Michelin adds four restaurants to its DC guide
Rye Bunny, Maison Bar à Vins, Bar Del Monte and Elcielo Bistró join Michelin's Washington DC selection, ahead of stars announced in December.
The Michelin Washington DC guide has added four restaurants, none yet starred, widening a list that will be judged for stars and Bib Gourmands in December.
The four newcomers are Rye Bunny and Maison Bar à Vins in Adams Morgan, Bar Del Monte in Mount Pleasant, and Elcielo Bistró in Union Market. Michelin listed all four on September 17, 2026, giving each its lowest public tier: "recommended", a step below Bib Gourmand or a star.
Four names to watch in DC
The recommended tier is where next year's stars usually start.
Rye Bunny serves an eclectic comfort-food menu that rotates through 10 to 15 dishes at a time. The restaurant has separately made the New York Times' list of 50 favorite American restaurants, a crossover that has drawn extra attention to its Michelin debut.
Maison Bar à Vins takes its cues from Paris wine bars, pairing a short, frequently changing list with snack-sized plates. Bar Del Monte, across town in Mount Pleasant, works the same small-format idea through an Italian lens, with pizza alongside its antipasti.
Elcielo Bistró is the most established of the four by pedigree. It runs as a casual, Colombian-inspired sibling to the fine-dining Elcielo brand, whose flagship holds a Michelin star, giving Washington diners a lower-priced route into the same kitchen philosophy.
Stars and Bib Gourmands due in December
None of the four restaurants carries a star or Bib Gourmand yet. Michelin's recommended tier functions as a holding list: inspectors have eaten there and consider the food worth a detour, but have not assigned a formal rating.
That changes, or doesn't, at Michelin's next US ceremony on December 14, 2026, in New York, when the guide announces stars and Bib Gourmands across the cities in its American network, DC among them.
For a guide that added its Washington edition only recently, four fresh names in September is a reminder that the list keeps moving between ceremonies, not just on gala night, much as Michelin's Spain guide added 20 restaurants earlier this month.
Sources
- Washingtonian · 2026-09-17
