Rasika (DC - Penn Quarter)

There are so many new restaurants opening in DC that it is hard to keep up with them all, but such is my charge in life.

I had been anticipating Rasika's opening since I first heard whispers that Vikram Sunderam would be leaving his post at Bombay Brasserie. BB was my favorite restaurant when I was living in London (albeit many years ago) and I couldn't wait to see how well the food translated across the pond.

A small group of us tried Rasika last night and were very impressed. The menu is long and difficult to get through, but the servers are well versed in ingredients, preparation and portion control.

We shared:

Trio of Chicken Tikka
Available in both a small and a large portion, this dish arrives as three separate preparations of chicken tikka: chili, basil and cheese. Each is incredibly tender, juicy chicken in a completely unique seasoning. From the heat of the red chili preparation to the herbal calm of the basil to the rich opulence of the cheese, each is as outstanding as it is difficult to synthesize.

Dahi Batata Puri
These are puffed up papadams - like the "golgapas" at Heritage India - light flour shells filled with a variety of ingredients. In this preparation, they are stuffed with potatoes, yogurt and tamarind date chutney. The dish explodes in your mouth, with the tartness of the yogurt amplified by the sweet tanginess of the chutney. The potato is more or less along for the ride, but you need something to provide a neutral base for the other flavors.

Palak Chaat
This is quickly becoming the restaurant's signature dish. That is not to say it is the best dish on the menu, or that Chef Sunderam is particularly known for the dish, but it is the one that no food critic fails to mention.

Chalk it up to the American fascination with novelty - if you take a leafy green like spinach and petrifying it by tossing it in a fryer, people are amazed. It is the kitchen equivalent of a parlor trick (everyone remembers that "fried ice cream" at Chi-Chi's - sure, it never really tasted that good, but we ordered it anyway, because we couldn't imagine how anyone could actually fry ice cream).

This dish features flash-fried spinach, yogurt and tamarind date chutney tossed together as a salad. Think of it as the crispy spinach from The Palm married to the sauce from the best Chicken Chaat you have ever had. It is a fun juxtaposition to the chicken tikka trio mentioned above - the chicken presents uniform texture across three unique flavors, while the salad offers a synthesized flavor with different textures in every bite.

Black Cod
Black cod in an Indian restaurant, you ask? Yes. Part of the adventure at Rasika is seeing ingredients you don't normally associate with Indian food shown a new light. Here the cod is just barely cooked - crispy on the outside, but moist, flakey and meltingly fresh in the center. It is ever-so-slightly glazed with honey and kissed with star anise before being plated with fresh dill and a red wine vinegar sauce. Each of the flavors is very subtle and they blend together in perfect harmony. It is a study in balance and restraint.

Typically we associate the panoply of Indian spices with overpowering, in-your-face, bold flavors and sensations. Here the Chef reminds us that the seasonings can be elegant and delicate as well. This dish reminds me of hearing your favorite song on the radio, just as the signal is fading out - the sound is so soft that you crane your neck, hoping to tease a little more out of the radio.

Dum Ka Duck
Picking up where the cod left off, duck was another dish that you don't immediately expect to find in your typical Indian kitchen. It appears here, rubbed with chili, perfectly medium/rare (still light pink at the outer edges, deep red in the center) and astride a puddle of saffron cream and cashew nuts. Here too the flavors are subtle. Just a hint of heat from the chili, not at all over playing the duck itself, followed by just a breath of saffron and a fleeting encounter with the crumbled cashews. The dish is topped with some caramelized onions, so if the combination of duck fat and cashew fat is too thick for you, the onions provide a little acidic bite to get you over the hump.

Lamb Shank Roganjosh
This is the dish you have all been waiting for - the big, bold, bowl-me-over dish. We have all had varieties of lamb roganjosh in our neighborhood Indian joints - cubes of tough stew lamb in a hot (though less incendiary than vindaloo) garam masala and tomato sauce. In this preparation, Chef Sunderam cooks the entire lamb shank and the result is closer to osso bucco than any lamb roganjosh you have ever had.

The presentation is marvelous, with the shank lying on its side, topped with frizzled green onions and virtually floating on a pond of spicy tomato-based sauce. The meat itself falls off the bone and arrives still medium/well done with traces of light pink in the center - tender, juicy and melting in your mouth.

The sauce is lighter and fresher than any you have likely had before as well. This isn't that brownish-red sauce that has been on the buffet line for a week. This sauce is a vibrant red and you can actually taste fresh tomatoes in between the richness of the lamb and the heat of the garam masala. I am salivating just writing about it. I devoted nearly half of our table's bread basket to sopping up every last drop of that sauce.

[NB: The wine list is also ambitious. They have searched far and wide to find wines - including an unusually large variety of wines by the glass - that pair with Indian spices. I had a glass of Gruner Veltliner with our starters and then paired a Spanish Grenacha with the Roganjosh and duck.]

This was a tutorial in how mind blowing Indian spices can be. From the delicate cod perfumed with anise and dill to the tangy duck with saffron, chili and cashew and on to the heady depth of the garam masala lamb shank, each dish was unique and balanced.

This is what keeps me coming back to Chef Vikram Sunderam's cooking. He constantly pushes the envelope of Indian cooking, innovating at every turn. He throws an amazing array of flavors and sensations at you and dares you to keep up with him. Ever since college, when I phoned my Parents from London to ask if I could use their credit card to take my girlfriend to dinner at Bombay Brasserie, I have been mystified by his cooking.

The Metro isn't the tube and the Penn Quarter will never be mistaken for Kensington, but we are extremely lucky to have Chef Sunderam here in DC.