Some of the best Persian food in the U.S. can be found at Joon, just outside Washington, D.C. Chef-owner Chris Morgan teamed up with legendary chef and cookbook author Najmieh Batmanglij to open the upscale restaurant, which quickly gained national acclaim when the duo was recognized as a James Beard Best Chef: Mid-Atlantic in 2024. Watch as the team breaks down a 75-pound Shenandoah lamb into dizi (also known as lamb neck stew), tahdig crispy rice, grilled lamb shoulder, meatballs, and more. The menu also features favorites like hummus, roasted branzino, and kebab platters.
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00:00One veggie hummus, one kebab platter.
00:03Here at June, we cook Persian and Middle Eastern food.
00:08So our menu here at June is broken down
00:10into various categories.
00:11You have our matse, which is like small plates.
00:14You have our vegetables, our land, and our sea,
00:17which is a blend of different kebabs and other dishes.
00:21I think in his past life, he was Persian.
00:26So Chef Najmie, my business partner here,
00:29and mentor.
00:31We've known each other since 2013 or 14.
00:34I mean, if you ask Otolenghi and Jose Andres,
00:37who is the foremost person on that cuisine,
00:39they'll say Najmie.
00:41The Reza reached out to me for open restaurant.
00:43I said, the only condition is if Chris Borgen
00:47agreed to become the chef.
00:50One lamb meatball working.
00:52Fire Borani lamb meatballs.
00:54That's two all day.
00:56Veggie hummus.
01:07So yeah, it is 8.30 in the morning in June.
01:09Our amazing prep cooks, Lupe and Christina,
01:13as they always are hard at work,
01:15with a massive list in front of them.
01:16Right now, at least, they're making three
01:18of our different specialty rices.
01:19We have our fava bean and dill rice,
01:21and then you have our sour cherry rice.
01:23And then a third one she's making right now
01:25is going to be our sabzi polo.
01:27That's an herb rice.
01:29So rice is extremely important in Persian cooking.
01:32I've actually never met anyone that eats as much rice
01:35as the Iranians that I know.
01:38So we do about 600 pounds of basmati rice a week,
01:41which is quite a lot.
01:42So they parboil all of the rice in salted water,
01:46and then we'll drain it off, cool all the rice,
01:48and then they'll use that as the base
01:49to make what's called tadik.
01:51Tadik refers to the crispy layer of rice on top.
01:54It's baked upside down, and we flip it out onto a plate,
01:56and you get that cool aha moment when you flip it over.
01:59So we're going to take the tadik containers.
02:01We'll take some saffron butter, melt them,
02:04portion them out between each bowl,
02:05and then we're going to take this tadik layer,
02:07and we'll press it at the bottom.
02:09And then what we're going to do is we'll build out each one of these
02:12with the steamed rice, the specialty rices,
02:15as well as our white rice,
02:16and these get banked in the walk-in and safe for service.
02:19We have about 1,000 of these containers in the restaurant
02:22that we use at any one time.
02:24The trick to doing this is to press the rice
02:27as hard as humanly possible.
02:28So this base part you can do softly
02:31and just make sure it's uniform,
02:32but you're adding all that other rice on top.
02:35But we'll do probably at any one given time,
02:37you'll have about 500 and probably about 550
02:40filled and ready to go.
02:41You know, I'm big on consistency.
02:43I don't like going to a restaurant one time
02:44and having something taste different than the next,
02:46as any chef is.
02:47And for us, this is the best route to serve as many people as we do
02:51and produce a great quality product with consistency.
02:54We do cook a massive amount of rice at the restaurant.
02:57I think in a given week,
02:58we will go through 16 to 18 40-pound cases of basmati rice.
03:05It should be on the table.
03:06It's a huge part of the meal.
03:12So this is Chef Jacob.
03:14He is our kebabie.
03:15So I am very blessed to have him on the team.
03:18He's been making kebab for 20-plus years.
03:20I know how to measure it because I do this for a long time.
03:24Approximately seven ounces each when we come to the end.
03:30I know without the counting, I know everything is the same size.
03:36And when he creates the divots, it allows for like even caramelization of the meat.
03:41It also creates a difference in balance of textures, which I find super fascinating.
03:45So like some pieces will be a little more crispy, some pieces will be a little softer in texture,
03:50all the while giving you like a beautiful mouthfeel, which is super important.
03:54This is hyper traditional.
03:55What he's doing right now is the best kebab shops in the world do it like this.
03:59Yeah, no, there's no way we could have this menu without kebabs.
04:03People would not be very happy with me if I opened an Iranian restaurant without kebabs.
04:11But he's about to make our barg, which is a beef tenderloin kebab.
04:16This is the most labor-intensive thing of all the kebabs by a mile.
04:20Just cut and open.
04:24He's using the dull side of the knife intentionally,
04:27so he doesn't cut all the way through the meat.
04:29This is the most important part.
04:38When you pull this kebab, it should literally pull apart.
04:42Really soft texture you're used to, but being able to like pull apart like strands of it.
04:48So he's going to make dota la fe, which means two-faced,
04:52or what we call it is kabir kebab, which is like the king kebab.
04:55So he's going to take our ground beef kubi day and spread it across the filet.
04:59And it creates a beautiful texture contrast when you cook it on the grill,
05:03because you get that rich flavor of the kubi day and then the soft tender flavor of the tenderloin
05:09that's been marinated underneath. It's really, really special.
05:12And he is the only person I've ever seen make this.
05:15So, you know, having someone with his expertise, which is making kebabs for 20 plus years,
05:21and he's Iranian and understands the flavors and how things should look and how things should taste
05:27and the textures and all these things that are so important obviously to executing food that is not my own.
05:34I've had to learn a ton and, you know, I wake up every day nervous.
05:38I want to make sure the food's the best as humanly possible.
05:40That is my ultimate goal.
05:41I want to pay respect and homage to the people of Iran who hold this food near and dear.
05:45This is our pastry chef, Anna. She's amazing.
05:50Hi.
05:51This is called ta'an daze sibs.
05:53Basically an Iranian version of tartate.
05:55So she's paying attention here to the color of the caramel.
05:58So what she'll do is she's basically playing with the flame
06:01to create that caramel color throughout, right?
06:04You want that same color across it.
06:06So she's tucking in the dough here so you get that nice edgy crust when you flip it back over.
06:11It'll rest nicely on top of the apples.
06:13It'll really soak in all of that caramel flavor as well.
06:18And she's going to finish these in the oven and then flip it out.
06:21And those get portioned and then we'll read those in the oven to order.
06:25There's a little bit of cardamom and cinnamon in here as well.
06:28We'll serve this dish with a lemon curd whipped cream
06:30topped with limon almani ground dried Persian lime.
06:34When this dish is finished, it's my absolute favorite.
06:37So we have a beautiful 75-pound Shenandoah lamb, grass-fed, grass-finished.
06:49We get one of these in a week.
06:51We're going to break it down into primal cuts.
06:53I'm going to use this for various specials and regular dishes on the menu.
06:57So first up, I'm going to take off the neck and we're going to make a dish called DZ.
07:02So this is going to get trussed and tied and braised.
07:05We're going to split everything off individually.
07:07Lamb is just a huge part of Middle Eastern and Iranian cooking in general.
07:11I've been cooking with lamb for a very long time.
07:14For me, it's absolutely one of my favorite flavors.
07:18And it's really beautiful because there's so many different cuts, right?
07:21You have your off cuts, you have your regular primal cuts,
07:25and all of them require different time and attention.
07:29So now we're going to take the lamb neck.
07:30I'm going to tie this up with one continuous knot,
07:32and then we're going to go season it in the back
07:34and get this ready to braise for the next four hours.
07:37So we're kind of R&D-ing this together right now.
07:40My thinking, Jakob, is to go ahead and tie this.
07:43Yes.
07:44So we'll tie this so it cooks super uniform throughout the braising process.
07:48Jakob's mentioning scoring it, which I think does a lot,
07:51especially allows more flavors since we're not curing it or anything in advance,
07:54to kind of get into the center of the meat, which I think is a great idea.
07:57Yeah, it's nice.
07:58All right.
07:58Yeah, let's do that.
08:02So this is a traditional Moroccan cooking vessel.
08:05It's called a tagine.
08:06But basically, it's a Dutch oven that has a sealed top.
08:10We're going to sear all the meat and vegetables in here
08:13and then lock in all that flavor, all that moisture, everything.
08:16And it's going to slowly braise inside the pot.
08:19So we take that lamb neck, kind of combining both of our ideologies
08:22behind my cooking experience and his idea of how the dish should be executed
08:27to come up with a homogenous idea that I think worked really well.
08:30So the spices Jakob and I discussed are very traditional, right?
08:33So you've got chili, you've got turmeric, black pepper, tomato, saffron.
08:38It's no sour, but they give you a little bit like a spice.
08:44It's not going to be spicy, but give you a good flavor.
08:47You want to start by giving your caramelization.
08:51Then we're going to add the potato, the tomato, the chickpeas.
08:54Then we're going to pull the meat out.
08:55We're going to add in our veg, saute that, then fold the meat back in,
08:59then add the remaining ingredients, and then we pop it back in the oven.
09:03Goal being, how can we create as much flavor in every process as humanly possible?
09:08It doesn't matter how good you are.
09:09You can be the most famous chef in the world.
09:10You're as good as the last dish you put out, in my opinion.
09:13So I wake up every day with that chip on my shoulder.
09:15Like if someone had a bad dish last night, I feel that.
09:18And then this, once again, will get covered and slow cooked until it's fall apart tender.
09:25All right.
09:25So Paco is setting up our Robo Blixer.
09:28This is like a gigantic Robo Coop, which is a food processor.
09:32It has a vacuum seal function.
09:33Most importantly, we use it for our hummus.
09:36We use dried chickpeas that we soak overnight in a baking soda solution.
09:40Those are cooked.
09:41Going to go in with the garlic into the Robo Blixer.
09:44These are going to get pureed until super, super fine.
09:47And then we'll start to add the rest of our ingredients.
09:52Hummus is not Iranian, right?
09:54We're a blend of Iranian and Levantine food here at the restaurant.
09:57Hummus just eats really well with everything.
09:59It's also really approachable.
10:00So to be totally honest, we have hummus on the menu and certain things,
10:04because we know that your average bystander who goes and looks at the menu is going to say,
10:07oh, hummus, I'm familiar with that.
10:14Yeah, so we're going to add ice.
10:15This is going to add a nice bit of air into the hummus,
10:18which is going to help it be a little fluffier.
10:20It's also going to help blend everything together more, and it's going to cool it down.
10:24So now we have the tahini.
10:27The number one most important thing for me is texture when I'm having hummus.
10:29But then within texture, you're looking for the blend of tahini and lemon juice.
10:35With tahini, you get that, like, you know, the peanut butter texture in your mouth.
10:39If it's too much that it's like makes your gum stick together,
10:42there's too much tahini, in my opinion.
10:43It's really good.
10:59My favorite hummus is lemony and bright.
11:02A little garlic on the back end, nicely seasoned, smooth.
11:06And then when it gets to the plate for the guest,
11:08we're going to be really happy with where we are texturally, as well as flavor and seasoning.
11:13And we're gearing up for lunch service.
11:18So right here you have one of our lunch specials, which is our chicken kebab.
11:21So it's a juje kebab.
11:23Right now is when we start to get hit a little bit with our big lunch rush,
11:26between the hours of 11.45 and 1.45.
11:29So we're cruising right now.
11:33So yeah, Paco's going to start making our whole bronzino dish.
11:36So this dish is called mahi yeshekam por, which is a whole stuffed bronzino.
11:41Usually this dish is filleted horizontally and then stuffed with a dried fruit filling.
11:48We try to do something a little more interesting,
11:50which we fillet the fillets off of the spine,
11:53partially to create kind of a pocket at the top of the fish.
11:57And then we'll stuff it with our filling.
11:59I mean, there's a lot of coastal regions in Iran, right?
12:01You have the water in the north and the water in the south.
12:03So there's a lot of seafood in that cuisine.
12:07Of the dishes that I've learned how to make with my partner Najmie,
12:10this is one of the ones I'm most excited about for sure.
12:13For these, we'll probably do about, I'd say on average, 10 a day.
12:16On weekends, we can sell upwards of like 20 to 22 on a busy Saturday.
12:22So I was eager to find a whole fish recipe.
12:25And then Chef Najmie and I got to talking about this dish.
12:28And we created a beautiful dish that I think presents and eats incredibly well.
12:33And I think it's a very unique fish dish that probably will not leave the menu.
12:39Now that they're done, we're just going to put these in the walk-in.
12:41And then the cooks will pull these out in advance of service.
12:43And then we'll roast these to order.
12:47We've been cooking Deezy all day,
12:49which is the braised lamb neck that we took off of the whole lamb
12:52that we butchered this morning that Jakob and I collaborated on.
12:56Chef Najmie is well familiar with this dish.
12:59So now we're kind of going to just try it together as a team
13:01and then figure out how we should plate it,
13:03what it should go with, all those things.
13:05Now in Iran, it's becoming very chic dish.
13:09And before nobody really eat this in the restaurant.
13:13It was in the 40 class area of the city.
13:18Lamb neck's so rich, just falls right off the bone.
13:21This is the way they put piece of the bread in it.
13:25And you let it soak.
13:27And you put a little bit of pickles inside.
13:30This is what happens when you go to her house.
13:34She force feeds you for two hours and then you can't walk.
13:38It's hot.
13:40The neck of the lamb is the cheapest piece part of the lamb
13:43because a lot of people, they don't use it.
13:45And that's the most delicious part.
13:47June in Persian means life.
13:50When you eat a piece of a delicious, any kind of dish,
13:54you, you say June means that's oh, so lovely.
14:01Guys, all day you have one kebab platter,
14:04filet medium well, one sauce tray,
14:06ma junta, two cash, one hummus, one meatball,
14:10two regular pistachio soup.
14:12So in a restaurant this size being 265 seats fully loaded,
14:17the kitchen can be very chaotic.
14:20So this is our bread station as well as where we cook all of the rice,
14:23finish all the rice that is.
14:25It's a pizza master oven.
14:27Our flatbread we cook on these stones at 700.
14:30And then the rice will start at 700 and move to the 600 degree oven.
14:34Gustavo will be making miles and miles of bread all night long.
14:42We are going to grill our prawns right now for tachin.
14:46We are going to fill it up with shrimp inside
14:49and then we will cover it back with the rice.
14:51Chef Typhoon's worked all over Washington DC
14:53and some of the best restaurants here and is an absolute machine.
14:56And I'm very fortunate to have them on the team.
14:58We have our three cores of rice and labneh, eggs, saffron, olive oil,
15:05dill and fava bit.
15:08And we are going to mix it all together
15:10and then we are going to build them inside this metal containers we use for the oven.
15:16And then we have the prawns that are going to get folded into the center
15:20and then we have our additional tachin rice
15:23that's going to go on top of that before being baked for 20 minutes.
15:28One veggie hummus, one kebab platter.
15:37How about fire kebab platter called cherry rice?
15:41Table four.
15:42How long meatballs?
15:45Pans, dong 218, lamb and chicken.
15:50Jun is a, I don't like calling it fine dining.
15:53I think it's more of an upscale dining experience showcasing the beautiful flavors of Iran and the
15:59Middle East in a modern way. It's a blend of traditional and non-traditional.
16:04I think there's a unique opportunity at this restaurant with the way the menu is built to have an
16:12experience that you can't have anywhere else. If you dine the right way, if you're guided by your
16:16server and you listen to their advice and go through that food journey that I've talked about,
16:20right, and building out that tablescape, I think we offer something that a lot of people don't have.
16:25Fire lamb shoulder, duck fast in June, cucumber salad. Hands, 213, kubi day with herb rice.
16:34I just want people to be happy. That's my main goal. But if people can come in here and feel like
16:37they had a different experience than any other restaurant, I feel like I'm winning.