TRIANGLE FOOD BLOG

Triangle Restaurant News

Triangle restaurant news…that not everyone knows. Impress your co-workers at the water cooler.

Featured Restaurant News

•  I’ve been telling you folks for years that we are blessed with some amazing dining options here in the Triangle. But if you won’t listen to me (I understand, I wouldn’t either) please take note of the two HUGE feathers we received this week in our collective cap. First up was the news that the food blog Eater named Raleigh’s Ashley Christensen as their Chef of the Year! And if that wasn’t enough news for one week, Forbes included Raleigh’s Brewery Bhavana on their Top 10 Coolest Places to Eat…in the world! Check out the Eater article here and the Forbes article here.

Wake County Restaurant News

• And if that is not enough Ashley Christensen news, we send out a quick congratulatory note to Ashley wishing her a happy 10th anniversary of Poole’s Diner coming up on December 17th. Kudos Ashley! Check out Poole’s here.

• The big news out of downtown Raleigh this week is that Weaver Street Market, a popular co-op food market founded in Carrboro nearly thirty years ago, will be opening at The Dillon in Raleigh’s warehouse district in late Summer 2018. While I normally don’t cover grocery store news, I have enjoyed some great meals over the years at the other Weaver Street locations (and was employed at the Carrboro location during my college years!). Get familiar with Weaver Street here.

• The ITB Insider and News & Observer both reported this week that after closing Cafe Lucarne in March in City Market, the owners of Royale have re-opened a new concept in the same location as simply Lucarne. Co-owner Jesse Bardyn said the new Lucarne will focus on small plates to snack on while imbibing on cocktails, wine and beer. The new chef is Bobby McFarland, who was previously the chef de cuisine at Royale. Keep up with them on instagram here.

• And keeping the Wahlburger’s vigil alive, reader Jeff Gimondo notified us this week that a sign now hangs outside their “coming soon” location in downtown Raleigh. And their latest Facebook posting in late November was a “now hiring” post. Any day now….Keep up with them on their Facebook page here.

• Over on HIllsborough Street in Raleigh, the ITB Insider reported that Penn Station East Coast Subs will soon be serving their signature sandwiches from the ground floor of the Stanhope at 3001 Hillsborough Street. Permits for the interior completion of the space were issued last week. They already have locations in Cary, Durham, Morrisville and Raleigh. Get familiar with Penn Station here.

• Over in downtown Cary, we first told you about this in May, but it looks like we are very close to the opening of the Postmaster Restaurant and Bar at the corner of E. Cedar St. and North Walker Street. Looks like this weekend they have a soft-opening that is invitation only, with the possibility of it opening to the public next week. Postmaster is the creation of Tyler Watt who also owns and operates Pharmacy Bottle & Beverage just a block away. Keep up with it all on their Facebook page here.

• WRAL shared the news this week that that California Tortilla, fast-casual Mexican-inspired restaurant, will soon expand into North Carolina for the first time after inking a deal in Raleigh. California Tortilla is currently looking for retail locations in the Triangle and hoping to open in late 2018. Get familiar with them here.

• We told you about this back on October 6th, but it became official recently that Rocky Top Catering sold Twisted Fork in Raleigh and Dean’s Kitchen+Bar in Cary to Darryl Cook (wonder if he will change it to Darryl’s…) of  Cook Hospitality Group. Cook formerly managed Empire Eats restaurants. Rocky Top will open a new catering kitchen in 2018 and will focus on their catering and event venues. Check out Dean’s here and Twisted Fork here.

Durham, Orange & Chatham Restaurant News

• The Wine Feed, a Raleigh-based wine bar and shop, is opening a second location in downtown Durham at 305 S. Roxboro Street. Opening in early 2018, it will feature an indoor and outdoor wine bar and lounge area that offers wines by the glass, tasting flights and snacks for pairing with wine. An expanded retail wine section will also offer a diverse selection of wines to take home. The adjoining event space, Pine & Poplar, will accommodate up to 125 people for wedding receptions, corporate functions or private gatherings. The Wine Feed will be located next to Bull City Ciderworks. Check them out here.

Closings

• Got word from readers Sharon and Todd Dawson that the North Raleigh location of Chubby Tacos at Falls River Town Center has closed after a seven-year run.

• And John Huisman, aka Triangle Explorer, noted on Twitter that the coffee trailer in Carrboro called Tin Cup Joe is closing up shop at the end of December. Last call for those Dr. Pepper lattes.

Food Trucks

• So if you love food trucks and are looking for a good cause to support this time of year, do I have the opportunity for you. Carly Erickson is in the middle of a Kickstarter campaign (halfway there!) to fund the next phase of her Boro Beverage business – a “beverage camper” that will allow her to mobilize her dream of bringing healthy drinks to the Triangle. Consider helping her Kickstarter campaign here. Thanks to Julie Albert for bringing this to our attention!

• Or if you are thinking you want a career change in 2018, how about owning and operating a food truck? Right now you can purchase the Mac-Ur-Roni food trailer (a turnkey purchase) for just $55k (an additional $20k if you want the truck to pull it). Say goodbye to that boring 9-5 desk job crunching numbers for the man. Check it out here.

• So, with the cold months upon us there simply aren’t many “official” food truck rodeos happening. So, you will have to act like a squirrel and really work to find your food trucks for the next several months. Here are a couple of online resources to help you do just that (please note, this is not an endorsement of any of these sites, just an effort to help my readers find their favorite trucks). Street Food Finder is one, check them out here. And another is aptly named Roaming Hunger and you can find them here.

Events

• The new WRAL.com Voters’ Choice Awards voting is under way now through December 17. The awards allow you to vote for your favorite North Carolina people, places and businesses, from the mountains to the coast. Vote here. And while you are there, if you love my blog I would be greatly honored if you’d throw a vote my way for Best Blogger! 🙂

• Families for a Change will hold their Chefs for a Change Dessert Gala tonight, December 8th from 7-10 p.m. at the Rickhouse in Durham. In addition to celebrating their extremely successful inaugural year, they will be announcing the 2018 chef line-up at 9 p.m. If you want to make it tonight, get your tickets here.

• The 3rd Annual Bull City Holiday Food & Wine Soirée will take place again this year at the Rickhouse in Durham on Sunday, December 10th from 1 to 5 pm.  It is a food and beverage-centric pop-up holiday market with over 25 local NC producers.  This year pick up your stocking stuffers, Secret Santa gifts and holiday treats all in one place while you support local businesses. Get all the details here.

• And here is a great event to kick off your 2018… Can you say sausage!?! Durham’s first Sausagefest invites meat-lovers to taste and stock your fridge with locally crafted sausages from your favorite restaurants and butcher shops! VIP tickets include early entry from noon – 1pm with passed appetizers, T-shirt and an exclusive sausage making demo. General Admission entry from 1 – 4pm. Sausages of all kinds will be available for take home from First Hand Foods, Left Bank Butchery and more. Restaurants providing bites to include Gocciolina, Dashi, The Root Cellar, Black Twig Cider House and more.  VIP tickets (Noon – 1pm) are $45; General Admission (1-4 p.m.) are $25. Get all the details and tickets here.

• Also, the dates for the Lucy Daniels Center 2018 version of their popular Cooking for a Classic have been set. This year’s event consists of three rounds and eight chefs vying to win a restored ’49 truck. It is gorgeous! The first round kicks off on Monday, January 22 and continues through the week. The semifinals are the following week and the final showdown will be on Wednesday, February 7th. This year’s competing chefs are Trey Cleveland of Top of the Hill, Chapel Hill; Matt Hannon of Ironwood Café, Southern Pines; Jonathan Ballard of Dean’s Kitchen and Bar, Cary; James Patterson, McConnell Golf Dining; Troy Stauffer, City Club Raleigh; Aaron Matyac, Whiskey Kitchen, Raleigh; Dean Thompson, Raleigh Renaissance Hotel; and Nick Fay, Coquette, Raleigh. Get a peek at the truck and all the details here.

Food Bank Corner

• No child or family should go hungry during the holidays… and with your help, they won’t! That’s the power of your giving when you share a meal from your table to theirs. Help reach the goal of 2.5 million meals before December 31!

• A gift of $35 will feed a child for twoFOUR months
• A gift of $85 will provide groceries to an elderly couple for over twoFOUR months
• A gift of $120 will provide enough food to sustain a familyTWO FAMILIES through the winter months
• A gift of $210 will provide more than 1,0002,000 piping hot holiday meals to local familiesAnd your gift goes even further this winter. To help make sure our neighbors have enough to eat, friends of the Food Bank have generously agreed to match donations, up to $56,000, now through December 31st. Help ensure that no one goes hungry this holiday season…Share a meal today!

Triangle Restaurant News

Triangle restaurant news…that not everyone knows. Impress your co-workers at the water cooler.

Featured Restaurant News

•  Alright Ursula Littlejohn, here is the spot for our next lunch! WRAL shared the great news that Dame’s Chicken and Waffles will be opening a third Triangle-area location. Located on the ground floor of Liberty Warehouse Apartments at 530 Foster Street, this one is not too far from their original Durham location on Main Street. They also have a location in Cary as well as in Greensboro.  If you haven’t already done so, get familiar with Dame’s here.

Wake County Restaurant News

• Got word from JMR Kitchens Restaurant Group owners Justin and Ryan Riek that their Medlin Drive location of Taste has changed to Tuesday through Sunday dinner service until January 27th – at which time that location will close. That’s the bad news. The great news is they have opened another Taste location (Five Points) at 1912 Bernard St in the Highpark Shopping Center off Whitaker Mill. In addition to dinner service (same menu as Medlin location) seven days a week, they also run coffee/brunch service from 7a to 1p Tuesday through Saturday and Sunday Brunch from 10a to 2p. Check out all their restaurants here.

• Coleen Speaks, who recently launched the event venue Whitaker & Atlantic, has opened a cocktail bar and café called Hummingbird in the adjacent space. Located at Dock 1053, at the corner of Whitaker Mill and Atlantic Ave., it is open Monday through Saturday from 8am until midnight. Check it out here.

• The on-again, off-again story of Boylan Bridge Brewpub continues with WRAL reporting that is has closed again, but just temporarily. The restaurant reopened in May after being closed for more than a year after a wall collapsed. A drop-off in business, attributed to street closures due to the construction of the multi-use development The Dillon, led to the most recent closure. Look for it to reopen early next year. Read the full article here.

• The ITB Insider reported that permits have been issued for Kaiju Bowl & Bao, the latest offering from Ken Yowell who also owns the Oak City Meatball Shop and Calavera Empanadas and Tequila. The new restaurant, located at 170 East Davie Street in the former home of Dickey’s BBQ, will offer a kind of “Asian chicken wing.” Keep up with their progress on their Facebook page here.

• Also in downtown Raleigh, it was announced this week that Barcelona Wine Bar, a wine and tapas restaurant inspired by the culture of Spain, will be opening at The Dillon in the Warehouse District at 223 W. South Street. They currently have locations throughout Connecticut and in Atlanta, Boston, Philadelphia, Nashville, Reston Virginia and Washington DC. The Dillon location will be their first restaurant in the Raleigh market. Get familiar with them here.

• In North Raleigh, reader Rebecca Calhoun notified us that the Nothing Bundt Cakes location at Falls Village (6643 Falls of Neuse Rd.) opened yesterday, and they have opening events schedule for today (December 1) and tomorrow. Check out their website for all the details.

• Also in Falls Village, the ITB Insider reported that a wine and craft beer shop with a taproom called Falls Village Wine & Beer opened its doors for the first time last week. So now bundt cakes and beer. What else could North Raleigh possibly need? Not much on their website yet, but get the latest on their Facebook page here.

• Just a little bit further north in LaFayette Village, owner Michael Bongiorno informed us that Zanyu Asian Noodles is now open with a limited pre-opening menu and they are adding dishes by the day! Check out their Facebook page to get all the details.

• Reader Hugh Autry notified us that La Roca Mexican Grill has opened in Raleigh at the Garner Station shopping center at 1431 Garner Station Blvd. Check them out on Facebook here.

• Over in Cary, Autry also noticed that there is a Buffalo Brothers moving into the former Outback location at Saltbox Village on Kildaire Farm Road. Buffalo Brothers already has locations in Raleigh, Garner and Wake Forest. No word yet on a timeline. Check them out here.

• Sassool continues their explosive growth announcing that their Cary location has added a new grocery and retail section. The addition opened November 27 in the space formerly occupied by Neighborhood Bottle Shop in the Shoppes of Kildaire at 1347 Kildaire Farm Road. Check out Sassool here.

• Also in Cary, congratulations to Cary-based ice cream shop, Andia’s Homemade Ice Cream as their French Vanilla ice cream won second place at the National Ice Cream Retailers Association (NICRA) conference this November, a coveted prize among national ice cream shop owners. Check them out here.

• And we were deeply saddened to learn of the passing of Wake Forest’s Bill Joyner, who owned and operated Shorty’s Hot Dogs with his son Chris. Bill Joyner’s grandfather and Uncle “Shorty” opened the restaurant in 1916. We lost a truly great man. Rest in Peace. Shorty’s.

Durham, Orange & Chatham Restaurant News

• Chapel Hillians rejoice! You no longer have to drive to Durham for your holiday stollen! This week the much-anticipated location of Guglhupf opened in Eastgate Crossing. Guglhupf Bake Shop is just a few doors down from Trader Joe’s. Check them out here.

• Antonio McBroom, who owns the Franklin Street location of Ben & Jerry’s, opened a location in November in the Streets at Southpoint mall according to The Daily Tar Heel. Check them out here.

• And Chapel Hill’s Franklin Street is getting (wait for it) another pizza place. Reader Delonda Alexander notified us that MidiCi, The Neopolitan Pizza Company, will move into the former Ackland Art Museum gift shop space below Top of the Hill at the corner of Franklin and Columbia streets. Check them out here.

Closings

• Got word from the folks over at Market Street Coffee that after over ten years of serving the Meadowmont community in Chapel Hill, they will be closing on December 15th. They still have locations on Elliot Road in Chapel Hill and in Carrboro. Get more information on those locations here.

Food Trucks

• RDUMFA is hosting their 3rd Annual Rudolph’s Holiday Rodeo at Knightdale Station Park on Sunday, December 3rd from noon to 4 pm. Eleven decorated trucks will be there donating proceeds to Meals on Wheels of Wake County. Meals on Wheels of Wake County will be there to share information about their programs (donate, sign up and/or volunteer). There will also be a 50/50 raffle. Get the details on this rodeo on their Facebook event page here. Thanks Art Sheppard!

• So, with the cold months upon us there simply aren’t many “official” food truck rodeos happening. So, you will have to act like a squirrel and really work to find your food trucks for the next several months. Here are a couple of online resources to help you do just that (please note, this is not an endorsement of any of these sites, just an effort to help my readers find their favorite trucks). Street Food Finder is one, check them out here. And another is aptly named Roaming Hunger and you can find them here.

Events

• The new WRAL.com Voters’ Choice Awards voting is under way now through December 17. The awards all you to vote for your favorite North Carolina people, places and businesses, from the mountains to the coast. Vote here. And while you are there, if you love my blog I would be greatly honored if you’d throw a vote my way for Best Blogger! 🙂

• The Raleigh Beer Garden will host an International Tasting Festival this Saturday, December 2 from 11:30 until 2:30. Your $35 ticket gives you access to over 220 national and international beers as well as a sampling mug. Get tickets and all the details here.

• The 3rd Annual Bull City Holiday Food & Wine Soirée will take place again this year at the Rickhouse in Durham on Sunday, December 10th from 1 to 5 pm.  It is a food and beverage-centric pop-up holiday market with over 25 local NC producers.  This year pick up your stocking stuffers, Secret Santa gifts and holiday treats all in one place while you support local businesses. Get all the details here.

Food Bank Corner

• No child or family should go hungry during the holidays… and with your help, they won’t! That’s the power of your giving when you share a meal from your table to theirs. Help reach the goal of 2.5 million meals before December 31!
• A gift of $35 will feed a child for twoFOUR months
• A gift of $85 will provide groceries to an elderly couple for over twoFOUR months
• A gift of $120 will provide enough food to sustain a familyTWO FAMILIES through the winter months
• A gift of $210 will provide more than 1,0002,000 piping hot holiday meals to local families

  And your gift goes even further this winter. To help make sure our neighbors have enough to eat, friends of the Food Bank have generously agreed to match donations, up to $56,000, now through December 31st. Help ensure that no one goes hungry this holiday season…Share a meal today!

Raising a Ruckus

• Fellow restaurateurs, Ruckus Pizza has created a non-profit organization, Raising a Ruckus (RAR), which works with local guidance counselors to help identify families most in need in our Wake County School system. These are families that without someone stepping in to help, would not have what many of us know as “Christmas.” In the spirit of the season, we would like to reach out to our fellow restaurant owners and see if you would be open to partnering with us for collaboration on this annual project.

  Ruckus will take care of the organization of the project, including identifying the families needs, creating marketing materials, putting together all materials your restaurant would need and coordinating the pickup and delivery of the items to these families. What we are asking of you is to consider “adopting” one of these families with us and promoting the giving tree in your location and working to collect all items on the family’s wish list. More often than not, most items are basics like socks, pants, a jacket, a gift card for groceries, a new doll and other basic items.

  With several of us working together, we can partner to help provide for those most in need in our area and allow our customers to get involved in the giving process. This is a brief summary of the program, so please don’t hesitate to reach out to us on how to get involved or if you have more questions. We hope you will consider a partnership together during the time of year that can often be one of the most difficult for those in need. For more information contact: [email protected]