In many ways, The Restaurant at Patowmack Farm is an oddity in the world of fine dining. You eat under a tent or in a sparely decorated greenhouse. Though there are some career servers in the pack, there’s always room for young folks just starting out who can barely pronounce the global preparations of the farm-to-fork ingredients. Still, the cuisine, made from ingredients plucked from the onsite farm, rarely failed to bowl me over with its quality, innovation, and simple deliciousness.
But after August 31, just two years short of its 30th anniversary, the welcome baskets and green-bean soda will soon welcome no more. The zucchini will no longer be turned into sweet bread to take home after a night of dining.
At a recent meal there, Patowmack maintained its high levels and would surely have ranked high on our 50 Best Restaurants list again this year. (It was No. 1 in 2024.) It won’t be easy to find a replacement — and my 50 Best dining will be a little less exciting next year.
I first fell in love with Patowmack during the tenure of chef Vincent Badiee, who combined his chops hewed at Eleven Madison Park and Gravitas with a childhood on a Virginia farm. He used his Persian heritage, as well as his training in Italy, to propel the restaurant to the next level. Now, he’s about to open the hotly anticipated The Hunton inside Hotel Burg in Leesburg and I can’t wait to see what comes out of his new kitchen.
Current chef Colby Janowitz succeeded him at the summer of 2023. He brought a West Coast flair to the restaurant’s offerings, with dishes that leaned Japanese thanks to his time at 3-star Michelin restaurant SingleThread. But I’ve often said to friends that Mykel Winterstine is the not-so-secret ingredient that makes me love my meals at Patowmack the most. The pastry chef joined the restaurant in 2021 and from her platonically ideal biscuits to her manifold uses of freshly picked blueberries, my palate will never be the same. I breathlessly anticipate seeing where the two will land and hope that they will remain in Loudoun County. I also await seeing what will become of the property.
But one of my favorite restaurants in NoVA isn’t gone yet. My advice is to make a reservation quickly before it’s too late. It will be money well spent for an experience like no other.
Feature image of The Restaurant at Patowmack Farm by Michael Butcher
