[QUOTE=flodnak]
Pretty Cheap is excellent, and this is where Foggy Bottom is making me nervous. We know the city’s crowded with tourists in the summer and we’ll likely have to wait, and we can do that if the food is worth it and service goes reasonably quickly once we get a table - or we can happily carry our own trays.
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Georgetown is right out if you’ve got cost requirements; the proliferation of wealthy folks and high rents in that area has caused localized inflation that will drain your wallet. Stick near the Mall or the neighborhoods along the Red Line where things will be less unreasonable. Union Station has a food court downstairs with lots of local chains, like Vaccaro’s (from Baltimore - great Italian desserts). The food court is decidedly one-star, and half a step up from good street vendor food, but it will fill you up, and it’s not horrible. Upstairs in Union Station is the East Street Cafe, where you can get great southeast Asian food (Filipino, Japanese, Vietnamese, Thai… the owner blurs the lines). I like their yellow and green curries. You can easily get lunch or dinner at East Street Cafe for under $20, and if you get a seat by the railing, it overlooks the station and you can watch the crowds milling about.
Bizarrely, the cafeteria at the Holocaust Museum is delicious. You’d think nobody would be in the mood for lunch afterwards, and you’d be right. Small crowds when I’ve been, lunch or an early dinner for under $12. Food is a la carte and automat-style (most portions are already wrapped), so kids with eyes bigger than stomachs may be able to get $15 worth of food on a tray.
DuPont Circle and Adams Morgan (neighborhoods on the red line) have loads of good food that won’t cost you more than $30 per person, but drinks will quickly push the price over $40. If $30 - $40 is still reasonable for you, there’s Hank’s Oyster Bar. The food is sublime, and in early summer you’re likely to find local seafood on the menu. If your kids are under 13, I wouldn’t recommend this spot.
I won’t rule the neighborhood out entirely, but all of the restaurants I’ve been to in Georgetown have been in that price range or above, and the service and value for the dollar has never pleased me. Georgetown is also full of yuppies. Privileged, self-important, and practically Parisian in their attitude towards tourists, the denizens of Georgetown wander around dressed like hipster rejects, frittering away their parents’ money on all of the fashionable stuff you can get in Georgetown for only ten times what a sane person would pay. (Clearly this is a gross generalization - I’m sure some lovely people make their homes there. I’ve just never run into them. I will also admit that I have a bias against the neighborhood for refusing to allow a Metro stop to be placed there.)
Since the OP hasn’t clarified his cost requirements, I’d encourage posters to include approximate price ranges for lunch and dinner – if you’ve already posted, maybe even edit to include prices. That’ll give the OP some concrete numbers, since one man’s “not terribly cheap” is another man’s “unreasonably overpriced”.
