16 Best Restaurants To Enjoy Springtime In Washington DC

CORRECTION 4/11/23: A previous version of this article indicated that the Voltaggio brothers are the chefs at Estuary. Ria Montes is the restaurant's current chef.

With nearly 130 Michelin-starred restaurants in the area, plus a plethora of unique diners, cafes, and pop-up restaurants, there's no bad time of year to dine out in Washington, D.C. If you were to choose only one season for sampling restaurant cuisine in the District of Columbia, though, it would have to be spring. As the cherry blossoms bloom, the whole city seems to come to life, and local restaurants celebrate the season with inventive new menus and specials.

The annual citywide National Cherry Blossom Festival encompasses five weekends, and during these weeks, many D.C. eateries pay homage to the cherry trees and their blooms (a gift to the nation from Japan in 1912). Cherry blossom-watchers refer to the weeks when the blooms are at their prettiest as "peak bloom." You could say that springtime in Washington, D.C., is a "peak restaurant season." With that said, we've collected a sampling of some of the best spring menus, cherry blossom specials, and cherry blossom cocktails that D.C. has to offer in 2023.

The Mayflower Club's building history dates back to the Prohibition Era when the fourth floor housed a speakeasy. Today, the cocktail list still retains a bit of a Gatsby vibe. There's plenty modern about The Mayflower Club, not the least of which is Chef Alex Oradei's approach to his Mediterranean-focused menu. His commitment to local produce means that the dishes have even more than their usual share of sizzle and color in spring (when there's plenty of nature's bounty to choose from).

This season's special prix fixe tasting menu ($55 per person) begins with a cherry reduction-topped baked Brie with crusty French bread, followed by the Mayflower's version of classic surf and turf. Diners can choose between a signature cherry blossom margarita or a glass of fruity rosé. The dessert is a real showstopper: a beautifully-decorated chocolate eclair filled with cherry-vanilla pastry cream. Take your after-dinner revels upstairs to the blossom-bedecked Zebbie's Garden for clever cocktail constructions, including a refreshing cherry-centric twist on a smooth Old Fashioned.

During spring, Residents Café and Bar is like an oasis in the middle of the hustle and bustle of Dupont Circle. To celebrate the season, the patio, bar, and upstairs dining room have all been festooned with hanging cherry blossoms (over 22,000 of them) to create a picturesque paradise that will have you snapping Insta-worthy photos even before you see how stunning the new dishes are. (Don't forget that the patio is heated, so you can enjoy the air, even when the temperature drops in the evening.)

The spring dinner menu at Residents has signs of spring all over it, from the pickled Persian cucumbers perking up the salmon carpaccio to the basil and spring ramps in the spicy crab pasta. The herb risotto is the essence of the season on a plate. New seasonal cocktails, like the Japanese highball, celebrate fresh spring ingredients. Cherry blossom enthusiasts will gravitate toward the petal-pretty sakura spritz but don't miss the bright and frothy rhubarb cocktail.

Tryst is a staple spot in the Adams Morgan neighborhood, where a bohemian vibe rules. The laid-back coffee shop and cocktail bar combo has a large interior that mixes comfy couches with its tables so that you can choose your level of chill. Have a quick coffee and bagel at a table, or kick back on the sofa with a glass of wine. The diverse clientele makes it a great place to people-watch, and even more so on the patio, where you can take the air while watching the eclectic neighborhood buzz around you. 

If coffee shops don't scream "spring" to you, you haven't been to Tryst. Changing with the seasons is all part of the vibe, from the cherry blossom mural on the windows to the house-made sakura syrup that infuses cherry lattes. Tryst has given its menu a spring clean, too. Look for the new bursting-with-berries yogurt parfait and the avocado toast topped with feta and colorful corn salsa. The spring sangria is season-perfect, made with white wine, peach liqueur, and fresh fruit.

If your spring schedule is a hectic one, you may not have time to stop and smell the roses (or the cherry blossoms). That's where places like Café Georgetown come in, providing luscious coffee and tea concoctions, bakery items, and sandwiches that you can grab on your way to wherever the season takes you. (You can sit and savor if you like, but keep in mind that the space is small, so it's best suited for on-the-go sippers.)

Café Georgetown's spring drinks include a spectacularly Instagrammable pink cherry blossom latte, plus a delight the cafe calls the Day Dream Latte — a deep ocean blue espresso drink made with butterfly pea flowers. A popular item is the printed latte, which allows you to customize your latte's decoration via a downloadable app. Whatever spring means to you — whether it's a baby chick, a bouquet of tulips, or your pet's fuzzy face — you can have it rendered in the medium of latte foam. Pair your drinkable work of art with a blueberry muffin or a flaky spinach and leek turnover.

You can get pretty much any kind of food in Washington, D.C., but some of the most exciting restaurants are the ones that combine cuisines in smart, new ways. At Cranes, Chef Pepe Mocayo's menus focus on Japanese and Spanish dishes, exploring the unique aspects of flavor that the two cuisines share. The result is a vibrant restaurant and sake lounge with food that manages to evoke the history of the two countries while creating its own modern style of cuisine.

For cherry blossom season, the chef is offering a three-course tasting menu that begins with a flame-seared wagyu short rib starter with kabosu fruit crème fraiche, fresh radishes, and bubu arare rice crackers. The entree is an artfully-plated smoked salmon rice dish topped with salmon roe, wasabi mayo, puffed rice, and snap pea blossoms. A citrus cheesecake rounds out the menu, and a seasonal cherry blossom sake cocktail is available as an add-on.

Immigrant Food describes its restaurants (with three D.C. locations) as "cause-casual." That's because Michelin-starred Chef Enrique Limardo is dedicated not just to celebrating the rich traditions of historical American immigrants but to supporting and furthering the causes of immigrants today — whether that's by hiring immigrants, serving immigrants, or giving to programs that help them succeed and thrive. Diversity is key at Immigrant Food, from the people in the restaurant to the stories and flavors on the plate. 

Spring cherry blossom specials at all three of Immigrant Food's locations include a sumptuous cherry blossom trifle: a layered confection with a base of Genoise sponge cake alternated with fresh raspberries, sour cherries, pomegranate ganache, cookie crumble, white chocolate, and chantilly cream. Also special for the season is a white wine sangria made with lush tropical fruits. The White House location's happy hour menu includes fun seasonal twists on classic mimosa for after-work cocktails. 

Bring a big appetite to Yardbird because this is one place where you definitely won't be eating like a bird. The James Beard Foundation-praised restaurant (with sister restaurants in a smattering of hotspots from NYC to Singapore) focuses on American classics, and many of those are Southern classics — the kind of dishes known for a hearty rib-sticking ability. That means overstuffed deviled eggs, whole fried chickens with hot honey for drizzling, and brunch-time country biscuits and gravy that are worthy of choosing as your last meal on earth.

Yardbird's special creations for the Cherry Blossom Festival are also steeped in classics. The featured cocktail is inspired by chocolate-covered cherries, made with Rémy Martin VSOP cognac, orange Curaçao, and chocolate bitters, all topped with Grand Marnier foam. For dessert, the chefs have created a rich cherry vanilla butter cake, served with a cherry blossom crème Anglaise and good ol' classic vanilla ice cream. You can also celebrate the spring with a glass of sangria: Yardbird's recipe changes seasonally to incorporate fresh fruits that are of the moment.

The Washington, D.C., location of Chef Michael Mina's Bourbon Steak (at the Four Seasons Hotel in Georgetown) is a haven for steakhouse lovers, with a menu that is mostly pure Americana, even if it dips its toe into the adventurous (e.g. grilled octopus, hamachi crudo). Bourbon Steak already has a bit of a Japanese connection with its high-end wood-fired Wagyu striploins. For cherry blossom season, the steakhouse has even more offerings from Japan to complement its otherwise heavily surf and turf-centered menu.

A seasonal libation called the Sado brings the ritual of Japanese tea to the cocktail hour ("Sado" translates to "the way of tea"). The drink — a clever mixing of matcha, mint-infused Haku Japanese vodka, Bermutto sake, Orgeat syrup, and lemon — is poured tableside from a ceramic tea kettle. Also on offer is a Japanese fusion version of crispy tater tots. The Tokyo Tots are topped with Kewpie mayonnaise, bonito flakes, and sweet-and-savory okonomiyaki sauce.