There aren’t many places in downtown DC where out-of-towners can stumble in and get a taste of the city’s real local culture. But if they’re visiting the convention center or staying at one of the many hotels nearby, it would be easy to stumble into the Alumni, a pop-up that local activist, promoter, and musician Justin “Yaddiya” Johnson has created inside the shuttered bar/restaurant Baby Wale.
“We’re not just commemorating the culture, we’re creating the culture,” Johnson says. “We’ve done that in the street through activism and art. Now we can truly do it through the experience of food and actually interacting and engaging with people. This is a heavy tourist area so we are here to introduce a lot of people to our culture.”
For the culinary aspect of that, Johnson brought on chef Trea’onne Allen, who grew up six blocks east in Sursum Corda, has worked under DC culinary stars Kwame Onwuachi and Kevin Tien, and has acted as an independent culinary consultant for places like Ben’s Next Door. To build his distinctive menu, Allen drew on the Southern, Chinese, and Creole influences on the city’s staples like wings, Chinese carryQout fare, and fried whiting.
The “Grandma’s House, No Henry’s” is a fried chicken wing plate with collard greens and mac and cheese. A tribute to when the Wharf was largely a seafood market, the “Meet Me Down the Wharf” is a fried fish plate with sides like garlic mashed potatoes or fries. “It Don’t Mean a Thing If You Ain’t Got the Go-Go Wings” translates to wings with Allen’s own gochujang-spiked mumbo sauce.
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