Georgetown is getting a seafood-studded taste of Tulum on Friday, September 4. Cafe Tulum comes from Mexican restaurateur Juan Dracoulis, who envisions the alleyway respite as a plant-filled spot to relax over Mexican small plates with Japanese influences
(3210 Grace Street NW).
Dishes include roasted octopus with potatoes; guacamole with tostadas; spring rolls stuffed with cucumber, carrot, jicama, shiso, and shrimp; hamachi tiradito with ponzu sauce; scallop ceviche with lotus root; and seafood-stuffed chile relleno. There are also oysters, tuna tostadas, tacos, yellowtail sashimi, and a pair of sushi rolls with crab or salmon.
“I travel a lot to Japan,” Dracoulis says. “Cafe Tulum is influenced by its food, not for the ingredients but more for the respect for the product.”
Leading the kitchen is Gerardo González Sánchez, who’s well-versed in Japanese and Mexican cuisines and has moved up in his career from prep and line cook positions to sous chef. In NYC, he helped open Pink Taco Times Square and moved to D.C. two years ago to roll out both Minetta Tavern and Eunoia in the Union Market district.
Cafe Tulum’s cocktails, served from the matte-black bar, are all built with natural fruits. “We don’t use frozen,” Dracoulis notes. A cucumber-basil vodka, watermelon with mezcal, and classic margaritas and palomas run about $12 each, with Mexican Coke bottles also in the mix.
In reality, the scenic and scene-y resort town of Tulum sits along the Yucatan Peninsula, which divides the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea. So naturally, seafood is a big focus at the restaurant. Similar to what its popular cliffside beach clubs like Papaya Playa Project serve, just without the epic backdrop of turquoise waters and white sand. The 50-seat space takes tips from Tulum’s eco-villas and tropical minimalism aesthetic, with bamboo, hardwood tables, ceramics lining the walls, concrete flooring, and earth-toned palettes.
Dracoulis moved to D.C. from Mexico eight years ago. He opened a polished Mexican restaurant, Maiz 64,on 14th Street NW in 2021, which suffered fire damage in 2024 and never reopened. “Cafe Tulum is going to be affordable and more casual, not fine dining. A place you can be there twice a month,” says Dracoulis, who also runs street food spot Rabbit Taco in Tysons Galleria.
He plans to change up the menu twice a year, with hot plates and soups entering the fold in the winter. For a year-round beach vibe, straw hats hang in the bathrooms and murals of palms frame the dining room to the soundtrack of a mix of EDM and Latin music. “It’s a social place to have a lot of small plates to share with one friend or a lot of friends and feel relaxed,” he says.
Cafe Tulum’s hours are Monday to Wednesday from 5 to 10 p.m. and Friday until midnight, with weekends starting at noon until late. Thursdays will be closed to the public for private events, something he’s learned is a key component to running a restaurant.
“Georgetown is very different now than two or three years ago,” he says, with lots of fresh faces moving in. He notes the nearby arrivals of two steakhouses in the past year alone: Brasero Atlantico and Ox & Olive.
