Charcoals flash red and orange. As rendered fat from the spatchcocked chickens drips down, flames rise, licking the birds to an appealing char. A queue of devotees forms. And this is only half the action at Arlington’s Tio Pelé. The other side of the restaurant reveals blenders working overtime on fresh fruit at a counter intended for sweet, nourishing smoothies and bowls. Arabic and Portuguese are both audible in the small dining room.
At Tio Pelé, it’s possible to get a Lebanese-style grilled chicken sandwich and wash it down with Brazilian lemonade. In fact, it’s a very good idea, as the condensed milk of the creamy sip can cool the sizzle of the intensely garlicky toum.
Ramzi Iskandar and his brother, Yehya Eskandar, (yes, they really do spell their last names differently) have an unusual heritage. Their father, Adnan, is Lebanese, while their mother and lead chef, Leila, hails from Brazil. The fast-casual restaurant is an excuse to spend time with his family for Iskandar, a serial entrepreneur who has two more new restaurants planned for this year alone. (Look out for Lamis in Clifton and La Omri in Tysons soon.)
“I turned 50, and I sat down with myself, and I was like, ‘I’m just gonna give it everything I have.’ Instead, everyone was telling me, ‘You’re gonna slow down.’ I was like, ‘No, I’m just gonna give it one last push,’” he says.
The restaurant’s name comes from a childhood run-in with the soccer superstar Pelé in 1980s Saudi Arabia, which resulted in a cover photo of the young Iskandar and the Brazilian athlete on a national sports magazine. “Here comes a little boy that nobody knows, and suddenly everyone in the school is trying to befriend me, so it was a big deal,” he recalls.
And Tio Pelé is a big deal itself. A single taste of the crisp chicken, dipped in Pelé Sauce — a mayo-based concoction that includes fire-roasted red pepper, chilies, sumac, and lime — is enough to hush any skeptics that Lebanese and Brazilian flavors should go together.
Feature image by Michael Butcher
This story originally ran in our July issue. For more stories like this, subscribe to Northern Virginia Magazine.
