Seasons 52 — Restaurant in North Bethesda

Found ourselves down this way doing some shopping and in a light snowstorm made a quick decision to grab some dinner before heading home. It was hard to get a feel for what we were getting into from their online presence (wine bar/American'ish place) and this review may not help much as I didn't take any photos, but I hope to add a couple of clarifications. As we settled into a booth in the bar area there was a noticeable draft from the large commercial windows (it was cold out), lighting was good, neutral smells, oddly carpeted floor, seated nicely by James who introduced our server, Kevin. Kevin was on the new side, but attentive and genuinely nice. I was hungry and it was Friday, so we started with the wood fired artichokes with preserved lemon hummus, a glass of Rhone and a glass of Bordeaux. Good selection of wines by the glass, not quite to the point I would call it a wine bar, but way better than an average restaurant. They offer 6 and 9 ounce pours, and, of course bottles. Both wines were nice, the starter was tasty, nice to not have another fried artichoke starter, and this got us thinking that "this place can wood fire things", something to keep in mind as we progressed through our evening here. After considering some flatbreads we opted for my staple, a Caesar salad with a plan to follow up with their big filet and a side of parmesan panko macaroni & cheese - sharing all of this. Caesar was good, had to ask for the ground pepper which is sort of mandatory, nice dressing, cold, crisp, oddly bready croutons. The mac was not good, too saucy and cold, not going to eat this - they exchanged it for some yukon mashed potatoes without flinching. Those were very good. Things were balanced in general nothing too grossly sweet or over-compensated with salt. The filet was great, cooked as we liked, rare, ordered Pittsburgh blue it had a nice crust yet very rare in the center - they nailed it. Broccolini, very small side of mushrooms, and those nice potatoes rounded out the entree. It was a little small for an 8oz portion, but cooked correctly. Overall, this place was likely as good as we could have done with the amount of effort we exerted in searching. Are there better restaurants around, sure. If you're bored of your same old place or just passing through, it's worth a shot, order carefully. If you want a nice glass of wine and an appetizer - all day long. It's a 3.85 if I could do that. 3.5 and over are worth going to, under 3.5 never. What kept it from a 4 or above was (1) the cold mediocre mac&cheese, (2) the draft coming in from the windows, (3) the carpet (just creeps me out) , (4) a novice server - he'll get better, but 4+ and 5 star places don't miss a beat, (5) inconsistent food, artichokes and filet were really good, Mac and salad were a bit lacking. Don't misread this review and I gave it a 4, this place is solidly good, but it's a 3.85. more than halfway to a 4 from a 3.5. Joking a bit here.

My apologies...

This is one of those rare occasions where winning a contest really paid off. My mobile carrier gave me a $100 GC to go to any restaurant I wanted. I had the choice between a bill worth of Taco Bell or a Seasons 52 (52) . I went with the latter, though a bill worth of tacos would have been a site to see.

Alas, here we are all sort of dressed up and we head on into the restaurant. Now for my older heads of DC the place is like the Orlean's Steakhouse back in the day. If you are from the DMV, you know what I mean. It is beautifully dark and moody. Very classy. The music was at an acceptable level. Not loud but enough to hear and enjoy while having dinner.

Our waitress (Erica) was fantastic. She offered us flat bread but we declined and had the Crab-Bisque Soup (for the lady) Tuna Tartare (for the lady) and Meatballs for me. Now the two dishes for the lady I couldn't sample because I'm allergic to shellfish and avocado (each was in the respective dish) but, she was impressed with the Tartare. From my perspective, it was a beautifully prepared dish and it looked delicious. The crab bisque.....well she was saddened by it. By her words it was bland and she tried to add some S&P to it and it didn't help. We had to send it back. For me the meatballs were on point. I mean I wanted a dish of spaghetti and these meatballs with the marinara.

The main dishes were 1/2 a roasted chicken for me and Chilean Sea Bass for the lady. I know roasted chicken, how pedestrian. Well two things, I order chicken from new places because if there is one dish that has to be spot on is chicken. It is basic and if you screw that up you'll make mistakes on bigger items and I do not want to pay for your mistakes. The second thing is that this chicken crossed the road to get 52 to be cooked and devoured by moi like a piranha de-meating a cow. It was done perfectly and was placed on a bed of wild rice with respect. It had a side of green beans that needed a little more time cooking.

The wife's Sea Bass was top notch. It was all that she wanted and she had never had Sea Bass so this was a good introduction for her.

Lastly, the dessert. Interesting enough they have these little shot glasses of cakes that are very cute. They are also very tasty. I had the smore and the wife had the Key Lime.

All in all, I will give 52 a 4.8 The green beans and the bisque are their failing points.

Erica was the shining star and the fact the head chef was at the front desk was a bonus.

Oh I almost forgot; the Old fashioned. They pulled it out there. It erases the .1 for the beans so I will give them a 4.9. Don't be afraid to season the bisque. For gods sake your name is...

The foods here are.... interesting. Let me explain. To start I tried the meatballs, crab & shrimp stuffed mushrooms and the butternut squash soup. For entrees I tried the sesame grilled salmon salad and the wood grilled dry rub pork chop with a substitute of marscapone risotto as the side.

The meatballs had a fine texture, I liked a few bites but then I hit a patch of spicy which I did not enjoy, as on the menu it is only stated as tomato basil sauce, so I have no clue as to why it was spicy. Not a good look on a menu or resturant when the description does not match the food.

The crab & shrimp stuffed mushrooms, well all I can say is there was no crab flavor, the whole flavor was fishy and repulsive. It's served with mainly spinach and white stuff that I'm assuming is crab? The shrimp was over cooked and not the fishy part so it must have been the crab. The whole thing just fell apart when you put it on your plate. Anyway, skip it, it's gross.

I'm not sure what I was expecting for the butternut squash soup, but it was a nice texture and very sweet and served with their plain fatbread slices. If you're expecting a sweet soup you'll like this.

The sesame grilled salmon was actually pretty good salmon, the texture was on point but it was definitely under seasoned with salt lacking. The salad was good and not limp.

As for the pork chop it was okay, I feel like it could have been cooked a little less. But the whole dish lacked luster because of the lemon honey glaze that was clearly just added on the top instead of cooking with it. You might think what did this do to the food? Well it completely destroyed the flavor of the mascarpone risotto, do you want sour risotto because I don't. They definitely missed the ball on the risotto because it was undercooked so it was like biting into a seed every time you took a bite of it because the rice was not cooked through and then add the sourness from the lemon.. don't get the "glaze" if you want to enjoy the food it sits on.

Now you would expect a nice place like this to have a good bourbon or whiskey menu but it does not. Infact I had an old fashioned and it was not right at all. The blood orange margarita was pink and tart.

Overall this place was meh. The service was good and our waiter was very nice so I enjoyed that but the food and the lack of proper descriptions and flavors just doesn't make me want to return. Also by the time it was 7pm the whole place got very loud and it was hard to talk to the people across the...