Saturday, May 19, 7:00 P.M.
Members $85, guests $110

A Feng Shui master was called in to ensure that the interior of TenPenh—the new Asian-inspired restaurant opened by the team that brought Washington the popular DC Coast—had the proper balance of yin and yang to allow for good energy flow. The cooking team spent several weeks travelling through the Far East tasting local delicacies, searching for exotic treasures to adorn the dining room, and picking up culinary inspiration that would inform the restaurant’s menu.

The result is a gorgeous dining room overflowing with treasures from the trip. There is a 17th-century Burmese statue of two men carrying a gong. Diners sit on elegant teak chairs that were custom made in Hong Kong or on banquets upholstered in green and gold Thai silk. The room is divided by glass panels that have been painted with the same pattern that graces a temple in Bangkok. Teak floor lamps with silk shades purchased in Ho Chi Minh City cast a warm glow over the lounge. Guests eat with utensils made of hammered bronze, the knives shaped like traditional Thai swords.

The menu is as carefully thought out and brilliantly executed as the decor. Jeff Tunks, the executive chef and owner, made a name for himself in Washington with the opening of DC Coast in 1998. The American seafood restaurant was named one of the top new restaurants of the year by just about everyone—Esquire, Bon Appétit, Food & Wine, and the Washingtonian. At DC Coast, Tunks has "mastered the skill of melding big American flavors with bright ideas from the Pacific," John Mariani wrote in Diversion magazine. At TenPenh, he wanted to take his Asian inspiration one step further. Tunks enlisted the talented team of Cliff Wharton and David Guas to man the kitchen and pastry kitchen respectively, and the result is a wonderful amalgam of Asian dishes like sweet coconut-chicken soup ("irresistible," according to Brett Anderson of Washington City Paper) and a trio of sorbets—coconut with lemongrass, mango with fresh ginger, and pale green apple ("smiles of pleasure follow the first tastes," Tom Sietsema wrote in The Washington Post.)

Wharton set out to be a rock star, but DC denizens are counting their lucky stars that he turned his sights toward the kitchen instead. After working at several restaurants in his hometown of Kansas City, Missouri, Wharton left home for San Diego, where he got a job at the Loews Coronado Bay hotel. Tunks was the executive chef at the time. The two proved such a good team that Wharton accompanied Tunks as sous-chef when the latter went to New Orleans to take over the stoves at the famed Windsor Court hotel. It was there they got a taste of what Guas could do in the pastry kitchen. Guas, a New Orleans native had grown up cooking and eating with his family, whose eclectic culinary traditions (one side of his family came from Cuba, the other from New Orleans) are evident in his desserts. At the Windsor Court, Tunks grew to admire Guas’s ability to "transform old-fashioned desserts into contemporary creations." Ultimately, Guas left New Orleans in the company of Tunks and Wharton to open DC Coast, and now, TenPenh.

"There’s no corner of the city that pulses with as much creative energy as TenPenh," Sietsema wrote. Come taste the excitement.