Darko Zagar

Washington's Culinary King: Ashok Bajaj

Ashok Bajaj has become the soft-spoken demigod of the D.C. restaurant scene, amassing dining establishments—and a reputation—that defy trendiness and a wayward economy.

If social power derives from food—more specifically, where you eat it—then Ashok Bajaj is a Washington culinary icon. “For me, it has never been about the numbers. Creating restaurants is simply something I like to do,” says Bajaj, who recently snipped the ribbon at Bibiana, the seventh restaurant he has opened here since launching the Bombay Club in 1988. “I don’t look at them as numbers because each one of my restaurants has its own identity and personality, and each one has a different cuisine.”

He’s not exaggerating. Two of Bajaj’s best-known restaurants, the Bombay Club and the Oval Room, though located across the street from one another (within walking distance of the White House and the power corridors of the nation’s capital), are a world apart in flavor and style: The Bombay Club features gourmet cuisine from India’s different regions, and the Oval Room offers traditional American fare.

And unlike many high-profile restaurant owners around town, Bajaj isn’t a chef—but he has an uncanny ability to tap into trends and, perhaps more important, understand the people who dine at his restaurants. These are among the main reasons why many in the Washington food establishment consider Bajaj the most powerful restaurateur in town—and why Forbes has included the Oval Room on its list of “Power Dining Tables” and why GQ recently named Bajaj among the 50 most powerful people in Washington.

Mixing It Up

In 1991, giving notice that he wasn’t interested in establishing a series of Indian restaurants, Bajaj opened 701—often called the “elegant” 701 (right)—where the food is American. Seven years later, he tried his hand at a neighborhood restaurant with Cleveland Park’s Ardeo, which worked so well that in 2001 he launched the wine bar Bardeo next door. Both offer menus suited to their status as neighborhood eateries. Rasika, which the indefatigable Bajaj opened in the Penn Quarter four years ago, reverts to Indian food, but its modern Indian dishes are quite different from the traditional fare available at the Bombay Club.

See a pattern? No, because there isn’t one. The guy is all over the culinary map—and successful every time. For this restaurateur, variety is indeed the spice of life. So at Bibiana (a name he chose because it “sounds like the name of a beautiful woman”), which he opened in 2009, the food is Italian. Bajaj, who says he takes only working vacations, has been to Italy three times in the past year to research the country’s different culinary offerings firsthand.

As his parents’ firstborn son, the New Delhi native was urged to become a doctor. But Bajaj, a master of self-deprecation, says, “I’m not that smart.” Instead of studying medicine, he earned a degree in commerce at the University of New Delhi and a post-grad degree in hotel management and tourism.

After seven years with two of India’s leading hotel chains, Bajaj moved to London, and then in 1988, to Washington. He chose D.C. as the site of his first restaurant, the Bombay Club, in large part because of its proximity to the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and the White House. Bajaj had a partner in his entrée into the restaurant business, but that was the only time.

Asked if this progression of new restaurants (seven in 20 years) was part of a carefully laid business plan, perhaps scrawled on a napkin late at night years ago in London or Delhi, Bajaj dismisses the question politely with a wave of his hand (as he does when asked his age, saying, “I’m like Deepak Chopra. I don’t talk about age. I am ageless.”).

“No, no, this isn’t the result of a master plan. Restaurants are very intricate things to put together.” Indeed, he believes conceiving, building and running restaurants are creative acts. “I’ve had a 25-year relationship with Harry Gregory, a very good designer in London. We sit down, talk and come up with good ideas quickly. He and his team offer suggestions, I give them my feedback, and that’s the way we create a new restaurant.”

Tough Times, Stronger Ideas

In a sea of restaurants roiled by the economy, Bajaj has managed to swim as straight as a shark. He is quietly proud of the fact that he’s never had to close a restaurant and was able to complete last year more than $800,00 in renovations to 701, where only the pillars remain the same.

The secret? For Bajaj, owning restaurants and catering to the known (Presidents George H. W. Bush, Bill Cinton and Barack Obama, plus the past three Secretaries of State, Albright, Rice and Hillary Clinton), as well as thousands of the unknown, is a labor of love. (See Bibiana, left.)

“If you find your niche, it’s a not a job,” Bajaj says. “When one of my new restaurants opens, only then can I start thinking about the next.” Asked whether that might be in his adopted home of Washington or, as some of his chefs would like, in New York City with its challenging if-you-can-make-it-here-you-can-make-it-anywhere cachet, the ever-cautious Bajaj answers with typical enigmatic charm, “Who knows what comes next?”

7 and Counting

Bibiana (opened 2009)

701 (1990, renovated 2009)

Rasika (2005)

Ardeo (1998)

Bardeo (1998)

Oval Room (1994)

Bombay Club (1988)