The Sign of the Pineapple.
Words by Stefanie Gans Photos by Rey Lopez
I want to ride a spaceship.
This spaceship is made not of steel, but of sugar and flour. It is fueled not with fire and the brains of NASA’s control room, but with butter and yolks.
I don’t want weightlessness; I want a sugar high.
In Reserve 2216’s dessert, spaceship doughnut, there’s a scoop of vanilla ice cream melting into a warm glazed doughnut drizzled with a sweet and creamy brown sugar-infused butter sauce. I’m sold on outer space.
Sure, the doughnut is store bought. Ice cream is Breyer’s. But must every ingredient be so precious, so carefully sourced that we can’t love a doughnut grilled on a flattop, covered in ice cream?
Can’t food just be good?
With 24 seats and another six at the bar, this is a small space compared to Del Ray Pizzeria, its sister restaurant downstairs. (Also a part of the family is Stomping Ground, a biscuit shop due this spring on Mount Vernon Avenue.) And mostly, Reserve 2216 does a good job. It opened in January, and I made visits early into its existence. I like what I see so far. But I hope to like it a lot more once it settles.
What doesn’t need to change? Hot chicken. This Nashville original is fried chicken but spicy, with moist meat and crisp skin. Chef Eric Reid changes the sides often; on one night, the creamy spoonbread and pickled cauliflower work well together.
The pepper relish adds intrigue to the housemade cavatelli with broccolini and mushrooms, contributing a pop of brightness unexpected in a winter pasta dish. It’s also a continuation of the Southern theme felt through the menu and the walls—cast iron doubles as both interior design and the serving vehicle of a batch of frickles, fried pickle chips, instead of bread and butter to start the meal.
In the cleverly titled Metairie shrimp (the dish is named for the Louisiana town where Crystal hot sauce is made), the crustaceans swim in a creamy, not-spicy-enough sauce that occupies all of the given baguette slices. But for $15, it’s tough to only see four shrimp on the plate.
A reimagined Caesar salad doesn’t react well to the changes of limp red romaine, bland sweet potato chunks and not nearly enough dressing. A rockfish was cooked just right, but the rest of the plate, from soggy winter asparagus to saucy beans that overtook the delicate fish, couldn’t support it.
But Reid, who upon starting at Del Ray Pizzeria four years ago was promised his own chef-driven restaurant, changes his menu often and will, hopefully, with time—and like that pineapple on the sidewalk out front—deliver on signs of a Southern welcome.
Notes
Reserve 2216
Scoop
Reservation only (hence the name Reserve), though you can walk in and the host will take reservations for that night.
Dishes
Appetizers: $7-$16 Entrees: $18-$31
Open
Dinner Thursday through Saturday
2216 Mount Vernon Ave., Alexandria
(April 2015)
