Coincidentally, Tyler today posts his list of Cajun restaurants, but hasn't been to two I recently attended.

Bardia's (Adams-Morgan) had a friendly and helpful proprietor, but is hit-or-miss. The fried foods were meh, the jambalaya bland. The creole was pretty good for the DC area, but the price point was too high for what it is, especially given the bare-bones atmosphere. If I'm in Adams-Morgan, I'd rather have Ethiopian or Cashion's. And I'm in Adams-Morgan much less in my thirties than in my twenties.

The new Acadiana (9th and New York) is a beautiful space; I went with Shani for lunch Restaurant Week. I agree with the assessment of too much butter and not enough chile, but the presentation was aesthetically pleasing. Decent gumbo when served at Restaurant Week prices. But I've never been a big fan of the Passion Food Hospitality chain of restaurants, so your mileage may vary.

Isn't it sad that my favorite Cajun in the area is the Popeye's at the Pentagon City mall? (It's the one branch of the chain locally that serves jambalaya.) And even in Pentagon City, I'd just as soon get drunken noodles at the Thai place next door to Popeye's—no line, because noone seems to trust food-court Thai.

Slim and a couple of lawyer friends and I went off to Fogo de Chao (downtown DC) a couple of months ago. Meats placed on sword-like skewers, grilled with Brazilian spices. Definitely a quantity-over-quality kind of place, but the quality was relatively good—but, at the same time, if I'm going to pay that much for food, there are just many more pleasant options in the area. On the quantity side, even with the variety of the meats and the quality of salad bar and service, it's not three times as good as, say, BD's Mongolian BBQ, even though it's more than three times as expensive. (In contrast, I'd say Maestro is three times as good as Tosca.) Not that we didn't leave stuffed and satisfied, and not wanting to eat for a day. Worth going to once, but perhaps not more than that.

Tyler Cowen reviews a couple of other churrascarias, and it's not clear I went to the correct one for a full-fledged churrascaria experience. While Fogo had eleven or so cuts of meat, they were of the beef/chicken/pork/lamb variety; Green Field in Rockville, however, also offers "duck, rabbit and other." Mmm... other. Of course, Tyler would say I'd have to go to Brazil to get the real thing.