The Roost | Washington, DC

The Roost

1401 Pennsylvania Ave. SE, Washington, DC 20003

The Roost is a food court that has several food options to include a bar, coffee shop, pizzeria, sushi, burgers, and Mexican. What's really cool and innovative about this food court is you can sit at any table you like and the QR code at the table and order from any of the restaurants. Upon sitting down you get water for the table and silverware and each of your dishes are brought to you no matter where you order from. You pay as soon as you order, so when you are done, you can just get up and leave. It is definitely an elevated food court experience.

We started with Cameo which is the coffee shop. We tried the Chai Latte, Mocha, and Hot Chocolate. The Mocha and Hot Chocolate boast they are made with housemade chocolate sauce and the Chai Latte claims to have freshly ground spices. The Chai Latte was very light in flavor, not what I prefer for Chai. It seemed almost a bit bland. The Hot Chocolate was overly sweet, almost like the syrup mimics Hershey's. The Mocha was good however. I suppose the bitterness of the coffee and the sweetness of the chocolate sauce balance each other out. If order from here, I would stick with coffee or tea.

The second place we ordered from was Red Apron which is their burger joint. We got the Red Apron Original, which was two smash burgers with their house sauce, shredded lettuce, pickles, and red onions served with their beef tallow fried french fries. The french fries were delicious. They were soft on the inside and crispy on the outside. The burger was good too. Very tender, and a good flavor combo from the sauce, sweetness of the pickles, and sharpness from the red onions. I loved how thinly sliced the red onions were and that it came with shredded lettuce versus a piece of lettuce. It was very good but I didn't think it was worth the $20 price point. When it came out I was surprised how small it was. Overall it was delicious though if you're willing to spend the money.

The last place we ordered from was Ako. We got the Shrimp Tempura, Tuna Avocado Cucumber, and the Donkey Kong. The Donkey Kong was a specialty roll that had eel, fried plantain, cream cheese, cucumber, tempura flake, togarashi mayo, and sweet shoyu. Every roll was delicious and pretty reasonably priced. My only critique was the shrimp in the tempura roll was a little small.

Overall I highly recommend checking this place out! Especially with a group of friends because you can each get what you want and even pay separately very easily. We'll definitely be back.