La Cafe II

I get off at Farragut West for work ever day and on the days when I decide to have breakfast, this is where I go. LA Café is located on the basement /​food court level of International Square and you can get to it from the Metro station without going outside — helpful if it’s a cold DC winter day.
I didn’t even know that they were a sushi place for a lunch until I came to this Unilocal page. So my 4 star rating only applies to their breakfast selection. The variety is pretty good and the quality is solid. A full station of hot breakfast food with the classics: eggs, potatoes, meats. A half station full of fruits. A pretty random couple of boxes of donuts which always seem to call out to me as I’m checking out. My go-​to box usually consists of:
— Scrambled eggs with sausage and peppers on top. The eggs alone may lack a little flavor but this combo really hits the spot.
— Few tater tots. Best when they’re fresh out of the fryer but delicious either way.
— A chicken wing (or two). Kind of an odd thing to serve at breakfast but I’m not complaining.
— Few pieces of mango. Surprisingly ripe.

Warm sushi. warm salad. friendly service

I love going here for the sushi, which is def cheaper than traditional sushi places. PLUS you can get a free, delicious miso soup if you buy a pound of sushi (easy to do, trust me). What turns me off is the RUDE attitude of the checkout lady on the sushi side of the restaurant. Without fail, and everytime, she has an attitude problem! Now im not expecting amazing costumer service at a buffet station in a food court, but maybe just a little cordialness?

If you work in Foggy Bottom or downtown and like sushi, definitely give this place a try for lunch. The sushi is delicious, and the price is a great value – the pricing is by weight, so eating only nigiri (rather than maki rolls) is a lot more affordable than elsewhere. I can get a full meal (12+ nigiri pieces) for $ 10-​$ 12.
The fish is very tasty, and there’s a good variety, including tuna, salmon, eel, mackerel, and several other nigiri types, along with a big selection of maki rolls such as soft-​shelled crab, salmon skin, and spicy tuna. (The sushi chef is a nice guy and happy to answer questions.) My favorite is the mackerel nigiri.
LA Café is located in the basement food court of the International Square building in NW, between I and K and 18^th and 19^th. I like the sushi so much that I haven’t tried anything else here, so I can’t speak to the non-​sushi buffet fare.

Permanently closed due to ‘numerous and egregious’ health code violations. I loved your sushi and your breakfast bar that included cheese sauce. You will be missed my friend.

The sushi is great!
For years I discounted this sushi because it’s a deli — but my coworker made me try and it really is good. So good that whenever I eat it for lunch I think about it, with fond memories, for the rest of the day. I’ve especially always had delicious salmon.
As a side note — someone said the wasabi wasn’t «bright green» like it is in other places; that bright green color is fake, dear.

I can’t believe I’ve only just discovered this place after working nearby for years.
Everything I got from the hot and cold selections was very good. I think the chunk of roasted chicken tipped the scale though – I didn’t think I got much but it was $ 11. Bit owie.

Some of the sushi did not look or taste fresh. The eel roll and the nigiri salmon tasted good but the tuna roll was def sitting out for too long. What was the most bothersome is that the ginger was spoiled, 100% and the wasabi was not a bright green as it is in most places. Basically, you get what you pay for, and it was not even a bargain, 4 pieces of sushi and 2 pieces of nigiri for $ 7.50 is standard price. I would advice to pay a few dollars more and get sushi at KAZ or Café Asia instead where there is quality control at least. The rest of the place looked like a standard buffet you find anywhere else around the area.

There are days at work when I just want cut up fruit, lots of it and a variety of it. But I’m also lazy and don’t want to go through the trouble of buying whole fruit and hacking them apart myself. I’ve tried the tiny fruit boxes that area lunch spots have at the check-​out counters as a way to provide a healthy snack, but they are way over-​priced and generally look like fruit that’s been sitting there for days. No thanks!
Enter LA Café II. They have a quarter of their salad bar devoted to fruit! Mango, pineapple, grapes, kiwi, watermelon, grapefruit, already mixed fruit, you name it! The first time I went there I got so giddy and bought almost 3 pounds of fruit! Of course, the price is by weight so I paid almost an arm and a leg, but whatever, I was happy the rest of the day, or it could have been all the sucrose in the fruit that had me hyped up.
I think it’s 6-​something a pound for the buffet, which isn’t bad in this city. They also have a sign that says after 3 (or is it 3:30?) you get 15% off per pound for the buffet, although I’ve never gone that late and can only imagine the selection is pretty slim by that time.

Good place to get quick, fresh sushi.
Also, there is a bottle of siracha and spicy mayo available with the condiments, which makes this perfect for lunch during work.
1 Roll = less than $ 6.00

I LOVE La Café. This place is buffet style with a sushi bar, deli/​grill, fruit and salad, and the hot food. They have breakfast in the morning, which is definitely the best time to go. It has the best selection and the prices are great. There is eggs, sausages, bacon, muffins, and much more. The sushi there is good, too. Of course it won’t be the best you ever had, but it’s still delicious, especially for how much it’ll cost you. The only downfall is the lunch buffet. Although the food here is tasty, the only kind of meat they seem to add to their buffet foods is chicken (or small shrimp). But, they make up for it by having asparagus and other fresh ingredients in their salad area. It’s one of my favorite places to eat for breakfast and lunch!

It’s hard to find places in Farragut that serves food that isn’t off a truck or that won’t leave you seeking financial assistance. La Café is one of the rare eateries that provides you with a quick and and moderatly priced lunch.
I had a shrimp tempura roll and a seared tuna roll. They were both pretty tasty. Their prepackaged rolls are «first come, first serve» so if they run out of the type of roll you want they will not make you new one.

I just had 9 pieces of nigiri and 3 roll pieces for $ 10. It is $ 10.99 per pound and I made sure not to weigh my soy sauce. It was not the best sushi I’ve had, but still pretty good, and good enough that I will go back. And for the price it was great.
I am sitting here staring at a ruler after having already devoured the sushi to try and think about the how thick the slices of fish were on the nigiri. The salmon slices were the most generous, but not by much. I’d say they were just under a ¼ thick, maybe ³⁄₁₆. Everything else was just a hair thinner, but still plenty there.
They had a decent selection of sushi. For nigiri there was Salmon, Ahi, eel, 3 white ones I can never tell apart (but I still like them) and the one that is usually a bit silvery like the skin is still on it. I’m not good with people’s names, let alone fish names, let alone fish names in Japanese. For rolls there were at least 6 different ones I saw, including ones with shrimp tempura. The rolls had a decent amount of fish/​crab/​shrimp in them and were not skimpy by any means.
The sushi itself would probably be 3 stars, but the price bumps it up to 4 in my opinion.

Great place for inexpensive and yet good sushi. Friendly staff, and a huge selection of dishes if you feel like something other than that raw seafood goodness. Lol

I had a sushi craving at lunch today, and unfortunately your options for quality sushi around Farragut Square are limited. Aware of these limitations, I ventured underground to La Café.
Upon entering, you will notice a lunch buffet to your left. I usually avoid these setups like the plague — paying a flatrate by the pound is inherently absurd. A cup of rice should not cost equal to a chicken breast. Anyway, I digress.
The sushi bar to the right looks a bit more appealing. It’s stationed by a sushi chef, which gives the impression that the sushi is freshly made. There is not much to choose from, however. I noticed 6 – 8 varieties of rolls and a few different kinds of nigiri. They all looked appealing enough, especially the nigiri, but I was concerned about how long they had been under the lamp. I picked 6 relatively large rolls (at least twice the size of neighboring sushi joint Wasabi) and two pieces of nigiri. It ended up costing me $ 7 and some change, not bad for a tray of sushi. (The sushi is also priced by the pound. Rolls can be heavy, so stick to the nigiri for the best value.)
Unless you count the food court seating, there is none at La Café, so I decided to stuff my face at Farragut Square, sitting below my buddy Admiral Farragut. Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead.
First, the rolls. I immediately noticed the lights had «cooked» the outside of the rolls, which resulted in a slight crunch (and not in a good way). The fish tasted relatively fresh. The nigiri was much better (although one piece was slightly chewy). It didn’t exactly melt in my mouth, but it was pretty tasty. In conclusion, I recommend a high nigiri-​to-​roll ratio.
For the price, it’s a decent deal, I’ll probably be back. If I could give it 3.5 stars I would. I’m still hunting for better though.

The BEST place for breakfast takeout (sausages with onions, french toast, eggs, etc. – the selection is fantastic)!!!

Sushi, sushi sushi… yawn. How about mentioning that they have a $ 6 triple-​decker club sandwich that weighs about three pounds?! ‘Nuff said!
One piece of advice: Keep away from the buffet table while they are preparing your sandwich. Before you know it you will have a box filled to to the top with crap you don’t need.

I work one block away, so I eat here all day everyday, no lie! Who else serves fried chicken for lunch AND breakfast. It’s like these guys see into my soul.
They have a grill/​made to order are for sandwiches and stuff, but the impressive part of LA Café is the buffet. Most of the items breakfast/​lunch items are hearty and delicious, with an almost fanatical adherence to fat and grease – spot hitters, all of them.
They also have a salad bar for you pansies. It’s full of salad ingredients so you can make your own, or there are premade offerings, and gross stuff like seaweed and vermicelli and whatever. Gross.
There’s a nice little sushi bar that’s prepared infront of your eyes, daily. Very fresh, very clean. I get no heebie jeebies from this sushi bar.
The one Fail is the fruit bar. I’m a grape lover and I feel like these guys recycle their grapes throughout the week – which isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but by Thurs/​Friday the grapes are all soft and puckered, visibly unappealing. It’s as if they pluck them all at once at the beginning of the week, so of course they die a faster death.
But the grapes are the only downfall. The checkout lines move quickly and they don’t hassle you if you pull out a CC for $ 4.90, even though their signs clearly say $ 5 minimum.

Nobu, it is not — this place is a pretty standard lunch-​buffet, except for the sushi.
The price has gone up to 10.99 per pound, but for a very fresh selection of fairly standard rolls (cucumber, avocado, tuna, tuna/​avocado, salmon, salmon/​avocado) and nigiri (tuna, hamachi, salmon, unagi) it’s a steal.
By contrast, the rolls at Lawson’s are 4.95 a la carte… good (and I love Lawson’s) but the price point can’t compare, not to mention the sushi restaurants in the area.
Miso is good, and free with a pound of sushi (but getting a full tuna avocado roll and six pieces of nigiri cost me 9.60 yesterday for lunch)
Won’t find anything fresher at anywhere near this price.

Not sure why this is #2, the sign doesn’t seem to state this. Nevertheless, this is downstairs in the food court at 1850 K St.
Place is set up like every other lunch deli in the area. There is a massive buffet table where you get what you want for $ 5.99 a pound. The sandwich artists in the back will hook you up with a sub, and there’s the usual coffee and soda options.
What sets this place apart is the sushi selection. It’s no sushi bar with chefs and all, but a buffet where you choose your own, and weigh it for $ 9.99 a pound. Fortunately sushi isn’t very heavy, so each roll or nigiri should set you back a buck or so. It’s very fresh and very tasty.
They also have large miso soup for $ 1.50, and you get to put your own aburaage and negi (had to look them up in Wikipedia).
Overall, that makes it #1 by my standards.