Grill Kabob is a DMV icon. Whether it was in a suburban mall or an urban DC location, it’s the place where many locals were introduced to Afghan cuisine. But for Wais Shoja, having 16 outlets of his family business wasn’t enough.
In 2014, the entrepreneur opened a bar and lounge, Mist, attached to Cherry Blossom Banquet Hall on a small lake in Sterling. Shoja closed the business in 2019 and set his sights on a more food-centric experience. As is the case with many restaurants, the pandemic put a crimp in his plans. Ivy by the Lake eventually debuted in February 2022, with its space filled with photo-friendly nooks and crannies.
One major thing that’s different from Grill Kabob? The food at Ivy by the Lake isn’t Afghan. Shoja and his family trusted a newbie to Mediterranean cuisine, Matt Franklin, with helping him to create a menu that both gives new life to classics and, especially in the case of Sunday brunch, fuses American classics with Middle Eastern flavors. Fusion can be a word too readily offered up by restaurateurs to describe their food, but at Ivy by the Lake, that is precisely what is available.
Perhaps even more accurate? This is next-generation Instagram cuisine. A young crowd, as eager to smoke some hookah on the patio overlooking the water as it is to pose for group selfies in front of the wall that’s decorated with a quote from Rumi, is flocking to the restaurant as much for the food as for a scene that includes late-night DJs and drinks like the Red Sea Margarita, which combines tequila with Aperol, St-Germain, and tangy sumac syrup, served in a glass dusted with more of the colorful Middle Eastern spice.
“These days, it’s about the ambiance, it’s about the cocktails — the whole experience,” says Shoja. The crown jewel of this ethos is unquestionably his tableside shawarma. Diners must order the $92 feast at least 24 hours in advance in order for the restaurant to properly marinate and cook the chicken.
Once guests have dined on a dip and a mezza included with the meal, a cook appears at the table with a rotisserie stacked with turmeric-tinged fowl. When I called ahead, I asked the woman on the phone how many people the dish would serve. She told me, “the whole table,” without clearly elaborating on numbers. I would say that the deeply marinated, tender shawarma carved from the spit is enough to feed around six diners.
The meat comes with more of the fluffy pita that, early on in Ivy’s run, replaced bread made in the tandoor. A quartet of sauces includes highlights like harissa and garlicky cilantro-flavored toum. Perhaps best of all are the pickled veggies — sweet onions and cucumbers that add a sizzle of spice along with the presence of crimson chiles. Combined with the craving-stoking meat, the dinner is not just an experience to remember, but one to be repeated.
Groups can also partake of a vadouvan-spiced, roasted whole chicken and a mixed grill of powerfully flavorful meats. Among these is a New York strip steak that’s rubbed with aromatic spices, sliced, and drizzled with a Klieg-bright chermoula of saffron and cilantro.
The steak is also available as a mezza, a small-plate concept common across the Mediterranean but not prevalent in the Shoja family’s native Afghanistan. “To be honest with you, Afghan food is still my favorite, but it’s a lot heavier,” Shoja explains. “We stray away from that here.”
Diners have the option of making a meal of nothing but appetizer-sized dishes. They shouldn’t miss the creamy hummus, which zaps the tongue with garlic just as nutty tahini calms it. It’s available with a spicy shot of harissa or lamb to make the dish even more substantial. For something less commonly seen on menus, there’s cacik, a dip of garlicky yogurt made refreshing with cucumbers and dill.
The best part of falafel is inarguably the crispy exterior. So why don’t more restaurants capitalize on that? In Franklin’s kitchen, the chickpea fritters are small and puck-shaped, meaning that the well-seasoned rounds are almost all surface area. The only concern is that they might be dry without the tongue-rousing lemon labneh in which they repose.
I usually don’t try a dinner restaurant’s brunch for a review, but Franklin’s menu for the Sunday-only meal persuaded me to make an exception. For $35, the repast begins with a bread board that includes eggy spinach-and-cheese bread, something much like babka layered with halvah, and simits, or Turkish bagels.
Starters include mezzas from the dinner menu, but also dishes like a hard-to-put-down plate of labneh drizzled with pistachio pesto and served with smoked salmon, ready to be placed on another simit.
The entrées, however, are where the chef flexes his innovative spirit. A heaping plate of French toast is flavored with cardamom and mounded with rosewater-flavored cream and fresh berries. The za’atar-flavored biscuits were likeably crumbly, if a bit burnt on the bottom when I tried them, but that didn’t stop me from enjoying their gravy flecked with spicy beef chapli kebab.
Though service can be amateurish, the young staff is clearly trying its best. Those imperfections are worth overlooking. Shojar has indeed done what he set out to do: create an experience. There’s only one Ivy by the Lake, not 16, but that’s all the more reason to make a trip to Sterling.
Ivy by the Lake
Rating:★★★
See This: The onslaught of Instagrammable spaces begins with the stairs painted with ivy and continues all the way to the chic bathrooms.
Eat This: Middle Eastern–spiced New York strip, tableside chicken shawarma experience, cardamom French toast
Appetizers: $8–$18
Entrées: $27–$92
Brunch: $35 for three courses; $55 to add bottomless mimosas
Open for dinner Tuesday through Sunday. Brunch is served on Sunday. 46110 Lake Center Plz., Sterling
This story originally ran in our December issue. For more stories like this, subscribe to our monthly magazine.