What H Street Needs is an occasional series on District Cuisine looking at ways that the neighborhood could be improved even more. You can see our previous columns on the need for a Thai restaurant and a bagel shop (we’ve gotten both since!).
H Street’s dining scene continues to expand in new and interesting ways every month. However, there is a gaping hole in our culinary options: barbecue. Good barbecue is hard to find, partially because there are so many different options for style (Texas, Carolina, Kansas City, Memphis, etc) and even for protein (brisket, pork, chicken, ribs, etc). Some places try to do a wide variety of styles and fail to do any of them particularly well. Yet good barbecue that mixes smokey tasting moist meat with well crafted barbecue sauce, is one of our favorite types of food.
A good barbecue restaurant would do particularly well on H Street because it could serve both lunch and dinner and, if done right, have a thriving bar scene as well. It could also do a solid takeout business and cater for events on the Hill. Barbecue appeals to a wide variety of customers as many people will tell you that they enjoy barbecue. At either end of H Street (or even in the middle), a good barbecue restaurant would be able to attract a large clientele.
For a little while we had a barbecue carry out spot in Inspire BBQ, but it was carryout only and wasn’t that great of an option. TD Burger just up the street in NoMa has begun serving barbecue, but we concluded several months ago that it was best to avoid that. The best option for barbecue (arguably in the DC area) is DCity Smokehouse previously at the corner of North Capitol and Florida Avenue and soon moving closer to Shaw, but DCity is somewhat far away, only does takeout, and frequently attracts extremely long lines.
A well done barbecue restaurant that does both food and drinks well is needed on H Street. The next location of DCity Smokehouse? A brand new concept? H Street is waiting.
District Cuisine 
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