The Restaurant Project: Four Sisters (September)

And, we’re back on track with the Restaurant Project.

We have the rest of the year’s restaurants lined up, and we have the theme for the 2012 project all decided. (It doesn’t have to do with dining, but that doesn’t mean the end of this project. You’ll see.)

This month’s project stop was extra special because we had company — my very best friend Tracey and her husband, Nick, who recently foresake Hawaii to return to the lovely suburbia of Northern Virginia. Somewhat collectively, we selected Four Sisters, a Vietnamese place conveniently located between our homes.

Four Sisters is consistently a top-rated D.C. restaurant — it’s generally on both the Top 100 Restaurants and the Cheap Eats list from Washingtonian. Vietnamese certainly isn’t ever going to be my top cuisine choice, but everyone else seemed game, so we dove in.

The water was deep — the menu offers 149 items over approximately 37 pages (which prompted Nick to ask, “Does this thing have an appendix?”) — and it didn’t help when the waiter stopped by 2 minutes after we were seated and asked if we were ready to order. He received a patented Meredith Death Stare because, REALLY?! We’d barely made it to page 2.

Given the depth of options, I think we all had menu paralysis — so we ordered the pre-set, dinner for four, which included:

• Crispy pork spring rolls — the second-best part of the meal, in my opinion.
• Papaya salad with shrimp and pork — I was unable to find the papaya or the salad in this dish, but I did enjoy it nonetheless.
• Seafood combination soup — I mostly skipped this because, um, seafood.
• Caramelized pork in clay pot — Good, but teeny-tiny serving for a dinner to feed four.
• Chinese broccoli sauteed with beef — Very good, but I’m not a huge beefeater. Haa.
• Grilled lemongrass chicken — The very best part of the meal, in my opinion.
• Seasonal fruits — This dish did not include cantaloupe, which was disappointing, as we were all hoping to catch some listeria

What was left of papaya salad, pork, beef, and chicken after the boys had had their way with them.

All that food, plus drinks for each of us, came in at a grand total under $90. Not bad to feed a dinner of four. (Of course, I wanted to go to the Arby’s across the street afterward … but we came, we tried.) I’d definitely return; and now I’d know exactly what to order (lemongrass chicken, I am looking at you).

Previously:
August = We Suck
July = Graffiato
June = Smith Commons
May = Lyon Hall
April = Pubbelly (Miami)
March = Volt
February = Kushi
January = Let’s not talk about it.

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