18th Street - Marc Joss Review

Our second Nando's in DC was certainly not in the same league as our first visit the previous night.

It was a horrible Monday in DC with relentless rain and we jumped in a taxi at the Air and Space Museum to reach this Nando's.

On arrival, we asked the Nandoca if there was a table not so close to the door because it was cold, but he was quite blunt and didn't give us a choice. The downstairs area was fairly busy in his defence, but it was the lack of Nando's spirit in the reply that didn't go down so well.

I went up to order and after an awkward exchange with a surprisingly moody manager, I tried to order a lemon and herb caeser wrap for Saskia, only to be told that it has to be medium at least because it's pre-prepared and the Brussels sprouts were out of season and unavailable. I went for the Nando's burger which is chicken, cheese, pineapple and salad. It is served in two halves which I enjoyed for breaking up the meal because my burger policy is usually that once it's in my hands, It doesn't return to the plate!

Mayo was served in a ceramic bowl this time, making a change from the Hellmann's tubes on 7th Street. The food came after about 12 minutes, but Saskia's got cold quite quickly as I'd ordered hers first and I imagine they waited to bring out both meals at the same time. The peri chips were nice enough, but I prefer the UK version.

A big perk for Saskia was the presence of wild herb sauce for the first time in our US and Canadian Nandventures. They also have extra extra hot sauce in black bottles here, but no sign of them in Canada.

James's review from 2010 suggested that they put peri salt on the table at US Nando's, but we've seen no sign of that so far, so maybe that's no longer the case.

With one or two more US Nando's to squeeze in before tomorrow evening, I'll certainly be sampling an American half chicken very soon and hope it's up to scratch!