DISCLAIMER: These photos do not do the food justice. I left my camera in Miami (I don’t want to talk about it) and was so eager to eat/bordering on hyperventilation as each dish came out that I haphazardly whipped out my phone for a quick snap. My apologies. If you tried the sea salt ice cream, you would understand. To make up for the embarassing pictures, I promise to deliver a detailed play-by-play of the meal. 

 Enter, Graffiato: Mike Isabella’s first restaurant. His baby. Graffiato is evidence of pure heart, soul, motivation, and talent being channeled into one tangible entity.  The food was far superior than it even needed to be, and the service was impeccable. Jason, the service director, sat with us for a while, discussing the dishes and history behind the restaurant. It was clear that Graffiato’s team is a family of people who truly care about the food and, most importantly, each other. I would go back to DC just to visit Graffiato in a heartbeat. 

The Top Chef alums stopped by Graffiato after cooking dinner at the Mexican Embassy.  In between my attempt to simultaneously hold back tears and prevent the tequila from resurfacing in the form of emotional gushing, they were gracious enough to humor me in talks about our favorite subject: food. I admire these chefs’ passion and skill so much and was honored to be included at their table, even for a brief moment.

 {Clockwise from left: Spike Mendelsohn, Mike Isabella (Graffiato), Carla Hall, me, Antonia Lofaso, Richard Blaise}{Spike Mendelsohn of Good Stuff Eatery, We, the Pizza, and Sixth & Rye} After he described the dish he cooked earlier that night (pork belly, peaches and vanilla bean sauce), I proceeded to throw my arms around him in a giant hug. In all honesty, I don’t think he minded.Our reservation was for 9:30pm, leaving us plenty of time to scope out the bar and taste test the mixology selections.

Tim Starr: Illegal mezcal, market fruit puree, solerno blood orange liquor, lime.  This drink tasted like the bartender mesquite-smoked pork shoulder, liquified it into a glass of tequila, and added some fresh lime juice. I love tequila. And pork. This drink was right up my alley. The glasses were stout and shallow, perfect for avoiding the usually unavoidable ice dilution syndrome that comes from a large glass, copious amounts of ice, and a cocktail. Marinated snap peas with tomato, almond pesto, goat cheese, preserved lemon and mint.  My favorite dish of the night. Vibrant, crunchy, grassy snap peas atop an almost smoky pesto. The almonds lent an earthiness that usually lacks in standard basil pesto. The goat cheese was tart, creamy, and the perfect juxtaposition to the snap peas that popped immediately in your mouth. The highlight of the dish was the preserved lemon and super high quality olive oil that shined through like a little ray of sunshine underneath clouds of almond pesto. The lemon was just sour enough to counteract the rich sauce. Well done, Chef, well done.Fresh Fennel with stone fruit, hazelnuts, and moscato.  The snap peas were my favorite, until I tasted this fennel salad. Just looking at this picture makes me drool a little on my keyboard. The moscato had so clearly mascerated the fennel that the flavors were virtually indistinguishable from one another. The wine imparted a sweet, rich, velvet essence into the crunchy, anise-flavored fennel. The stone fruit was also sweet, but in a tart, soft, honey-esque way, much different than the moscato. The hazelnuts added a much-needed crunch  that changed the texture of the whole dish in its entirety. I didn’t want to stop eating it, but the slightly disturbed looks of my friends when I started running my finger along the inside of the bowl to scoop up any ounce of fennel that escaped the wrath of my fork was enough incentive to just let it go. [sad face]Oh, little spiced, julienned beets, topped with pork-fried marcona almonds, micro arugula, and orange segments. I’ve developed quite a love affair with beets. And pork belly, but that’s another story. They just taste so sweet, clean, and earthy, how could you not eat a stack of them? The marcona almonds were a nice textural touch and the micro arugula’s bitter bite rounded out the flavor balance.    

Local burrata with heirloom tomatoes and 30-year-old balsamic. Yes please. The cheese, similar to mozzarella but with a creamier interior, was milky, gooey, runny, salty. Imagine popping a poached egg with your fork and oggling the sexy yoke running across your plate, permeating every crevice like liquid magma. The second we cut into the cheese, it immediately escaped into the arms of the balsamic, as if they had waited 30 years to reunite. It was magical. And then we ate it. Every. Last. Drop.Vermont pizza: melted leeks, farmhouse cheddar, and bacon. The crust was so crispy, with that yummy flour resin on the bottom that lets you know the pizza was just made. The bacon was like tiny little porkbellies, floating amidst the tangy, sharp cheddar. The leeks added a hint of onion, but were slightly non-existant. Maybe upon closer examination I could have pointed one out, but I was too busy trying to steal my guests’ slices when they looked away.White house pizza. I didn’t take a picture of the whole pizza because it just wouldn’t do it justice. This was divine. I could write a book on this pizza. The crust was, again, crispy, doughy, chewy, salty, and all other adjectives that could describe the perfect pizza crust. This crust, however, served as a blank canvas for the masterpiece sitting nonchalantly on top: mozzarella, taleggio, ricotta, prosciutto, & black pepper honey. The honey. The sweet, sweet, melted, honey that crystalized the prosciutto until it resembled shards of meaty glass. The heat of the pizza melted the honey into a simple syrup. But this dish was anything but simple.Sweet Corn Agnolotti with canterelles and pine nuts. Well, Chef Isabella, you’ve done it. This dish was coined, by my exceedingly hard to please friends, “[t]he best thing I’ve ever put in my mouth.” Personally, I thought it could have used a little more filling and a tad less salt. Nonetheless, the pasta was cooked beautifully and the sauce was light, yet creamy.Potato gnocchi with braised pork shank and buratta, topped with micro greens. My friend from DC said that this gnocchi was comparable to “[sleeping with] Adriana Lima on pure Colombian yayo”. Take that as you wish. The tiny little potato pillows melted in my mouth faster than M&M’s in a sweaty kid’s hand in the DC heat wave. I’m dreaming of these. The pork was as tender as porkly possible, slightly sweet from the braising sauce. The pasta was perfection, and the burrata melted enough to tie each component together. I can’t even properly describe it. Go eat these immediately, if not sooner.Carrot Panna Cotta with spiced nuts. This is the hardest dish to describe. It had the all-spice warmth of pumpkin pie with the pungent sweetness of fresh carrots, amalgamated into a perfectly set and chilled panna cotta. In true parfair form, the spiced nuts separated the cream on top from the gelatinous layer on the bottom. It was exceptionally creative.

Chocolate tart with olive oil & sea salt gelato. Bitter, rich, crunchy, cold, salty, melty, grassy. Everything a dessert should be but rarely is.  For so long, I thought I was the only strange soul who enjoyed overly bitter, not too sweet chocolate. Apparantly I was wrong.  This tart’s cocoa content was so damn high that the Mr. Sweet & Mrs. Sugar hightailed it out of the dish, leaving only pure, unadulterated chocolate essense. The sea salt ice cream was strangely perfect. You immediately taste the salt, but the ice cold cream encompasses each salt crystal in a rich, velvety shell.  The olive oil drizzle was awesome, and likely the chef’s way of showing off his fantastic breed of oil lingering in the kitchen, itching to jump on each and every dish on the line.

Special thanks to Jason Awad for taking time out on a busy Thursday night to listen, share, and contribute his mutual love for all things food. It is rare to find such amazing food at a new restaurant, but Graffiato’s menu was thoughtful in both concept and execution, down to the coarse sea salt on top of the snap peas. I tried to convey to Chef Isabella how truly flawless the meal was, but I was trying to hold back tears and likely just babbled to the table of chefs. Such is life. 

 -Shari