Food ︎︎︎︎︎

Service ︎︎︎

Location ︎︎︎

Oh how long I have been waiting to write about this place. My first impressions, when I went 4 years ago, were great. I had a fantastic dinner of steak frites for a good price. I loved the novelty of only a few things on a set menu. Bread, salad, then steak frites. It was organized, delicious and satisfactory in every way. Many years later when I started to do “bottomless brunch” as I have reached the age to legally consume alcohol, I was delighted to hear that Medium-Rare had a great bottomless brunch for a decent price.

I went to this bottomless brunch three times last year, and all of those experiences will be summed up here:

I don’t know what happened to medium rare over the past 4 years, or if I was just blind to it in the past, but that place has actually the worst quality food. I am not positive when saying this but, according to someone I know, Medium-Rare’s eggs come pre-cooked in a bag. This does not surprise me because every time I had their poached eggs it was exactly the same. Like exactly the same. The quality of the egg was nowhere near a store bought egg, and you can easily spot the difference. During brunch they serve you either mimosas, screwdrivers or bloody Mary’s. Obviously we did the mimosas and screwdrivers but the orange juice was so gross. There is so much pulp that every sip is a fight for your life to not choke on the pulp. They store their orange juice in those containers that you get your wonton soup in when you order take out. And once, they just left the OJ like that (in the wonton soup container) on our table. Great presentation. Of course they do not give you enough of champagne, prosecco or whatever cheap sparkling wine they used so you need to consume 7 mimosas before feeling anything.

Medium-rare is known for their steak, but the steak that they serve with their Eggs Benedict actually tastes like left-overs from the night before. Every single time, it was gross, cold and had a weird texture. I am convinced that the steak they served to us was meant for dogs. Not only was that gross, but they just drown the eggs and steak with their secret “sauce.” So combined with the extremely undercooked, runny factory poached eggs and a cup of their secret sauce, your bread base becomes soggy and the plate becomes a soup.

There are only two good things about medium-rare, so if you ever end up going because your friends are annoying and want to find a cheap brunch place instead of going somewhere far better for only 10 dollars more, I hope you enjoy their salad and their fries. The salad is great. Fantastic dressing. The fries are the only thing that put me through their meals without barging into the kitchen to see what the f*ck was going on in there.

This restaurant is a perfect example of how the quality can be absolute garbage for a place that looks nice. It is highly popular and I am sure that the majority of college students in D.C know about it. So please, if you want to do bottomless brunch, go to a real place.

The service is fine. Sometimes unprofessional. Really just depends on who is helping you. Food comes out fairly quickly, but hey, how hard is it to microwave factory bought eggs and leftovers from last night’s shift. Location is decent right off the metro, more in a residential area but still nice.