I’ll kick it off by noting that CityZen no longer allows BYO (which they very irritatingly told me a month after I made the reservation and the day before my anniversary at which we were to drink the same wines as at our wedding - “I see you wanted to bring your own wines - we no longer allow that.”)
These are now a bit dated (Asia Nora is on both lists and has been closed for years) but still useful.
I see that Dino (from our friend Dean Gold) is not on the list from Bassin’s. Dean offers free corkage Sun-Wed (excluding holidays)
I’d check with the restaurants that do offer corkage as many of them have free corkage on certain days. In addition, I’ve attended many wine dinners where we have been able to negotiate a reduced corkage fee for the dinner.
If you use OpenTable, check the Aditional Details section. It usually has something about whether personal wines are welcome.
in DC it’s restaurant option and the law says a maximum of 2 bottles at $25 per. As with many “laws” in DC, venues do not always observe the regulation so call ahead. Dean knows more about this than moi so please comment. I know unlike MD or VA you cannot legally take unfinished wine away from the restaurant but again…
Actually, there’s no restriction on the number of bottles in the regulation, which I just re-read. Also, DC law has changed, and restaurants can now let you take home one opened but recorked bottle in a tamper-evident bag. (However, the corkage regulation - which says the bottles can’t be removed once opened - hasn’t been updated, so arguably it has to be a bottle you buy from them.)
Cafe’ du Parc has corkage early in the week; dined there recently and the new chef was quite enthusiastic about people bringing wine. Stemware is weak but may improve…
I find most places in DC very accomodating. Lately, many of us DC drinkers have been doing dinners at Urbana at the Palomar because we have gotten either 0 corkage or a flat nominal charge (I think it was $75) for as many bottles as we’d like when we took the private dining room in the back on an early weekday.
I have to post that one of my favorite restaurants, Corduroy, is very strict about corkage and allow 1 btl @ $30. They were rather curt about it to a fellow dc wino on his anniversary…Quite a shame as I’d love to organize dinners there.
Bad news. I haven’t eaten there since it moved to the new location, but in the old one, it was not a problem to bring a couple of bottles. I ate there once with a fellow wine geek, brought 2 bottles, and got fabulous service, great stemware, and interest from the wait staff in the wines. Sorry to hear things have changed.
Dean Gold was very accomodating to our group last week with waiving corkage fees at Dinos.
And there’s always Mark’s Duck House - very nice stems for a Chinese restaurant and with the prices of the food as reasonable as they are, it doesn’t seem too bad to pay the minimal corkage per bottle.
I took a bottle with me to Fogo de Chao last weekend and paid $25 corkage, but it was worth it because their wine list sucks. I’m taking three bottles with me tonight and I’ll let you know if they make a fuss. What? I’m on the Atkins diet and Fogo is paradise!
Edited to add: Apparently no limit on bottles – they opened all 3 and charged $25/per.
Can we also formulate a list of places that will accomodate a group that wants to do a wine tasting type of event with multiple bottles and perhaps only ordering apps/charcuterie and the like, as opposed to a corkage for a bottle or two at dinner (or a more extensive, formal private dinner)? I think this would be useful information for the people on this board.