Annie's Bistro Francais

A few weeks back, we mentioned some new restaurants opening in Bethesda, one of which was Annie’s Bistro Francais on St. Elmo Avenue. My coworkers and I were looking for a lunch option with some good soups, and I had been meaning to try this place for awhile, so off to the “other side of Bethesda” we went.

Annie’s is a fairly small space, and it wasn’t crowded when we arrived. The menu was fairly simple and consisted mostly of sandwiches, salads, and some daily homemade soups. I had a hard time deciding which to try, so I opted for the small house salad and the roasted tomato soup.

The soup was simply made with tomatoes and water blended with fresh herbs and spices, and there was no dairy in it. It was the perfect soup for a late fall day, and the small salad was more than big enough to complement the soup. They also served the meal with fresh bread, and it was a nice touch to have a large bottle of water on the table to refill our glasses if needed.

My coworkers chose a heartier soup and some sandwiches, which they said were delicious as well. If the space was a little closer to the office, I could see us going there all the time.

It looks like they are planning to serve alcohol there at some point, but as of now, they don’t have their liquor license yet. It appears that they are only open for lunch at this point and will begin serving dinner at a later date.

If we have any recommendation for Annie’s, it would be to have a legitimate website so customers can easily find the place and menu. As of now, the only information about Annie’s comes from a few reviews on Yelp and a Facebook page that is sparsely updated.

We hope a small new eatery like this survives the dizzying Bethesda restaurant scene, and will be going back soon to see how it develops.