Author: Shea Gibbs

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Living

Two of a kind: Omelets are a breakfast staple, whatever form they’re in

Tip Top Restaurant’s scrambled-style omelet stands out as one of the area’s best breakfast options. Photo: Elli Williams

My mom had the most ridiculous omelet maker when I was a kid. It was essentially a hinged non-stick skillet, with two half-moon shaped sides. You would pour your egg mixture into the pan, top either or each side with your omelet ingredients, and when the egg was just beginning to set, flip the skillet at the hinge to flop one side on top of the other.

The hinge was comically wide. You had to be quick to make sure you didn’t get any egg on your face, and the whole proceeding was more violent than an OCD chef wielding a Slap Chop.

Somehow, though, the contraption made great omelets, and it’s influenced my thinking about omelets to this day. To me, the archetypal omelet is essentially an egg-based Hot Pocket: fluffy chicken ovums folded delicately around melted cheeses, crisp-tender vegetables, and salty breakfast meats.

If you’re looking for an omelet that could have come out of the egg-flip-o-matic itself, look no further than The Nook. The Downtown Mall diner’s been serving breakfast under one name or another since 1912 and went through a major renovation in 2007, making it no stranger to the comings and goings of a trend or two. But the omelet they’ve settled on these days is all folds of thin egg layers winding around tasty filling. The individual layers of egg are well seasoned and all so nicely layered that the overall effect is almost flaky.

The Nook’s omelets aren’t perfect, though. The amazing-sounding combination of sweet basil, tomato, and asiago cheese tucked inside layers of scrambled eggs, doesn’t quite work for me, and the restaurant has fallen victim to a few careless errors on my visits. Last time I was in, the kitchen sent out its Original Ham Omelet—shown on the menu with ham, caramelized onions, cheddar, and Monterey Jack—with no cheese at all. And on a previous visit, the mushrooms were distributed in such a way on my mushroom and Swiss omelet that half the omelet was just a Swiss.

Still, properly cheesened with its salty-sweet caramelized onions and stacks of deli ham, the Original Ham from The Nook is a solid omelet that stands in contrast to so many omelets these days that are really no more than a glorified scramble, eggs and ingredients thrown together in a pile and served flat and without substance. More often than not, this strategy results in a dense, rubbery mouth full of indistinct ingredients. But, done right, it can be a satisfying diner meal, indeed.

Take the dish served up at Tip Top Restaurant, the oft-forgotten Pantops joint tucked between row after row of new and used cars at the surrounding auto dealerships. Tip Top’s omelets are the type that would never come out of my mama’s kitchen, but their deliciousness is in their simplicity.

“We throw all the ingredients into a bowl, scramble them, throw it on the grill, flip it and fold it,” said manager Cody Vassalos, whose father runs the joint. “When you mix it all together, the ingredients still get sautéed, it cooks in the eggs, and it adds to how quickly we can make an omelet.”

Both Tip Top’s Western Omelet (green peppers, onions, ham) and Greek Omelet (feta cheese, black olives, onion, tomato) are satisfying breakfast options. The eggs used in either case are cooked perfectly, and served fast and with a smile. The veggies, although a little undercooked due to the quick sauté, taste fresh, and the knife work is consistent, which helps both dishes come together.

“These cooks have been here for a long time, and they’ve cut a lot of produce,” Vassalos said. “They have it down to an art form.”

If you decide to go for the diner’s Western Omelet, be advised it’s a straight-up traditional Western, meaning no cheese. Even my server last time I was at Tip Top knew I was not going to be happy to see a plate of hot eggs, peppers, onions, and ham come out without some melted cheese on it.

“Would you like cheese on your Western?” she asked me. Why, but of course. How did she know? “I know people,” she said. And I’m inclined to believe her.

Categories
Arts

Downtown church brings back short-lived artists’ forum

Discover the local connection to Life of Pi when Charlottesville-based film consultant Kho Wong discusses her role as assistant to the producer in the Makers Series on Thursday.

How cool can a church get before it starts to ruffle some feathers?

Christ Episcopal Church, which operates The Garage, an outdoor concert venue/art gallery (a super-cool combo if ever there was one), is pushing the boundaries of non-secular hip yet again by bringing back its Makers Series. The quarterly event features an evening of presentations that allows three artists to tell the story behind their work. Sam Bush, curator of The Garage and Makers Series organizer, said that while the event is held at and partially bankrolled by a church, it’s not religious.

“It’s important for us to do these things without attaching any sort of agenda,” he said. “I think people are tired of the church with a capital C using a bait and switch formula to attract people, so we are wary of that. We simply want to honor art and artists for their own sake.”

Christ Episcopal launched the series, held in its Meade Hall and co-sponsored by The Garage and the New City Arts Initiative, five years ago. But it quickly went on hiatus a year later when its founder moved away to attend art school. Then, last fall, the church brought the event back, reportedly due to popular demand. Now, if the Makers Series can just go for four straight years, its run will have lasted as long as its hiatus.

The next event stands to be a good step in the right direction for the series’ longevity. Kho Wong, assistant to the producer of the Oscar-winning Life of Pi, who’s also worked on box office successes The Lake House, The Strangers, and Date Night, will headline the installment by offering a behind-the-scenes look at producing. She said she’s looking forward to showing the audience what a producer actually does for a film.

“Producing in general is sort of misunderstood,” Wong said. “For my boss, who was one of the producers, his job was to mostly support the vision of the director Ang Lee. But he also had to make sure the studio approved of the choices Ang was making. It’s a marriage between serving a creative vision and finding the practical, affordable solution.”

Bush said the May event will explore several production processes, be they in the creation of “landscapes, soundscapes [or] spaces.” Wong will present along with Colin Killalea, a record producer for White Star Sound located just outside Charlottesville, and Tosha Grantham, curator at Second Street Gallery, which focuses on contemporary art and artists.

“The whole idea is to provide a platform where artists can speak about their creative process openly and honestly,” Bush said. “I think the public’s understanding of art is limited by only seeing the finished product. More often then not, we miss out on what it took to get there.”

The event essentially works as a companion piece to The Garage’s indie music acts and unique, installation-focused art shows, giving creative types a forum to unpack, for example, the sometimes-bizarre scenes they lay out in the small brick enclosure outside Christ Episcopal. Bush said the question and answer portion of the event at the end of the night can be the most interesting, allowing patrons and artists a chance to have a two-way conversation about the artwork.

Sometimes, though, pulling back the curtain on art fails to enhance it and in fact takes away some of the mystique. Bush said he’s aware of the risks.

“I think artists have every right to be suspicious of showing their cards, but I think what helps, what hopefully will help an artist let down his guard at these events, is an openness and a trust,” he said. “There are so many failures alongside the successes, so many frustrations alongside the victories.”

When it’s her turn to take the stage, Wong promises to have a more user-friendly presentation on hand, with behind the scenes clips from her work on Pi interspersed through her discussion of the practicalities of working on film. But that’s not to say she doesn’t have a deeper, touchy-feely artistic side, as well. She’s worked on a variety of small productions over the years that are closer to her heart, she said, including a screenplay she’s writing while living in Charlottesville. She revealed the script is a “dysfunctional love story,” but she wasn’t giving up any more details.

“Everyone wants to be the director because you have the creative control,” Wong said. “There are lots of ways you can be creative and still have a satisfying career in film.”

But what about those ruffled feathers? If the Makers Series does last, will Christ Episcopal’s tithing parishioners be cool with their money going toward an arts series as opposed to their house of worship? Bush doesn’t think it’s a concern.

“A lot of parishioners have given to The Garage, and I think with those donations and with that support comes an understanding that loving people comes in a variety of ways,” he said. “And all that entails is giving something without expecting something.”

Producers and Curators, the next event in the Makers Series, features Kho Wong, Colin Killalea, and Tosha Grantham and starts at 7pm on Thursday, May 1, in Meade Hall  in Christ Episcopal Church. 

What artist would you like to ask about their work? Tell us in the comments section below.

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Arts

Country songwriter Rodney Crowell isn’t about to sell out

Lovable curmudgeon Rodney Crowell has written countless hits for others. He will play his own tunes at the Jefferson on Sunday. Image: David McClister

Rodney Crowell probably wouldn’t like you. Don’t take it hard. He doesn’t seem to like much—except for country music.

The old school songwriter has recorded a handful of tunes that have had commercial success over the years, but he’s even better known for songs other people end up singing. Crowell’s penned tracks that have been turned into chart toppers by the likes of Johnny Cash, Willie Nelson, Waylon Jennings, Keith Urban, Tim McGraw, Van Morrison, and Etta James. Probably the best-known Crowell cover is 1982’s “Shame on the Moon,” the first single from Bob Seger’s “The Distance.” Crowell’s songwriting, Seger’s voice, and The Silver Bullet Band’s instrumentation spent four weeks at number two on the Billboard Hot 100 pop singles chart that year.

Gearing up for his April 27 show at the Jefferson Theater, Crowell talked to C-VILLE Weekly about writing something someone else makes famous, his guarded view of social media, and what it takes to keep commercial success from going to your head.

You released a new album on April 15. How would you put Tarpaper Sky into the context of your career?

It’s among the best three records I’ve ever made. When you’ve made 20 records or so, to put such things in perspective is hard. It is a satisfying record for me personally because of my own performance. My performance, which is live in the studio, is consistent from beginning to end. I would say Tarpaper Sky is performed more than produced. That’s just what I am at this time in my creative journey: I am more interested in what I can do as a performer. When I get songs right for myself, generally speaking, people cover them.

Is there any part of you that is offended when you write a song that someone other than yourself ends up making famous?

I am grateful that anyone would record my song. I have heard many versions of my songs that I simply didn’t like, but I am grateful that they even tried. Sometimes the version I want to hear is not the best version. My version of “Shame on the Moon” is nowhere close to Bob Seger’s version. He blew me completely out of the water. I am only grateful, for better or worse. A lot of times for worse.

 

You’ve had so many greats record your songs over the years. Which ones stand out in your mind?

Norah Jones’ version of “Bull Rider” turned me inside out. I thought it was fantastic. Lucinda Williams’ version of “God I’m Missing You.” Stunning. Rosanne Cash’s version of “No Memories Hangin’ Round.” There is a great version of “Ashes by Now” that Roger Daltrey did. Too bad it was never released.

 

What do you hope your longtime fans will get out of the latest record? What about new fans?

I don’t go there. It’s not for me to consider what fans are going to think. You can’t sit around scratching your head, asking yourself what the fans in Dubuque want. I sort of cringe for people that go on social media and talk it out. I will never do that ever. I would need a new job if that were the case.

Speaking of social media, what’s your take on online promotion and sales?

The Lord giveth, and the lord taketh away. As record stores have dwindled and our music gets copied, we don’t get paid as much, but it is reality and it is what happens. I have someone who spearheads my social media. I contribute, but I contribute in the same way I do as a songwriter. I write something once a month or so and put it out there, but I just say what I think I want to say, and I control it that way. It is a one-way conversation with me; otherwise, I think you can blow your mystique.

You’ve worked hard to maintain artistic integrity while attaining commercial success. What do you think about how commercial country music has become?

Merle Haggard is country music. Johnny Cash is county music. Hank Williams. I still exist. There are people making country music, but I’m not so sure it fits with the business that big time radio is into. They are selling air space, so it is pop music. You can’t sell ad time with country music. You can sell it will pop music, because most of the advertising is for pop culture. I don’t fault anyone for making pop music, but I’m a purist. The beauty of the digital age is you can find and download real country music if you want to.

Is it something you think about, trying not to sell out?

I would say. And most of the artists I admire greatly have a version of that thought. Which is not to say we don’t fall on our ass from time to time. Leonard Cohen certainly maintained some great integrity. Willie Nelson has. Bob Dylan has. I don’t know—the poets somehow manage to do it. I am drawn to the poet. I would say that’s the bottom line.

Categories
Living

Brew battle: Two Charlottesville beer joints go head-to-head

Co-owner Adam Gregory and his Timberwood Grill cohorts are obsessed with all things beer, and load up the bar with 24 brews on tap and 70 bottles. Photo: Emily Moroné

When a college fraternity brother of mine got married about 10 years ago, he gave his groomsmen, me included, giant mugs as part of the grooms’ gift.

“Yeah, dude! Huge ass beers!” is something that hopefully no one said out loud. But the implication was clear: throw that sucker in the freezer, go get yerself some cold beer, and suck down icy suds 24 ounces at a time, by God.

The world of beer has changed a lot in the last decade. Today, the focus is more on quality than quantity. Beer drinkers have more options to choose from, and they’re pickier about how their drink of choice is served. Sure, the giant icy mug persists—to the chagrin of beer snobs—but a lot of bars are raising their game when it comes to how they deliver pints.

Charlottesville, fortunately, has its fair share of spots that pride themselves on their beer. Here’s a look at two local joints that take opposite approaches to honoring the beverage.

An oldie but a goodie 

Bill Curtis runs a great beer bar, but he prickles at the mention of the craft beer boom. He’s been serving dozens of beer varieties at Court Square Tavern since the early 1970s, long before dudes with beards started singing the praises of super hopped up IPAs.

“When I started out, there was no American microbrewery movement,” Curtis said. “I’m not anti-local or anti-American microbrew, but I do harbor a grudge for making the traditional market sort of marginal.”

Curtis said he cornered the local market for imports back in the day by personally driving to Northern Virginia and hauling cases of hard-to-find ales and lagers back to Charlottesville. He’s stayed the course with a focus on imports ever since. His mammoth 100-bottle beer list is at least two-thirds imports, and six of his eight taps are devoted to European staples like Spaten Lager.

“A lot of the difference between places like Beer Run and me is they revel in constantly changing their beer list,” he said. “I’ve been serving Spaten for 22 years.”

Curtis figures Court Square Tavern is the only place in town that has the traditional German brew on at any given time, and he likes it that way.

The beer list isn’t the only thing about Court Square Tavern that makes you feel like you’re in a traditional Old World pub. The place is a tad dank, offers some interesting aromas, and is snugly fitted in the basement of a historic Court Square building. The service staff plays their part, most of them as terse as an Englishman after his mum’s funeral. And the pub grub rounds out the experience—ploughman’s platters, stuffed mushrooms and the like, and a few hot sandwiches. Curtis explained that since the tavern is in a historic building, he can’t install a ventilation hood, so he preps the bar food at his nearby restaurant Tastings and only puts the finishing touches on dishes in the onsite kitchen.

Hopping mad 

Timberwood Grill, located across Route 29 from Target, is so polished you might mistake it for a chain. But the thing that most clearly sets the bar and grill off from the fern bar set is its one-of-a-kind beer list. (Literally, the list itself is one of a kind, made up of homemade “trading cards” displaying each beer’s provenance and stats.)

Timberwood’s 24 taps and 70-some bottles are carefully curated by a group of beer nerds all looking to give customers—and themselves—the opportunity to taste as many of the great beers out there as they can.

“If we see something that has any sort of good rating online that we’ve never tried before, we like to bring it in,” manager Russ Payne said. “Our biggest philosophy is, if someone comes in and wants a specific style of beer, that we have that available.”

Consider a recent IPA tap takeover the saloon held to honor the birth of co-owner Adam Gregory’s first child. On March 20, Timberwood tapped kegs of Three Notch’d Brewing’s Mosaic IRA, Troegs’s seasonal favorite Nugget Nectar, and the sought after Bell’s Hopslam, which is consistently rated among the top 50 beers in the world. That trifecta of rarities is long gone, but Timberwood still has remnants of the event, including Sixpoint’s double IPA Hi-Res and Green Flash’s hop-bomb Palate Wrecker.

“I would say IPAs have become king of the craft beer world, so we do see a lot more of those,” Payne said.

Co-owner Steve Guiffre admitted Timberwood was a card-carrying member of the big frosty mugs club when it opened, but the restaurant now also offers cold and room temperature pint glasses and room temperature snifters.

“The dynamic has changed,” Guiffre said. “You don’t want people drinking two or three big mugs of beer that are the equivalent strength wine. It’s not just the old strategy of the biggest mug is the best. Now some of the beers are really turning into sipping beers.”

My own giant mug? It’s also mostly retired from beer drinking. At least until one of my old fraternity brothers comes to visit. Yeah, dude!

Categories
Arts

Renaissance man Todd Snider brings his circus to town

Todd Snider brings his colorful snark to the Jefferson where he will preview a film he stars in, read from his upcoming book, take questions, and probably play music. Photo: publicity photo

Just seconds into my conversation with Todd Snider, he’s telling me about some LSD that was “going around the neighborhood” a few months back. The next moment, he’s on to a story about dodging fruit hurled by Jimmy Buffett. He then deadpans that if young musicians come to him asking for career advice, “they’ve already failed.”

Such is the frenetic personality of the singer-songwriter-poet-open-drug-user who’ll bring his variety show to Charlottesville’s Jefferson Theater on April 26. Snider dubbed the event “Springer: The Folk Show” on a whim during a recent phone conversation.

“I’m not exactly sure what it’s going to be,” he said. “I kind of have a plan, but I also am the VP of the Abrupt Plans Change Department at Aimless Productions.”

It’s hard to tell whether Snider’s kidding or not, but the rough schedule at this point is to open the show with a partial screening of a new movie produced by two of Snider’s friends, who he called “total jerks.” After he denounces the movie, a “stoner musical” entitled East Nashville Tonight in which the aforementioned LSD figures prominently, Snider said he’ll read a poem that he hopes to dash off earlier in the day, and move into a reading from a collection of autobiographical yarns he’s going to unleash on the masses at the end of the month.

According to Snider, I Never Met A Story I Didn’t Like (Mostly True Tall Tales) was pieced together with the help of Nashville music writer Peter Cooper and lacks any kind of linear structure, which makes the book the perfect way to capture Snider the man.

“It’s kind of like Tuesdays With Stoner,” he said. And then, pleased with himself: “I just thought of that.”

At some point after the book reading, there promises to be some music played at Snider’s Jefferson show. But even that’s intended to have a circus bent to it, with microphones set up in the crowd so people can either make song requests or just ask questions to see where Snider goes with them.

The answers are sure to be surprising. To wit: Does it ever bother Snider to be pigeonholed as a folk singer? “Pigeonholes don’t bother me. You get all snuggled in there,” he said. “Everyone that offers me a hole to pigeon in, I take them all.”

Um, is that LSD still going around the neighborhood?

For all of Snider’s irreverence, there’s a conflict between his easygoing truant’s lifestyle and his music. Sure, there are the funny songs—he sings about “the human race to fill up more and more empty space” on the opening track of his latest, Agnostic Hymns and Stoner Fables—but Snider also knows how to throw a sucker punch to the gut while his audience is giggling along.

“This is the last time you’re going to break my heart,” he sings over strings and craggy guitar riffs on “The Very Last Time.” “Staring down the barrel of a lonesome truth, we never got that far/From the worn out welcome of a wasted youth/I see the way we are.”

It’s the lyrics, man, that have always spoken to Snider. He admits he isn’t the best at melodies, and he knows he doesn’t have the range or power to do some of the things other singers can do vocally. But he knows how to work a crowd and turn a phrase.

“If I’m working on a song, I wait ’til there is a line in it that makes me want to sing the whole thing,” Snider said. “Every 12 songs I make up, I find a line that has a heart, then we wait for the next one.”

Snider is willing to look to others for help with the melody stuff. He has a good relationship with a few songwriters he trusts, and he hopes his latest project, the super group Hard Working Americans, will continue to push him in the right direction. Alongside Snider, the group consists of bassist Dave Schools from Widespread Panic, guitarist Neal Casal, keyboard player Chad Staehly, and drummer Duane Trucks. The band’s first record was composed entirely of covers, but Snider hints that there are surprises to come.

“We are working on some new stuff that is a little more melodic for me, [as well as] some country songs that are mostly melody first,” Snider said.

The idea for Hard Working Americans, according to Snider, was to take his folk roots into another arena. But the project quickly became “something way bigger than that.” Snider said Schools has become the de facto leader of the outfit, the guy who can serve as the first line of defense against any of his ideas that might be off the mark.

Hopefully, Schools’ filter won’t be too conservative. It’s a lack of filter that makes Snider who he is—a guy who openly credits his ability to “work high” for allowing him to be a productive artist.

“The things I do most naturally are make up words and be an emotional conduit for music,” Snider said. And then, once again pleased with himself: “Which is not a talent, but it is a problem.”

Categories
Arts

Britain’s hot new singer-songwriter strides across the U.S.

Dan Croll’s confident, up-and-coming folktronica rolls into the Southern on Wednesday. Will the audience be made up of appreciative observers or people going mad? Photo: Laura Lewis

Dan Croll could be on the verge of something big. And he knows it.

The 23-year-old British singer-songwriter touched down in California at the start of April for his first U.S. headlining tour, and the crowds are growing by the show. By the time Croll hits The Southern Café and Music Hall on April 23, you’re likely to have heard his name in more than just this article.

“The crowds have been fantastic,” Croll said in a telephone interview. “We’re coming straight off the U.K. leg, and the energy has been maintained.”

Croll isn’t what Americans usually think of when they think of “singer-songwriters.” Sure, he’s got the Elvis Costello glasses thing going, but his music is infused with enough electronica to make sure no one forgets he’s from across the pond—think David Byrne or Brian Eno-style singer-songwriter.

“For me, it is an essence of fun. I think that is what I want it to be at the end of the day,” Croll said. “It’s not worth doing if it’s not fun.”

That sense of having a good time comes leaping out of the speakers on Croll’s Passion Pit-esque walk-in-the-park “Wanna Know,” the third track on his debut full-length record Sweet Disarray. But the British sensation knows how to lay down an acoustic warbler in addition to dance-y rump shakers, as he demonstrates in “Home,” the album’s final song. The tune’s lactose-sweet vocals and rolling guitars are enough to take the listener’s ears off the somewhat sophomoric, heavy-handed lyrics: “If you ever come ’round to my house take your shoes off at the door/Cause it’s impolite not to, you’ll be damaging my floors.”

If Croll is missing the depth of lyrical content that more traditional singer-songwriters strive for, he can probably be forgiven—at least for now. The young man from near-Liverpool only started writing “proper songs” five years ago, when an injury derailed his hopes of a professional sports career and pointed him toward music. Croll seems to think he had a good shot at making it in sports (he lacks nothing in confidence), but he said the injury was the best thing that could have happened to him.

“It’s not so much that I was badly injured,” he said. “I realize that music was just the thing I had the most amount of passion for.”

Croll gained entrance to the Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts (LIPA) after the injury at age 18, and that’s when things really got moving. By the end of his four years at the institute, he had met the guys he now tours with—“four of my best mates,” he said—won a U.K. songwriting award, signed with his label Turn First Records, and had the opportunity to meet LIPA founder Sir Paul McCartney.

One of only eight students who were awarded the sit-down, Croll spent about 45 minutes with McCartney in 2012, chatting about Liverpool, dissecting how his career was getting along, playing his songs, and just jamming.

“It was a pretty mind-blowing experience,” Croll said. “He seemed confident in me and my songwriting and kind of displayed that. He seemed to say that I’d be alright. It gave me a nice bit of confidence.”

His current tour is built on that confidence, with him and his four mates trading instruments on stage and coming together for multi-part harmonies. Where the songwriter’s tracks are clean and tightly produced on his records, he said he looks to generate a more raw sound on the road, an attempt to treat audiences to a more genuine experience.

Croll said he and his backing band tend to do best among “people like him.” Presumably, he means young post-hipsters who are open to different types of music. He said one of the things he enjoys most about being on the road is the ability to introduce audiences to a unique range of influences.

To be sure, Croll’s not reinventing the wheel by fusing electronica with folk vibes. But he said the combination does tend to bring crowds to shows that aren’t sure whether they should break into a frenzy or sway gently.

“There is a different reception in each place,” Croll said. “Our last gig in the U.K., people didn’t move. They chose to stand still and appreciate it. At other shows, people are going mad.”

Going mad and letting go might be the preferred course. Croll is at his best when his beats and melodies are otherworldly and his lyrics drift dreamily over the top. On Sweet Disarray, Croll sounds as if he’s calling to his listener from down a well. The words of the song are softly saccharine, indistinct. And that seems to be the point.

As for Croll, he doesn’t go in for all this “music critic” stuff.

“I tend not to get too involved in reviews because they can take it to all kinds of weird emotional places,” he said. “Some reviewers take one listen to the album and write a piece that is not very accurate really.”

And why not ignore the din and enjoy the ride? The past few years, essentially since that sit-down with Paul McCartney, Croll has been going non-stop, seeing where that wave of confidence can take him.

Categories
Living

Corner mainstay The White Spot delivers more than just the Gus Burger

The Grillswith, The White Spot’s super sweet donut-and-ice-cream concoction, is not for the faint of heart. Photo: Emily Moroné

It’s called the Grills. Then, below that highly nondescript moniker on The White Spot’s menu, it says “with ice cream.” It’s not clear whether you have a choice between with or without.

Regardless, you want it with. I’ve only been to The White Spot a couple of times, and I know that. For fans, it’s a foregone conclusion. They simply call the infamous dessert the “Grillswith.” And if you’re to believe The White Spot owner Dmitri Tevampis and a handful of online reviewers, there are plenty of devoted Grillswith fans.

“A lot of people, as soon as they come to the airport, they come straight here,” Tevampis said. “People will call, say, ‘You have the Grills? O.K., I’ll come over.’”

The “Grills” part is two Krispy Kreme donuts seared in butter on a medium-high flattop. The pastries are then nestled side-by-side on a plate and topped with a small carton of vanilla ice cream, a slightly larger version of the cups you got with the little wooden spoon at birthday parties and in cafeterias as a kid—nothing fancy, no little specks of vanilla bean or ribbons of chocolate.

And that’s it. That’s the Grillswith. Maybe some chocolate sauce would spruce it up? Or a handful of nuts might be fun? Not gonna happen, according to Tevampis.

“I try to keep it always the same. I don’t want to change,” he said. “People like this. If you start putting things on it, toppings, it’s no good.”

Tevampis bought The White Spot 14 years ago and inherited the menu, along with its Grillswith glory. He also inherited the rights to the renowned Gus, a fried egg-topped diner burger that typically catches the headlines associated with the restaurant.

It’s appropriate that I was in The White Spot to try the Grillswith on the eve of the annual Gus Burger eating contest, a day when UVA students sit elbow to elbow in the Madison Bowl and consume as many Gus Burgers as possible in a short six-minute span. The Gus could have its day in the sun later. For me, it was all about the Grills.

Before I went to visit him on the Corner, I asked Tevampis over the phone if I could come into his kitchen to watch him make a Grillswith. He laughed at me. Once I got to the restaurant, it was clear why—I took a seat at the bar and was close enough to reach out and help him make the Grillswith if I wanted.

I decided to keep my hands to myself and let the Grillswith master do his thing. He put a ladle of drawn butter on the griddle, pulled out a box of Krispy Kremes, and slapped them down to sear. He turned his back, chatted, seemed to ignore the fact that two freaking donuts were grilling away behind him. You can’t extinguish a grease fire with water; what about a sugar fire?

After a few minutes, Tevampis turned the fried dough and deliberately retrieved the requisite carton of ice cream from the back. When the Krispy Kremes were indeed crisp, he put them side-by-side on a plate and upturned the ice cream. The vanilla came to rest roughly between the ’nuts, still holding the shape of the cup.

Voila. The Grillswith.

“People love it any time, but you can’t find better at three in the morning after the bar,” Tevampis said. “You have the Gus and the Grills, you’re done. It’s perfect.”

Perfect? I don’t know. A tasty indulgence? For sure. The crisp on the donuts gives the dessert a pleasing bit of crunch, but the Grillswith is sweet almost to a fault, as grilling the donuts seems to only intensify their sugary glaze. The ice cream actually serves as a nice counterpoint, somehow cutting the sweetness.

While I’m whipping through my Grillswith, taking care to have a bit of ice cream and donut in each bite, I ask the guys seated around me at The White Spot counter if they’re into the dessert. Neither has ever had one. One of them’s a diabetic, and I tell him I think the Grillswith would indeed do him in.

What about Tevampis? Does he like the Grillswith?

“Yes, I do, believe it or not,” he said, seeming almost apologetic. “When you want something a little sweet, it’s perfect.”

Watching me eat the concoction, he didn’t seem to be able to read my reaction, so he pushed for more.

“Tell the truth, it’s not bad right?”

No. It’s not bad. But it’s a good thing I’m not diabetic.

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Arts

Music Resource Center lines up a big-name bluegrass show

Larry Keel’s mindblowing talent has made him a roots music Pied Piper. “There are a lot of bands in the younger market that have brought awareness to bluegrass music, but bluegrass music in general hasn’t been the most popular,” he said.

Larry Keel, Virginia bluegrass legend, has lost it. Fortunately, he thinks he can find the old magic anytime he wants.

“My beard and I have recently become separated,” Keel said. “But it will be back.”

Over the years, Keel has sported a number of facial hairstyles, perhaps none more recognizable than the salt and pepper reverse goatee he shaved last year. The thing that hasn’t changed over the years for Keel is his ability to climb the ranks of the bluegrass charts, seamlessly walking the line between traditional and progressive ’grass.

“I like to play it pure, as well,” he told C-VILLE Weekly in a recent phone interview, “but I think everything needs to grow, or it diminishes.”

With or without his beard, Keel and his backing band Natural Bridge are headlining a small event on April 18 at the Verulam Farm on Charlottesville’s western edge. The show will benefit local nonprofit the Music Resource Center (MRC), which makes it pricey—$100 of the $150 tag will go toward supporting the center’s summer programs—along with being a chance to get up close and personal with a guy who’s regarded by many as the best flatpicking guitarist in the world.

If you haven’t heard of flatpicking, you’re not alone. Keel said the art of delivering runs on an acoustic guitar, using a pick as opposed to your bare fingers, is something to which many popular progressive bluegrass acts never introduce their fans.

“There are a lot of bands in the younger market that have brought awareness to bluegrass music, but bluegrass music in general hasn’t been the most popular,” he said. “It’s a roots music that needs preserving.”

Keel recognizes the “double-edged sword” of preservation, though. If mixing electric guitars and hard rock elements into traditional bluegrass can get thousands of kids exposed to the genre, he’s all for it. That attitude makes him an ideal match for MRC, which next year will celebrate 20 years of teaching primarily underprivileged middle and high school-aged kids to play instruments, sing, dance, and write and produce music.

“We have members that have gone on to a lot of exciting things in the music industry,” said Terri Allard, MRC community engagement coordinator. “The number one reason MRC was started was to give kids a safe place to go after school.”

Keel agrees that music can be empowering for youth. And while bluegrass might not seem to be the type of music that gets kids these days into a lather, Allard said the MRC’s mission is to expose them to “everything from hip-hop to jazz to rock to acoustic singer-songwriter stuff.” Plus, the Verulam Farm show, with opener the Jon Stickley Trio, is all about giving the MRC supporters one magical night.

Keel thinks he and his band can deliver. In the scheme of his illustrious career, Natural Bridge is a relatively new development. He started the band in 2005, and he said it’s grown a lot in the past decade. Today, the band includes Keel’s wife Jenny on the upright bass, mandolin player Mark Schimick, and Keel’s longtime banjo player Will Lee. The quartet has been touring consistently since it released the critically acclaimed Classic in 2012, stopping through giant festivals, small rooms, and everything in between.

“Things just have really developed into a lot of completely original sounding music at this point, to where it just feels so good, and it is a lot easier to make this music because of the combination of people I’m playing with,” Keel said.

Natural Bridge is the latest handpicked lineup for a guy who has, over the years, rubbed elbows with legends like Tony Rice, Chris Thile, Vassar Clements, Sam Bush, and Del McCoury, who made a hit single out of the Keel tune “Mountain Song.”

Keel’s other current side project, Keller and the Keels, is a collaboration with his wife, and jam circuit favorite Keller Williams.

“Keller is one of the most uniquely talented people I have encountered,” Keel said. “You talk about turning on the young kids, he surely is doing that.”

The MRC focused its spring benefit show last year around another acclaimed progressive bluegrass act, the Infamous Stringdusters. That’ll surely be a tough act to follow, but Allard is confident that the MRC has the right lineup in place to keep things going this year, when no more than about 200 fans will be able to gather in Verulam Farm’s cider barn to watch Stickley and then Keel take the stage.

“It’s this gorgeous old barn…in a gorgeous location in Ivy,” Allard said. “People will be right there watching this great concert.”

Tickets are still available for the event, as Allard said sales have been a bit slower than expected. For the bearded among us who might be looking to attend, Keel has some advice.

“I’m a man of many faces,” he said. “So I would say keep changing it up. It’s kind of like grass. If you keep mowing it, it will come back fuller.”

Guys with beards are so cool.

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How Camp Changed My Life

Rosser Wayland couldn’t be sure the crying child he saw on the D.C. subway was lost. The boy seemed alone. But were his parents nearby, waiting out a temper tantrum? Were they administering a timeout? Wayland watched the eyes of the other passengers […]

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Arts

Horse Feathers celebrates 10 years of fluctuation

Justin Ringle’s notable folk voice has been compared to many popular singers including Tracy Chapman.

Bandmates come and go. It’s just a fact of the music business, according to Justin Ringle, who’s been fronting the Portland, Oregon-based indie folk outfit Horse Feathers since 2004. Most break-ups are under the radar—just musicians going about their professional lives, rather than the splashy teeth-gnashing feuds the media eats up.

“I used to hate it,” Ringle told C-VILLE Weekly in a recent phone interview. “I thought it was a major problem. Now I have embraced it. Having the rotational thing, where people are coming and going, has actually been the most consistent thing in the group.”

Most, but not all, of Horse Feathers’ break-ups have been amicable, Ringle said. Peter Broderick, the violinist who joined up in 2005, left to pursue a better paying gig in Europe in 2008. Broderick’s sister Heather, Horse Feathers’ first cellist, did the same months later. Ringle said he knows he’ll outlast everyone else in his band, or else it wouldn’t be his band.

“Right now I have two of my best friends on tour with me,” he said. “When I have straight up hired people to go on tour, that is a different feeling. We have a bit more of a family vibe going on. We’re enjoying it.”

Having been on the road with strangers, friends, and everything in between over the past decade, Ringle is celebrating Horse Feathers’ 10th year as a band with an anniversary tour that launched on March 21. The tour includes a stop in Charlottesville on April 14, a date Ringle said he’s looking forward to (although that may be entirely because of his abiding love for Christian’s Pizza).

Joining Ringle when he takes the stage at the Southern Café and Music Hall will be longtime violinist Nathan Crockett, cellist Lauren Vidal, percussionist Dustin Dybvig, and multi-instrumentalist Brad Parsons. It’s a group that Ringle said brings a special set of skills to the stage, and it’s helped him “change what I want to get out of music.” Where he was once close-minded about how the songs on his records were arranged, he now recognizes that different players have different strengths and weaknesses and tries to account for them.

Ringle said he’s currently going through a musical transformation, the second of his career. When he got into music as a youth “full of piss and vinegar,” he was drawn to straight up rock ‘n’ roll, screeching electric guitars, and pounding drums. But when he moved to Portland in ’04 to develop himself as a professional singer-songwriter, he found he wanted to pursue a different sound, something more easygoing, something more meaningful.

“When I was about 21, it was weird, the loud stuff just didn’t interest me anymore,” he said. “I got more into songwriting and switched over to acoustic guitar. Ten years later, I’m still focusing on songwriting.”

Ringle said his passion for folk lyrics developed during his years growing up in a small town in Idaho. He’s naturally drawn to agrarian imagery and working class struggles, because that’s what he knows. When he breathes, “Every night, we all go to a house we’ll never own/Every night, we are tired from being worked to the bone” on 2012’s Cynic’s New Year, he said he can see scenes from his youth in his mind’s eye.

“When you have those things in your memory, you can come up with the details,” he said. “Writing lyrics is really difficult. The goal is to do something honest. If you have experience in some capacity, that’s how you breathe life into it and give it a heartbeat, and it becomes something beyond words and music.”

The latest transformation for Ringle is slightly back toward his roots. He’s added a drummer and bass player to his studio sound, shifting his tunes into the folk rock arena and giving the sound more volume and structure. The album he plans to release this fall will be a “different animal” from what he’s been doing, he said.

Still, when Horse Feathers graces the Southern with songs it’s working on for the (untitled) next record, the sound will lack the distortion or aggressiveness that would mark a full move into hard rock.

“I love the folk palette, the sound and style,” Ringle said. “When you start to go down that path, it’s hard not to be influenced and indebted to it.”

In addition to the current anniversary tour, Horse Feathers has reissued the three albums it produced on the Kill Rock Stars label, along with several unreleased tracks, as a four-cassette box set to celebrate the band’s longevity. Hearing the collection has given Ringle a chance to reflect on the music he’s made over the years. “Listening to material spanning almost 10 years, just hearing the changes and the different approaches and different players, is pretty exciting,” he said.

The one constant on each of the records has been Ringle’s unmistakable voice, which he said has been compared to more musicians than he can count. Whoever’s popular at the time a review is written typically gets the nod, be it Cat Power, Fleet Foxes, or Bon Iver. But the comparison that’s stood the test of time is probably the most curious —Ringle’s fairly deep, matter-of-fact speaking voice somehow transforms into a dead ringer for Tracy Chapman when he opens his mouth to sing. “I like that comparison because it is such a weird one for this white bearded guy from the Northwest,” he said. “I don’t know how the hell it happens.”