The Experiment: Bringing the Asian street-food experience to DC

By Whitney Pipkin

My face was still ringed with sweat when Chef Erik Bruner-Yang stopped by to see how we liked the first course. It was a traditional Khmer papaya salad called Bok Lahong, paired with an equally adventurous Taiwanese pig’s blood cake.

“Spicy,” I said of the salad, which I still couldn’t stop eating, “but the cake helps.”

He nodded, glad to have the feedback as he headed back to the kitchen to prepare a dim sum cart between courses. This restaurant-in-residence operating out of Hanoi House on Washington, DC’s popular 14th Street exists solely for the feedback.

Over three months operating the “pop-up” eatery, Bruner-Yang and chef de cuisine James Wozniuk have tried some 120 dishes on eaters willing to be part of the experiment. At just $30 per person, the family-style, seven-course meal was a deal for DC diners, and a chance to preview the menu at Bruner-Yang’s highly anticipated eatery on H Street, Maketto, scheduled to open by year’s end.

Only about 30 dishes will make it onto the menu at the new eating concept, which will offer an Asian street food experience in a mixed use space, alongside clothing stores and a coffee purveyor.

“You guys are guinea pigs,” Bruner-Yang said of those who’ve left Hanoi House stuffed with new dishes and a better idea of what’s to come. “We hope you like most of the (dishes) and some of them might be on the fence. But we need to work through the different techniques so we can pick and choose what we want.”

The temporary restaurant is also a way to introduce DC diners to new dishes and tastes, from Laap sausages to Khmer coconut fish curry. Born in Taipei to a Taiwanese mother and American father, Bruner-Yang’s first restaurant in the District, Toki Underground, has garnered national praise and put noodle soup on the local map.

For those accustomed to the comfortable bowls of soup, Maketto will be a decided departure.

Even familiar dishes, like a creamy, coconut-infused curry are built on spices and textures that are entirely new to DC’s mainstream dining scene. Not to mention, making a meal out of kimchi and pig’s blood-based dishes may feel utterly foreign — which is sort of the point.

Maketto will be designed to feel like a walk through the streets of Cambodia or Taiwan, with food carts offering up a variety of Asian specialties.

At Hanoi House, a dim sum cart is wheeled around throughout the meal to weave in this concept, offering pork buns, caramelized chicken wings and kimchi as $2 snacks.

The cold pork salad from the cart was perfectly balanced, and shrimp bits skewered on a sugar cane stick provided one of the best bites, passing my personal test. But not everything will make the cut for the menu at Maketto.

A cook grinding papaya for the salad, which has, surprisingly, been one of the most well received dishes, told me the dessert they’d been serving had not won over many fans (us included).

The gingery tofu soup with tea-flavored ice crystals and peanuts tasted watery at best. It may be one dish that, regardless of its origins in tradition, won’t sell well to an American audience.

But it was worth a try.

For more information on Maketto at Hanoi House visit www.hanoihousedc.com