Celebrate National Italian Heritage Month with Don Ciccio & Figli
/A New Amaro Tasting Bar Alluring as its Name Debuts a New Fall Menu
For a taste of Italian tradition, visit Francesco Amodeo and his Bar Sirenis, the home of Don Ciccio & Figli this weekend. Open from 1 - 8 p, the tasting room and distillery is located in Ivy City at 1907 Fairview Ave NE.
By Jessica Wolfrom, photography by Jennifer Chase | From the Edible DC Fall 2019 Issue
You could say that amaro runs through Francesco Amodeo’s blood.
His family has been making it in Italy for 135 years. But in 2012, Amodeo transported this tradition from the Amalfi Coast to our nation’s capital.
His company, Don Ciccio & Figli, recently expanded into an Ivy City warehouse, which more than doubled the space from his previous location in Northwest’s Manor Park neighborhood.
But you can’t just walk into Don Ciccio & Figli’s new tasting room on Distillery Row. You have to find it.
An electric blue facade points the way to a dim hallway. Save for the colorful tiles and soothing music, the extreme contrast might make you question if you made it to the right place.
This is exactly the reaction Amodeo intended. “When you’re here, I want you to forget where you came from,” said Amodeo. “It’s a journey. In Italy, we call it passo a passo: step by step.”
Step by step is how one digests the entire experience at Don Ciccio & Figli.
When you have made it into the tasting room, cordials, amaros and aperitifs beckon from a long bar. The tasting itself comprises 15 Italian liqueurs and runs the gamut from an easy-drinking herbal liqueur called Ambrosia to a dark and brooding fernet.
“We build a bitterness barometer,” said Amodeo. “We go from the sweetest to the most bitter.”
It has been said that bitterness is as essential to Italians as pasta. But Americans are beginning to enjoy the bite. “In 2015, people were asking me, ‘What’s an amaro?’” said Amodeo. “Now they are asking me, ‘When are you coming out with your next one?’”
But bitterness doesn’t mean forgoing balance. Amodeo is hyper-focused on fusing the Italian love of bitterness with the American obsession with all things sweet.
Amodeo’s goal is to reach as many people as possible, through flavor alone. “Why am I chopping 10,000 walnuts or peeling 2,000 lemons if you can’t taste them?” he asked.
One of only a few amaro tasting bars in the U.S., once you’ve tasted through the portfolio here, Bar Sirenis will lure you in for more. The bar is named after the mythological Sirens that used music to enchant passing sailors to shipwreck on the rocks off the Amalfi Coast. Amodeo’s bar is a temptation not to be passed up.
Here, though, surrendering to impulse pays off. Amodeo will safely guide you through how to use his products in classic cocktails like the Negroni and the Spritz, and in specialty sips that blend Amadeo’s cordials and bitter liqueurs.
“This place makes you think,” said Amodeo. “This place makes you become creative. It forces you to become more involved in what we do. It hugs you. It embraces you. It makes you wonder what is coming next.”
Amodeo on his tasting bar, his locally produced product behind him.
Don Ciccio & Figli | Bar Sirenis, 1907 Fairview Ave. NE, Washington, DC.
Open Saturday and Sunday, 1– 8 pm. 202.957.7792; donciccioefigli.com
