By Stefanie Gans
“It was too fast,” says Driss Zahidi of the sudden deal that led him back to Evo Bistro.
From 2007 to 2011, Zahidi was chef and majority partner in the McLean restaurant, but he left to start Le Mediterranean Bistro in Fairfax in April 2013.
After being approached three weeks ago by the current owners of Evo Bistro, Zahidi agreed to take over the restaurant. His first shift in the kitchen was last night.
On Monday, Zahidi, a Moroccan native, will release his new menu, which shifts Evo Bistro from its current emphasis on American-Italian food to pan-Mediterranean cuisine pulling from Spain, Italy and Morocco. Dishes will include lobster ravioli — “House-made, of course,” says Zahidi — Mediterranean rockfish with saffron risotto, an appetizer of boquerones and a lobster and foie gras croquette, which debuts as a special tonight for $9.
Zahidi will continue cooking at Le Mediterranean Bistro, but he is already wary of being able to keep both restaurants afloat. “I’m trying to make it work,” says Zahidi. But if he had to sacrifice one, it’d be Le Mediterranean Bistro. Says Zahidi, “Evo Bistro was my little baby.”
