Washington, D.C
Food Critic Tom Sietsema on Falling in Love with Journalism at Georgetown – Georgetown University
In October, Tom Sietsema (SFS’83) stepped down as The Washington Post’s food critic after 26 years.
During his tenure, Sietsema wrote 1,200 restaurant reviews and 50 dining guides. He used pseudonyms and disguises while eating out 10 or so times a week.
Along the way, he covered America’s top food cities and the eating habits of Hillary Clinton, Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders; went undercover in the CIA’s dining room and in a kitchen as a dishwasher, and this fall, penned his final list of DC’s 40 best restaurants.
Sietsema’s journalism career dates back to his undergraduate years in Georgetown’s School of Foreign Service.
The Minnesota native set out to be a diplomat, but after internships at Good Morning America and the Chicago Sun-Times, he fell in love with reporting.
Decades later though, Sietsema still practices diplomacy — just not in the way he thought.
“I’ve been able to use diplomatic skills at the table for 26 years, so in a way, thank you Georgetown School of Foreign Service,” he said.
Find out how Sietsema carved his own path in food writing and how he practices diplomacy at the dinner table.
Culture Shock at Georgetown
Sietsema fell in love with Washington, DC, while spending a semester studying and interning there as an undergraduate. He was a student at Hamline University in St. Paul, Minnesota, at the time, and by the end of his exchange program, he didn’t want to leave DC.
Sietsema decided to apply to Georgetown and arrived on the Hilltop in 1981 — a “huge culture shock,” he said.
“I felt as if I were a representative of a class of people who were from the Midwest. I went to public schools. I was a Protestant. What amused me was how similar students were from around the world in their regard for Georgetown and Catholicism and making the world a better place.”
Sietsema lived in Village A, a few floors away from Patrick Ewing (C’85). He took German classes and a course taught by Jan Karski, a Polish WWII spy and diplomat and SFS professor. He ate mainly from the salad bar on campus, and in his off-hours, worked as a waiter at a pizzeria to save up money to eat out.
“What I loved about Georgetown was it seemed to be a magical place at the time,” he said. “I remember it being a really optimistic time in my life.”
Finding His Footing in Journalism
His senior year, Sietsema took the university’s first journalism class, taught by Ted Gup, then an investigative reporter at The Washington Post who worked under reporter Bob Woodward.
His classmates were Kara Swisher (SFS’84) — a “whirling dervish then and remains one now” — and Mary Jordan (C’83), a Pulitzer-Prize winning writer and editor for the Post, with whom he’d compare notes and help edit one another’s papers. The class taught the nuts and bolts of breaking into the news business, he said.
“I loved the Georgetown way of thinking and teaching, and I think I’m a better reporter because of the professors I had there,” he said.
Gup connected Sietsema with the Post, and after starting as a copy aide, he worked for Phyllis Richman, the newspaper’s restaurant critic. Sietsema tested recipes for readers, learning how to clean squid, prepare African peanut stew and bake colonial cakes — among the more than a thousand dishes he finessed for readers.
“It was the greatest cooking class,” he said. “I think my grocery bill was double my rent.”
After cutting his teeth in food writing, Sietsema headed west, working as a food editor, reporter and/or critic for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, the San Francisco Chronicle and the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, before a role covering restaurants for Microsoft’s Sidewalk brought him back to DC.
In 2000, Sietsema took on the mantle of the Post’s chief food critic.
Food as Diplomacy
In covering restaurants for 26 years, Sietsema has been able to put his diplomacy skills to good use.
He says he tries to make his dining companions feel comfortable, encourages them to try a new food or shows them how to eat a certain dish. In the process, Sietsema has found that people often open up.
“I would take a starving artist or a young family to a big deal restaurant just to see it through their eyes,” he said. “I like to take hoity-toity people to dives. I realized people would open up over a meal in a way they never would in a different setting. I’ve had people tell amazing stories over the years. I feel it’s been a masterclass in life and living.
“Food is a diplomatic tool. It can be symbolic. It’s nourishment. It’s been the most important thing in my life really.”
After logging thousands of reviews, Sietsema is looking forward to becoming a regular in restaurants. He also plans to cook more. He’s hosting a monthly lamb burger night for DC movers and shakers. He recently invited his Uber driver, an Afghan contract worker, to join, he said.
“He’s going to be the most important guest there,” he said. “You can effect change one meal at a time, and that’s what I want to do. I’m very optimistic about the future.”
Pro Tip
Where to eat out in Georgetown: Chez Billy Sud, My Little Chamomile, the River Club and Le Bonne Vache.
Editor’s Note: The first photo in the story is by Marvin Joseph/The Washington Post.
Washington, D.C
DC reaches settlement with man detained while protesting troops with Darth Vader song
The District of Columbia has reached a settlement agreement for an undisclosed amount of money with a resident who claims police illegally detained him for following an Ohio National Guard patrol while playing Darth Vader’s theme song from “Star Wars” on his phone — an act of protest against the Trump administration’s federal law-enforcement surge in the nation’s capital.
A court filing late Thursday says the plaintiff, Sam O’Hara, will drop his lawsuit’s claims against the District and four Metropolitan Police Department officers within three business days of receiving the settlement payment. The filing doesn’t specify a dollar amount for the deal between the district and O’Hara, who is represented by the American Civil Liberties Union of the District of Columbia.
In an email on Friday, an ACLU spokesperson referred to the settlement’s financial terms as “a significant amount” that O’Hara “is pleased with” but said they aren’t disclosing the dollar figure to protect his privacy. A spokesperson for D.C. Attorney General Brian Schwalb’s office declined to comment on the settlement.
O’Hara’s agreement with the district doesn’t resolve his related claims against an Ohio National Guard member. Attorneys for the Guard member, Sgt. Devon Beck, have asked a judge to dismiss O’Hara’s claims against him.
“He was there because that was his assigned duty,” Beck’s lawyers wrote. “This was not an accidental encounter or a one-time disagreement on a public sidewalk.”
An earlier court filing, in February, said O’Hara had reached a settlement agreement “in principle” with the district. In response, a judge agreed to suspend the case while they negotiated terms.
O’Hara sued the district last October, claiming police officers violated his First Amendment rights to free speech and his Fourth Amendment rights against unreasonable seizures and excessive force.
The ominous orchestral music of “The Imperial March” from Star Wars movies was the soundtrack for O’Hara’s peaceful protests against President Donald Trump’s ongoing deployment of Guard members in Washington. Millions of TikTok users have viewed O’Hara’s videos of his interactions with troops, according to his lawsuit.
A series of major events tied to the nation’s 250th anniversary celebrations promise to bring big crowds and heightened security. On the News4 Rundown: That security is likely to include more National Guard troops as a new report says there’s a limit to their impact on safety in D.C.
O’Hara, an artist who works in the hospitality industry, says he didn’t interfere with the Guard troops during their Sept. 11, 2025, encounter on a public street. One of the troops summoned Metropolitan Police Department officers, who stopped O’Hara and kept him handcuffed for 15 to 20 minutes before releasing him without charges, according to the lawsuit.
“The law might have tolerated government conduct of this sort a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away. But in the here and now, the First Amendment bars government officials from shutting down peaceful protests,” the suit says.
Trump, a Republican, issued an executive order declaring a crime emergency in Washington last August. Within weeks, hundreds of Guard troops and federal agents were helping police patrol the city. The surge inflamed tensions with residents of the heavily Democratic district. Hundreds of Guard members remain deployed in the district nearly a year later, with no clear end in sight.
The overhaul is the first in more than a decade and comes in response to feedback that it’s hard to find information on the current site without being efficient at using Google or other search tools.
The D.C. government’s website is getting a complete revamp, a step city leaders hope will make it easier for residents, visitors and business owners to access the help they need.
The District unveiled a beta version of the new DC.gov — beta.dc.gov — and plans to have the redesigned site ready to launch before the end of the year.
The website’s overhaul is the first in more than a decade. It comes in response to feedback that it’s hard to find information on the current site without being efficient at using Google or other search tools.
“This website, it’s really going to eliminate the alphabet soup that you have to remember every day,” said Stephen Miller, the District’s chief technology officer. “So, do you need to know that it’s DPW that’s picking up your trash, or you just need to know that it’s dc.gov?”
The site is built on Drupal 11, which the city said has stronger built-in security features. It includes an integrated calendar and sections for seasonal government services.
Popular searches, based on site traffic data, will also be featured prominently on the main page.
“It’s going to show you, here’s popular services today, based on being a resident, based on being a new resident, based on being a job seeker, based on being a business owner, or based on just being a general resident of the city,” Miller said.
The project cost about $500,000 in dedicated funds.
“We’re setting this up so that you can just go in, say, ‘My trash was missed,’ and it’s going to tell you exactly how to fix that problem,” Miller said.
D.C.’s Office of the Chief Technology Officer is collecting feedback. Residents can leave comments on the beta site and at events at Haynes Senior Wellness Center and Eastern Market, among others, in the coming weeks.
An artificial intelligence-powered search tool, built using Google’s AI technology, will be included on the new DC.gov site after its official launch.
The District, Miller said, is “trying to clean up our content, because what we want to make sure is when we put AI into this site, it’s giving you the right information.”
“We see a lot of future use with AI,” Miller said. “I’d love to get to a point where it’s, ‘Hey Siri, renew my driver’s license,’ and we’ve laid out the foundation for something like that to happen in the future.”
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A 16-day state fair is among the biggest attractions of the country’s 250th celebration in Washington DC. The Great American State Fair, which features attractions from each of the 50 states, runs from 25 June to 10 July across the National Mall from the US Capitol to the Washington Monument.
The BBC asked visitors why it was important for them to attend the fair.
Video by Meiying Wu
Produced by Madeline Gerber
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