Got a strong recommendation from a fellow Yelper at a DC Yelp event last week. My girlfriend & I were in DC last night for an event on U St, and we wanted to go with his recommendation.This is a very short walk from U St Metro station on the Vermont Ave side exit; literally just across on east side of Vermont on U St. We walked in, and not surprisingly this was a small place, but that didn't bother me. It was cutely decorated with a bar area & seating for full service. We got here in time for happy hour, which runs 5-7 PM. The happy hour is only drinks; so don't expect a food deal, but I knew that as I briefly checked website. I wanted to get an alcoholic beverage (on the happy hour price of course) to get the full experience besides only drinking water.I liked that the server mentioned the happy hour and said what the HH cocktail of the day was, as I was going to ask him. I also liked that he poured water in their cold metal cups right away before we settled on drink. He let us look, decide, and came back in reasonable time. I knew I didn't want the cocktail of the day. I was between 2 choices. I asked the server about Pisco Punch, which he explained as a type of Brandy from Peru (& also Chile...gotta give credit where credit is due, but server mentioned Peru). I said that sounded good over Old Fashioned and went with trying that for $9 (happy hour price...normally $11).Server brought me the Pisco Punch. Wow, it was excellent; they really know what they're doing on mixed drinks (at least this one). My only compliment was too much Ice; I don't like when the ice sticks up from the glass. The alcohol was fairly strong but covered with some sweetness. I shared some with my g/f, and we both agreed that it was excellent. She even jokingly commented we never both like the drink. I politely said well maybe something more generic like beer or some white wines.Per Yelper's recommendation, we decided to split the fried chicken. We got 4 breast pieces for $36, which came with broccoli & mac n' cheese. I was pretty hungry (just shy of hangry). We were both VERY impressed with the broccoli. It was the best broccoli, I've had in a long time, well seasoned.The mac n' cheese was good, but nothing to write home about either. The fried chicken was great, but it wasn't exactly what I thought. It had a nice honey or maple type of glaze, which added a nice sweet flavor. But I guess I had kind of hoped for something a bit more traditional. Having said that, I still thought the chicken was very good.The bill came, and of course not surprisingly it already included 20% gratuity. That is more of a common practice in DC with that Initiative 82 where it essentially raises the wage for tipped workers. Some restaurants I guess pass on to the customer with an automatic tip included. It's pretty rare for me or my girlfriend to be in DC, and when we have we didn't have tons of time to go to a full service restaurant as we were down there for another reason like Capitals hockey, Nats baseball, or other event. I've mentioned this in a few Yelp reviews of restaurants in DMV that do this for even medium sized parties of like 6. The problem with this is that the server could be terrible, slow, surly, etc. and still get that guaranteed 20%. In this case, our server had a good job with time efficiency, water refills, & answering questions. However, he wasn't friendly; he was cordial enough, but not at all friendly either.Additionally, restroom was clean but very small. Toilet was right by the sink, little room in there. Not much to be done there with the space constraints of the restaurant.Overall, food was very good, drink excellent, service was efficient but not friendly, and overall mostly a positive, but I wouldn't necessarily rush back here either.
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