RSS FeedPresidents: The Best Chinatown Sports Bar You’ve Never Heard Of
So you missed your opportunity to get Caps tickets and now you’re looking for a great sports bar from which to follow the action. Problem is you don’t want to fight the crowds before, during, or after the game. You’d like some place with enough televisions to watch the game but quiet enough to impress your friends with your encyclopedic knowledge of Ovechkin’s dental history. Why compete with the suburbanites for bar service when the Verizon Center is in our backyard?
Presidents Sports Bar, located inside the Renaissance Marriott Hotel (999 9th Street, NW), provides a perfect solution. Only a few blocks from the arena, it is the best kept secret of neighborhood sports bars, free of the long drink lines and cramped spaces so common at sports bars along 7th Street following a Caps or Wizards game. At Presidents there are comfortable booths, large screens, lots of leg room, and several fantastic beers you won’t find at ordinary sports bars.
Resist the temptation to stop at the hotel’s newly renovated lobby bar. It looks great but that’s not why you’re here (recommend it to your in-laws the next time they visit – they’ll love you for it). Just beyond that you’ll find Presidents. Its dark wood paneling, sports-themed decor, and unique bar chair fabric makes it feel like Washingtonians once enjoyed cigars and whiskey back when the Senators played on TV. If you appreciate a little humor and kitsch with your drinks then you’ll love the poster-sized photograph of Obama bowling, hanging near the bathrooms.
The bar’s food is decent, straightforward American fare, and at first impression, so is the beer selection. Yet if you read carefully, you’ll notice two extraordinary Belgian ales on the menu – Chimay and Duvel. Granted, these might be considered a bit heavy to drink over the course of an entire game. But either would make a great start before diving into a thick cheeseburger and a pitcher of American domestic. I’d stick with the Duvel, but that’s just me.
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THF is a Penn Quarter resident who blogs about the culture of drinking at: thehipflask.wordpress.com
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Comments
sooo maybe we have found a substitute for the renovating irish channel?? will check it out this week! thanks for the tip..
xoxo
Responding to Columbo’s comment regarding the Overdrive app (since comments are now closed there): Even with the app you can’t download audio directly onto the iPod unless it is in their iPod-compatible format. Most of the library’s audiobooks are either WMA or are non-iPod compatible MP3s, which can be played on an iPod but have to be downloaded onto a computer first and transferred over. You can download the ODM files directly onto the device but the Overdrive app won’t let you open them.
I live about 3 blocks away and have been to Prezs a handful of times when family is staying at the hotel. This place is usually dead, which can be good or actually really boring most of the time. The food is OKAY at best and the brews are overpriced. True some times this is better than waiting 25 minutes for a beer at some other chinatown spots but this place shouldn’t make any “best of lists.” If there is a game you have to watch then it is not a bad choice but dont go there just for a night out or to see what is on. Grand Slam in the Hyatt toward metro center is a much better option and worth the 4 block walk!
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Love the Ovechkin comment =)