Tag: Keevil & Keevil

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Culture

Small Bites: April 6

Pizza has long been a favorite carry-out food, and that hasn't changed during quarantine. Lampo Neapolitan Pizzeria recently posted this photo of a dizzying pizza box tower and asked followers to guess how many. Photo courtesy Lampo Neapolitan Pizzeria

Stepping up to serve free meals

In these trying times for the restaurant industry, chef Harrison Keevil of Keevil & Keevil Grocery and Kitchen is using his talents to serve others. What originally started as a free lunch (about 20 meals each weekday), has expanded to include breakfast and dinner, and by April 13, Keevil is planning to offer 500 meals a day out of his kitchen. He’s currently funding it himself and taking donations at @keevil-kitchen. He’s also keeping it local by using as many area sources as possible—think Caromont cheese, Albemarle Baking Company pastry, and locally grown vegetables. If you know of someone in need, email keevilkitchen@gmail.com for delivery coordination.

Local bartenders get creative

With no bar to tend to at the moment, Tavola’s cicchetti bar team recently launched a Cocktail Quarantine video series. Episode one featured “quarantinis:” Husband and wife duo Rebecca Edwards and Steve Yang, both recently recognized as top 100 bartenders in the U.S., shook up their favorite variations on the martini. The best part? They’re taking requests. Go to @cocktailcoupleva on Instagram or tavola cicchetti bar on Facebook, and send a direct message or leave a comment with your cocktail of choice. Don’t forget to leave a virtual tip!

In the same spirit, The Local’s beverage director Alec Spidalieri developed a cocktail recipe book, which is available on a pay-what-you-can basis as a downloadable PDF. Visit his website for payment information and to download the content.

It’s five o’clock…on Zoom?

What would we do without Zoom and Facebook Live? In the time of social distancing, these platforms are allowing friends to connect and businesses to creatively reach their customers. The Wine Guild of Charlottesville and King Family Vineyards are hosting happy hours and virtual tastings, which allow people to come together while keeping their distance. Want to join the fun? Follow the Wine Guild and King Family on social media for upcoming virtual events.

Survival by takeout

Quarantine is for pizza lovers, or at least that’s the way it seems. Both Crozet Pizza and North Garden’s Dr. Ho’s Humble Pie have added additional phone lines to keep up with ordering demand. And a recent Instagram post from Lampo showed to-go pizza boxes piled high, and asked followers to guess the number of boxes shown. Those feeling fancy have takeout options too, with restaurants including The Farmhouse at Veritas and C&O now offering multi-course meals for pickup. Bet you never thought you’d enjoy steak chinoise in your pajamas, did you?

 

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Knife & Fork Magazines

All about that bass: Chef Harrison Keevil gets a dream gift (a guitar, not a fish)

Chef Keevil and his beloved Höfner bass at his Belmont shop, Keevil & Keevil. Photo: John Robinson

Sometimes, when you hear the name of a well-known local chef, you think of him only for his culinary exploits. You may recognize Harrison Keevil for his corner store in Belmont, Keevil & Keevil, where he offers great sandwiches, salads, and desserts, and prepares meals for home delivery. If you’re into the Charlottesville restaurant scene, you might also know that Keevil once ran his own place, Brookville, on the Downtown Mall, and recently helped to create the concept of “modern Virginia cuisine” that informs the menu—and serves as the tagline—at Commonwealth Restaurant & Skybar.

All of these things are impressive, and Keevil certainly cuts a figure in the local food landscape. But he also plays a mean bass guitar. We discovered this in July, when Keevil posted a photograph of a black Höfner 500 four-string—the signature instrument of Paul McCartney—on his Instagram feed. We knew right away that Keevil is more than a casual bassist, otherwise the photo wouldn’t have also shown a daisy chain of effects pedals on the floor.

“I have wanted this bass for over 30 years (since my mom and dad introduced me to the Beatles), and @jpkeevil made it happen on my 37th bday,” he wrote. “So awesome!”

The awesomeness was a gift from his wife, Jennifer (@jpkeevil). It struck a profound chord for the chef, whose aunt, a Long Islander, was present at the 1965 Beatles concert at Shea Stadium that solidified the British Invasion. Keevil’s mom was the younger sister, not old enough to attend the show. But back in rural Goochland County, she and her husband made sure that young Harrison (after his grandfather’s surname, not George Harrison) got an earful of the Fab Four from an early age.

“The first album I got was Revolver,” Keevil says. “That one definitely opened the door.”

His next move was to get the Beatles songbook and learn to play their songs on his Dean bass. (Mind you, the kid was still in grade school at the time.) That was what he calls his “cheap and cheerful” bass—nothing compared to the Hofner that Jennifer bought for him.

Keevil went on to perform in a band in high school, and in another group in college. Neither was established enough even to have a name, but they scratched the itch that Keevil first felt when he heard Revolver. Come to think of it, the fact that that album marked the beginning of the Beatles’ psychedelic phase may partly explain why Keevil’s college group was a trippy jam band and not a pop band.

Not long after college, Keevil found his way to the French Culinary Institute, in Manhattan, which propelled him into his career as a chef. But the Beatles—and especially, McCartney—remained an inspiration to him, even after the ex-Beatle started Wings. “I was really into James Bond at one point, so I loved Paul’s music, you know, ‘Live and Let Die.’”

Today, Keevil plays his bass daily, just noodling around or perhaps playing a song or two. He’s practicing for the Party Like a Rock Star event October 18 at the Music Resource Center. Jennifer is on the MRC committee organizing the event, and Keevil will play a favorite song, the Foo Fighters’ “My Hero.”

Playing the Hofner is the equivalent of working with just the right knife in the kitchen. It feels good in your hands and is easy to use.

“The Hofner makes a big difference for me,” he says. “I love the bass and its association with McCartney, but there’s also something great about the fretboard. You can play it more like a guitar, you know, multiple notes at once as opposed to just one at a time.

We get it. Why be “just” a chef when you can be a bass player, too.

“Playing the Hofner is the equivalent of working with just the right knife in the kitchen,” he “It feels good in your hands and is easy to use.”

Categories
Living

Sammy love in the new year: Guest sandwiches are back at Keevil & Keevil

The first “guest chef” sandwich to debut at Keevil & Keevil this year is a bologna wonder from Mason Hereford, of New Orleans’ Turkey and the Wolf. Photo courtesy Keevil & Keevil

After a consulting gig at Commonwealth Restaurant & Sky Bar, Harrison Keevil is back full-time at Keevil & Keevil, with some new ideas for the store he co-owns with his wife Jennifer.

“We’re bringing back the guest sandwiches —where I ask friends what their dream sandwich is and try to make it come to life with local ingredients,” Keevil says. He’ll start with a take on Charlottesville native/UVA grad Mason Hereford’s famed bologna sandwich.

Hereford’s New Orleans sandwich shop, Turkey and the Wolf, was voted Bon Appetit’s best restaurant in America in 2017, and was also a James Beard finalist for best new restaurant that year. He’s famed for turning your average sandwich into a work of wonder.

“Mason asked us to make an all-Virginia version of his fried bologna sandwich,” Keevil says. Hereford shared a family recipe for mustard, which will be mixed with Duke’s mayonnaise. The bologna is made from local grass-fed beef, the bread comes from Albemarle Baking Company, and it’s all topped off with Route 11 Potato Chips.

Other chefs with guest sandwich offerings in the months to come will include Jason Alley, owner of Pasture and Comfort in Richmond, and Trigg Brown, formerly of Ten and Blue Light, and now co-owner of Win Son, a Taiwanese-American restaurant in Brooklyn.

The chef whose sandwiches sell the most during this multi-month smackdown will make a $500 donation to the charity of his choice, and Keevil & Keevil will then match the donation for Therapeutic Adventures, in honor of a friend of Harrison’s who passed away last summer and had lived a very full life with only one leg.

Keevil says they’ve got some other new things brewing at the shop, including seasonally focused sandwiches and pick up/takeaway dinners.

“We’ll do some beef bourguignon, lasagna, and some more heartier stuff during the winter, keeping an eye on the weather,” he says. “If it’s going to warm up, we’ll do some lighter stuff, and if it’s colder, we’ll do more braising. We’ll have delicious stuff people can grab and take home to feed their family. Now that I’m back in the kitchen full-time, I have a lot of ideas and energy and a lot of new time to dedicate to creating delicious food here.”

So long, farewell to Jose De Brito

After a year at the helm of Fleurie’s kitchen, esteemed local chef Jose De Brito is leaving to return home to Washington, Virginia, where he and his wife settled when he worked at the Inn at Little Washington.

De Brito, who at times could be as professionally elusive as Peter Chang once was, rose to prominence when he headed the kitchen at The Alley Light, earning praise in the food world with his French cuisine.

Fleurie owner Brian Helleberg says he hates to lose a gifted chef but understood his need to return home.

“Chef Jose had been keeping an apartment in Charlottesville for the work week and was missing his wife and home in Little Washington,” he says. “It was certainly a privilege to have him as the chef and although I’ll miss his presence, I’ll look forward to continuing our friendship.”

Helleberg says Fleurie is in good hands with Joe Walker, the new chef de cuisine.

“Walker is going to surprise some people when they see just how good he is,” he says. “Chef Joe has been immersed in great kitchen culture and Michelin star food his whole career, and I think Jose would be the first to agree that his ceiling isn’t even visible from here.”

No sweet ending for Sweethaus

Sweethaus, the sole remaining cupcakery in Charlottesville, unceremoniously closed its doors days before Christmas with no explanation. The store’s other two locations, in Ivy and Brooklyn, appear to have closed as well.

A little nookie

The Nook is under new management, sort of, after owner Stu Rifkin sold his share of the business to longtime co-owner Gina Wood.

More downtown pastries on the way

Looks like MarieBette’s satellite shop on Water Street should be opened by the end of the month. Co-owner Jason Becton said they fell behind due to some contractor issues, but are hoping for a late-January launch.

Categories
Living

Feast! pairs up with Blenheim Vineyards

Red Knierim and Matt Wyatt performed for patrons at Feast!’s rooftop wine garden on Saturday, October 1. The pop-up space will host wine tastings from Blenheim Vineyards on Fridays and Saturdays through October 22. Rammelkampfoto

There’s a rooftop wine garden in town, but blink and you’ll miss it.

On Fridays from 4-7pm and on Saturdays from 1-6pm, now through October 22, Feast! is hosting a pop-up wine garden with Blenheim Vineyards in the Main Street Market tower, a cozy, open space with bistro tables, padded benches and some excellent views of the city.

Tracey Love of Blenheim says the vineyard approached Feast! about doing the pop-up. It “was based on wanting our wines to be easily accessible and approachable to folks visiting from out of town and for those living in Charlottesville,” she says. “Even though our actual tasting room is only 15 minutes south of town, that is sometimes too far for people that don’t have means of transportation or time to make the trek.”

Feast! owner Kate Collier was eager to utilize the space, which Feast! has had for about a year and a half and uses for gift box production during the holiday season. “We felt bad hiding it from the public for so long,” she says.

Rooftop wine sippers have their choice of Blenheim’s chardonnay, Painted White (a blend of chardonnay, viognier and sauvignon blanc), merlot or cabernet franc. The wines cost $6 per glass, and between $17 and $25 for a bottle. A tasting flight of all four wines costs $6, and you can bring your glass to Blenheim’s tasting room at a later date for a free glass of wine, Collier says.

Customers can purchase food at Feast!—salads, sandwiches, cheese and charcuterie—to take up to the garden, or you can buy small snack packs, such as Virginia cheese straws, dark chocolate with cranberries, roasted Marcona almonds and tart cherries, or wasabi crisps with Virginia peanuts for between $4 and $8 at the bar.

The setup is temporary, but Collier says that other vineyards and cideries have expressed interest in doing something similar at Feast!’s rooftop garden. Stay tuned for future pairings.

Special delivery

Keevil & Keevil Grocery owner and chef Harrison Keevil loves Champion Brewing Company beer so much he’s made four sandwiches—available exclusively for delivery from his store to Champion beginning Thursday, October 6—to pair with it. “I wanted to highlight the amazing things the Champion brew team is doing,” Keevil says, and make food that would “bring out the essence of the beer.”

He’s made a chicken tikka masala burrito with Carolina gold rice to pair (if you choose) with the Missile IPA; a beer-braised sausage sandwich with housemade beer mustard and sautéed onion to go with the Shower Beer; a braised beef sandwich with carrot salad and beer cheese for the Black Me Out Stout; and a roasted chicken wrap with Carolina gold rice, romaine and ranch to pair with any of the lighter beers on tap. Keevil is currently developing a vegetarian sandwich option as well.

At Champion you can call in or text your order along with your name, and you’ll have your $10 sammy within an hour—Keevil & Keevil will deliver on the half hour, from 30 minutes after Champion opens until 7pm Mondays through Saturdays.

These sandwiches are exclusive to Champion, but Keevil & Keevil will soon offer hot in-house sandwiches—such as bahn mis and burgers.

Send your food and drink tips to Erin O’Hare at eatdrink@c-ville.com.

Categories
Living

Cold-brew coffee isn’t a watered down version of the original

Snowing in Space Coffee Co. co-owner Paul Dierkes, left, says adding nitrogen results in smooth, thick and creamy coffee, similar to a Guinness.

It’s been really hot. We’re all sweaty and sluggish, and most of us could use a good jolt to get through the dog days of summer.

Enter iced coffee, which, on a steamy day, can taste like the ambrosia of the gods…as long as it’s done right.

Brew a regular cup of coffee, let it cool and drop in a few ice cubes and you’ll be left with a bland, weak, watered-down brew. It might cool you down, but it won’t taste very good. There’s an art to brewing a flavorful glass of iced coffee, and coffee shops and markets all over town are mastering it with different techniques.

None of them are necessarily better than others, it’s just “a matter of preference,” says Milli Coffee Roasters owner Nick Leichtentritt.

Here are some of the methods local coffee shops are using right now.

Cold brew

A few years ago, almost nobody was cold-brewing coffee, says Shark Mountain owner and head coffee roaster Jonny Nuckols. Now, it’s all the rage, probably because the cold-brew method yields a smooth, flavorful, non-acidic beverage ideal for adding some cream and sipping slowly, he says.

Cold-brew coffee is a distinct way of brewing. As its name implies, it never touches heat. To create a batch of Shark Mountain cold brew, Nuckols finely grinds a light-roast coffee and adds the grounds to a filter bag within a nylon bag inside a five-gallon bucket. He pours about three gallons of cool water onto the grounds and lets the mixture soak for 20 to 24 hours. Then, he pours the filtered, concentrated brew into a five-gallon keg and adds water to bring the brew to a normal, but still fairly strong, strength. It’s dispensed from the keg and poured over ice as customers order.

This method extracts good flavors from the bean while leaving out the bitterness found in hot coffees, says Nuckols. Depending on the bean used, you’ll taste more chocolate, nut and berry flavors than you might with a hot cup of coffee, but you won’t get as robust a flavor profile, because high temperature is what ultimately draws out all of those notes. But still, “cold brew is definitely a good thing for the coffee industry,” he says. You can try Shark Mountain cold brew at Studio IX or at the iLab at Darden.

Shenandoah Joe’s Brain Freeze is also a cold-brew iced coffee. Owner Dave Fafara says his shops use a blend of coffees created specifically for iced coffee. Their 16-hour, triple-strained cold brew is popular: Fafara estimates that, during the summer, Shenandoah Joe moves between 100 and 125 gallons in Charlottesville each week. And JM Stock Provisions also sells cold brew—you can take home a growler of it—which they brew in-house.

Japanese style

Over at Milli Coffee Roasters on the corner of Preston Avenue and McIntire Road, Leichtentritt uses the Japanese-style iced coffee method. The resulting brew is “a little more well-balanced,” he says. “One of the big selling points of cold-brew coffee is that people say it’s very low-acid.” But, to him, “that little bit of acid is what helps make a good, balanced cup of coffee.”

Like cold brew, the Japanese-style method begins with finely ground coffee and a filter, but this method uses hot water. “It’s essentially like brewing really strong coffee” that is immediately poured—and thus cooled and diluted—over ice, Leichtentritt says. The cooled coffee is then stored in a carafe and poured over ice once again upon serving.

Cooling the coffee right away is the key. High temperatures bring out a coffee’s flavor, but the longer a brew is exposed to air as it cools, the more those flavor-packed compounds break down. Cooling the coffee quickly, with ice, helps trap and preserve those compounds.

Other shops around town, including Atlas Coffee and Mudhouse, make their iced coffee using a similar process. It’s the easiest way to make a lot of iced coffee quickly, says one Mudhouse barista.

Nitro

Nitro coffee, one of the latest coffee trends, is more like a craft beer than a brewed coffee, says Snowing in Space Coffee Co. co-owner Paul Dierkes. Nitro isn’t served on ice, but it is cold brewed and served cold from a keg. It tastes great black, but if cream and sugar is your thing, pour ’em in.

To brew nitro, Snowing in Space cold brews coffee on a large scale, kegs it, then pumps nitrogen gas into the keg at a high pressure for a long time to essentially agitate the brew. It’s served directly from the keg’s tap. Dierkes likens the resulting brew to a Guinness (a nitrogenated beer); it’s smooth, thick and creamy, with a foamy head.

Snowing in Space sources its beans from Shenandoah Joe and offers three single-origin brews, including the straightforward, nutty Brazilian Gimme-Dat and the unusual blueberry Lil Blue, and plans on introducing more varieties, including a cocoa mole flavor, soon. “The goal is experimentation,” Dierkes says while admitting he’s not a coffee connoisseur. “Let’s get experimental with styles and flavors and get interesting coffees to people.”

You can try Snowing in Space’s nitro coffee at Paradox Pastry, Keevil & Keevil Grocery and Champion Brewery. But it isn’t the only nitro in town—Shenandoah Joe and Mudhouse offer it as well.