by Leo Suarez

Winter 2015 Restaurant Roundup

Carolina Ale House in Glenwood South
Each year, downtown Raleigh seems to have a burst of new shops. 2013 was the year of the bottle shop. As we wrapped up last year, I think it’s safe to say that 2014 was the year of the bakery. 2015 could be the year the barcade but that’s still left to be seen. Here’s the list of Winter openings and coming soons for 2015.

For a complete list of eats, drinks, and coffees in and around downtown, make sure to bookmark the DT Eats page. Try something new!

  • Pictured above, the Glenwood South Carolina Ale House is finally open after being announced years ago. On the top floor of the new 3-story building at the corner of Tucker Street and Glenwood Avenue, the flagship restaurant has some pretty nice views and plenty of space for large sports parties.
  • For the rest of the building at 500 Glenwood Avenue, plans are in place to set up a Mediterranean restaurant and a banquet hall. When I asked, I was told that these were hoping to be ready by August of this year.
  • The construction work on the Raleigh Beer Garden is really taking shape. The beer garden, with over 100 taps, should be open later this year.
  • Pho Pho Pho Noodle Kitchen & Bar is now hiring for the restaurant going into the former Oryx space in the 510 Glenwood building. Owned by Quy Duong, who also owns Sushi Blues, the new spot will be “bringing authentic Vietnamese cuisine and crafty cocktails” to Glenwood South.
  • Could this be a cannoli from the upcoming Italian restaurant Big Boom? (planned for the corner space in 510 Glenwood)

  • The downtown bakery scene has really heated up with the opening of Lucettegrace on Salisbury Street. There are some very tasty pastries, almost works of art, here and I highly recommend.
  • Rounding out the 2014 year of the bakery is Night Kitchen Bakehouse and Cafe in Seaboard Station. I’ve picked up some delicious breads here recently and is another recommendation.
  • The Level Up, Kitchen and Barcadium, located at 126 South Salisbury Street, is opening very soon. The place wants to serve pub food and craft beer around classic arcade games.
  • Still nothing new, of significance, on Ashley Christensen’s new place, Death and Taxes, planned for 200 South Salisbury Street.
  • On Fayetteville Street, La Volta has closed but has quickly turned around to a new Caribbean concept called The Twisted Mango.
  • The restaurant space in the Marriott Hotel is open again but this time as Rye Bar & Southern Kitchen.
  • A small, cozy bar, called Anchor Bar, has opened on the 200 block of Fayetteville Street.
  • WRAL reports of a new brewery coming to downtown Raleigh by the owners of Bida Manda. The article says that the location hasn’t been determined but I was at a Central CAC meeting about 2-3 months ago and the same owners were there presenting plans for a restaurant at 501 South Person Street. (The CAC didn’t vote for the needed rezoning) The renovated church at 501 South Person is probably not big enough for a brewery so either there are two projects going on by the Bida Manda folks or this is where the brewery is trying to go.
  • Mo’s Diner has changed their name to Holly’s on Hargett.
  • A Facebook page and website for a gastropub called Whiskey Kitchen has popped up. The maps show it going at 201 West Martin Street.
  • The Boxcar Bar and Arcade has opened in the warehouse district on Davie Street. They are continuing to add more games and is a pretty fun place to visit if you’re into video games.
  • A cockatil supply and tasting bar called ABV, run by Crude Bitters and Sodas and Eco-Tech Draft, is open at 517 West Cabarrus Street.
  • The folks behind The Busy Bee Cafe and Trophy Brewing have opened a Bottle Shop, The State of Beer, at 401 Hillsborough Street. The new shop sells craft beer and tasty sandwiches.
  • Highlighted on the blog last week, work continues on the new space for Taverna Agora on Hillsborough Street.
  • A coffee, wine, and beer shop called Drink, Drank, Drunk has opened near the West Morgan Street and Hillsborough Street roundabout.
  • Nearby, in the 927 Morgan Apartment building, P.G. Werth’s is now open.
  • The highly anticipated opening of Standard Foods is coming soon as the restaurant, grocery store is now hiring.

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14 Comments

  1. I think the 2 I’m most excited about are Standard Foods and Death & Taxes. Does anyone know why the latter has taken so long to open and there is still no update?

  2. @Jeff^^ – I checked out the interior of Death & Taxes a few Saturdays ago when Goodnight Raleigh was hosting that day of self guided tours of 4 different historic buildings in Raleigh. First of all, it is MASSIVE. We actually got lost a few times, thinking we were back on the ground floor, when really we were on the 2nd floor… then took the stairs down and ended up in the basement. 2nd of all, I got to climb up to the roof, which was hella fun. Decent view from up there, and the roof of the building next door could totally be renovated someday to be rooftop seating for D&T (I’m just dreaming, I don’t actually know if it’s structurally sound for that, but damn it would be cool). 3rd and most importantly: the interior is a mess still. I mean it seriously looks like they just started working on it (which cannot possibly be the case, so I’m assuming this was a massive renovation undertaking). I don’t want to say anything negative, because A.C. is so respected, and therefore I have a strong feeling they know exactly what they are doing…. but boy…. from looking around, it seems like it’ll be another 2 years before the interior is complete. I’m talking drywall, bare floors, pipes & wires coming out of the walls, a hole or two in the floor here & there…. it’s rough. There are two bars being built, one on the first floor, another on the second floor- so I mean there HAS been progress… but it just looks like it’s going to take FOREVER. The bank vault down in the basement was pretty sweet! As far as I know, I believe she is planning on the old bank vault to be the wine cellar. And then the top floor is a HUGE open space, which makes sense because I believe that is going to be a banquet hall you can rent out…… I just can’t see that being cheap haha. Overall, it’s going to make a beautiful, high class restaurant some day. That’s the thing though; “some day” doesn’t look like it’s coming ANYtime soon.

  4. I live across the street from the 501 S Person church. They are definitely NOT putting the brewery there and a stipulation for the rezoning has said as such. Hopefully something from the Bida Manda folks will go in there, but it won’t be the brewery.

  5. I was wondering about death and taxes as well. On a side note, it would be nice to get that dumpster out of the street. And why has that dumpster been in front of Centro for so long? Management at that place has to be sick of that? Just an observation… There will always be construction somewhere.

  7. Centro renovated their 2nd floor for Gallo Pelón Mezcaleria!! They ran into complications during construction but just got over $30k from a fundraiser. Hopefully finishing up and opening soon!

  8. A quote from a recent N&O article featuring info about “Level Up Bar + Arcade” and other new retail/restaurants says: “Ashley Christensen’s wood-fire restaurant Death & Taxes and private event space Bridge Club are expected to open this spring at the corner of Hargett and Salisbury streets in downtown Raleigh.” …….I really hope so!!! But to reiterate from my (long ass) comment above, I cannot see how this is possible unless they plan on tripling up on construction workers and work at least 80hour weeks. But hey, fingers crossed!!! Not trying to be a negative nancy, just trying to be realistic based on what I saw.

  11. I visited downtown Charlotte last weekend and it was interesting what a marked difference there was in the quality of downtown dining, retail and other consumer-oriented stores (esp. coffee shops!!). Charlotte’s DT was a good deal more expansive and more developed than Raleigh’s but it was much more focused on commercial office space. It seems the lack of large scale commercial development in Raleigh helped keep prices low enough that the locally owned dining and retail could move in more easily and the arts community was really able to flourish. I wonder if having the different colleges nearby helped spur that as well.

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