“The comfort food choice: 821 Cafe”

Posted on by
Reply

Style magazine has an article this week on “Unexpected places to dine when you don’t eat meat or dairy.”

Here is an excerpt:

At 821, meat lovers can order a one-pound burger served between two grilled cheese sandwiches, but there’s also a vegan chicken salad sandwich on the menu. If it’s bar or comfort food, 821 probably has it in meat and veggie forms. The vegan chili fries ($4) are enormous, a perfect drinking companion to soak up excess alcohol from 821’s well-chosen taps. Fried artichoke hearts ($8) aren’t elegant, but they’re strangely habit-forming with a classic crunchy exterior and creamy interior, served with a spicy sweet chili sauce.

And as long as we’re sticking with fried and unhealthy, the buffalo tofu ($7) has been a favorite of mine since before it was on the regular menu. Beer-battered tofu is covered in buffalo sauce and served on a roll with lettuce, tomato and vegan mayonaise. The house-made veggie burger ($7.25) feels healthier, with black beans, sweet potatoes and quinoa, a South American grainlike seed, making up the patty, with an avocado for a topping. Though the patty could be firmer, the subtle flavors strike a nice balance of sweet and savory with a hint of garlic. 821 offers an extensive vegan menu with breakfast choices, appetizers, sandwiches, salads and pasta.

821 Cafe
825 W. Cary St.
649-1042
821caferva.com
Monday-Wednesday: 8 a.m.-10 p.m.
Thursday-Friday: 8 a.m.-11 p.m.
Saturday: 9 a.m.-11 p.m.
Sunday: 9 a.m.-10 p.m.

There’s also a nice bit about the Nile on Laurel Street.

McShin Foundation,Terry McAuliffe At Virginia War Memorial On Monday

Posted on by
Reply

From press release:

Richmond, VA (April 8, 2013) – The McShin Foundation is proud to host their 9th Annual Spring Awards Banquet at the Virginia War Memorial Education Foundation (621 S. Belvidere Street, Richmond, VA 23220) on Monday, April 8, 2013 at 6 p.m. This year, we will be presenting Dr. Sarah H. Scarbrough with the NCADD Bronze Key Award for her dissertation on the Richmond City Jail’s McCovery tier, titled “Reducing Recidivism in Returning Offenders with Alcohol and Drug Related Offenses: Contracts for the Delivery of Authentic Peer Based Recovery Support Services.” Her studies showed that inmates that went through the jail’s McCovery program were 18% less likely to return to jail or prison. Today Dr. Scarbrough serves as Director of Virginia’s Governor’s Mansion under Governor Bob McDonnell and Mrs. Bob McDonnell.

Democrat and gubernatorial candidate Terry McAuliffe will be our key-note speaker. He is from Fairfax, Virginia, and served as Chairman of the Democratic National Committee under President Bill Clinton.

Tickets are $100 and available in advance. Business attire is requested. Join us in supporting recovery! For more information visit www.mcshin.org

About McShin Foundation
Founded in 2004, The McShin Foundation is Virginia’s leading non-profit, full-service Recovery Community Organization (RCO), committed to serving individuals and families in their fight against Substance Use Disorders (SUDs). Our mission is to deliver a message of hope to recovering addicts and alcoholics and facilitate their journey to a healthier life. The McShin Foundation is a great alternative for drug and alcohol treatment; drug and alcohol rehab; and drug and alcohol detox. We are the Nation’s Leading Recovery Community Center.

###

5K Run/Walk to Remember This Saturday

Posted on by
1

The Virginia War Memorial will host their 2nd annual 5K Run/Walk to Remember on Saturday, April 6 at 8 am. The route goes through Oregon Hill and Hollywood Cemetery. Between 8:30 am and 9:30 am there will be 500 participants traveling on the streets.

The event will only close 2nd Street from the Lee Bridge to Byrd Street the morning of the race. No others streets will be closed. Soldiers from Ft. Lee will be along the race route directing participants.

DPU Doing Work On Belvidere and Cumberland

Posted on by
1

From email:

Starting Wednesday, April 3, contractors for the Department of Public Utilities will be making drainage repairs at the northwest quadrant of the intersection of Belvidere and Cumberland streets. Two lanes of Belvidere headed south will be closed for 2-3 days to install a manhole. One lane of Belvidere and one land of Cumberland will then be closed for approximately three weeks.

Parking will be limited in this area during April, which will impact VCU students. Repairs include replacement of two drop inlets, installation of a manhole, repair of an existing drop inlet, and curb and gutter construction. Estimated completion date is May 1.

Mariane Jorgenson
Marketing and Public Relations Specialist
Richmond Department of Public Utilities
730 E. Broad Street, 6th Floor
Richmond, VA 23219
(804) 646-5224, cell (804) 690-8589
www.richmondgov.com/dpu
Blog www.cordpu.blogspot.com
Twitter: @UtilityBuddy
Facebook www.facebook.com/rvadpu

Richmond Riverfront Corporation Proposes Elevated Bike Tubes As Part of 2015 Race Preparations

Posted on by
Reply

It’s already been quite a morning for riverfront development plans, and yet there is more…

Overlooking the Haxall Canal, a representative from the Richmond Riverfront Development Corporation made this announcement:

“Some of our corporate members are concerned about the daily dangers for our commuter drivers and workers presented by bicyclists who insist on riding in the same riverfront area streets as motorized vehicles, therefore, we are proposing to building separate but equal, elevated bike lane tubes. In addition to increasing safety, this project will represent a major contribution to the 2015 UCI World Road Cycling Championship race that will be held in our fair city.”

Skycycle screen shot

The curiously unnamed representative declined to put a cost to this bike tube project, noting that this still needed to be worked out within the public/private partnership. While it was not stated, it seems likely that this project will be done in tandem with the James River Skyway project and Japanese-Italian conglomerate Fuki-Trani. Elevated bike lane tubes are all the rage in the urban design world since last year, when landscape architect Sam Martin proposed Skycycle, a separated, elevated system of bike lanes for London.

Locally, elevated tubes were mentioned several times at the recent Envision This Challenge for Shockoe Bottom, a contest that sought to gin up plans to connect the Bottom and the Slip.

Members of the Richmond bicycling community seemed more surprised than anyone else. City Bicycle, Pedestrian, and Trails Coordinator Jakob C. Helmboldt and New Sportsbackers Bike Advocate Max Hepp-Buchanan have not stated anything in relation to this announcement yet. Though longtime City watchers have also been whispering about future Richmond ‘tube projects’ for a while now, including a new, improved Church Hill tunnel and ‘high speed vacuum’.

Venture Richmond To Release Monday/Tuesday/Wednesday/Thursday Cheers Schedule

Posted on by
2

In exciting local entertainment news, the public/private partnership Venture Richmond announced plans to release their schedule for a new concert series that would take place every Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday summer evening at their proposed new amphitheater.

While a full listing will not be available until Friday of this week, some of the bigger names that rumored to be part of this series include metal band Trixter, American Idol country singer Danny Gokey, rapper Machine Gun Kelly, goth rocker Marilyn Manson, hip hop’s Keyshia Cole, Nickelodeon’s Fresh Beat Band, and megastar David Bowie (supporting his new album). There were also hints that there would be multiple performances by ‘Center Stage Stars’, subsets of the Richmond Symphony that play at reduced rates (minimum wage). Local band “Six Sheets to the Wind”, which plays yacht rock’ from the ’70’s as well as ’90’s ‘skacore’ has been suggested as one of the opening bands, with more to be announced.

Oregon Hill residents were both enthralled and disturbed by the news. “WoooooHoooooo!” exclaimed VCU sophomore Rich Berry. In contrast, the Overlook Condo Association immediately released a statement in protest, mainly due to sound concerns. “This goes against the deal”, said one Overlook resident who wished to remain anonymous. In response, a Venture Richmond said that “While it is true we told Overlook residents we would not host Friday Cheers at the amphitheater, that was before the Monday/Tuesday/Wednesday/Thursday Cheers series was developed.”

In other news, the City government announced a plan to raise admission taxes and release new nightclub restrictions.

Byrd House Market Buys Fine Foods

Posted on by
Reply

While its not on their blog yet, Byrd House Market manager Anna Edwards has confirmed that the Byrd House Market farmer’s market, using a mixture of funding from the William Byrd Foundation, federal grants, crowdsourcing, and their own produce proceeds, has purchased the Fine Foods convenience store on Idlewood.

“We wanted to create a ‘game-changer’ for Richmond farmers markets in order to further our mission of providing living laboratories for learning nutrition, ecology and economics.” said Edwards. She alluded to a not-yet-announced partnership with another grocery enterprise to help run the new store/market.

Though a lot of details have not been settled, some things are becoming clear- the farmer’s market with outside vendors will eventually move from their current location near the Grace Arents Community Garden to one side of the Fine Foods building and possibly be open everyday to sell fresh produce. (This is where the Fancy Flea market was held previously.) The Fine Foods building itself will go through a major overhaul. There’s discussion of adding a whole floor to the building and doing significant landscaping changes to the asphalt parking lot area. Solar panels and/or green roof are part of that. A portion of the building will be reserved for gardening and community workshops. The grocery shelves will gradually become more oriented to natural/healthy/gourmet.

Perhaps of more interest to current Fine Foods patrons, the new business will, at least in the beginning, retain the employees of Fine Foods to sell selections from their expanded beer fridge as well as lottery tickets.