Historic presidential home offering tours, holiday decorations & events
1600 Pennsylvania Ave NW, Washington, DC 20500 Get directions
"Serving Atlanta since 1948, and stuck in a timeworn retail strip that also includes a Pizza Hut delivery place, the White House is a classic diner, from the black and white tiles to the pink tables and booths, to the blue hair on the senior waitresses. The menu serves a generous assortment of old-school breakfast favorites, including hot cakes and French toast, omelettes, bagels with lox, biscuits, grits, and spectacularly average coffee." - Office of Brothers
"Ina Garten's former workplace where she worked as a nuclear policy analyst." - Bettina Makalintal
"There aren’t many tourist sights in Washington, D.C. that can match watching the President land on the White House south lawn in a “white top” Marine One helicopter. It’s a loud, masterfully choreographed routine that exudes pomp and spectacle. The helicopter itself is arresting. The Marine Corps has a fleet of dozens of customized presidential choppers that are decked out with cutting edge communications equipment and defensive countermeasures. One of the more iconic variants is a modified Sikorsky SH-3 Sea King, a huge helicopter that was originally designed to hunt Russian submarines. Marine One typically approaches from the south, roaring up the Potomac and hooking around the Washington Monument. At the southwestern corner of the White House it descends over a huge flowerbed shaped like a Times New Roman number “1”. Landing a tractor-trailer sized helicopter on the tight confines of the White House grounds isn’t an easy feat. Constant helicopter landings would trash the lawn so staff roll disks out onto the grass to absorb the wheels’ impact like giant coffee coasters. A highly specialized team of Marine pilots continuously train at the delicate act landing on the tiny, temporary helipad." - ATLAS_OBSCURA
"Used in the piece as the exemplar of real-world diplomatic dining, the president's official residence hosts elaborate state dinners that function as tools of cultural diplomacy: carefully staged meals that build alliances, project national identity, and perform ritual hospitality. These formal events are invoked to contrast how food operates in reality versus the symbolic, often theatrical role it plays in science-fiction worldbuilding." - Rachel P. Kreiter
"In testimony about the January 6, 2021 events, a former aide said she saw the outgoing president fling a plateful of lunch, leaving gobs of ketchup dripping down the wall — an image that quickly became national fodder, drawing sharp attention from late-night hosts and comedians (Chelsea Handler quipped it looked like the end of a presidential playdate). The episode turned a mundane mess into a vivid symbol of political theater, reinforcing the presidential residence’s role as both a workplace and a stage where trivial details can fuel media scrutiny, satire, and wider debates about food, optics, and policy." - Claudia Geib
