When Chef Jeremiah Langhorne opened The Dabney in Washington, D.C., in 2015, he had been cooking in restaurants from the time he was 17. The kitchens ranged from a pizza place to fine dining, with stages with such notable chefs as Sean Brock, Thomas Keller and Rene Redzepi at Noma. But when it came to his own restaurant, he felt he had to have a strong connection to the cuisine.
“I really loved the connection to Southern food I developed working in Charleston for Sean Brock, but I never felt that in Europe,” said Langhorne. D.C. was surrounded by the bounty of the Mid-Atlantic region. Chesapeake Bay crab, clams and scallops, local oysters, sweet potatoes and corn grown in from Virginia … the list goes on. These ingredients are culturally woven into the culinary history of the region, he said. “I read a lot of old cookbooks to research that regional cuisine before I opened The Dabney,” he added.
But a lot of people didn’t get it.
“When I first opened in D.C., most people told me that Mid-Atlantic cuisine didn't exist, that it was a waste of my time, that it didn't make any sense and they couldn't wrap their heads around it,” he recalls. The Dabney was hard to categorize. It wasn’t French, Southern or Italian, the most popular genres in D.C. at the time.
Chef Jeremiah Langhorne. | Photo by Bonjwing Lee
But he stuck to his vision and worked to bring the public on board. In 2017 and 2018, you could get a full meal at The Dabney for $40 or so. “And then we ended up getting to a prix fixe menu at one point, and then a tasting menu, but I realized that wasn’t what the heart and soul of the restaurant was about,” said Langhorne. “My original vision for The Dabney was that it would be timeless, so about a year ago, we decided to take it back to an a la carte menu like it was originally meant to be.”
Now guests can “write their ticket” when they visit, whether it’s sitting at the bar with a beer and small plate or coming in and choosing from the whole menu, he added. And there’s also a five-course prix fixe for those who prefer.
Shareables are part of the a la carte experience, and Langhorne offers snacks and artfully arranged small plates as well as entrée platters that feature every part of the pig or lamb cooked over the wood-fired hearth. He’s a proponent of whole animal cooking, sourcing from local farmers who have built long relationships with the restaurants.
Staples on the menu include the familiar, like cornbread and oysters, but also the unfamiliar, like American puffer fish. “These are little fish that also go by the name ‘sugar toads’ because the fishermen claimed they were sweet as sugar but ugly as toads,” said Langhorne. “We batter and fry them and serve them like chicken wings.”
Micro-seasonality is also key to the restaurant, and Langhorne works with farmers who are growing vegetables that thrive in the mid-Atlantic region. The Dabney’s hearth-roasted vegetable salad features 20 or more peak-season vegetables at any one time. And the region also boasts great creameries, with cheeses produced and sourced from Pennsylvania, Maryland and Virginia.
Langhorne admits that food costs can be high when you source from local producers, but he’s a strong proponent of supporting these purveyors and he’s learned to be smart about balancing out his menu. “If you’ve got 25 dishes and five have very high food costs, then make sure you have another five that are really low so it averages out,” he said. Right now soft shell crabs are expensive, but vegetable- and grain-centric items offer a good balance, he noted.
When Langhorne opened The Dabney, Michelin didn’t exist in D.C. and he was laser-focused on making his guests happy and doing the best the restaurant could. “I think it's very important for chefs to ask themselves a simple question: ‘Are you cooking for yourself or are you cooking for your guests?’ and there is not right answer,” he believes. Langhorne chose to take the path that his reward would come from running a full restaurant filled with happy guests.
But in 2016, Michelin came to D.C., and in 2017, The Dabney was awarded a star. “It was a huge and wonderful surprise for us,” he said. And the restaurant has retained its star every year since, while still fulfilling Langhorne’s original vision.
For more about The Dabney and chef Langhorne, check out the Menu Talk podcast.
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