A Table Down the Street: Dominion on High

Howie Southworth visits Good Fortune, located on the rooftop of Hotel Heron, 699 Prince St. in Old Town Alexandria.

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Food & Dining

“A Table Down The Street” follows Howie Southworth, author of "A Taste of Alexandria," one local barstool at a time. No reviews. Only encounters. The bartender chasing perfection, the chef with a story, the regular who swears this place was better before you found it. Food and drink may be the excuse. People are the point. A corner seat can tell you everything.

The elevator does the work. Penthouse level please. Doors close. Numbers climb. Cordial chatter drops off somewhere around the fourth floor. By the time the doors open again, the town has rearranged itself beneath me and the Good Fortune rooftop. Up here, it doesn’t feel like a visit. It feels like ownership.

Being here early helps. The elbows are still clear. Sightlines open to the horizon. The river runs where it should. The rooftops stack neatly across the blocks. For now, it feels less crowded. More personal. Almost private. From up here, my city doesn’t feel shared. It feels inherited. I know this won’t last. But for the moment, I’m early enough to act like it is.

Jason keeps the bar. Grew up here. I say you don’t hear that much anymore. He says, “I hear it all the time. Lots of people leave. Then they come back. That’s the deal.” From this height, that makes sense. You can see the place differently from up here. The depth of it. The layers of time and politics. 

Old Dominion, stretched out in steeple-spiked lines and spring twilight, looking like a history text and home and garden magazine all at once. I came for the crab rolls. Jason admits they’re gone for the season. There’s a stare, a pause. A recalculation. I had a crab joke ready. It doesn’t get used. 

Pimento cheese comes to mind. Not as funny. Still the great unifier. Even at this height, even with this view, even with us all holding our drinks a little higher than usual, pimento cheese still holds court. It arrives with what look like crackers dressed up for the occasion and a cap of bacon jam that doesn’t need to be there but… bacon.

The pimento pieces are smaller than I expect. Almost blended all the way in. For a moment, it’s unnerving. Then it isn’t. This still hits, doing its own thing. I must have looked concerned. “Hey, sorry,” Jason says. “I know that makes you crabby.” He laughs. I do too. He stole my joke. 

Some things you give up at this altitude. Like the stem. Champagne up here comes in a glass that looks like it used to have one. Probably safer this way. Less to knock over while everyone is busy owning the place. Necessary compromise. I ask where my caviar is, just to see what happens. Jason laughs again.

The woman next to me is working through her drink decision. Or more accurately, what her drink says about being here. The view comes up. The town comes up. The vibe. Whether this calls for a dirty martini or something grounded like an Old Fashioned. You do see a lot of Old Fashioneds around here. No one seems to know why.

She settles on champagne. I go a step further. A Kir Royale feels appropriate. Now we’re both posh. Still no caviar.

She’s in town for work. On the roof for something opposite. Not even staying at the Heron. Saw the umbrellas from the sidewalk, wandered in, hit the penthouse button. She sees spaces like this for a living. Says this one feels different. We land on Charleston as a reference point. Not exact. But close enough. We’ll take it.

People start to arrive. The ones already here shift. Phones come out. Not for DMs. For proof. The view through the lens replaces scrolling for a minute, then becomes something others will scroll later. Posture changes too. A little more space taken up. A little more planting in the way people stand, turn, claim a piece of the bar or table with an arm. Then two. 

Jason moves through it easily. This is his place in a way that doesn’t require the view. He talks about growing up here, about taking the history for granted, about coming back and seeing it differently. From up here, that tracks. You get the past and the present at the same time. Stories and gloss, all at once. 

Dominion feels generous when there’s still elbow room. Right now, we have it. Space to breathe and behave like you own a little part of this. That won’t hold. It never does. The roof will fill. Shoulders will rub. The crown will get divided, diluted, maybe even challenged. But that’s later.

For now, the vistas are wide. The river behaves. The Masonic Temple remains tilted. The steeples spike. The pimento cheese binds us. The champagne does what it can without a stem. And the town, for a little while, shows itself in a way that makes you feel just a little more important.

Time for another drink with a classy title.

Howie Southworth is a seasoned denizen of Old Town Alexandria and the best-selling author behind "A Taste of Alexandria: Modern Restaurant Recipes That Echo Our City's Past," published by Alexandria Living Magazine.

Southworth is also the author of a new book, Hemingway’s Spanish Table (Insight Editions), released March 17. 

Past works include "Chinese Street Food," "One Pan to Rule Them All," "Kiss My Casserole!" and "How to Cook Anything in Your Dutch Oven." Howie is also a regular essayist for Salon.com.

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