All-Star Octopus Dishes in the DC Area

Do you have a favorite dish you're so obsessed with that, when it's listed at a restaurant, the menu closes automatically, your eyes burning a hole through the waiter across the room before your conscious mind even realizes you've decided what to order?

I have a few, and when prepared by a chef at the top of his game, these foods monopolize my thoughts long after the meal.  In the days that follow, during meetings at work, I find myself nodding towards the person speaking to me and thinking: how did they get the skin of that pork so crispy the other night?  How hot do they set the oven?  In the shower, while others' thoughts drift to the guy who posted his kids on Craigslist, I debate the ingredients in the veal cheek marinade.  All this eventually forces me into my own kitchen to try recreating a dish that, let's face it, my culinary talents don't stand a chance of achieving.

Now, just imagine the disappointment when I request one of my favorites at a new restaurant, and it turns out their version is no good.  It's crushing.  Yes, my job performance is significantly better over the next few days.  Still, crushing.

So, to avoid such debacles, recently I looked for rankings of restaurants that offer my favorite foods.

They don't exist.

Which is strange, because we Washingtonians generally don't suffer from a shortage of food lists.  Some lists tell you the dishes most beloved by local chefs.  Others rattle off the best items that a given restaurant has to offer.  Some just catalog the whereabouts of Top Chefs contestants.  None of them, though, takes one particular dish and ranks all the restaurants that serve it.

So, without further ado, I give you ...

The Top 5 Places to Get Octopus in DC

1. Zaytinya

Grilled baby octopus, marinated onions, capers, yellow split pea puree

I ordered the baby octopus because I heard it's Chef Mike Isabella's favorite food to prepare. He got some cooking tips in Santorini, Greece, where octopi swim the Aegean in such abundance that native Santorinis paint them on their pottery and call them their "apples of love." Santorinis are, apparently, a somewhat creepy people. Like the Santorinis, Isabella braises his octopus in red wine vinegar. But whereas the locals just boil their love apples, Isabella also grills them until the arms turn brown and crisp.

Have this dish - it will rejigger your understanding of octopus. If, as I used to, you think of it as seafood's second-class citizen - certainly palatable but bland and chewy - Zaytinya will disabuse you of your octoprejudice. Isabella's version is sweet as lobster, and I haven't enjoyed crispiness this much since cracklings. Thanks to Zaytinya, I overcame my fear of slimy undulating tentacles coming to life in my kitchen and attacking me, and bought my first octopus to braise and grill.

 
2. Cafe Atlantico

Grilled Octopus with sobrasada, salsa verde, fingerling potatoes, arugula

Chef Terri Cutrino’s octopus actually competes with Chef Isabella’s work at Zaytinya. Instead of the more traditional approach of boiling, Cutrino cooks it sous-vide before grilling. The flavor is, as Sam Sifton would say, head-scratchingly good – Cutrino packs the sous-vide bag with a pungent mix of paprika, oregano, and salt. For unbeatable tentacle texture, I’d go with Isabella’s version, but this was close.


3. Vidalia

Grilled baby octopus – green chic pea hummus, piquillo peppers, smoked lemon emulsion

4. Palena

5. Ceiba
Gazpacho Vinaigrette, Queso Fresco, Black Olive Aioli

Honorable Mentions:


Eventide

Octopus Escabeche with green olives, cauliflower, peppers, chickpea mash

My Apartment (probably biased)

Most Disappointing:

Jaleo

Boiled octopus with potato, pimentón and olive oil

Jaleo plates their eight-leggers right after boiling instead of proceeding to grill them - just like they do in the kitchens of Spain.  The side of potatoes is authentic, too - just like you'd get it at a beach resort in Santorini.  One problem: Mediterranean people should grill their octopus, and they should give you more than a few buttered-up potatoes.  It's better that way.  To see why, all Jaleo Chef JohnPaul Damato has to do is drop by fellow Jose Andres restaurants Zaytinya and Cafe Atlantico.   Maybe it's time for a ThinkFoodGroup conference call.
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Others that I Still Need to Try:

Masa 14

Black Salt