100 Very Best Restaurants

Rank: 45
1789 Restaurant
1226 36th Street, NW

Cuisine: It doesn't get more old Washington than this clubby Georgetown dining room. But fresh talent in the kitchen - 24-year-old chef Daniel Giusti - is shaking up the rear-guard American menu, slipping Burgundy snails into the broccoli soup and jazzing up the reack of lamb with pierogi.

Mood: With its stuffed pheasants, flowery Limoges china, and aged Currier & Ives prints, the place is imbued with a stately stodginess.
Best for: Anyone with hard-to-please tastes; winter dinners by the old stone hearth; privacy seekers (there are plenty of places to hide away among the siz dining rooms).

Best dishes: Steak tartare topped with a runny quail egg; caramelized veel sweetbreads with figs, bacon relish, and bleu cheese; rack of lamb; rockfish with smoky littleneck clams; deconstructed tarte Tatin, each of its parts delicious; chocolate brownie laced with mission figs and dotted with Marcona almonds.

Insider tips: A $40 three-course menu, server every night, is a terrific deal, but you have to request it. desserts are one of the best parts of this meal, courtesy of new pastry chef Travis Olson. The most desired tables are in the John Carroll Room near the fireplace.