Contemporary southern Indian cuisine is front and center at Malabar, a brand-new dining destination headed by restaurateur Ashok Bajaj in D.C.’s Forest Hills neighborhood.
Located only a few blocks from the Van Ness Metro station, Malabar is a bright and breezy restaurant with an open kitchen, palm leaves and greenery, tropical-themed wall coverings as well as an abundance of Indian artworks on the walls.
In comparison to Bajaj’s other well-known Indian restaurants, such as Rasika and Bindaas, he told WTOP that he sees Malabar as breaking new ground with a focus primarily on coastal cuisine. The restaurant, after all, is named after the Malabar Coast, located off the southwest coast of India.
Bajaj is the founder of Knightsbridge Restaurant Group, which is known for several other eateries in the region, including Annabelle, Bombay Club and Sababa. For this new venture — his 20th in the D.C. region — he said the main difference between southern and northern Indian cuisine is the spices used.
“In the north, a lot of nuts are used in the cuisine, like cashew nuts, almonds, poppy seeds (and) saffron,” Bajaj said. “Whereas in the south, you have curry leaf, mustard leaf and coconut.”
For the menu, there are a few “crowd-pleasers” from Bombay Club and Rasika at Malabar, including the palak chaat, butter chicken and the ginger black cod, which is marinated in tamarind and jaggery.
For Bajaj, some of the must-try dishes unique to his Forest Hills restaurant are the scallops caldine appetizer, which is served with coconut, green chili and cilantro, as well as the Malabar seafood bouillabaisse entree, which is filled with shrimp, mullets, rock fish and coconut milk.
A few essential desserts include the bebinca, an Indo-Portuguese layered coconut pancake dish, and the jackfruit ice cream.
The executive chef heading Malabar is Vikram Sunderam, a Bombay, India, native who was behind Rasika and Rasika West End. In 2014, Sunderam also was awarded Best Chef: Mid Atlantic by the James Beard Foundation.
In January, Malabar opened at 4455 Connecticut Ave. NW, replacing Rosedale, which opened in late 2024 by Bajaj.
On what to expect for the future, Bajaj said he’s eyeing his now-closed restaurant, Modena, for a brand-new Italian concept, called Rosselli. The chef behind it will be Carlos Cardona, previously of Hong Kong’s NOI by Paulo Airaudo. Rosselli restaurant is expected to open by the end of March.
“Downtown, as you know, has been not very busy, not thriving,” said Bajaj, who described Rosselli as a “new and exciting restaurant from a world traveled chef.”
