Jackson 20

Recommends

Ellen F.

Joined 1 year ago

Old Town Favorite. I live in Old Town and this is our favorite restaurant. The food is great and creative and the menu changes seasonally and as they highlight new dishes.

I love the crab cakes with fried green tomatoes, the J20 Nachos (which are waffle fries with pulled pork, gouda, and other deliciousness), and the Virginia Gentleman cocktail. They also had the most amazing root beer float dessert that was 4 good sized floats with different home-made root beer and ice cream.

We frequently brunch and take advantage of the bottomless mimosas. Eco Happy Hour and Doggie Happy Hour are fun with good deals.

Ask for the bar menu and try a few things that are not on the dinner menu.

The only con is that service is sometimes spotty and there is one particular waitress who we have seen be very rude, although never to us. They do take it to heart though and if you let the manager know, they care.

Doesn't Recommend

DLynnK

Joined 2 years ago

AWFUL. This was the worst waste of money and most terrible service I havef ever had. The food was terrible. No flavor. The service was awful: we got a guy who mumbled and looked as if he could care less if he was there. It was a nightmare. Never again will I go here. Don't waste your money.

Recommends

amandapanda44

Joined 2 years ago

Best Brunch EVER!. This place is great! The food very creative, fun and delicious! We couldn't decide which entree to eat for brunch so we had the crab cake eggs Benedict as a breakfast appetizer. Great food and wonderful service!

Doesn't Recommend

SK Singla

Joined 3 years ago

Headline. Details

Recommends

rl727

Joined 6 years ago

Really friendly in a wonderful neighborhood. Really solicitous staff in a dining room located in the middle of Old Town, Alexandria. The food was really good, the staff was solicitous, and all of the customers in the place, including us, were pleased, and at ease. The dining room is an adjunct to the Monaca Hotel, which is funky. We have become used to the Kimpton chain, and we thought this experience was high end and reasonably priced as well.

Recommends

Galt79

Joined 4 years ago

AMAZING EXPERIENCE!!. We were promptly seated and met by our waitress who believed herself to be pretty smart in congratulating us on our 1 year anniversary. A couple of glasses of complimentary celebratory champagne. Big fun. Ordered one of the wines off of the $20 list. Good enough for $20. We ordered the fried green tomatoes with arugula salad, blue crab buttermilk dressing as an appetizer ($12). Spectacular. Great mix of hot and cold, perfectly cooked crunchy southern fried food. Soon after we'd finished, the waitress brought over an appetizer order of the jumbo lump crab cake with seasonal slaw and mustard aioli--The-Chef-wanted-you-to-try-this-happyannive rsary ($15). Living around here, as you can imagine, one eats some crab cakes. These were exceptional. Hint of something unusual. Cinnamon? The slaw was fresh and asparagus-y. Just wonderful. I ordered the rockfish served with red quinoa, cherry tomatoes, asparagus, with butter sauce ($26), and my wife ordered the brook trout that came with crawfish etoufée, and smothered okra ($22). She's one to pick the one with the okra side every time. We ordered an extra side of braised collard greens with smoked bacon and caramelized onions to share ($6). The waitress returned in a couple of minutes to pour wine and let us know that they were out of the rockfish, and I switched over to the grilled veal meat loaf, roasted red potatoes, green beans, with house made ketchup ($19). The meals were presented beautifully. I'm pretty sure that our waitress went off by then. Someone else brought the plates. Some host guy stops by to chat, ask if everything's ok. Then chat some more. I mean, he was nice enough, pleasant (manager? hotel concierge? hanger-on? don't know.). Yeah, everything was ok. Onto the meat. Literally, figuratively. My veal meatloaf was superb. The housemade ketchup was a little sour, but it imparted a wonderful counterpoint to the grill flavor. The green beans were perfect. The potatoes, surprisingly underdone. Everything on the plate was so perfect, I kept trying to reconcile how that could be, but yeah. underdone. The veal was so good, I kept my standard veal joke to myself because I know it always embarrasses my wife (How's your dinner sir? I couldn't be enjoying it more had I tortured the calf myself). But I digress. This was seriously good. Different. Unusual. Special. Major. Also? A portion for two. The leftover veal was dinner again another night.

The collard greens were ordinary. Fine.

My girlfriend completely and utterly endorsed her plate, said everything on it was really good, really worked.

We had something of a wait to get our server back to take an order for coffee ($2.50) and bring the dessert menu. The coffee was drinkable. We ordered some sort of chocolate pot de crème to share for dessert which was excellent, and delivered with the wonderful "and-of-course-this-is-on-us-happy-anniversary." To sum up--exceptional food, serious pricing for Old Town (yet, we got about $50 in free food--apps, champagne, dessert--just kind of because we asked), and fawning and somewhat misguided service. But this seemed like a real restaurant. Serving food that you don't get in the 40 other adjacent restaurants. This was really, really good, but we wanted it to be just a tiny bit better. But it was really, really, REALLY good. I wouldn't hesitate to go back again. And again. Great. Heartily recommended. We had a terrific meal here. Better than almost any I've had in that neighborhood in the time I've lived around here.

Recommends

Scatone

Joined 5 years ago

Great Classic American Food. My GF and I went to Jackson 20 on a total whim while visiting Washington DC. We spent the day in Washington DC and wanted to find a nice place for dinner. We picked up a town guide in our hotel and one of the places advertised was Jackson 20. We had no idea how charming Old Town Alexandria was, or even that it existed. About an hour or so before we wanted to have dinner, we called up and made a reservations with Jackson 20. We were immediately taken back by the fact that they asked if we had any special occasion or if anyone had any food allergies. They wanted to make sure that we were completely covered in case we had any kind of special circumstance involved.

Anyway, when we showed up, we were seated right away. An earlier reviewer said that they didn't like the ambiance... we loved it... it was a great blend of modern meets contemporary styling. The lighting was great to give it the right amount of atmosphere. I can only describe it as mellow yet electric at the same time...

I'll get the only negative of the evening out of the way right now... we waited a bit to get our water and first drink. And when I say a bit, I mean, maybe 10 minutes... not too bad, but not that great either. If that is the worst part of the review I can give, you can imagine that we had a wonderful meal.

We started off the dinner with a few drinks. I had a chocolate martini and she had some kind of bar specialty. I could have had a little more vodka in mine and less godiva chocolate, but what are you going to do? For our meals, I had the Virginia Macaroni & Cheese Casserole with Bacon, Ham Hock and she hadBarbecued Pork RIbs with Apple Cider Cole Slaw and a side sweet potato. My Mac & Cheese was great!!! It would have been the perfect dish if they made the pasta fresh, or even used larger macaroni, but that's nitpicking. I mean, how many places really make their own pasta. The bacon was a great touch as it had a smokey flavor to it... just wonderful!!!! My GF's ribs were ridiculously tender and had a robust flavor and her sweet potato was the equivalent of... crack!!!! It was that good. Each bite just made me want more and more!!!

Overall, the service at Jackson 20 was pretty good, the ambiance was great and the food was highly enjoyable. I feel sorry that other's who posted reviews before me weren't happy with their meals. I highly recommend the restaurant and would go there again.

Recommends

boyacasha

Joined 5 years ago

good american food. burger was good. drinks were awesome. had a vodka tonic and some other drings that really washed down one of the best burgers ever. someone got the salmon and that was good too!

Recommends

Anton Ego

Joined 4 years ago

My favorite place!. I love Jackson 20 and had drinks there last night and whenever I am in town to visit my girlfriends parents. Its always a great atmosphere and a fun time!

Recommends

Bridgetann

Joined 4 years ago

I miss Jackson 20!. I used to live in Virginia and I used to come to Jackson 20 all the time! I recently returned for a visit and decided to pop in for dinner and I remembered all over again why I loved this place so much! I ordered the wedge salad and it was sensational! I truly wish I could come back more often!