Tom Power - Owner-chef of Corduroy

From a discreet spot to an open kitchen

Talk to Washingtonians who take their food seriously — from reviewers and chefs to discerning gastronomes — and if they really like you, they may reveal one of the capital’s best-kept dining secrets: Tom Power’s restaurant Corduroy, at the corner of 12th and K streets NW. The place is discreet, there's no immediately obvious sign on the street to show it's there. And at the end of January it won’t be, so get down there fast — or wait for its new location to open in March.

The current Corduroy is tucked away on the second floor of the Sheraton Four Points Hotel. Even the meaning of its curious name isn’t clear. “It’s a secret,” teases Power, amused. Then he continues, “No reason. It doesn’t sound Italian. It doesn’t sound like a steakhouse.”

If you know anything about Power, it’s unlikely you would confuse his food with Italian or steakhouse fare. An alum of two of Michel Richard’s Citronelle restaurants — the now-closed outpost in Philadelphia and the one in Washington — Power has adopted much of Richard’s approach to food. Produce is sourced as locally as possible and turned into dishes that allow each ingredient to shine. “I don’t like to put too many things on the plate,” he says.

Diners don’t simply praise his clear, precise food and the glorious desserts that he learned at the hand of Richard, a master pâtissier. They also rave about the wine list. Power is unpretentious talking about wine — a subject that can bring out the pompous in the most unaffected of people. “I pretty much didn’t know about wine before I opened the restaurant,” he says. “Two years before, I started trying to learn. Before that, I was in the kitchen drinking beer.” His advice to novices? “Just drinking a lot you learn.”

Growing up in New Jersey, Power took a job in eighth grade washing dishes at a local golf club in winter. He liked the atmosphere in the kitchen. “There were a lot of characters there. They’d give me beer. That was great!” His mother was not a particularly good cook: She didn’t use salt, he says, and everything she cooked came out well done. But his father would sometimes take the family to good restaurants when they traveled.

After washing dishes at several locations, Power was let loose to do “a little bit of prep.” That encouraged a deeper interest in the catering world, so he enrolled at the University of New Haven in Connecticut to study hotel and restaurant management.

From there, he took a culinary training program at the Hyatt in Cherry Hill, N.J., that fired his enthusiasm for the cooking side of the business. Finally, he signed up for the acclaimed culinary training program at Rhode Island’s Johnson & Wales University.

After a stint at the South Sea Plantation in Florida, he went to the Four Seasons in Georgetown, under sous chef Robert Weidmaier, now owner and chef of Marcel’s, and then to Baltimore, where he opened two restaurants for The Classic Catering People. Then Michel Richard poached him for Citronelle in Baltimore, a sister restaurant to Richard’s original San Francisco restaurant and his other Citronelle in Philadelphia. Richard’s intention was to train Power to his exacting standards, then send him to another of his restaurants.

Power wound up in Philadelphia, where he worked at Citronelle for almost three years, forming strong relationships with the farmers who turned up in the regular markets there. Then the hotel in which Citronelle was located was sold and the restaurant closed, so Power moved down to Citronelle in Washington, where he worked directly with Richard.

In 1997 came a move to Old Angler’s Inn, where he cooked his way to review acclaim. Three years later, he opened Corduroy in the Four Points Hotel.

“The location was very bad,” he says. “It was a terrible corner seven and a half years ago. It took a long time to clean up. The building across the street is only two years old. Before that, it was an empty parking lot. There were 12 hookers on one block.”

But the hotel offered him a good deal, including building his kitchen. Now, though, he is leaving. Corduroy’s last day is Jan. 31. At his next restaurant, this quiet and modest chef will be closer to his diners. He’s bought “a cute little town house with an open kitchen” at 1122 9th St. NW across from the convention center.

And as a chef with no hobbies or family of his own -- “This is my family,” Power says, waving his arm around the current Corduroy dining room -- he won’t be found anywhere but work, except perhaps on Saturdays between 8 a.m. and noon, when he goes to the Arlington Farmers Market. Corduroy is one of a handful of polished restaurants in the capital where the chef himself is in the kitchen doing the cooking nightly. Still, he manages to dedicate time to various local charitable organizations, from Children’s National Medical Center to the Corcoran.

Corduroy (202-589-0699; corduroydc.com) is located at 1201 K St. NW until January 31. The new Corduroy will open in March at 1122 9th St. NW. Main courses cost $20 to $33.

This article by Julia Watson first appeared in the Northwest, Dupont, Foggy Bottom and Georgetown Current Newspapers. Photo Bill Petros/The Current.