Eat It, Virginia!

There's a greenhouse in Goochland growing some of the freshest lettuce in town. Greenswell Growers hopes its hydroponically-grown greens can solve a grocery store concern for some shoppers. "We've all been in the grocery store picked up that package of greens and seen that wet, nasty tray in the bottom of it and put it back on the shelf and said, I'm not eating that," Greenswell Growers president Carl Gupton said on theEat It, Virginia podcast. "The reason is that that was harvested three, four, five, six days ago at a minimum. It's harvested, cool chain there [California or Arizona], traveled across the country, hit a distribution center. It's not just a problem of fresh produce, they've got drought. We've all seen the mega droughts going on in California. It's changing the way that we are consuming. Throw COVID on top of it and the supply chain is broken in a lot of ways for our food system. We talk with some of our food distributors and when they order from the West Coast, they d...

Gwen and Brittny Hurt are the mother-daughter team behind Shoe Crazy Wine and Spirits. They started the Richmond-based business after one of the worst weeks of their lives. "I was downsized from a company I spent 17 years in," Gwen shared on the Eat It, Virginia podcast. "They said they needed to replace my skills with other skills. I have a degree from a historically black college here in the U.S and I was working in China, and they said they needed [someone from] Yale or Harvard or an Ivy League school because our organization was now being reported to the board. So they let me go." When Gwen flew back to the states after losing her job, the situation did not improve. "I was going to my office to clean my desk and we were in a car accident. We were at a red light and this gentleman slammed into us at 55 miles an hour," she said. "So we get the bad news at the hospital. My back is injured. My neck is injured. Brittny's bursa sac and her hip were destroyed." It was during their at-home recovery, that their new life emerged. "We did physical therapy. It was a year of physical therapy. And after three, four weeks of crying in my room with the shades drawn, Brittny's trapped upstairs with her cane. She couldn't walk, I could barely move. I got on my walker and I just said, I can't stay in this room anymore," Gwen said. "So I kind of took the walker and toddled out into the great room and said, 'Brittny, we're going into the wine business.'" And with that, Shoe Crazy Wine was born. But the hard work was only just beginning. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Chef Danny Mena and Beverage Director Lauren Spain recently opened Big Kitchen Hospitality's newest restaurant Conejo in Richmond, Virginia. For Mena, a native of Mexico City, Conejo is a chance for him to show off a side of his hometown he finds under-represented at many Mexican restaurants in the U.S. "Mexico City is very cosmopolitan. It's not the typical idea that a lot of people have of Mexican food. It's a big city with a lot going on. And that's my influence," he said. "I'm a city boy, born and raised. And so that's what we're trying to bring [here], a modern take on traditional food." Mena cooked in some big-name New York City restaurants and opened two of his own (Hecho en Dumbo and La Loncheria) before he was tapped to lead the Conejo kitchen. And in that kitchen, Mena said he and his team lean on quality ingredients. "The quality of meat that we use, the quality of ingredients that we do is far superior [to many other Mexican restaurants]," he said. "We luckily have the t...

While Kendall Appich might have been working at Capital One in Richmond, her dream job was not with the area's largest employer. "I had that, I wouldn't say midlife crisis, but just like, I'm still young enough in my late 20s. where if I want to try something, now's the time we don't have kids," she said. "I've always wanted to be an entrepreneur. I wanted to create the next great food product." After some soul searching and discussion with her husband, the couple landed on a frozen custard truck. Two, to be exact. Learn more about jiji's Frozen Custard on this week's Eat It, Virginia! See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Katie Stuart is a TikTok star. The bar manager of Richmond restaurant Foo Dog, in the Fan, has more than 170,000 followers on the social media app. While she joined TikTok in 2019, she was able to focus more on content creation when she found herself stuck at home during the early days of the pandemic. "The lockdown happened and I didn't have a job anymore," she said. "I was stuck inside with my roommate who was also a bartender. So, it was a way for me to pass the time and stay creative." Using the handle BarDaddy_, a nickname she earned behind the bar at now-defunct Richmond restaurant Fatty Smokes, Stuart posted drink recipes and funny skits to keep herself and her growing fan base entertained. "It was a hobby at first," she said. "Now it's a whole tax form. Now it's a responsibility. I have contracts. I have deadlines. Stuff that I never really expected to happen." Brands reach out to Katie now, hoping she will review their product or create a recipe using their spirit. It seems...

Elizabeth Redford co-founded Tablespoons Bakery as a way to provide jobs and on-the-job training to adults living with disabilities. "We are a part of a larger nonprofit, the Next Move Program, and what we seek to do each day is to combat the 70% unemployment rate for young adults with developmental disabilities here in Virginia," Redford said. "Young adults come here, they do training with us on-site, and then we also have them work in different departments within the bakery, everything from packaging, to marketing, to working in the kitchen, to also doing sales at our main sales counter." On Saturday, May 21, from 10 a.m. to Noon, Scott and Robey will be working at Tablespoons Bakery as part of an effort to help raise money for the Richmond nonprofit. Tablespoons Bakery is located at 1707 Westover Hills Blvd, Richmond, VA 23225. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Some of your favorite Richmond restaurants have teamed up and opened in the same spot. Hatch Local, Richmond's first food hall, is now open on Hull Street in Manchester. Hatch Local consists of seven restaurants: Buttermilk + Honey Sincero The Beet Box Odyssey Fish Fat Kid Sandwiches Royal Pig Bully Burger Hatch Local general manager Annie Holland said the new food hall can help you and your friends answer an age-old question. "You can really come in with a group of people that don't know what they want, or the famous 'I don't know what I want to eat for dinner' question and have a perfect spot," she said. "You can really get whatever you want. And then you can all sit together and eat it." Hatch Local also has craft cocktails to pair with food coming out of the different kitchens. "So you come in and scan one of our QR codes and then ask the bartender and they're more than willing to be in your business and ask what did you get to eat, and then suggest a cocktail," Holland said. "[...

Tanya Cauthen went to school at the University of Virginia to become a rocket scientist. When she left, her focus was on food. It was a path that would eventually lead Cauthen to open Belmont Butchery in Richmond, Virginia, a national television appearance on the Food Network's Chopped, and the East Coast's Meat Queen. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

While Pinky's might be one of the newest restaurants in Richmond, Virginia, co-owner Steve DeRaffele is no stranger to the Richmond restaurant scene. The New York native, who comes from a family that literally helped define the look of Northeast diners, cut his teeth at restaurants like LUNCH:SUPPER and Brunch (remember the waffle flight, kids?). But when it came to opening a place of his own, Steve leaned on his family -- that includes not only the food he serves but the person he honored when it came time to name the restaurant. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

For 10 years, David Avery's smiling face has greeted coffee drinkers at the Starbucks on Gaskins Road in Henrico County, Virginia. In this episode of Eat It, Virginia, David shares some Starbucks secrets, provides coffee-making tips to help you up your home coffee game, and discusses how TikTok has changed the way Starbucks baristas do their jobs. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.