Addie's

11120 Rockville Pike
Rockville, MD  20852
301.881.0081
www.addiesrestaurant.com


I went up to Germantown to watch one of my nieces play in a lacrosse tournament.   Her first game was around 8 a.m. and I went last year and remember being home by lunch.  I guess a year really makes a difference as they played four more games throughout the day and ended up winning the whole damn thing.  This was great, good and bad.  The great was that my niece won a friggin' lacrosse championship by playing five back-to-back-to-back (you get where I'm going) games.  Not sure where kids get all that energy but it sure was put to good use this day.  The bad was all I ate through the whole day was some Dunkin' donuts, a hot dog and a large cup of coffee.  The good was that Germantown is a bit north of DC and as I was driving home around dinner time, I could stop by Addie's.


I had some time to kill so I stopped by White Flint Mall to maybe do some shopping, which is practically across the street from Addie's.  So, yeah.  What the f*ck happened to White Flint Mall?  I remember it as a high class mall that was always busy.  On this day, it was like a ghost town and there's about 3 stores there with 2 of them being P.F. Chang's and Cheesecake Factory.  Regardless, I didn't stay long and went up to Addie's.

Addie's is part of the Black Restaurant Group who are the same people who run BlackSalt and Black Jack. It's also the place where the new chef from EatBar came from so I was expecting some creative things.  My first look over of menu did not promise these said things.  The menu read like a litany of solid yet somewhat uninteresting choices with origins form the south.  My humble theory about this is that Addie's is, in reality, a suburban restaurant that likes to cater to more conservative tastes than what you would find within city limits.  I can only make a guess if that were true but the crowd sure did look like more with what you'd find in the suburbs than in the cities.  Regardless, I was hungry and they did have some dinner specials.  For my appetizer, I ordered the duo of terrine from the specials, then the locally raised pork chop (as per the waiter's recommendation), and the berry crisp for dessert.

The duo of terrines was composed of a veal pate and a beef terrine sliced up in little cubes.  They came with a peach compote, where the peaches were reduced with coarse mustard, and some slices of toast.  The veal pate had a nice creamy texture with little hints of the liver-y aftertaste.  Like any pate, it went great with the toast and crunch of the bread.  The beef terrine had a more hefty and earthy flavor.   The peach compote provided a nice little surprise with the sweetness only hinted at with the addition of the mustard grains.  The spicy/sweet combination balanced out the richness of both terrines.

I didn't realize it or didn't read that the mustard would continue on in the pork chop but it helped bridge the meal for me.  Along with a formidable chop from the belly, the dish came with nice sized piece of cornbread and braised greens.  The pork was moist, fatty and nicely cooked right at medium.  It had a ton of flavor which was enhanced more by the mustard ale sauce (where the grains came back) it sat in.  The corn bread was a nice sweet interlude as were the bitterness from the greens.  The greens and mustard together had a bit too much acidity for me but was tempered if you piled the pork on top too.  All in all, it was a nice solid, well-made combination of an entree with obvious southern roots.

The dessert reminded me of the south again.  The menu says its a berry & peach crisp with buttermilk ice cream.  I didn't see or taste any peaches so I'll just be referring to it as a berry crisp.  The ice cream was a cool diversion during a hot day.  The crumble was nice, crispy and the berry compote on the bottom really let the berry flavors come through.  For a dessert, a crumble with some berry compote and ice cream is a pretty safe bet.  But, it's still a safe bet that someone has to execute and this one was spot on.

To me, Addie's is a nice little restaurant located just on the outskirts of Washington DC.  You would never accuse it of having cutting edge cuisine or offering eclectic ingredients (or at least eclectic to your average diner).  You could, however, accuse it of having well balanced, well made, and familiar foods.  My meal and the menu is a study in more traditional offerings which are cooked really well.  Sometimes, that's just what you may be looking for.