The Pie Chest owner Rachel Pennington misses the days when customers would sit and relax in her shop, chatting with friends over coffee and a slice.
Photo by Amy and Jackson smith
By Julia Stumbaugh
In 2018, Charlottesville residents Jessica Niblo and Samuel Kane met for a first date at The Pie Chest. But they were both too nervous to eat the shop’s signature dish. Instead, they sipped coffee.
Three years later, in January 2021, Kane proposed to Niblo at the same spot where they’d first met. But like many of Charlottesville’s bakery/cafés, The Pie Chest had changed drastically. It was forced to pivot from the kind of community gathering spot where Kane and Niblo gazed at each other over cups of coffee to a purely commercial exchange of money for take-away boxes.
“I think a big part of The Pie Chest’s identity was the space we provided for people…it would get full pretty quickly, and a lot of people would end up talking to people they didn’t know,” says Rachel Pennington, baker and owner of the shop. “Losing that, going to fully carryout and takeout, it’s just heartbreaking. I think of it every time I’m up at the shop now. We’ve lost the buzz that can happen in the room, the connections that can happen…the whole social component is mostly gone.”
The Downtown Business Association of Charlottesville told NBC29 in December that COVID-19 had sliced business revenue in half through the 2020 holiday season. Even places that have been able to remain open have felt the sting, both from the loss of income and the loss of a place to gather.
In Charlottesville, a town defined by its love for food and drink, bakeries and coffee shops are a core part of the town’s social fabric.
“We’re able to stay open and survive, but it’s become more about commerce than community, which is kind of sad,” says Jason Becton, who opened MarieBette Café & Bakery with his husband, baker Patrick Evans. “Eventually, one day, we’ll come back to that.”
With the current closure of MarieBette’s dining room, what Becton misses most is the conversations and connections he used to find with regular customers. But like Pennington, he knows the changes are necessary to keep the business around.
“I think any business that’s been able to stay open is a comfort to people in our community, just because we crave that normalcy,” Becton said. “Even though it’s not quite normal, we try to be able to keep it as normal as possible.”
Thanks to an endless series of stay-at-home orders, home bakers across the United States have turned to their kitchens for comfort, trying viral recipes to make everything from sourdough bread to whipped coffee. But for bakers like Evans and Pennington, who have spent the last year baking to keep their shops afloat, the art is more about sustenance and less about fun.
Even so, their influence has led other local bakers to discover their own love of the craft. Pennington held a series of baking classes in 2019; now, she can turn to social media to see her students reap the benefits. One student displayed her fresh-made biscuits, still golden from the cast-iron skillet. Another posted an album featuring her Pie Chest-inspired veggie pot pie.
“Before I did it for a living, baking at home was absolutely comforting, not just in the process but in knowing that I was able to do something for other people and give them something that they would enjoy,” says Pennington. “So I still know what that feeling feels like.”
The search for that feeling helped spark a new addition to the Charlottesville bakery scene—Pear, a stall at the IX farmers’ market that opened in January 2021, is a local collaboration by two strangers whose only connection was that they both love to bake for people who love to eat.
Myo Quinn, co-founder of Pear, moved to Charlottesville from New York City this summer. Lonely and homesick, the Food Network test kitchen cook headed to the farmers’ market for a sense of normalcy. There she met Holly Hammond, who was working at the Whisper Hill Farm stall.
Quinn is a culinary school-trained chef, Hammond a farmer from Arizona. This winter, they opened their own bakery stall at the market where they met.
“We’ve had a lot of recurring customers, including friends of Holly’s and customers of Whisper Hill, that keep coming over and over again,” says Quinn. “We had our third weekend and the faces started looking familiar.”
Sharing her baking with newly familiar faces has allowed Quinn to weave herself into the fabric of the Charlottesville community. She and Hammond have learned through Pear what the owners of The Pie Chest and MarieBette know well: Even in a pandemic that forces people apart, baking can bring strangers together.
But for now, most of Charlottesville’s professional bakers are left dreaming of a time when their work involves more leisurely connections with customers.
“I long for the first day I can go into a coffee shop and just sit at a table and read the paper,” says Pennington. “I think about it at least once or twice a week. I just want to be part of the food community.”
Meals on Wheels provides meals for seniors in need.
Go with Grace
Cavalier Produce has put a creative twist on feeding those in need. The food distributor announced Grace’s Good Food Box Program as a way to get fresh food into homes that need it through a partnership with Loaves & Fishes, PB&J Fund, Louisa County Resource Council, and Blue Ridge Area Food Bank’s Lynchburg branch. The boxes are filled with fruits, veggies, and other groceries for holiday meals, and delivered at cost. The program is named for the owners’ daughter, who “reminds us every day to pay attention to these little things and to take nothing for granted.” To donate, go to cavalierproduce.com.
Wheels of good fortune
In lieu of its annual Taste This! fundraiser, Meals on Wheels of Charlottesville/Albemarle is hosting a bingo event focused on supporting local restaurants. Unlike regular bingo, this version uses cards with area restaurant logos occupying each square. Players visit a variety of establishments, get their card stamped, and then enter the cards into a raffle—one entry per stamped logo—for multiple prizes. The event runs from December 15-March 1. Participating restaurants include The Alley Light, Orzo, Grit, Tavola, and MarieBette.
The fundraiser will help MOW keep its clients fed through this difficult time. Executive Director Leigh Trippe says Meals on Wheels has been very fortunate so far: “I should not ever be surprised by this community, but I’m amazed at all the help that we’ve gotten,” she says. “It has made us extremely grateful that we live where we live.”—Will Ham
A nod to excellence
When The Ridley opens in The Draftsman hotel in January, it won’t just add to Charlottesville’s upscale dining scene, it will bring an important legacy into focus.
Theseafood-meets-sophisticated -Southern-cooking restaurant is named for Dr. Walter N. Ridley, who was the first African American to receive a doctoral degree from a Southern, traditionally white university. Ridley had to persevere through years and layers of resistance to earn his doctorate in education from the University of Virginia in 1953, and his achievements paved the way for the thousands of Black students who came after him.
The team behind The Ridley, UVA/Darden alum Warren Thompson (Thompson Hospitality) and his friend and business partner, Ron Jordan
(Jordan Hospitality Group), honor Ridley not only in name, but by supporting his foundation through their venture. Thompson’s parents both studied under Ridley, and he considers the project to be deeply personal. “The Ridley is a way for me to publicly recognize his contributions and his commitment to action and equality in a town critically important to both his story and my own,” says Thompson.
The Ridley crew say they’ll provide an elegant yet casual atmosphere that feels like a big city dining experience, plus a tantalizing menu of Southern, coastal offerings. Expect to fill up on soft shell crab, fried lobster tails, branzino, red snapper, and Cajun oysters at 1106 West Main.
A property at 902 Forest St. in Rose Hill (above) was put up for auction in 2003, and eventually demolished. It’s now one of 18 vacant lots in the neighborhood. PC: Staff Photo
Back in 2013, Julie (who asked that we not use her last name) bought a house in Rose Hill, a small, historically African American neighborhood roughly bordered by Preston Avenue, Madison Avenue, and Harris Street. The house had gone into foreclosure during the housing market crash, and had been neglected for a while.
After determining that bringing the house up to code would be too expensive, Julie considered demolishing it and turning it into a small brewery. But the property was zoned B-3, a type of intensive commercial zoning that would require her to provide more parking than seemed feasible for the mostly residential neighborhood, along with other requirements like making retail sales and staying open till 1am.
While a majority of Rose Hill is zoned for single-family residences, and parcels along Preston Avenue are zoned for mixed-use, others are still zoned B-3 for major commercial uses—what planning commissioner Lyle Solla-Yates calls “our worst zoning.”
Business zoning “is the least efficient…and least useful for the city,” says Solla-Yates. “It’s been thought for a long time that mixed-use is the better way to do cities. If you have housing above and businesses below, that’s more pedestrian-friendly, welcoming, [and] prettier. And it gives you housing in areas where you need housing.”
That was the intention of another owner in the neighborhood, Julie says, who originally submitted a site plan for an office space below, and residential above. “But his site was not zoned for that,” she says, “so he went back to [Neighborhood Development Services] with an office space.”
Julie ultimately decided to submit a site plan for a small warehouse, but after learning from a neighbor that the site planning process could take months to complete, she called it quits.
Lately, she’s noticed more and more houses like hers being demolished in Rose Hill—“and the lot just sits there.” There are currently 18 vacant lots in the neighborhood, six of which are zoned B3.
“I’ve attended a couple of [site plan reviews],” she says, “and it just seems like they don’t go forward.”
Some projects run into issues with sewer and property lines, Julie says, but others, like hers, have faced restrictions with zoning.
Since the ’90s, the city has gotten rid of “almost all of its B zoning,” Solla-Yates says. He guesses that it kept B zoning in Rose Hill because “it was small.”
He adds that the city “hasn’t given a lot of love and attention to Rose Hill.” Like 10th and Page and Fifeville, two other historically African American neighborhoods, “there’s some pretty serious social justice issues with [Rose Hill] not getting infrastructure and services at the same level as the rest of the city for decades,” Solla-Yates says. “Which is also part of why we’re a little bit slow to think about [its zoning] seriously.”
The city’s upcoming zoning overhaul will get rid of business zoning, as well as other out-of-date zoning practices, Solla-Yates says, and will have an “integrated look at zoning and housing.” While consultants are still in the process of reviewing the zoning, he predicts that business zoning will be replaced with mixed-use.
“Business-only zoning doesn’t have a future in Charlottesville,” Solla-Yates says. “We are not fine-tuning the existing zoning. We are replacing the zoning. We want something better, and we’ve waited long enough.”
Read Brodhead, a zoning administrator with Neighborhood Development Services, agrees that mixed-use zoning is generally more practical, but doesn’t think the city should get rid of business zoning entirely, as “there’s traditionally been a lot of commercial uses of it.” He points out, for example, that MarieBette Café & Bakery, on Rose Hill Drive, is zoned B-3, and that the four vacant parcels across the street from it (also zoned B-3) could also be used for a business “that’s significant for the neighborhood.”
But until any type of new zoning is approved, Julie remains concerned about the future of Rose Hill. Every week, she receives phone calls and postcards from developers wanting to buy her property, and is ultimately concerned that a large developer will come in and buy up all of the vacant lots and create a large commercial business, since a developer would have “the time and resources to go through the whole approval process.”
“That would just be out of scale with the neighborhood,” she says.
And as for the other property owners with deteriorating houses or vacant lots, “they are sitting there and wondering what other people are going to do,” she says.
The ham biscuit at JM Stock is a favorite. Photo: Tom McGovern
From bagels to biscuits to burritos, we dig in to the best meal of the day (and where to find it around town).
BY: Brielle Entzminger, Ben Hitchcock, Laura Longhine, and Erin O’Hare
Ace Biscuit and Barbecue. Photo: Amanda Maglione
Best in biscuits
Biscuits are a breakfast staple around here-—but which one is the best? We rounded up our favorites (with top honors to the ham biscuit at J.M. Stock), but biscuits are personal, so feel free to disagree–we know you will!
Bluegrass Grill & Bakery: With a mix of white and whole wheat flour, Bluegrass’ biscuits are denser than most, and slightly sweet—almost muffin-like, but weirdly satisfying.
Blue Moon Diner: Your basic biscuit: pale, soft, and flaky, best with eggs or sausage gravy.
Fox’s Cafe: Delightfully light and fluffy, Fox’s homemade biscuits are the perfect foil for salty country ham or bacon.
The Pigeon Hole: In addition to egg biscuits (avocado is optional) you can get a biscuit basket with honey butter and strawberry preserves.
J.M. Stock: Though they’re only served one way (as a ham biscuit), Stock’s biscuits are head and shoulders above the rest. Made with both butter and lard (from the same local pigs that supply the ham), the Stock biscuit is perfectly golden, buttery and flaky, firm enough for a sandwich, and has a nice salty kick. Add the country ham and a dash of hot sauce and honey, and you’ve got an unbelievably delicious breakfast.
Tip Top: Tender and satisfying, Tip Top’s biscuits stand up to their flavorful sausage gravy—at only $4.10 an order, it’s a steal.
The Pie Chest: Rachel Pennington makes a damn good biscuit: salty, generously sized, and so buttery and rich it’s liable to crumble through your fingers. They’re sold one to an order, with a (stellar) housemade pear butter.
Ace Biscuit & Barbecue: Fans swear by the Ol’ Dirty Biscuit, which turns the classic biscuits and gravy up a notch (or 10) with a fried chicken thigh, pimento cheese, and pickles.—LL
When it comes to breakfast potatoes, The Villa Diner is firmly on team hash browns, while Blue Moon Diner comes down on the side of home fries. Photo: Tom McGovern
The great debate: hash browns vs. home fries
We’re not ones to fabricate a starch—er, staunch—rivalry between two delicious potato-based breakfast side dishes, but we’ve noticed that most restaurants tend to offer either hash browns or home fries, rather than both.
What’s the difference, anyway? And is one better than the other? Hash browns are potatoes, grated or shredded, and pan-fried. Home fries are potatoes, diced or wedged, and pan-fried. Hash browns tend to be crispy, while home fries tend to be soft. Both have plenty of potential to be extremely delicious.
Each cook has her own way of seasoning and preparing her hash browns and home fries, and there’s plentiful offerings of each dish around town. The Villa Diner, The Cavalier Diner, IHOP, and Waffle House are team hash browns; Blue Moon Diner, The Nook, Bluegrass Grill, Tip Top Restaurant, and Moose’s By the Creek are team home fries. (We couldn’t find a local spot that offers both.)
There’s a reason why Georgia-based chain Waffle House has a cult following, and we’re pretty sure the hash browns are a big part of it: You can order them 10 different ways. Get ’em plain (good ol’ potatoes alone), smothered (sautéed onions), covered (melted cheese), chunked (hickory smoked ham), diced (grilled tomatoes), peppered (jalapeño peppers), capped (grilled mushrooms), topped (with the chain’s proprietary Bert’s Chili), or country (sausage gravy). Or, order them “all the way”—with all the toppings—for $5.
For Bluegrass Grill owner Chrissy Benninger, that sort of flavorful hash browns option seems like a rarity. “I get the appeal [of hash browns], but they seem a bit bland to me. It doesn’t seem like people season hash browns. Maybe I’m wrong, but it just seems like French fries in a different form.” For her, it’s all about the home fries: “Chunky, perfectly spiced, onion-laden, crispy potatoes. What’s not to love?”
Interestingly enough, the debate over what to call Blue Moon Diner’s breakfast potatoes has continued for more than a decade. When Laura Galgano and her husband took over the diner in 2006, the menu called the dish—which is cubed potatoes roasted with peppers and onion—”hash browns.” The couple spent more than a year explaining to customers that while they were called hash browns, they were more like home fries. “We changed the name on the menu and thought that would be the end of that.” They were wrong; people still had questions.
But Galgano’s come to an extremely logical conclusion in this debate: “It sure doesn’t matter what you call them, as long as you enjoy them!”—EO
Shenandoah Joe
Who’s got the best cup of coffee in town?
The good news is, every local coffee purveyer seems to have its fans: Our call
on social media brought up everything from Guajiros Miami Eatery to the mobile popup JBird Supply. Here’s how the finalists stacked up in a Twitter poll:
Lone Light 18.3%
Mudhouse 23.7%
Shenandoah Joe 58.1%
Breakfast burrito breakdown
Tia Sophia’s, a diner in Santa Fe, claims it coined the term “breakfast burrito” in 1975. But it seems impossible that no one dreamed up such a simple combination before then. Eggs, cheese, maybe potatoes, maybe some sausage, wrapped up in a tortilla—it makes too much sense to have been invented as late as 1975.
The breakfast burrito is a twist on a twist, an Americanized, breakfast-ified version of a food that was already informal and customizable. As such, a modern breakfast burrito isn’t bound by any strict set of culinary rules. If it’s got eggs in a tortilla, it’s a breakfast burrito. The rest is up to the person with the pan.
Even so, breakfast burritos are deceptively difficult to execute well. If the eggs are too wet, the tortilla can get soggy. With nothing to provide some crunch, the whole thing can turn to mush. Too much filling can overwhelm a fragile wrap. In Charlottesville, plenty of places do it right—and they all do it differently. Here, the breakfast burrito’s delicious versatility is on full display.
Blue Moon Diner’s burrito is a vegetarian dish. Just eggs, cheddar, and beans,served in a spinach wrap, it’s on the healthier end of the eccentric eatery’s Southern-style diner menu. Don’t let that dissuade you—the eggs are fluffy, the cheddar is soft and melty, and the black beans provide some important textural contrast. Add a little of the tangy, flavorful salsa to kick the whole thing up a notch.
The En Fuego at Ivy Provisions. Photo: Cramer Photo.
Ivy Provisions takes the opposite approach. Its breakfast burrito, called the En Fuego, is a decadent, salty, fatty hangover cure. Take a bite, and the En Fuego will send a squirt of orange grease trickling down your hand from the back of the wax paper wrap. Jammed with chorizo and potatoes, everything inside melts together into a piping hot mess, propelled by the spice from the sausage. The En Fuego is transcendent, though not for the faint of heart.
Breakfast burritos can also be quick, on-the-go fast food. That’s what you’ll find at Nuestra Cocina in the Marathon Station at the Rio-Greenbrier intersection. Charlottesville’s gas station food has a well-known reputation at this point, and like the other humble, hidden kitchens in town, this place doesn’t disappoint. Its burrito is rich but not overwhelming; the eggs are scrambled withonions and green peppers, balancing well with potatoes and greasy chorizo.
Quality breakfast burritos can also be found at Bluegrass Grill, Grit Coffee, Firefly, Beer Run, and plenty of other local eateries both on and off the beaten path. Be sure to let us know if we missed any great ones—we’re always hungry.—BH
Something special
Looking for a special occasion splurge? The Clifton’s acclaimed 1799 restaurant serves an elegant breakfast daily, from steel-cut oats with Virginia apples to smoked salmon and roe with a roasted garlic pancake and charred onion crème fraiche. Sunday brunch adds more savory dishes, like escargot and North Carolina trout. Sit on the sunny veranda or enclosed patio, take in the gorgeous view, and start your day off in style.—LL
Juicin’ it: Where to grab a healthy breakfast
Want to wake up on the right side of the bed? A healthy breakfast is the perfect way to start your day. Whether you decide to take in your nutrients via liquid form at a nearby juice bar or partake in a bowl or platter is up to you, but thesefour spots will put a little extra pep in your morning step.—MI
Corner Juice
What you need to know: Corner Juice has two locations: the original on the Corner and another on the Downtown Mall. At both, cold-pressed juices made in small batches are the focus. Beyond juice, the selections include toasts, sandwiches, smoothies, and bowls. Power shots and nut milks round out the menu.
What you should order: With just four ingredients—organic orange, pineapple, lemon, and ginger—the Dr. J juice is a good place to start. The Blue Ridge Berry smoothie is a customer favorite, made with blueberries, mango, banana, avocado, flax powder, and almond milk.
Essentials:cornerjuice.com, two locations at 201 E. Main St. and 1509 University Ave.
Farm Bell Kitchen
What you need to know: Consider this a public service announcement: Farm Bell Kitchen offers brunch every single day of the week from 8am-2pm. The weekday menu and the weekend menu offer some differing selections, but no matter the day, guests will find omelets, salads, and bowls.
What you should order: On the weekday menu, the farm omelet (egg whites, spinach, tomato, sweet potato, cheese) and the grains of truth bowl (tofu or chicken, quinoa, kale, tomatoes, sweet potatoes, onions, peppers, pecans, and avocado dressing) are your best bets for lighter fare. Come the weekend, order the power bowl, served with kale, tofu, and sweet potato with roasted red pepper vinaigrette and a poached egg.
What you need to know: First Watch opened its Charlottesville doors at Barracks Road Shopping Center last April. With more than 200 locations throughout the country, it’s fair to say the restaurant has breakfast, brunch, and lunch down to a science. Dishes range from health-conscious to decadent, and a kid’s menu ensures the whole family is taken care of.
What you should order: In the mood for something savory? The avocado toast is topped with extra-virgin olive oil, lemon, and Maldon sea salt. Steel-cut oatmeal is on the sweeter side, made in-house and served with berries, sliced banana, and pecans. On the seasonal menu, million dollar bacon may not be healthy, but topped with brown sugar, black pepper, cayenne, and a syrup drizzle, there will be no judgment if you can’t resist!
Essentials:firstwatch.com, Barracks Road Shopping Center
The Juice Laundry
What you need to know: Founders Sarah and Mike Keenan started The Juice Laundry in 2013. Today, there are three locations of the cold-pressed juice shop in Charlottesville, one in Richmond, and one in Washington, D.C. The menu goes beyond juice, with smoothies, acai bowls, nut milks, and other healthy goodies in the lineup.
What you should order: The Waterboy, which can be ordered as a smoothie or acai bowl, is the philanthropic choice. It’s made with pineapple, mango, blue majik (an extract of spirulina), and coconut water, and $2 from every one goes to Chris Long’s Waterboy Foundation. On the juice menu, the Gentle Green combines kale, spinach, cucumber, grapefruit, and apple.
Essentials:thejuicelaundry.com, 1411 University Ave.; 722 Preston Ave., Suite 105; 450 Whitehead Rd. (inside the UVA Aquatic & Fitness Center)
Craving pork chops and eggs at 2am? The Waffle House is open 24-7, and the grill is always hot. Photo: Eze Amos
Midnight breakfast
Breakfast for dinner was novel when you were a kid, and it’s no less delicious when you’re an adult. Plenty of diner-type spots in town keep bacon and eggs on the griddle until close—Blue Moon Diner, The Nook, Tip Top Restaurant, to name a few. But sometimes the breakfast craving hits before morning can come again, and that’s when we thank our lucky stars that we live in a place that has Waffle Houses (on Route 29 South and Fifth Street) and an IHOP (at Rio Hill Shopping Center), two iconic 24-hour breakfast spots with extensive menus. And there’s Sheetz on the Corner, too, where you (and plenty of intoxicated undergrads) can get bacon croissants, hash browns, and the Walker Breakfast Ranger sandwich at all hours. —EO
Photo: Morgan Salyer
A local classic
Bodo’s Deli-Egg isn’t just delicious. It also solves a problem.
“You get to a point where you’re slicing deli meat, and you have an undersized heel you don’t want to use for a sandwich,” says Scott Smith, co-owner of the venerable bagel vendor.
Bodo’s didn’t come up with the idea—it’s an old New York Jewish deli trick—but Smith and his team have taken it a step further. Because they’re not kosher, they’ve added ham, capicola, salami and Swiss, muenster and provolone cheese to the traditional deli egg mixture of pastrami and corned beef.
The result is one of Bodo’s most popular items. Indeed, the sandwich shop sells so much deli egg, they end up using far more cured meat than just the stuff that comes from the unused ends.
Smith says most folks are straight down the middle with their egg sandwich orders—Deli-Egg on an everything bagel is most popular. But some add more meat and cheese, usually bacon and cheddar, or balance out the richness with some punchy pepper spread.
Smith’s pro tip? Try the Deli-Egg a couple times before you make up your mind about it. The meat and cheese contents can vary depending on what’s available to chop on any given day.
Don’t forget the donuts
Spudnuts and now Sugar Shack may be gone, but there are still a few spots to get your morning sugar fix.
Carpe Donut: Organic, local, and delicious, Carpe makes what may be the perfect apple cider donut, rolled in cinnamon sugar. In recent years they’ve added a range of other toppings, from maple bacon to blueberry. 715 Allied Ln., and at City Market
Duck Donuts: A fresh donut is a good donut, and this North Carolina chain delivers with made-to-order cake donuts you can customize with your choice of coating, topping, and “drizzle.” The Shops at Stonefield
Dunkin’ Donuts: Homesick New Englanders can get their Dunkin’ fix off 29 North. The donuts? They’re fine. Rivanna Plaza
Krispy Kreme: For a classic old-school glazed, Krispy Kreme is still the king. Get one hot or follow their advice and microwave for eight seconds—you won’t be sorry. 5th Street Station
Savory breakfast pies at The Pie Chest. Photo: John Robinson
Breakfast on a budget:
Five vegetarian morning options—$5 and under
Last November, my boyfriend suggested we go on a pescaterian diet together. He had done his research, and thought it would be a great way for us to eat and live healthier in the new year. And with relationship weight gain being a very real thing, I thought it wouldn’t hurt to give it a try.
So when it comes to grabbing breakfast in the morning, I’m looking for something vegetarian. This isn’t that difficult, with all of the juice bars, coffee shops, and such around town. But what can be hard is finding something delicious and filling on a budget—I certainly can’t afford to buy $7 avocado toast on a regular basis.
Thankfully, there are plenty of spots in town that have vegetarian options priced at $5 or less, for whatever breakfast mood you happen to be in. Here are some of my favorites. —BE
Something classic
For an affordable breakfast, you can never go wrong with Bodo’s. Made-from-scratch bagels are just 85 cents each (75 cents if you buy a dozen or more), and there are an array of spreads, from plain cream cheese ($2.05) to cinnamon sugar or honey and butter. For a little extra change, get the flavored cream cheese—I recommend the cinnamon-raisin bagel with honey pecan cream cheese ($2.40).
If you’re in the mood for a sandwich, there are multiple vegetarian options for under $5, including egg, veggie patty, three cheese, and PBJ, and all will hold you over till lunch. Everyone has their own Bodo’s order: My favorite is the three cheese (muenster, cheddar, and American) on whole wheat.
Something sweet
While MarieBette Bakery & Café does have a breakfast menu, most of the options are over $5. But no worries—if you’re looking for a sweet breakfast treat, its wide selection of authentic French pastries are a step above your standard coffee shop muffin. I recommend the pain au chocolat for $3.25. But if you’d prefer something salty, try the pretzel croissant. At $4, it’s a little pricey, but it’s fairly big, tastes exactly like a pretzel and a croissant (at the same time!), and will fill you up.
Something (a little) spicy
Here’s something to get you out of bed: From 7-8am at Brazos Tacos, tacos are buy one get one free! But if you’re like me and hate waking up early, make sure to stop by on Tuesday, when tacos are $1 off all day. With either deal, you can get a Flora (sautéed spinach, scrambled eggs, refried black beans, queso fresco, and roasted tomato salsa) and an I Willie Love You (scrambled eggs, mashed potatoes, sliced avocado, roasted corn pico, and queso fresco), and still get out for under a Lincoln.
Something cheap
If you’re on the run and want something cheap (but still tasty) for breakfast, head over to Market Street Market for a $1.99 egg and cheese biscuit, which you’ll find wrapped in foil near the checkout. The biscuit is light and fluffy, while the egg has the perfect amount of cheese melted on top. And don’t miss the array of fruits, yogurts, and other breakfasty items available to get the most bang for your (five) bucks.
Something savory
The Pie Chest may be known for its delectable desserts, but it certainly does not slack on savory pies. A selection of hand pies for just $5 is available all day, and includes those of the breakfast variety. On some days, the vegetarian breakfast pie is stuffed with salsa, egg, and cheese. Other days, there’s a spinach and feta pie. With a flaky crust and cheesy filling, both are equally delicious.
Year after year, traditions are often what lead us through the holiday season. They mark everything from the place settings—a favorite heirloom tablecloth or a fine china set that has been passed down over the years—to the meal itself, from pie recipes scribbled in old family cookbooks to a particular way of carving the meat. We asked some local chefs, restaurant owners, and producers to share their own holiday memories—and a few cherished recipes.
In praise of eggnog
Scott Smith, co-owner of Bodo’s Bagels
Between Thanksgivingand Christmas, besides the stuff we all do during the holidays, I celebrate six close family birthdays and my anniversary. It’s a gauntlet of occasions run too close together to savor (the whole reason to celebrate), and Christmas is the finish line. I cross it exhausted, grateful, and relieved.
A few years ago, about halfway through, I read a piece about Charles Mingus’ secret and legendary eggnog recipe, which he left to his biographer, Janet Coleman. It’s everything you’d want his recipe to be: prodigious, improvisatory, excessive, and sweetly easy to overindulge in before you know how far in over your head you’re getting.
The article described it as a velvet-gloved gorilla.
It seemed the perfect way to celebrate the crescendo of the year’s celebrations and obligations, and I’ve made it and shared it every Christmas afternoon since.
Photo: Morgan Salyer
Fine kettle of fish
Matthew Brown, wine director at King Family Vineyards
Being from an Italian-American family, food holds a special place in our lives the whole year, however there is no doubt that we really turn up the heat around the holidays. Inspired by the classic feast of the seven fishes, traditionally enjoyed on Christmas Eve by Italian Catholics, my family gathers every year for a much simpler take on this tradition: shrimp scampi and linguine. Like most good home-cooked meals, there is no recipe.
The ingredients are simple: fresh shrimp, lots of garlic, lots of butter, and lots of lemon. The secret is to share a bottle (or two) of Champagne while cooking the meal. Once finished, the dish is best served with homemade linguine and topped with plenty of freshly grated Pecorino Romano. We always enjoy white Burgundy or aged Virginia chardonnay with our meal and then finish up with a generous splash of old vintage Madeira. The people at our Christmas Eve table change every year, but the meal is always the same!
That’s the stuff(ing)
Jason Becton, co-owner of MarieBette Café & Bakery
Photo: Keith Alan Sprouse
My grandmother was an excellent baker and a really solid cook. When I was a kid, she would make all of the food on Thanksgiving start to finish and we kids would help her prep. The centerpiece of the whole shebang was, of course, the turkey. Ours was usually a Butterball with a simple bread stuffing. Every year it was predictably the same.
When my grandmother passed away, my mother, who had always been intimidated by making the turkey, passed the responsibility on to me. I tinkered with the roasting process, the brine, the bird itself, and the gravy, but one thing that was sacrilege was to change the stuffing.
I don’t know very many people who actually cook the stuffing in the bird. There are lots of folks who think it’s not safe, it makes the bird dry, or is just completely a pain in the butt to do. I agree with the last part but the stuffing made with six ingredients—breadcrumbs, butter, eggs, onions, salt, andpepper—is remarkably tasty and never makes the meat dry. In fact, I’m proud to say that my simple roasted turkey has turned many turkey haters into believers.
Photo: Tim Gearhart
Go with the dough
Tim Gearhart, owner of Gearharts Fine Chocolates
One of my favorite treats as a kid was something amazingly simple. As a lot of food memories can often be, it of course goes deeper than its basic four ingredients: pie crust, cinnamon, butter, and sugar. It evokes childhood, holidays, and family to me. As I look back, it also helped start a lifelong passion.
My mom would set out to make maybe a pecan or pumpkin pie for Christmas dinner, but all I could think about was the buttery and flaky cookies she would make with the leftover dough. They were perfect—just simply rolled out bits and pieces of dough, slathered with butter, and finished with a generous coat of cinnamon sugar. She would then roll it up, slice and bake until a light brown. I waited and waited, watching the sugar bubbling up as it caramelized. Without a doubt, I was more excited about these cookies than whatever the main attraction was going to be!
I think in the end, whether it’s a 15-course gourmet meal or a cookie made with leftovers, it’s about making something special for someone.And sometimes, four ingredients are just enough.
Magic in a Mason jar
Hunter Smith, owner of Champion Brewing Company
Photo: Amy and Jackson Smith
Many years ago, long before I knew of the relaxing and invigorating effects of alcohol, I took notice of a particular seasonal increase in neighborly traffic to my childhood home’s kitchen door. Many came bearing their own holiday treats, such as Pat’s sweet, soft sourdough bread, or the other Pat’s delicious monkey bread that we always ate, through Herculean restraint, before opening presents on Christmas morning. The majority of these seasonal visitors, however, came wide-eyed in pursuit of their Mason jar of The Recipe.
Despite plenty of annual light-hearted—and dead serious—offers to pay for The Recipe, my mom was as stern a gatekeeper as ever. The Recipe is of old Albemarle County origin, passed to my mom by family friend, grandmother figure, and legend in my memory, Marty, whose home we always visit in Earlysville. When I returned from college in Boston one Christmas and we all gathered around the tree, I found myself teary when opening a boxed Pyrex set that included a lined index card detailing the legendary Recipe, written in cursive in my mom’s signature blue ink. My fiancée at the time, Danielle (now my wife of 10 years), and I reveled in the opportunity to take a stab at making our own at home, with no limit on our allocation from mom.
The stuff itself is so rich and intense that you always find yourself amazed by how quickly and smoothly it goes down—and even a stout, seasoned drinker like myself can be taken unawares by the empty glass and light-headed sensation. The Recipe itself? A combination of sugar, eggs, cream, and heaps of dark spirits that aren’t bourbon—and that’s surely as far as I can go without facing excommunication. Served cool in a pewter Jefferson Cup, a traditional gift in our family, it’s a perfect fireside sip or Christmas morning fuel for tolerating all of the new family traditions—like noisy electronic toys, iPads, and Disney Blu-Rays for this era of Smiths. We’ve always joked in our family of booze producers that it would be legendary to take this magic in a bottle to market—but that would defeat the purpose of the special treat we know as The Recipe.
Photo: Morgan Salyer
Breaking with tradition
Courtenay Tyler, co-owner of Tilman’s
When I was living in Chicago, I worked at a small mom-and-pop neighborhood butcher and grocery store, a lot like the ones we have here in Virginia, where we made family-style food. Our Thanksgiving dinners were hugely popular, and each year I roasted over 25 turkeys, and made all the traditional sides to go with them. We were open until noon on Thanksgiving day for neighborhood customers to come and pick up their dinners. It made for a very long week, and by the end of it, I hate to say it, I was sick of Thanksgiving and couldn’t even look at turkey.
One year, I had already invited a group of friends over for Thanksgiving, but I couldn’t bring myself to cook another turkey. I had to come up with Plan B. So I took a look at our meat counter, spied a bone-in pork roast, and knew what our dinner would be. I had the butcher tie up a massive crown roast of pork. It was glorious.
As a nod to the Thanksgiving that I knew my friends were expecting, I stuffed it with caramelized onion and apple stuffing. That year, a tradition was born. I’m a huge fan of Friendsgiving, and we never have turkey. But we do a wink and nod to the traditional sides.
Photo: Tom McGovern
Lefse with Lila
Kate Hamilton, co-owner of Hamiltons’ at First & Main
My grandmothers were both of Scandinavian heritage. My mother’s mother, Lila, was Norwegian-American, dad’s mother, Garnett, was Danish-American. Food traditions ran strong with them, and I treasure their recipe boxes and hand-sewn aprons. My grandmothers instilled in me a love of baking that still binds the generations together each Christmas. I may know their recipes by heart, but reading them is half the fun. Smudges and spills. Notes in the margins. “Take butter the size of an egg and cream in small bowl with sugar,” or “Lard is the secret for flaky rolls,” in Lila’s small, loopy writing. “Calls for oleo-—sub. butter when avail,” in Garnett’s spiky script.
Lefse is a Norwegian flatbread made primarily of potatoes, and was a staple in Lila’s Christmas kitchen. Hot from the griddle, slathered with butter and a bit of jam or cinnamon sugar, then rolled up like a crepe, it is among my favorite taste memories from childhood.
Every Norse family swears by its lefse recipe and I’ve tried many of them. I’ve used russet potatoes and the wrong potatoes. I’ve mashed them and I’ve riced them. I’ve even tried instant potato flakes. But when making lefse with Lila, we simply used up the extra mashed potatoes from the previous night’s supper. These were boiled russets, mashed with warm milk and butter, then lightly seasoned with salt. In the morning, we’d knead flour and a little sugar into the chilled leftovers, put the sock on the rolling pin and roll the dough balls into circles. Then we’d cook them on a dry pancake griddle one at a time, using a flat spatula to flip them when the desired brown spots appeared. We had a stack of damp tea towels nearby and layered the lefse and towels on a platter until meal or snack time. A simple but delicious treat and memory.
Photo: Morgan Salyer
The slice is right
Angelo Vangelopoulos, chef and owner of The Ivy Inn
My favorite family holiday tradition is my dad’s homemade pita with a coin hidden inside served on New Year’s Day. Some years it’s made with spinach and feta (aka “spanako” pita), and other years it’s made with ground pork and pine nuts and brushed with lard.
We eat it for lunch after we’ve placed it in the middle of the table, spun it around a few times, sang a holiday song or two, and my dad has offered a blessing in Greek. Our savory pita “pie” is then cut into pieces for everyone present, and extra pieces are designated for any missing family members who couldn’t attend. We then dig in, and eat the pita while carefully making sure we don’t swallow the coin inside. There are annual jokes about whether or not my dad remembered to put the coin in (yes, that happened once), and plenty of arguing over which piece is which. I can hear family members saying, “Once it’s on your plate, it’s YOURS!”
The “winner” is the family member whose piece contains the coin. The coin is said to give a year of health and wealth, and it’s considered bad luck to ever spend it. This celebration is rooted in Christianity in celebration of St. Basil, who died on January 1. It’s a similar concept to King Cake, just without the baby inside, because that’s just weird!
RECIPES:
Caramelized onion, apple, and sage stuffing
from Courtenay Tyler of Tilman’s
Ingredients:
1 loaf of crusty day-old bread. Any will do, but I use a French country loaf, roughly cut into small 1-inch cubes. Note: I like to cube and leave these overnight to stale for best texture, but you can also speed the process by drying them out in a low oven, set to 250 for about 30 minutes, if you did not plan ahead.
2 onions, diced
3 Tbs. olive oil, divided
Salt and pepper to taste
2 apples, peeled and diced
2 ribs of celery, minced
Fresh sage, about ½ bunch or tbsp., chopped
1 large egg, lightly beaten
3 cups chicken broth
Instructions:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Butter a baking pan. In a large skillet, sauté the onions, salt and pepper in about two tablespoons of olive oil until browned and caramelized. This takes patience, and frequent stirring. Give yourself 15-20 minutes to get to the proper golden brown color. Once golden brown and caramelized, remove the onion to a large mixing bowl. Add one tablespoon of olive oil to your skillet and sauté the celery, diced apple, and fresh sage. Once soft, remove and add to the mixing bowl with the onions. Stir to combine.
Add your cubed bread, beaten egg, and broth. Stir to combine. Bake for 50 minutes to an hour, until the top is lightly browned.
Lefse
from Kate Hamilton of Hamiltons’ at First & Main
Equipment needed:
Potato ricer or food mill
Flat pancake griddle or electric lefse griddle
Rolling pin or grooved lefse roller
Wooden spatula or lease stick
Damp towels
Ingredients:
6 large russet potatoes of similar size
3/4 cup melted salted butter
1-2 Tbs. cream
2 tsp. salt
3 Tbs. sugar
4-5 cups all-purpose flour
Instructions:
Peel, halve, and gently boil potatoes until centers are fork tender. Drain water and briefly replace pot on the stove to let some steam off. Push the hot potatoes through a ricer into a mixing bowl—you should have about eight cups of riced potatoes. While still hot, stir in the melted butter, salt, and sugar. Spread the mixture on a baking sheet and allow to cool, then shape it into a ball and refrigerate, covered, overnight.
The next day, preheat your griddle to 400-500 degrees. Because you want to add the flour right before baking, you should work with half of the riced potato mixture at a time, keeping the rest chilled in the fridge.
Place half the riced potato mixture in a bowl, add about two cups of flour, and mix in well using a stand mixer or your hands. If dough is sticky, add a bit more flour. If dough is too tough, work in a tablespoon of cream. Divide the dough into golf ball sized balls and keep in the refrigerator, removing one at a time to roll out and bake.
Dust your rolling pin and rolling surface with flour, then roll the lefse dough ball into a circle as thin as you can without it tearing. Using the wooden spatula or lefse stick, transfer to the hot, dry griddle and cook until light brown speckles appear, then flip. Bake until larger brown spots appear, then place on platter and cover with a damp towel. Continue in that way, layering lefse and damp towels until you’ve used up the first half of the dough, then repeat the process with the remainder of the refrigerated riced potato mixture.
A cooking partner will make the work go faster—one of you rolling and one of you baking. This recipe makes about 16 lefse.
Lefse is traditionally eaten rolled up with butter and jam or cinnamon sugar at Christmas. It’s also delicious with savory fillings. Enjoy!
Charles Mingus’ eggnog (in his words)
a favorite of Scott Smith of Bodo’s
Separate one egg for one person. Each person gets an egg.
Two sugars for each egg, each person.
One shot of rum, one shot of brandy per person.
Put all the yolks into one big pan, with some milk.
That’s where the 151 proof rum goes. Put it in gradually or it’ll burn the eggs, okay. The whites are separate and the cream is separate.
In another pot—depending on how many people—put in one shot of each, rum and brandy. (This is after you whip your whites and your cream.) Pour it over the top of the milk and yolks.
One teaspoon of sugar. Brandy and rum. Actually you mix it all together.
Yes, a lot of nutmeg. Fresh nutmeg. And stir it up.
You don’t need ice cream unless you’ve got people coming and you need to keep it cold. Vanilla ice cream. You can use eggnog. I use vanilla ice cream.
Right, taste for flavor. Bourbon? I use Jamaica rum in there. Jamaican rums. Or I’ll put rye in it. Scotch. It depends. See, it depends on how drunk I get while I’m tasting it.
Notes from Smith on making the Mingus his own way:
After a year or two, I settled into a process. I beat the egg yolks with the sugar (one teaspoon per egg) in a stand mixer, like Alton Brown. Leaning on his recipe, I put a couple of cups of whole milk and a cup of heavy cream or so (for four people) into a saucepan with a lot of fresh nutmeg and bring it just to a boil, whisking. I take it off the heat and slowly whisk it into the eggs and sugar before putting it all back in the saucepan. Before it goes back on the burner, I clean the mixing bowl and beat the whites into stiff peaks so they’re ready. I set them aside and cook the mixture, whisking over medium heat, until it reaches 160 degrees (thanks Alton). As it’s coming up to temperature, I add the 151. I pull it from the heat and add the brandy and some dark rum (one shot each, per person). Then I put in a pint (I have another on hand in case) of softened Ben & Jerry’s vanilla ice cream. It melts in and cools things down before I fold in the whites. Looking good? If it’s pretty and sweet, no more ice cream. Taste, like Mingus. I’ve never not added bourbon. Sometimes I add some Scotch. I’ve used Irish whiskey too. This is the fun part. I don’t measure these, just use them to adjust the flavor.
It should have a dessert taste with a kick that doesn’t begin to telegraph the absurd amount of alcohol in each glass. Use small glasses. Settle in. Mingus, the article said, also used to fire his shotgun in his apartment, so go easy.
Jason Becton and Patrick Evans, owners of the MarieBette Café & Bakery, reaffirmed their commitment to one another while moving to their new home with their daughters and two dogs. Photo: Rob Garland
Moving is stressful.
Moving to an old place that needs a gut renovation is more stressful.
Fighting with your spouse every step of the way? That’s a major test.
Jason Becton and Patrick Evans, owners of the beloved MarieBette Café & Bakery, were at odds about their new place. “Jason wanted nothing to do with the project in the beginning and definitely didn’t want to ever live in the house,” Evans says.
It was a rough start to a transition that would take a year to complete. “The house was in bad disrepair when we bought it, and it was hard for Jason to see the potential,” Evans continues. “It wasn’t until it was stripped down to the studs that he was able to start seeing that it could be a nice place—not to mention a home for our family.”
Becton and Evans persevered, taking great care to restore the charming cottage, inside and out. “We like to think we brought back the house’s original aesthetic and flow,” Evans says. “Also, when I first saw the house it had a red roof that had faded from its original color. But it was one of the things that caught my eye and I wanted to keep it. The triple gabled roof is also unique and I thought the color really brought attention to that feature.”
The partners in life and in business moved into the rehabbed place about three years ago, and they are glad to call it home—along with their daughters Marian, 8, and Betty, 6, and their dogs Seeta and Ponyo, rescues from Blue Ridge Greyhound Adoption.
Today, it’s a full house but a happy one, the product of a huge effort and an emotional journey. “It caused a few tense moments in our relationship, but in the end it worked out for the best,” Evans says. “We have learned to trust each others’ instincts and try our best to support each other, even if it’s not a decision we agree on.”
Petite MarieBette debuts downtown with a new co-owner, Will Darsie, and lovely baked goods.
Photo: Corbett Smithson
MarieBette Café & Bakery spin-off Petite MarieBette is now open at 105 E. Water St., offering coffee and baked goods (of course!), as well as breakfast sandwiches and grab-and-go lunch. Longtime MarieBette employee Will Darsie co-owns the new spot, and will manage it. The son of a chef (mom) and a farmer (dad), Darsie moved from his native California to Charlottesville in 2015. He found work at MarieBette, starting as a busboy and rising to general manager. “I never had any intention of working in this industry, but now I can’t see myself doing anything else,” Darsie says.
Music to your mouth
Prime 109 has a new menu available Wednesday nights to accompany weekly live jazz. Guests can enjoy a more casual midweek bite, while the cooks get to create “experimental dishes that don’t necessarily fit the structure of the dining room,” Executive Chef Ian Redshaw says. In keeping with the improvisational theme, the menu changes weekly. Past offerings have included housemade pastrami banh mi and an “octo dog”—octopus poached in olive oil and served on a Parker House-style hot dog bun with shishito peppers, shallots, harissa, and cilantro. Music, from 6-9pm, is courtesy of jazz trio Adam Larrabee, Brian Caputo, and Randall Pharr.
Winning spirit
For the third year in a row, Lovingston’s Virginia Distillery Co. has taken home a top prize at the U.K.-based World Whiskies Awards. The distillery’s Port Cask Finished Virginia-Highland Whisky earned a medal for Best American Blended Malt, the same award it won in 2018. Aged in Virginia port-style wine barrels, the spirit blends American single-malt whiskey distilled on-site with single-malt whiskey from Scotland. In 2017, the distillery’s flagship Virginia-Highland Malt won Best American Single Malt.
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.
Free Union Grass Farm's duck features prominently in a new dish at The Clifton. Photo by Tom McGovern
By Jenny Gardiner
The Clifton Inn is undergoing a season of renewal—and a name change to The Clifton. New owners the Westmont Capital Group brought in the coveted design team from Tennessee’s posh Blackberry Farm to put a fresh face on the property, and capped it off by hiring Michelin-starred executive chef Matthew Bousquet, who owned and ran the acclaimed Mirepoix in northern California with his wife, Bryan. With a large cultivated garden at his disposal, as well as wild herbs, fruits and vegetables on the 100-acre Keswick property, the place is a foraging haven for chefs. And Bousquet and his staff take full advantage of what nature has yielded when planning the menu for 1799, the dining spaces that include the newly renovated library, the spruced up veranda, and the terrace, gazebo, wine cellar and chef’s table, which seats six and provides diners with an up-close-and-personal view of the kitchen staff’s creative process. The Copper Bar, which abuts the various dining spaces, has also been given a facelift.
Clifton chef Matthew Bosquet says the bounty of local produce and products is the best he’s ever worked with, such as Free Union Grass Farm’s duck, in the dish above. Photo by Ashley Cox
“Seasonality is really strong in my cooking,” Bousquet says. “And the local food here is probably the best I’ve seen. You have a lot of young people starting farms and doing something fascinating, and it’s all really good quality. There’s a lot of experimentation and they’re all interested in trying it.”
Bousquet incorporates his classical French training while working with local Virginia products, as well as taking into account that his audience is not only locals, but visitors to the inn who come from all over the world.
“Hopefully our guests experience as much as we can get out of the garden, as much really great quality local super fresh stuff that is as seasonal as possible,” Bousquet says. “Foraging on grounds is unique to here—one of my sous chefs is really good at it—and it’s a great property for it. There are things in every little corner.”
And he’s enjoying working with items from local purveyors like Free Union Grass Farm’s duck.
“It’s by far the best duck I’ve ever worked with,” he says. “We got a batch of cherries in, and we put a super light pickle on them to preserve them and serve the duck with them.”
After moving to Charlottesville, Bousquet worked for a few years filling in as a chef in restaurants around town and raising his now-10-year-old daughter when his wife took over the front of house at Keswick Hall.
“Charlottesville is terrific. We just love the community—it’s been great,” Bousquet says. “You have a lot of different communities and cultures in the area through the university—that was very important to us because we were looking for that exposure to all aspects of community life.”
He adds that his daughter teases him that he’s got that one Michelin star, and one day she’s going to go for two. In the meantime, he’s happy to be manning the kitchen at Clifton.
“I wake up every day and I want to start cooking,” Bousquet says. “And I want to just cook good food and really keep developing it.”
The 1799 bar and restaurant is open to the public for breakfast, lunch and dinner.
Betting on this
MarieBette Café & Bakery plans to open a second location this fall on Water Street, next to Roxie Daisy, according to Charlottesville 29 blogger and C-VILLE columnist Simon Davidson. “The offshoot will serve MarieBette’s bread and pastries, with an increased emphasis on coffee, to fuel downtown workers and residents. Unlike MarieBette, itself, there will not be restaurant table service at the offshoot, but there will still be seating, as well as breakfast and lunch items, which customers may eat-in or take to-go,” according to the post.
Coming home
Asado Wing & Taco Company is aiming for a mid-August opening in the former Café Caturra location on the Corner.
Charlottesville native Ian Anderson, who with several partners, including a UVA grad, opened their first location near VCU a few years ago, says the group is excited to return home with their restaurant, which specializes in wings and tacos, natch.
“We decided to open in Charlottesville because we have ties to the city,” Anderson says. “So when the decision to expand came up, it was the first place we looked, because we know it’s a cool little town with a great college to support it.”
