After about four years, Honey Butter’s Kitchen in the Monticello Marketplace shopping center has returned to dinner service. Instead of closing Tuesday through Saturday at 3 p.m., the restaurant is now open until 9 p.m.
Owner Jason Steeg said it was time to return to a dinner business that was eliminated at the outset of COVID-19.
“We have a staff available, and I felt there was a need on this side of town” for dinners, which are now available five nights a week. Honey Butter’s continues to close on Sunday at 4 p.m., and the business is not open on Monday. Honey Butter’s in Norge will continue to offer breakfast and lunch and will not reopen at dinnertime.
Michael Poissant is the night manager and bartender and “the face” of Honey Butter’s at night.
This is the third week that dinners have been offered, and “it’s been very slow, which we had expected at first,” Steeg acknowledged. “We didn’t do a lot of advertising early because we didn’t want to be overwhelmed.”
“But business has been picking up every week. Through the years, our local following has been a mainstay.” Even in the years without dinners, he emphasized, “we’ve had many customers who return weekly” and some twice or more a week.
When customers walk into the restaurant, which opened in 2011, the shelves behind the bar look different. Now, there are dozens of bottles of bourbon, which will be a featured drink. “I have a passion for bourbon,” Steeg said. “I’ve collected a number of different bourbons over the years and decided I would make them available here.”
Virginia ABC stores have made it difficult to collect bourbon, he said, “but many now can be found here.” There will be a variety of bourbon cocktails available, plus a wide variety of other liquor and beers.
Steeg said that the menu for dinners will focus on burgers and sandwiches, but not include a lot of dinner entrées. “We have a kind of combination of our breakfast and lunch menus for dinner. We’ll also offer our favorites entrées — buttermilk fried catfish, chicken fried chicken and chicken livers.”
Chicken livers will be available at all meals: with eggs at breakfast, as a snack at lunch and an entrée at dinner.
Whaling Co. property sold
Seafood restaurant The Whaling Company LLC has sold its 2.75-acre parcel to 494WC LLC for $1.4 million.
The property is located at 494 and 496 McLaws Circle in Busch Corporate Center in James City County.
Whaling Co. general manager Stephen York said he has a new landlord and that the restaurant will continue operations.
494WC LLC also purchased the adjacent 1 acre former branch bank lot for $875,000 from VAN496 LLC, according to the Thalhimer’s Capital Markets group. The sale was completed by Clark Simpson and Erik Conradi of Thalhimer’s Capital Markets Group.
Jefferson Inn recognizes first responders
Mark Wright and his son E.J. opened the doors of the Jefferson Inn restaurant on Sept. 12 for the 22nd annual September 11th Memorial Dinner.
About 50 on-duty fire, police and EMS personnel serving Williamsburg and James City and York counties accepted the Wrights’ invitation to the free dinner for first responders.
Mark Wright, who has been a Williamsburg Fire Department volunteer for 35 years, said he felt it was important to recognize first line personnel across the Greater Williamsburg area, especially on the anniversary of the World Trade Center disaster.
The Jefferson Inn was opened in 1956 by James and Harriet Petrelli and was succeeded in ownership by their son Edward Wright and his wife, Julie. Mark Wright is the third generation of the family to own the well-known family restaurant. E.J.— the fourth generation — began working as busboy and dishwasher when he was a youngster and now works, like his father, seven days a week.
Enterprise Center picks realtor
Lovett Industrial of Houston has selected the Cushman & Wakefield | Thalhimer real estate firm of Richmond to provide exclusive leasing services for its new Class A speculative industrial park known as Lovett 64 Commerce Center in James City County.
The planned six-building, 2.21-million-square-foot Class A industrial park is located on 328 acres of land located at Exit 227 off Interstate 64.
According to Cushman & Wakefield, the proposed Lovett Center is uniquely positioned along the primary transit corridor between the Port of Virginia Hampton Roads and its four marine terminals and Richmond.
Geoff Poston, SIOR and Ellis Colthorpe of Cushman & Wakefield | Thalhimer are the representatives on behalf of Lovett Industrial.
Everbowl coming to James City
Everbowl, described as a superfood experience, was launched in 2016 as a quick-serve restaurant designed “to give people the nutrition they need to fuel their active lifestyles with superfood bowls and smoothies that are not only healthy, but also delicious,” founder Jeff Fenster said.
Approximately 1,000 square feet have been leased by Everbowl at Marketplace Shoppes on Monticello Avenue in James City County, according to S.L. Nusbaum Realty Co. of Norfolk. Site work is underway now, and it is hoped the business will open in early October.
Positions with the restaurant are open. For more information, follow on Instagram @everbowl_williamsburg.
Wilford Kale, [email protected]
This content was originally published here.
