—Dining at the Chef’s Table in the storied Inn at Little Washington fully qualifies as a culinary epiphany. Chef Patrick O’Connell, during his 48 years in this bucolic retreat in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains outside Washington DC, has earned all of the accolades and honors that a chef could aspire to receive. His guests make a pilgrimage of dinner in his restaurant and a night in the Inn.
—We celebrated a milestone birthday there: Afternoon Tea; drinks in the Edwardian drawing rook bar served in crystal glasses; dinner at the inner sanctum Chef’s Table in the spacious kitchen; a night in the Colonial Mayor’s House; and, homemade yogurt with granola and a flight of fresh juices at breakfast the next day on the way out.
—Afternoon Tea
Tea in the solarium amidst a Versailles garden set the mood. Staff members at every turn minister to your experience of royalty. A tower of small serving platters in the center of the table at the tea. Velvety quiches, croissants, fruit tarts, and cheese puffs complement the aromatic teas in China cups and saucers.
—The Restaurant
—After tea and a stroll through the restored village and grounds around the Inn, we returned to the main dining room bar where our maitre d’ escorted us into the expansive kitchen. Chef O’Connell greeted us as we entered. He wore an impeccable toque blanche and the distinctive Dalmatian spotted apron, patterned after the coat of the first mascot of the Inn, the Chef’s Dalmatian, Rose.
—The kitchen buzzed like a beehive as station chefs added their contributions to the trays that shuttled in and out of a kitchen, The counters and walls, replete with hand-painted Portuguese tile, the bronze fixtures, and the stone fireplace completed the showplace kitchen. Diners who had requested tours of the kitchen watched the staff at work. We admired the upgrades of the kitchen during the some twenty years since our last visit on another special occasion. No home chef could help but envy the equipment and workspaces. Much of the processing of local and imported provisions occurs in or within the immediate vicinity of the working central kitchen.
—The experience at the Chef’s table unfolds as an operatic eucharist complete with a faux priest in amise, cincture, and stole vestments waving a censer to cleanse the air with incense. It then settles into a supper of sublime foods and libations. Amuse bouches of potato chip cannoli stuffed with pimento cheese, a parmesan cream in an eggshell, and a seasonal bite, followed by delicate himachi crudo slices. We selected from multiple menus dishes ranging from colossal white asparagus, to poached lobster, to lamb carpaccio, to seared duck breast. The menus include vegan selections as well. We shared desserts somewhat overshadowed by a large serving of birthday cake.
—The Inn’s Director of Wine, Christine Barr, joined in as our sommelier for the evening. She recommended a perfect wine for our party: a 2015 Henri Gouge Clos des Porrets —Nuits-Saint-Georges Premier Cru. This red Burgundy wine had aged beautifully with a deep ruby color and only a faint brick red halo in the glass as the only tell of age. Its dark cherry and black berry and currant aromas and flavors transition into the grip of refined tannins. The pairings with himanshi crudo, drawn butter with lobster, lamb, duck, and birthday cake sealed the case for its choice.
—The Inn’s lost Michelin Star
—The Inn at Little Washington received a third Michelin star in 2019, long after the Inn had earned high honors as a top restaurant in the DC vicinity. Michelin downgraded the Inn to a two star restaurant in 2025, shortly after the Virginia tourism office chose not to pay $360,000 to Michelin to be included in a Guide for southern USA states. We suspect that the Virginia tourism decision affected the decision to drop the third star, but that the Inn had never really fit the Michelin template for the ideal restaurant. To its credit the Inn continues to perform a theatrical comedy of manners on a little stage where guests enjoy a feast of elegant food and drink. We have experienced Michelin-starred restaurants in Burgundy with none of the joy of a simple meal of beef bourguignon, bread, salad, and a Cote de Beaune Villages from the cellar of a vineyard. In the same way the Inn has a sense of place and a vibe that formal French style often lacks.
The Inn’s Director of Wine and curator of perhaps the finest wine list in the USA, Christine Barr, answers our questions
—How do you focus on wines for ILW when you have such a wide range of possibilities? Are the chefs guiding your choices? The regional cuisine?
—Christine responded by saying that vineyards producing the wines that everyone wants to buy allocate these wines in advance to importers and distributors world wide. ILW reviews the wines reallocated to ILW by the importers and distributors that we work with and order the quantities we want. (Our question seemed a bit naïve in that we did not take into account the excess demand for highly rated wines.)
—What wine and food pairings do you see working particularly well at ILW and what about them appeals to your guests?
—Seasonal variation and food choices of guests make good wine pairings with foods a matter of preferences. When asked about the difficult pairing of a wine with asparagus, Christine suggested pairing a Grüner Veltliner from Austria with the Chef’s favorite colossal white asparagus.
—You moved from Las Vegas to ILW in the Virginia countryside. What differences seem most striking to you?
—Imagine going from working as a sommelier in a fast-paced, high-energy resort and casino to an elegant rural retreat in the foothills of the Blue Ridge.
—What different varieties of wines do you find similar? Ones drastically different?
—During master sommelier class testing, a Gamay red from Beaujolais and a Loire Valley Cabernet Franc tasted much the same. A New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc has a very different taste profile than a California Sauvignon Blanc.
—Have your tastes in wine evolved with exposures to premium wines? Are there any bargain wines that you enjoy?
—It’s definitely difficult to step down from the best wines in the world in perhaps the best wine cellar! I do enjoy shopping for local wines in a local Culpeper Virginia shop. The Linden Vineyard’s Petit Manseng and the Crimson Lane Petit Verdot, small berry grapes, grow especially well in the verdant Virginia Blue Ridge region and offer distinctively different tastes.
Whether two or three Michelin stars, the Inn offers the finest in indigenous foods, accommodations, and an expertly curated wine list: a perfect venue for a celebration of an important event.
