PRICE:
Frommer's Exceptional

It's official: Central is one of the best restaurants in the country. So says the James Beard Foundation, which in 2008 named Central "best new restaurant." This place makes you feel good as soon as you walk through the door. It's a French-American brasserie with a joie de vivre ambience and a menu full of precociously re-created American and French classics. A lobster burger is layered with scallop mousse, macaroni and cheese is creamy with sour cream as well as cheeses, the fried chicken is an ungreasy version lightly dusted with bread crumbs. On and on it goes, the names of French dishes ping-ponging with American, hanger steak and onion soup to apple pan dowdy and banana split. The french fries, a country unto themselves, are perfection. Michel Richard is the chef of Citronelle, the city's best restaurant, and he opened Central in early 2007 to entice younger diners with smaller budgets. The Frenchman, who has lived in the U.S. for more than 30 years, has a special fondness for his adopted country; and it shows -- and not just in the menu. The bistro is half dining room, half bar and exhibition kitchen; and there's an actual television in the bar. Richard wants you to have fun and, from all appearances, Central's succeeding on that score.

Copyright: Excerpted from Frommer's Washington, D.C. 2009, (c) 2008, Wiley Publishing, Inc.

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