DC Coast

Uppity crowd and quality (although tiny) cocktails.

So I’ve been to DC Coast twice buuuut I’m still not convinced. The restaurant’s décor is quite nice and the custom service is pretty good as well.
With all that aside, the food is just okay. During my recent visit, I ordered their lobster Mac and cheese. This item is not a regular on the menu and for good reason! Have you ever had lobster Mac and cheese topped with ham??? What. Is. That. About? A little too ambitious if you ask me.
My friend ordered the seafood gumbo. Now that dish was way better but the rice was a little burnt. The chef or whomever tried to mask the less than favorable rice with the gumbo brown sauce! (Nice try dude, I see what you did there ;)).
Like I said earlier, they service is pretty good and the décor is something any parent would be proud of.
Btw– this restaurant is set to close sometime early next year.

Great restaurant with very friendly waiters. The food was very good! I recommend the Surf and Turf. The meat was delicious and the crab cake with the bernaise sauce is divine. We had a Key Lime Pie for dessert which was pretty good.

I visited DC Coast for happy hour and loved it! Try the fried oysters-​delicious! Great service and good food!

For what time I was in here, I quite thoroughly enjoyed myself. I stopped in to get a quick drink and app to hold me over before holding my happy hour at a liquor only no food food establishment.
I ordered from the happy hour menu getting their grape martini and shrimp and cream cheese dumplings. Both of which were totally delicious. I would have liked more substance in the dumplings, but otherwise no complaints.
My bartender Jeremy was a sweetheart. He was very jolly with both wit and his approach to his customer service.
As far as DC Coast goes — the building was built in 1929 in the art deco style to be a bank. If you recall though; 1929 wasn’t such a great year to be a bank. It never came to pass, and over the course of years the building has served a number of businesses. For the last 17 years one of the businesses it has served is DC Coast.
Valet is $ 7 if you’re dining in, and if you’re going somewhere else it is $ 15 during the week.

DC Coast offered a great Restaurant Week $ 35 dinner menu. You can pick any of the main courses combined with a good selection of appetizers and desserts. We had several of the seafood dishes (catfish, salmon, swordfish) and all were excellent. Another thing I like about this restaurant is that you could carry on a conversation at your table without raising your voice. Service was great also.

I asked the bartender at the hotel I was staying at where to go for good seafood. He recommended DC Coast.
It was good, not great. Crab cakes had lots of shells in them. Customer service was good, but the prices were sky high.

Haven’t tasted the food yet, but if it’s anything like the service I give it 5 stars. On our way to Airport an Chef Miles made an exception. Got our food ready and packaged it to go. We had the Lobster an flashed fried spinach, with fried red rice. Some family members said we had to try it, what a way to spend extra time when your flight is delayed.
4stars

I was craving crab cakes while in DC and I heard raving reviews about DC Coast.
Click here to see pics:
The building itself looks pretty fancy, but once inside, it’s more casual to dressy casual. Very fine service to go with the décor and quality of the food. The pictures don’t show it, but the bread basket contained little mini ciabattas. Cute and buttery… mMmmm! It doesn’t look like much that we ordered, but the whole trip was just one restaurant after another. We at at maybe 3 – 4 restaurants per day so all I could fit were the crabcakes, but they were so worth it! Purely crab with minimal breading and hardy enough to finish the day off as dinner. One order of crab cakes costs $ 35 with choice of sauce and side. It’s a little on the pricier side, but well worth the bottomless bread basket and quality crab cakes. I’d definitely visit again for great service and good food.

Although most of the food was good, the service was so terrible that it knocked off a couple of stars.
First, the food: The calamari and tuna tartare were both very good. The main course and dessert were fine as well.
However, the service left much to be desired. We were two people in our late 20s /​early 30s and probably didn’t look like we had a lot to spend, so I felt like we were treated like college students out at a nice restaurant. The place was mostly empty, but we were brought to a table right next to the kitchen, and next to two other full tables. Speaking of the open kitchen, we thought it was terrible. It wasn’t open to the point that you could sit at a bar and watch the food being made, but it was just open enough to be loud and distracting. Not what DC Coast should be going for.
Anyway, we then ordered cocktails from a condescendingly overly-​friendly waiter. But he said he didn’t really know the cocktail list when we asked a question, so he came back with the bartender. It then took at least 10 minutes for our cocktails to be made. We ordered appetizers, main meals, and a side of mashed potatoes. As we were (finally) enjoying our cocktails, the manager came by with the mashed potatoes and two empty plates to share. I called her back and mentioned that we didn’t even have our appetizers yet, so we clearly didn’t want the side that should come with the main meal. She apologized and took it back in, but who in their right mind would give a plate of mashed potatoes to two people drinking cocktails? Did she think we came there just to order cocktails and potatoes? How did our order get put in backward?
Partway through when we wanted to order wine, our waiter was nowhere to be found. He kept going to the table of middle-​aged businessmen right next to us and staying there joking around with them for minutes at a time. Later one of the fruit flies that were buzzing around (really, DC Coast??) flew into my glass of wine. We alerted the manager who was nearby and she said, «Oh I don’t know how that happened» and then asked if we wanted a new complimentary glass of wine. (Why is that even a question and not just automatically offered?) Then the waiter comes back to us and starts talking badly about the manager and her question to us and jokes that of course she knows where the fruit fly came from – they’re buzzing around everywhere. I found it very unprofessional to talk badly about your manager in front of your guests. Overall we just found the service to be lacking, especially considering we spent $ 200+ on our meal.

Came here to grab a bite and drinks after seeing the cherry blossoms this past weekend. I ordered the honey bee for my drink, and it was so good — reminded me of a mojito with a hint of honey and lemonade. Perfect amount of alcohol, and perfect amount of sweetness. I loved it!
Ordered the blackened catfish tacos from the bar menu, and they were absolutely delicious. Perfect bar portions, they came out as two soft tacos (on the smaller side). They were perfect for a snack to pair with some drinks. They had amazing flavor, were super juicy, and the sauce was impeccable.
Just based on the drinks/​bar menu, it was great. And to top it all off, the bartender was the best. Think his name was Jason. Definitely plan on going back.

I expected DC Coast to be much better. They certainly didn’t make it close to my expectation. The venue was nice of course and it’s located right on 14^th and Kst, where all the clubs are.
The Pros:
First, service and ambiance were both great! While you wait for your food, they do provide complimentary bread, which I ate a ton of before my food arrived. There is a large selection of wine and drinks to choose from. I had a lot of wine during my visit and the price of bottled wine was decent. actually great. It wasn’t overpriced.
Con:
One of the most important ranking factors of restaurants – the food. I am a huge seafood lover; practically grew up eating seafood, so I’ve had my share of seafood. The menu was pretty small and honestly, there wasn’t much to choose from. It’s a simple menu with the typical seafood choices. There was nothing exotic or special about their entrees that I couldn’t order at any other restaurant that serves seafood. For example, seafood gumbo? not very unique. Although, the gumbo itself was alright; a bit too salty for me and the type of seafood in there was also very common like, shrimps.
By all means, I’m not saying the food here is awful, it’s just very plain: wasn’t prepared in a unique way, it didn’t taste extremely delicious, not many choices and very common materials/​seafood used. I expected them to have more of an authentic menu with special entrees and taste I couldn’t experience elsewhere.

The Skinny: A reasonably priced seafood place with great «cold seafood» offerings that includes sashmi and oysters. This is a place to sit down and enjoy your meal, so if fast service is mandatory for you, I would look else well.
I went here for the fist time during prom night. I had the chilled lobster on top of a bed of oysters. I have to say it started my love for cold seafood. There are some complaints about the cooking but every restaurant has a specialty and here it’s the cold seafood such as oysters, sashmi, shrimp, and etc.
They are chilled to the right temperature and maintained at peak freshness. The oysters are silky and refreshing during the hot and humid D.C. summer. The shrimps offer a nice neutral flavor and I love the crackle of breaking shells (important indicator of freshness and cooling).
Other than that there are a wide range of meals here but the warmer foods are a little under quality compared to the cold bars. However, there are still delicious and perfect for a upper mid tier restaurant. The prices are also very reasonable.
From my experiences, the staff have always been exceptional. They were prompt and ready to respond but was never too intrusive. So, you don’t have to worry about them frequently interrupting a conversation or meal. A problem I found in some similar quality restaurants.
Who isn’t it for: If you don’t like seafood the simple choice is to stay away. If you are looking for ultra fine dining or one of a kind cuisine, this isn’t it. I would also make sure that anyone you bring does not have shellfish allergies as the non sea food menu is sparse. If you don’t like cold seafood, than there are better general serve seafood places in the area.

Disappointing. This is an unfortunate example of poor service overshadowing good food. We arrived on-​time for our 7:30 pm reservation and were immediately seated at a nice two-​top. We then sat waiting for 10+ minutes before or waiter showed up to see if we wanted water and leave a drink menu. We then waited another five for the water to arrive and a couple more for or waiter to return to take our drink order. I ordered a gin martini and my SO had the Honey Bee (from their cocktail list), about ten minutes later our server return with my martini and said they were still working on the Honey Bee, another five minutes passed before he returned with the drink (which my girlfriend said was not worth the wait). We were then informed they were out of several items. We decided to order before our waiter got lost and/​or they ran out of more dishes. I ordered the Tuna Tartare and Gumbo while my girlfriend opted for a Ceasar salad and crab cakes. I will say now that all the food was excellent and prepared as ordered.
The poor service continued as after or entrees were deposited our waiter never checked in to see how our meals were. We then tried to order the Mexican chocolate ice cream, what we got was mint chocolate chip. We mentioned this to the «hostess» as she cleared our dish, she did not say anything. When our server returned we mentioned it and he said they must have switched and not told him. He did say he would have it taken off our bill.
A manager did come to talk to us, turns out it was the same person we thought was a hostess who had no comment on the wrong dessert. The manager offered some token apologies. We paid our bill leaving a 10% on our bill which was more than was deserved.
While it was a Saturday night they were not extremely busy and a conversation with the table next to us revealed their service was also sparse (different server). The front of the house has work to do.

Dinner was really great during DC’s restaurant week, DC CoAst was able to seat us immediately. Our server was slow to get our dinner service started but became more attentive and conversational as the night went on. Ambiance was well delivered, medium light and soft music played in the background. Our food was great, we enjoyed a smörgåsbord of food on a pretty skinny bill. I would return!

My husband has been wanting to go to DC Coast since it opened so he thought he would surprise me for Valentine’s Day. What a great surprise. Naturally we had to order off of the Valentine menu which was double the price for this special day which is just our fault for picky a day like this. Nonetheless, the food was delicious and the service was excellent.
I had the Pear Salad which was delicious along with the Crab Cakes which were very tasty and filling. My husband loved the Thai Curry Butternut Squash Soup along with his Surf & Turf. I think he could have had a little bit more to satisify his appetite but it was delicious.
The only reason for not giving this visit five stars was I was not that impressed with the desserts served that night. I think they were specific to the evening and were okay but just not sweet enough for my taste. I had a tart apple dessert and my husband had a chocolate bomb which we didn’t finish.
I would definitely recommend a visit and I can’t wait to come back for happy hour or for a non-​occasional dinner. So many things on the menu I would like to try.
As I stated before, the service was amazing. We also were seated on the above floor against the glass so we could look down at the bar and dining area below. The building is beauiful and well decorated.

I was so excited to go to D.C. Coast for restaurant week with a dear friend. I have been a customer of DC Coast since it opened, and dinner was a nice treat. However, some of my very important personal paperwork was lost when I was dining there. I called the restaurant the next day and was told the GM would look into it. Then, I got a call from the GM several days later that I would hear from the owner. Then, the owner calls me berates me, is totally customer unfriendly and even goes so far as to not only insult my intelligence but try to make me feel like I was bothering him with my claim. He promised to reimburse the cost of needing to replace one document, but it never materialized. The worst part about the whole experience was that he was more concerned about what my boss, who dines there regularly, thought than what impact the loss had on me.
I love DC Coast; but I will not return. Ever.

Awesome bar menu, knowledgeable bartenders, great selection, and wonderful seafood. What more can you ask for. The décor here is very elegant and upscale and is in a great area near other restaurants and nightlife.
I had the jumbo lump crab cakes and the Tahitian Style Tuna Tartare. Both were very good. They were so good that I ended up ordering a double of both :). All in all, if you are looking for great seafood and great drinks, this is your place.

While I rated DC Coast as 4 stars, it’s actually somewhere between 3 ½ and 4. We enjoyed the food but felt that the service wasn’t quite up to par.
We made a reservation for 5:30 p.m. on a Saturday. Although we got there a little early, the door was open so we followed some other people in there. We were all told to sit in the small lounge area by the bar. Each table in the lounge had a sign saying that they were reserved for another party, which was confusing.
When we did get seated, the hostess wasn’t overly friendly. In fact, the vibe she gave off felt like she was doing us a favor by seating us. In fact, she later confirmed our suspicions when we saw her giving very friendly service to a customer who apparently was a regular there. We were taken upstairs to our table. While we don’t have problems climbing stairs, I felt that we should have been asked if we preferred being seated in the first floor dining area. That said, we did like the vantage point we had sitting upstairs. We could watch the bartender make our drinks and could see our server head upstairs with our food.
Our server was friendly and chatty. I asked him about the smoked lobster entrée since the menu description is vague. He got really animated when describing this dish, telling us that DC Coast has been around for 15 years, all because of this particular dish! When I found out that it consisted of a whole 1 ½ lb. lobster, I declined to order it as I didn’t feel like fighting with my food. I told him this and I swear he had a crestfallen look. Later on, my husband said that the server was probably hoping that I would order it since it was more expensive and that would have meant a bigger tip for him.
After looking at the drink menu, I decided to try one of their specialty drinks, the Honey Bee. This consists of vodka, lemon juice, honey and a mint leaf. It was a decent drink that tasted like a lemonade and wasn’t overly strong, a bit on the tart side. My husband took a sip and agreed that it was good. He ordered a Bloody Mary, which was spicy, just as he likes it. As the meal progressed, my husband ordered another Bloody Mary. This one was made by a different bartender and lacked spiciness.
When the server came back to take our dinner orders, he asked about the drinks. My husband mentioned that his drink was spicy, which actually alarmed the server. He offered to take it back. My husband had a hard time convincing him that he liked the drink just the way it is.
After we gave our orders, the server commented that we ordered «safe» items. Ummm… it’s not his place to make such comments.
We ordered 2 appetizers. I got the Octopus Yakitori and my husband got a shrimp cocktail.
When we saw «yakitori», we expected that the octopus would be on skewers. It was not served that way. In consisted of 3 legs that had been grilled. Despite the misnomer, this was one tasty dish! The octopus was properly prepared and was fork tender. The grilled added a bit of char that elevated the flavor. I didn’t care too much for the bed of slaw as it seemed a bit too vinegary.
The shrimp in my husband’s shrimp cocktail had an iodine flavor. We don’t fault the restaurant for that as iodine flavor has everything to do as to where the shrimp was harvested. We both thought that the shrimp was on the small side. Usually, you can count on shrimp cocktails to have large shrimp.
For dinner, I ordered the Norwegian salmon. This dish consists of: «honey soy glaze, bok choy and kim chi mashed potatoes. The salmon was properly cooked as it was medium to medium well, thus it was moist and flaky. I was concerned that the kim chi mashed potatoes would be too spicy but they were rather tame with just a hint of spiciness. The bok choy was baby bok choy and cooked tender crisp.
My husband had the Maine Diver Scallops. In addition to the scallops, this dish consists of: «creamy polenta, fava beans, English peas, ramps and Benton’s bacon». He thought that the scallops were well prepared and that the polenta lacked gritiness. The portion of fava beans, ramps and bacon was rather stingy with English peas being in abundance.
We were full so we didn’t have dessert. Before the tip, it cost $ 125 + change. If we went again, for me, it would be for the octopus! That was the most memorable part of the meal!

15+ years strong and they still have a solid following. Bar was packed and the mermaid that stands guard inside is still such a grand visual — how did they get that in the restaurant?
A must: the «Poisson Cru» Tahitian style tuna tartare served in the freshly cut half-​coconut. So i ordered the Tiki drink with that… because I am so sick of this snow and want to be somewhere warm.
Was celebrating my dear friend’s BD. She loved the Caesar salad minus the hairy anchovies. She doesn’t eat fish; I don’t eat meat. Plenty of options for us. I had the lump crabcakes with a knock out glass of Sancerre. She had the Goat Cheese Gnocchi.
Excellent service. Great value. Super HH prices too. I’ve enjoyed eating and drinking at the bar a number of times.
They are celebrating the Olympics withe some great themed cocktails. We had a fantastic meal.