The Melting Pot

Good, but trite and passé.

I went here for a double date with my fiancé and another couple. Dinner was amazing! We ordered the «Big Night Out» four course dinner which was REALLY GOOD! The meats and veggies were amazing. I throughly enjoyed myself as did my friends and my fiancé. I LOVED the cookies and cream fondu. I had white wine with my dinner; Riesling I believe, which was quite delicious.

The Melting Pot is a great treat and an awesome activity to do with a group of friends, but it’s perfectly fine for parties of two as well. The interior of this place is cavernous and a little dark but we have never had trouble being seated. It’s not a place we would make a habit out of visiting but it is an undeniably fun dining experience.
The Cheeses:
The cheddar cheese, the fiesta cheese, and the spinach artichoke cheese fondues are all solid. Our favorite of the three we tried was the cheddar, which has a nice touch of lager and garlic. The cheese fondues come up with broccoli/​cauliflower (yawn), a nice selection of breads and some tasty apples (our favorite).
Main Course:
Nothing too special here. You get a choice of different meat/​seafood/​vegetarian variety packs along with several sauces. This part of the meal is just about the experience of cooking your own food with fondue forks. The sauces were enjoyable but nothing to write home about.
Dessert:
Chocolate is chocolate and we all know that chocolate is wonderful. That said, your dessert options range from great to fantastic. To err on the side of fantastic we recommend the Cookies ‘n Cream or the The Flaming Turtle. The chocolate fondues come with moist pound cake, brownies, strawberries, bananas, marshmallows and a slice of cheesecake.
One really great thing about The Melting Pot is that it does have one of the best happy hours in DC. ½ off any cheese or chocolate fondue on their menu is a great deal!
Not-​so-​secret-​tip: Last time they offered us a replenishment of strawberries they gifted us with a box with an assortment of white/​milk/​dark chocolate-​covered strawberries (on the house). We were pretty pleased.
If you come for one thing, make it dessert but dinner is a great experience nonetheless.

One of the only fondue places in the dc area. Defintely overpriced, but unique and delicious and good for what you get. Recommend not doing the big night out as its waaay too much food unless you are two guys going out for a date.

***Sorry but you’re in for a long one***
I’d been to this location of The Melting Pot several times and never had a problem, until this time.
Our reservation was for the Friday of DC’s summer Restaurant Week. We arrived for our reservation and a quirky hostess took us to our table only to find people were still sitting there. Ok. We went back to the front and ordered drinks from the bar because we were told it would be a few minutes.
The hostess comes back to seat us and I immediately noticed the furnishings had deteriorated since the last time I was there, last fall. The seat cushions were all scratched up and the faux marble slab table appeared to be hanging off the wall.
We sat and waited for nearly 10 minutes for our waiter to greet us and bring us water, never happened. My bf tried to stop several other waiters/​waitresses to find out who was serving our table. That didn’t work so I got up and went to the hostess stand to inform then we had not been waited on.
Shortly after we were seated a table of girls was seated across from us. They started making a lot of noise and asked to be moved, later on we found out they’d seen a roach on their table. Yuck!
Anywho, our waitress Aisha finally came. Again, I’d been there several times so I knew what I wanted to order and bf went along. When Aisha came back to make our spinach and cheese fondue, she kept forgetting things, like the tongs and various elements that went within the fondue. It literally took her 3 attempts (the number of times she went back to the kitchen) to start making our fondue. Then we sat and waited and waited. The pot was empty and starting to burn, our glasses of water and drinks were also empty and Aisha was no where to be found.
Finally, another waitress came to take our pot. Another 10 minutes or so later, another person, who I believe was a busboy, came with our entrees. She tried her hardest to explain how long it took to cook the meats and to describe the sauces, but you could tell that wasn’t her forte. I will give it to her she definitely tried. She even admitted it was her first time serving an entrée.
All evening, we noticed it was incredibly warm in the dining area but once the pot turned on for our entrée it was unbearable. Our food was cooking in like 20 – 30 seconds, not the 2 – 3 minutes like usual and my boyfriend and I were sweating. It got so bad we had to get up and go to the bathroom just to cool off and bring back napkins.
At one point, I started feeling faint and told my boyfriend I couldn’t take the heat, literally. We expressed how uncomfortable we were to our waitress, who had finally made an appearance, and she blamed the excessive heat on it being DC in the summertime. Umm no. We then called the manager over, she admitted the AC had gone out and that someone was on the way to fix it. See, we knew we weren’t crazy.
So half way through dinner, we decided to ask if they could wrap up dessert so we could get out of there. This took another 15 minutes and my bf saw that I was barely making it due to the heat and told me to go wait in the lobby while he settled the check.
The manager did take something off of the bill. Between the service, or lack thereof, the condition of the restaurant, and the AC issue, after that experience I doubt I’ll ever go back to that location.

Everything met and exceeded our expectations at the Melting Pot.
We had a new server still in training so the service wasn’t flawless, but she was very friendly and did the best she could. The only major mistake of the evening was that she forgot to bring our coffee that we ordered with dessert, however, it wasn’t on our check, so we just let it go. It was also very warm in the restaurant, otherwise the I would have given them 5 stars.
The food was incredible! We had the 4 course dinner and everything was delicious. Yes, we had to cook our own meat for the third course, but it was fun and a unique experience. My husband and I enjoyed it, although we wish we could have been able to cook several pieces of the meat together without worrying about overcooking/​undercooking it. However, everything tasted amazing… my husband said he was going to start charging me for every time I said «Oh my goodness this is so good!» Also, the portion sizes look small, but for the four course meal, we were absolutely stuffed when we left. Don’t let the «small» portion sizes fool you, it really is filling!
We were not rushed to consume our meal and we were able to relax and enjoy dinner. The whole experience took about 2 hours and was about $ 100 + tip, but it was well worth it. We hope to return one day!

Wonderful date night!
But be warned: it can be A LOT of food.
The ambiance is kinda weird, incredibly dated, and WARM. Granted, there are heated metal bowls on every table, so the temperature makes sense.
But the food. OhMyGosh. So delicious. Our server, Jonathan, was fantastic. He steered me away from a less than great bottle of wine, and made a perfect recommendation (for roughly the same price). For our meal, we did the four-​course thing, which ended up being a TON of food. Personally, I could live without the ‘entrée’ course, and be happy with cheese, salad and dessert.
It might also be fun to stop by for just drinks and dessert.
Basically, it’s a unique experience (we were in there for almost four hours), with shockingly yummy food. Definitely worth a night out.

We had their 4 course meal (cheese, salad, entrée, dessert) and this are my recommendations:
— Come here if you want to have fun with your food. How often do you get to do that?
— Only come here for the cheese and MAYBE the dessert fondue. My problem with the dessert fondue is that it’s sweet on MORE sweet. And while I love chocolate, the chocolate brownie dipped in chocolate is too much!
— Block off 4 hours of your time. For some reason, from check-​in (i had made reservations) to leaving the restaurant, it took us nearly four hours. My it was b/​c our waiter took a while between courses, maybe it was because it was Sat night. Who knows… good thing we had nothing planned after dinner.
— Don’t get the salads (you didn’t come here for THAT, did you?)
— Don’t get the tuna. Sushi-​grade tuna should be eaten raw. It was really weird-​tasting being cooked in the caq a vin broth.

The Wisconsin Trio was okay, but I could still taste the alcohol, which I didn’t really like. I got the California salad which tasted good but was a bit too drenched in dressing. The pure dark chocolate fondue was great.
FYI — you can get free refills on all the things you dip into the fondues.

Since I am a poor intern, I had to wait for Girls Night Out to eat here. I was kind of disappointed because I assumed all of the courses would be dipped in cheese. Was I crazy for thinking that? Chalk it up to fat girl problems.
Anyway, I don’t think I would do the full four courses again but I am definitely up for the cheese and chocolate fondues. The Wisconsin Trio is amazing– the blue cheese gives an unexpected kick and it’s really good. I don’t remember what my dessert fondue was called but it was dark chocolate with graham crackers and marshmallow and it’s served with cheesecake, pound cake, strawberries, and other yummies to eat it with.
The salad course was just a wedge salad and the entrees were blah, except for the mushroom pasta (they looked liked potstickers) which was really good.

I have eaten at this Melting Pot on several occasions and never had a problem with service. In fact, we ate here last year for our anniversary and had a fantastic meal thanks to our server that evening. I made my reservation through Open Table for Friday, 11.4.11 @ 6:30 PM and noted that it was for our anniversary — I know that The Melting Pot likes to acknowledge events of this nature.
Upon arrival, we were greeted and taken back to our seat with no mention of a Happy Anniversary or anything like we had last year (even though I mentioned we had reservations through Open Table and it flagged it). The seats we were taken back to was a group of four small booths basically shoved underneath the staircase. It was meant to be romantic, but was more like Siberia. There was one tiny doorway which luckily we were sat in front of so we could see the rest of the restaurant — had it not been for that, I would’ve been claustrophobic.
Our waiter was Sam. He was a very nice guy (looked like the lead singer from Train) and very conversational but as a server, his skills were lacking. He was constantly forgetting our drinks — took us 20 minutes (well into our cheese/​salad courses despite ordering the drinks and waters) before we got anything. Then he proceeded to drop my fiancé’s drink. He finally got us our waters at that point and said that the manager was making the new drink personally and that it would be there shortly. That didn’t show up until the main course arrived and on top of it, it was an extremely weak Long Island Iced Tea. At $ 10 for the drink, there should’ve been more alcohol in there, especially in light of the fact that it took forever to get our drinks anyway and then on top of it, the inconvenience of having it dropped in front of us. I ordered a Strawberry Blonde (champagne, strawberry purée, and pineapple juice) which I couldn’t drink because it was about as thick as a smoothie and too sweet.
Our meal of the evening was the American Night out deal, which focused on American food items.
— Course #1 — a cheddar cheese fondue made with Sam Adams, mustard, and bacon. It was very thin and not very good, but it was edible.
— Course #2 — this was supposed to be some sort of wedge salad but we subbed in a house salad and a caesar — nothing wrong with that — I should note that it was the only part of the meal which didn’t get messed up.
— Course #3 — For the entrée (which we ordered the mojo cooking style) we asked if we could have the mushroom pasta removed and substituted with extra steak — Sam said that would be no problem. Lo and behold, there was mushroom pasta on the plate and no extra steak. We asked him where the extra steak was and he said «Oh, it looks like they forgot…» and promised he’d be right back with it. About 10 minutes later he came back, and it wasn’t the steak that went with the meal (which was filet mignon strips), but some sort of teriyaki sirloin. At this point, I was pretty much over all of it. I told my fiancé that I was just going to cook everything and ask for a box to take the leftovers home in — which you can do. As long as everything is cooked, they’ll let you take it with you. About halfway through cooking the remainder of the food when he dropped off the chocolate menu, Sam noticed I had a mound of the veggies and meat on the plate and asked me if I wanted a box to take it home — I told him yes since we were full. He said he would be right back with that. 20 minutes go by… the food coma is starting to kick in. He comes to drop off the check and says «Are you still picking at your food?» At this point, I was grumpy and said that we had told him that we were done a while ago and were waiting for our box. We ordered our dessert chocolate then.
— Course #4 — had the special event create your own deal which was a dark chocolate base with a shot of Bailey’s thrown in. This is always my favorite part of the meal. I have been mentally salivating over this course for weeks since making the reservation. Imagine my «joy» at having lukewarm, barely melted chocolate presented to me. It was sufficiently bad enough that we didn’t even eat the plate of dessert items.
Total with tax and tip was $ 150. For that amount, I expected a far better meal. We will most likely not be back to this location. We still love our cheesy melty goodness, but $ 150 is a large portion of our disposable income right now and we deserved far better than what we got for that price.

This place frustrates the HELL out of me!
Horrible for large groups. (Bright side: probably cute for couples.)
Small portions + large prices = no thanks

This place is so fun!
Many people have mixed feelings about this place but I thought it was awesome. It’s obviously unique and the flavors are actually great. This is a place you go every once in awhile. It’s a novelty but a great one.
I don’t have much else to say other than it was great!

I went here for the «Girls Night Out» promotion. The food was what you expect from a Melting Pot chain. The draft beer selection was pretty standard. Happy Hour specials consisted only of mixed drinks; I would have liked a little more variety.
I was surprised at how empty the restaurant was, given that tonight was a special promotion. The restaurant also had a «hotel restaurant» feel to it. A definite lack of any kind of vibe.
I would go back just because fondue is fun every once in a while, but I would never become a regular here.

I’m fairly certain they brought Kraft shredded cheese for our Fondu…
The apples were starting to brown and it took 18 minutes before the waiter greeted us after I had to ask the hostess (there were only 3 other tables seated!)

A couple of friends and I made an 8pm reservation at the Melting Pot on a Saturday night; we thought would be a smart move for the weekend in DuPont. Upon our arrival, we quickly observed the reservation was unnecessary: we were 1 of 3 tables in the place.
We ordered a cheese fondue appetizer and a couple of the main course meals to split. It was all tasty and incredibly filling. I know we enjoyed our meals, but now I can’t remember anything specific that we ordered, so it wasn’t totally memorable.
The service was fine and the atmosphere is cozy. The restaurant’s in a basement (but not a shady basement :)) and is dark and warm. The prices are fairly steep so save your pennies.
A great spot for a date.

If you haven’t had a fondue (cheese or chocolate), try one during their happy hour from 5pm till 7pm weekdays. You can get ½ off any cheese or chocolate fondue from the menu.
I chose the Special fondue of the month, Feng-​shui fondue (cheese with sake and rice wine). It came with small bowl of bread, cut-​veggies (carrots, cauliflower and celery) and cut-​apple.
Feng-​shui fondue had too strong sake/​rice wine flavor overpowering cheese flavor. I barely tasted cheese. so I was very disappointed sicne I was looking forward more cheesy flavor but people who like sake/​wine might enjoy this one.
Another disappointment was dry not-​fresh bread… I wished they served fresh soft bread. Unless I am making french toast or bread-​pudding, I don’t like getting dry/​old leftover bread that needs to be soaked into something to be moist.
Because I had a meltdown moment from this cheesy-​sake pot and dry bread, I got cold feet about ordering anything else including chocolate one.
Well. but still you can experience proper Fondue for $ 8. Pretty good deal and good service.
PS: I might get fresh bread next time to visit Melting pot:)

Definitely an experience for first-​time fondue goers, but if you tell me to go back here often or call it a favorite spot, it’s not.
Service was interesting to say the least… it had the same progression as how I felt about the food… from shoddy… to pretty good, to ending on a good note. Our server did the standard smiles and what not, but you know how when you get service that doesn’t *feel* very genuine? Like you can hear their thoughts spewing out saying I don’t want to be here serving you? By the end we «warmed» up to this service, quite slowly (took 20 minutes for a non-​alc drink) to say the least, and it ended well. By the way, 18% gratuity factored in.
We opted for the college night menu, which you have to ask about. I believe this takes place on Sundays as well; we went in on a Thursday evening. You can take your 3-​course combo of: salad, cheese, chocolate, or entrée. We went with cheese, entrée, chocolate – because why would you pay for greens when you’re here for fondue? (Though, the Cali salad looked pretty appetizing on the menu)
DRINKS: Friend was happy with this alcoholic bevs. Blackberry sage lemonade… surprisingly not to sweet, very sage-​flavored, and delicious! A must order.
CHEESE: Eh. I’m not a fan of the taste of alcohol – it’s cooked down, but in all the cheese choices there is an alcohol kick to it. The fondue comes with small vegetable cups (white broccoli, carrots, celery) and an assorted bread bowl (rosemary, white, wheat). Friends loved it around the table though, so maybe I’m an anomaly. BTW, no refills on cheeses. There definitely wasn’t enough to cover all the bread, so dip sparingly… It was frustrating because the less alcoholic pot was supposed to be placed on a certain pot on the table (aka my side), and the server put it in the wrong one and told us incorrectly as well. That would be a big no no for those with allergies or food restrictions (more mistakes to be made throughout the night).
ENTREE: Don’t get the broth pots. I think that’s pretty pointless when you can get Chinese hot pot somewhere for much better… even though this isn’t exactly the same as hot pot, I still find it nonsensical to pay that much to dip raw food in soup when you can do this at home. We opted for the Burgolnese (sp?) oil pots to fry — the fun experience begins! You get a personal plate: 2 pieces of beef (my favorite), 3 chili chicken cubes (eh), shrimp (standard), 2 dumplings (good except all of ours fell apart in the fryer which made things messy… so fry this one last). A medium veggie bowl to share (red potatoes sliced, green broc — fry with battery, alone gives an awkward burnt texture, and mushrooms — WINNER! with the orange batter).
FRYING SAUCES: You get two types of batters (an orange and and olive colored) – they tell you which to dip for, but I didn’t follow her directions and used orange for veggies and the olive colored for meats, which worked out well. Fry the beef thoroughly cause that took the longest. We received a ton of little dipping sauces… the explanations were confusing cause there were at least 15 sauces on our table for specific items. The best was probably the white bleu cheese sauce (chunkier white sauce). The server told us one of the batters was a dipping sauce – I didn’t believe her cause it smelled like batter – I taste tested it, and I was right. That was a big error.
CHOCOLATE: We ordered the cookies n’ cream (oreo bits) and the original (milk choc + peanut butter) because the server recommended those as the less sweet choices. It comes with an assortment of cheesecake, rice krispie cubes, strawberries, slices of bananas, brownie cubes, etc. Wish there was more of the fruits and less of the others. Really good. If I were you, I wouldn’t start dipping when they say… let the chocolate heat up some more; its more appetizing that way.
Overall, had the service been better/​faster (and minus all the mistakes), this experience could have easily ranked 4 stars. But for good food (not amazing) and fun times, it’s a-​ok in my book. It’s service you’d expect at a typical chain, but slightly poorer.
TIME: We dined at 7:45 and got out at 10:30. Fondue takes awhile! Looks like it would be a fun group outing.

We went here for my daughter’s birthday and my expectations weren’t terribly high, but we had an enjoyable dinner. We ordered the Spinach and Artichoke cheese fondue which was good. The items to dip could have been more creative and higher quality, but they are mainly a vehicle for the cheese so you don’t really taste them much anyway. We also ordered the Spinach and Mushroom salad. We had the Turtle chocolate fondue for dessert which was very good. They were happy to bring additional dipping items if you asked.
As others have pointed out, you go here for the experience and not the best food of your life.
We also noticed that they have several specials which can bring the price down.

Do you love me? You better. Cause this is going to be a loooooooooong dinner.
Who doesn’t want to be feed tiny morsels of food? The Melting Pot is a «must see and do,» not because the food is anything to rave about but because it’s freakin’ romantic. Valentine’s Day dinner– for sure.
They start you off with a bread course with cheese fondue. I just stared at him while he ate. He said it was,“decent,” I believed him. I don’t eat cheese and and I certainly don’t eat mounds of melted cheese, so the first course was a throw-​away for me.
Then, they bring out the meat, lobster and side course. The broth was good and I sat there and watched my food cook. NOTE: do not go hungry because it takes forever for the food to cook and then to eat.
Finally, they bring out the dessert course: marshmallows, graham crackers, bananas, strawberries, tiny cakes to accompany the chocolate fondue. By the time dessert rolled around I was stuffed. Surprisingly, they give you a healthy portion of food.
3 hours later, we left.