The Unique Dishes You Can Expect At The New Hell's Kitchen Restaurant In D.C. - Exclusive
No Hell's Kitchen restaurant will ever not offer up beef Wellington or sticky toffee pudding. That's also true of the two-story waterfront restaurant Chef Christina Wilson is helping open on 652 Wharf Street SW in Washington, D.C.
You've most recently watched Wilson and her team win "Hell's Kitchen" Season 21's first dinner service thanks to Sakari Smithwick's stew, and no thanks to Ileana D'Silva's butchered attempt at risotto. (Yes, you'll see a better-executed risotto on the menu at Hell's Kitchen D.C., too.) What the cameras definitely didn't show you was Wilson using breaks in filming to pick Gordon Ramsay's brain about new dishes she's developing as his VP of Culinary in North America. That's something she routinely does, the chef spilled to Tasting Table in a recent exclusive interview.
Ramsay once told The San Diego Union-Tribune that Wilson is his "culinary eyes and ears in the field" — so rest assured that the D.C. restaurant is in extremely talented hands. And while Ramsay has previously limited himself to promising "local flavor" at the upcoming East Coast establishment, Wilson gave us a few hints as to which local flavors we can look forward to.
An inside look at the Hell's Kitchen D.C. menu
Christina Wilson affirmed to Tasting Table that Hell's Kitchen's "tried and trues — risottos, scallops, Wellington, and sticky toffee pudding" — will always be menu protagonists. That's not stopping her from having "some fun with the other dishes" on the upcoming D.C. menu. The country's capitol offers the opportunity to play around more because the clientele is so diverse, says Wilson.
"The great thing about D.C. is it's got such an international market," the chef extrapolated, "so we're able to gently lean into some Mediterranean food, some more Japanese-inspired food, some more Thai-inspired food, and a few Mexican, Latin-inspired dishes on there as well."
Expect, for example, to see a side of elote corn and some unique seafood dishes. "For D.C. specifically, we worked on a really great octopus dish, which is beautiful and delicious," Wilson said. "That's one that we don't have on some of the other Hell's Kitchen menus."
Catch Christina Wilson on new episodes of Hell's Kitchen Season 21, which air Fridays at 8 p.m. ET on Fox.