• Source: Victor Albisu

Victor Albisu (born 1974 or 1975) is an American chef and restaurateur. He has created fine-dining Latin American restaurants Del Campo and Poca Madre in D.C. and the fast-casual chain of taquerias Taco Bamba, featuring traditional as well as inventive house-special tacos often influenced by other culinary traditions. Opened in 2013 in the Falls Church, Virginia, shopping center where Albisu's mother has a Latin market, as of June 2024 Taco Bamba has 15 locations in the D.C. area and nearby states. In 2015, the Restaurant Association Metropolitan Washington named Albisu chef of the year, and in 2016 and 2020, he was a semifinalist for the James Beard Foundation Award for best chef in the Mid-Atlantic region.




Early life and education


Albisu was born to a Cuban father and Peruvian mother; his grandfather was a baker in Cuba. Albisu grew up in Falls Church and Annandale, Virginia, and worked at his mother Rosa Susinski's nearby Latin market. He attended Annandale High School, then George Mason University in Virginia, graduating in 1999 with a bachelor's degree in politics and international relations. He later attended Le Cordon Bleu in Paris.




Career


After college, Albisu worked in international development before becoming a chef.




= Fine dining

=
In December 2007, Albisu became chef de cuisine, then later executive chef at BLT Steak, a steakhouse in Washington, D.C. popular with the Obama family. Albisu also cooked at the White House for the Obamas, and previously for George W. Bush. In 2011, he won a competition hosted by Eater in honor of the Obamas’ love of burgers, preparing a Kobe beef burger with cheddar, ketchup and wild ramp dijon mustard, nods to Michelle Obama's preference for Kobe beef and Barack Obama's taste for spicy mustard and spicy greens. The dish was later added to the BLT Steal menu.
Albisu left BLT Steak in 2012 to start his own restaurants and in 2013, he opened Del Campo, an upscale South American grill in the Chinatown neighborhood of D.C. Esquire named it to a list of best new restaurants in the country, with critic John Mariani praising Albisu's "phenomenal cooking". A review in Condé Nast Traveler said, "D.C. is notoriously plagued by mediocre steakhouses, but this Argentine-style parilla in the Penn Quarter ain’t one of them," commending the South American wines on offer, the Peruvian fish dishes like ceviche, as well as the "toothsome" of roast meats with chimichurri and salsa. In The Washington Post, Tom Sietsema gave the restaurant two-and-a-half stars, indicating good-to-excellent. In 2015, the Restaurant Association Metropolitan Washington named him chef of the year, and in 2016, Albisu was a semifinalist for the James Beard Foundation Award for best chef in the Mid-Atlantic region.
In 2018, Albisu converted Del Campo into an upscale Mexican restaurant called Poca Madre. In 2019, Sietsema listed Poca Madre at number six of the 10 best restaurants in D.C., highlighting "game-changer" dishes centered on vegetables like charred cabbage with mole and oxtail jam, or mango with chile, lime and charred habanero oil in ceviche. In 2020, Albisu was again a semifinalist for the James Beard Foundation Award for best chef, Mid-Atlantic region.
Poca Madre closed on March 16, 2020, when D.C. implemented a dine-in moratorium due to the COVID-19 pandemic; the restaurant did not reopen, closing permanently in September 2020.




= Taco Bamba

=

In June 2013, Albisu opened Taco Bamba, a fast-casual taqueria in the Falls Church, Virginia shopping center with his mother's market, Plaza Latina. His mother and stepfather Bill Susinski were cofounders with Albisu. Named for Peruvian slang for "inauthentic", Taco Bamba offered both traditional tacos (carne asada, barbacoa, birria) and more inventive versions, like fried tilapia with squid ink aioli. Esquire called Taco Bamba “some of the best tacos on the East Coast.” In September 2016, Albisu opened a second location in Vienna, Virginia. Washingtonian magazine described the Vienna menu as a “love letter to Northern Virginia”, with a “7 Corners Shrimp” taco honoring Eden Center’s hub of Vietnamese restaurants and “Bulgogi Bullfight” for the Koreatown neighborhood of Annandale, Virginia, Albisu's hometown.
When the COVID-19 pandemic began in March 2020, Taco Bamba had five locations, with half of revenue coming from dine-in customers. As indoor dining restrictions were imposed, Albisu laid off 100 people and closed the D.C. location, which was adjacent to Poca Madre. He converted the four Virginia locations to takeout-only, then introduced delivery service, which helped keep more staff employed. By the end of April 2020, Albisu said sales had almost returned to pre-pandemic levels though the dining rooms remained empty.
In 2021, Investors Management Corporation, parent company to the restaurant chain Golden Corral, acquired a stake in the business with the goal of creating a national chain. As of June 2024, Taco Bamba has 15 locations, in the D.C. area as well as Richmond, Virginia, Raleigh, North Carolina, and Nashville, Tennessee. These locations offer locally inflected dishes like barbecue pork tacos and pimiento cheese empanadas.




= Other activities

=
In 2015, Albisu appeared on the Food Network’s competition show Beat Bobby Flay. Albisu bested the celebrity chef with a dish of steak and eggs.
Albisu has worked with the aid organizations CARE and World Central Kitchen. At World Central Kitchen he was a member of the board.




Awards


Semifinalist, James Beard Foundation Award for best chef in the Mid-Atlantic region, 2016 and 2020
Chef of the year, Restaurant Association Metropolitan Washington, 2015




Personal life


Albisu is married and has two sons.




References

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• Victor Albisu
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• Beat Bobby Flay
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• Music of Cuba