"Nothing modernized, nothing having a take on it." Bhakti More said that to Washingtonian about the food at N.H. 48 Indian Kitchen, the restaurant she and Prady Rana opened at 4828 MacArthur Boulevard NW on September 3. Twenty-three days later, a few doors down at 4822, Kotobuki served its last sushi after 22 years upstairs.
The 4800 block of MacArthur has only a handful of dining rooms, and they tend to change hands over years. When a space opens up, how it gets filled shapes the block for the next decade or two. September showed both ways it can go. One room filled after ten months empty. In the other building, a Japanese kitchen that has been there for more than thirty years kept going, because it had a second room to hand off to.
4822 MacArthur has handed off its Japanese kitchen before
The building at 4822 has two units, and since the early 1990s at least one of them has had a Japanese kitchen.
Makoto ran the ground-floor dining room for nearly 26 years and closed on December 29, 2018, PoPville reported at the time. Kotobuki, upstairs in Unit B, kept cooking through the four years that room sat between tenants. In March 2023, Kappo opened in Makoto's old dining room as a polished Japanese tasting room, according to Eater DC. For about three and a half years the building had two Japanese kitchens, one on each floor. Kotobuki's closing brings it back to one.
| Unit at 4822 MacArthur Blvd NW | Restaurant | Status |
|---|---|---|
| Ground floor, now Unit A | Makoto | Closed December 29, 2018, after nearly 26 years |
| Unit B, second floor | Kotobuki | Closed September 26, 2026, after 22 years |
| Unit A | Kappo | Opened March 2023; taking reservations this fall |
Eater DC described Kotobuki as a "cozy" second-floor standby that specialized in sushi, sashimi, and kamameshi. A sign on the door read, "It is with a heavy heart that we announce Kotobuki will be permanently closing." PoPville broke the news, and one regular told the site the sushi "was better than usual when we went to say our goodbyes." Hoodline reported that no reason was given and that nobody has said what will fill the space.
So the Palisades still has a Japanese table at 4822. It is now a single room with a reservation system rather than an upstairs sushi bar for a casual weeknight. Kappo takes bookings through its website. Unit B stays an open question until a new tenant files paperwork. On this block, that usually happens in public: liquor license notices are where new names tend to show up first.
4828 sat dark for ten months before N.H. 48 took it
That is how 4828 surfaced. Momo's Cafe closed there on October 31, 2025. In July 2026, PoPville spotted the license notice naming the next tenant, N.H. 48 Indian Kitchen. The application gives a sense of the room's size. It requested a restaurant license with 26 seats, a summer garden endorsement for 8 more, a sidewalk café endorsement for 12, and carry-out and delivery endorsements. Those numbers come from the application, so they show what the owners asked for, not a confirmed final layout. Even so, a room built around a couple dozen seats is typical of the scale on this strip.
The doors opened September 3. That was ten months from Momo's last day and about two months after the license notice appeared.
The name comes from National Highway 48, the 1,744-mile road between Delhi and Mumbai. It runs through More's home state of Maharashtra and Rana's hometown of Delhi, and the menu draws on the regions along it, Washingtonian reported. Both owners have spent years in D.C. dining rooms. More served at Chai Pani, was an assistant manager at Tamashaa, and worked as maître d' at Bresca and Jônt. Rana held nearly every front-of-house job at Rasika West End before moving on to Del Mar, Osteria Mozza, and Fiola Mare. "We're just locals who worked in these institutions in the city," Rana told the magazine.
The dishes the owners are proudest of, per Washingtonian:
- Vada pav, the Mumbai street snack of a deep-fried potato patty on a soft bun
- Dahi ke kebab, pan-fried patties filled with thickened yogurt and herbs
- Chicken lollipops, frenched wings fried crisp and served with spicy chili sauce
- Mutton ghee roast, a South Indian goat stew enriched with roasted chilies and clarified butter
Eater DC added the restaurant to its October heatmap of new openings. It points diners to the pani puri, saag paneer, slow-cooked goat curry, biryani, and "all sorts of naan," and calls the room "color-soaked." The restaurant's own site has current details.
The neighbors still on the city's license roster
If MacArthur turns over one room at a time, the rooms that haven't changed matter as much as the ones that have. D.C.'s Alcoholic Beverage and Cannabis Administration roster, current as of October 1, 2026, still lists the businesses that bracket the two September changes.
- Lupo Osteria, 4814 MacArthur Boulevard NW, just west of the 4822 building
- Bassin's MacArthur Beverages, 4877 MacArthur Boulevard NW
- BlackSalt Fish & Market, 4883 MacArthur Boulevard NW
The roster shows a license on file. It doesn't show what's on the menu tonight, and it lags real life: Kotobuki still appears there as active after its September 26 closing. Bassin's is easier to confirm, since its website lists an in-store tasting on October 29.
Italian at 4814, Japanese at 4822, Indian at 4828, and a wine shop and a fish market across the 4870s and 4880s. That covers a full dinner's worth of choices in a few hundred feet. Because so few rooms exist, one closing changes what's available more than it would on a longer commercial street. The same goes for one opening.
Late October into November on the 4800 block, by date
Much of the block's weekly rhythm comes from fixtures that aren't restaurants. The Palisades Farmers Market is a growers-only market selling seasonal produce, farm goods, flowers, and baked goods. It runs year-round at the corner of 48th Place NW and MacArthur Boulevard, close to both September changes. The Palisades Community Association calendar lists it every Sunday from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. and carries the series into January 2027. A few blocks away, the Palisades Neighborhood Library at 4901 V Street NW has a full fall calendar.
| Day | Recurring event | Time | Dates |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sunday | Palisades Farmers Market, 48th Place and MacArthur | 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. | Nov. 1, 8, 15, 22, 29 |
| Saturday | Friends Book Sale, Palisades Library | 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. | Oct. 31; Nov. 7, 14, 21, 28 |
| Tuesday | Baby and Toddler Story Time, Meeting Room 1 | 11 to 11:30 a.m. | Nov. 3, 10, 17, 24 |
| Thursday | Palisades Writers' Workshop | 6 to 7:30 p.m. | Nov. 5, 12, 19, 26 |
| Thursday | Learning About AI | 6 to 7:30 p.m. | Nov. 5, 12, 19 |
| Wednesday | Improv for All workshop | 6 to 7:30 p.m. | Nov. 18 |
The Sunday market and the Saturday book sale both run through Thanksgiving weekend, November 28 and 29. The Writers' Workshop is listed for Thanksgiving Day itself.
If you drive in from the west, DDOT's construction schedule for October 16 through 30 lists preventive guardrail work at 6000 MacArthur Boulevard NW, on the right side of the road, weather permitting. If you bike in from below, the National Park Service's C&O Canal conditions page, updated October 14, shows a local detour on the Capital Crescent Trail near the Potomac Aqueduct. Farther out, the Park Service's project page for a 3.7-mile rehabilitation of the trail between Water Street and the Maryland line says the work is still in design, with construction expected to begin in 2027. The page was last updated in January, so check for newer notices before planning around that date.
The next change on the block is likely to show up the way N.H. 48 did, as a license notice for 4822 MacArthur Boulevard NW, Unit B.
At Thrive Team, we keep track of streets like MacArthur Boulevard one address at a time, because in the Palisades a single storefront changing hands affects daily life on the block. If you're weighing a move near the strip and want a candid read on what's changing within walking distance, start a strategy call with us.
