, as well as from a few sources stateside. Currently, he has about 150 different labels and 1,000 bottles on hand. The goal is to have 5,000 bottles in the second-floor, glass-walled wine cellar, although when that will happen is what Stefanelli calls “the million-dollar question.”
“With wines from Italy, France, and California, you have a lot of people that have been collecting over the years,” he says of why it takes him much longer to acquire specialty Greek wine. “I don’t have access to that on the Greek side because it’s not around. It’s a much younger scene.”
Currently, the restaurant is only open for dinner. Stefanelli is waiting to decide on lunch service until he’s able to better gauge interest. He’s trying to stay optimistic but says that it’s difficult. “I’m standing here at lunchtime looking out the window and there are two people walking down the street,” he says, looking out at once busy corner of L St. NW and 15th St. NW. “There should be hundreds and hundreds of people walking around.”
In the coming weeks, Stefanelli will roll out patio seating for 44 in the covered breezeway alongside the restaurant. He also plans to open Kaimaki, a Greek coffee shop and cocktail bar, next door. In the morning it will offer Greek coffee and bougatsa (phyllo dough stuffed with greens, cheese, ground beef, or sweet cream) before transitioning to a lunch menu that will extend through happy hour and into the evening, featuring souvlaki, gyro, and other street food.
Even as Stefanelli plots a second opening, he’s anxious about the pandemic’s lingering effects. “What does the downtown landscape look like as things settle into some sort of normal?” he asks rhetorically. “Are offices coming back? Will there be an abbreviated work week? Is space downtown going to be repurposed for apartments instead of being office buildings? Not having answers and having it be out of your control makes this all very difficult and frustrating to navigate through.”
Philotimo is located at 1100 15th St. NW. Open Tuesday-Thursday 6 p.m.-10 p.m., Friday 6 p.m.-11 p.m., and Saturday 5 p.m.-11 p.m.
