WaPo Going Out Guide: "After three smokeless days, expansion plans can’t come quick enough for DCity"

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Going Out Guide

After three smokeless days, expansion plans can’t come quick enough for DCity

By Tim Carman February 24 at 3:04 PM

For Robert Sonderman, pitmaster and owner of DCity Smokehouse on Florida Avenue NW, plans to grow the tiny barbecue joint can’t come fast enough.

As he deals with a water pipe break at his current location, which has shut down operations for days now, Sonderman is also working out the details on two deals that will expand his smokehouse empire: One will move his tiny treehouse of a barbecue shop to the ground floor of a small condo unit at 1700 Second St. NW. Sonderman says he's in the final stages of purchasing the space. He hopes to close within a month or so.

The other deal will expand DCity, at least for awhile, to a parcel of land just across Penn Street NE from the Dolcezza Gelato Factory and Coffee Lab in the Union Market area. The land is part of Gallaudet University's Sixth Street Development, a planned mixed-use destination that the school is developing with the JBG Companies. But those plans are far into the future; in the meantime, Sonderman has cut a deal that will allow him to smoke meats on a space where fruit, vegetable and poultry vendors used to hawk their wares at the old Union Terminal Market.

[The $20 Diner explains why DCity is the best barbecue joint in the District.]

Sonderman isn't sure how long the DCity pop-up would squat on the property. It could be one summer, it could be more. But he expects to start smoking meats for a "Texas-style barbecue" market in May or June. The menu will be a pared-down version of the one that convinced the $20 Diner to call DCity the best barbecue joint in the District. The pitmaster plans to sell meat by the pound along with sides, bread, pickles and beer. He even mentioned something about batch cocktails.

The other deal will expand DCity, at least for awhile, to a parcel of land just across Penn Street NE from the Dolcezza Gelato Factory and Coffee Lab in the Union Market area. The land is part of Gallaudet University's Sixth Street Development, a planned mixed-use destination that the school is developing with the JBG Companies. But those plans are far into the future; in the meantime, Sonderman has cut a deal that will allow him to smoke meats on a space where fruit, vegetable and poultry vendors used to hawk their wares at the old Union Terminal Market.

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