Highest Climber Award 2026, sponsored by Lee Kum Kee

Albi

Washington DC

Modern Palestinian cooking straight from the hearth

Chef-owner Michael Rafidi opened Albi in 2020 with a live-fire, wood-burning hearth as its centrepiece. The restaurant, located in DC's Navy Yard neighbourhood, offers Rafidi's alternate take on traditional Palestinian cuisine using modern techniques. Every dish is evocative of his grandparents' ancestry in Ramallah, Palestine and their home cooking. The hearth isn't just for show – it's a functioning fire that touches almost every dish before it hits the plate.

Albi not only means 'my heart' in Arabic – the restaurant's name also reflects chef Rafidi's conviction that food has always been personal and a powerful connection to family and tradition. Before he launched Albi, the Maryland native spent more than a year scouring cookbooks, digging up old family recipes and holding multiple pop-ups to further sharpen his culinary direction. The result? Dishes bursting with flavour, colour and memory.

The chef's choice five-course tasting menu highlights seasonal mid-Atlantic produce reimagined with Rafidi's signature Palestinian style, including dishes like Maryland blue crab with sweetcorn and serrano oil and a wood-fired potato pita with foraged mushrooms and hummus. For those dining a la carte, the menu features crab rice maqluba, Palestine's national dish.

Before he lit a fire under DC's dining scene, Rafidi studied at Le Cordon Bleu in Pennsylvania before spending three years at Blue Duck Tavern, working shifts that – as a prelude of things to come – included managing the restaurant's wood-burning oven. Eventually, Rafidi moved to California and worked shoulder to shoulder with Michael Mina as executive chef of the celebrated, now-shuttered RN74 in San Francisco. Rafidi returned to DC five years later, and with a renewed focus on the food from his childhood, opened Albi.

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