Category Archives: Food & Drink

With craft old fashioneds, fancy fritters, and holes of the highest standard, Half and Half Doughnut Co. now open on Capitol Hill

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(Image: Half and Half Doughnut Co.)

Here is the bad news. You live in a neighborhood where a craft old-fashioned doughnut costs $2.75. The good news? It might be the best old fashioned you’ve ever had.

Also, you should eat fewer doughnuts anyhow.

Half and Half Doughnut Co. — from the man who helped grow Top Pot from Summit Ave to the largest scale doughnut operation in the city — is now open on E Pike with a case full of filled old-fashioneds, fritters, and a craft take on the overlooked but now risen to new heights doughnut holes — here called bomba or bombs.

After a quiet weekend start, expect a busy Tuesday morning in the new shop. Continue reading →

Developer says return of City Market in the plans for seven-story E Olive Way development

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Developers working on the project to create a new seven-story, mixed-use building at the site of Capitol Hill’s City Market say the popular corner store is part of the plan.

“I am happy to report that City Market will be coming back into the new building,” Charlie Bauman of developer Barrientos Ryan tells CHS. “We are excited to be working with them to integrate their new store into the development.” Continue reading →

After big time attention, Capitol Hill ‘Hot Guys Serving Hot Coffee’ stand has new name, remains shirtless

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After only one month of business, Broadway’s coffee Dreamboyz are now men.

Dreamguyz Espresso, to be exact.

After making international news with Seattle’s second* ever man-kini coffee shack, the business had to make a quick shift, owners tell CHS, after some ownership issues came up with a company in the United Kingdom over the coffee window’s original Dreamboyz name.

The Dreamguyz folks aren’t naming names but The Dreamboys male strip shows do big business “every Saturday night in 13 UK cities.”

Meanwhile, the show goes on at the Broadway walk-up and drive-thru coffee business under the new Dreamguyz Espresso name.

‘Very early’ but City Market property being lined up for new E Olive Way mixed-use project — UPDATE

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City Market (Image: CHS)
(Image: @officialcitymarket)

They had better include a giant wall for the City Market poster sign maker to continue their impressive body of work.

Early filings with the City of Seattle show plans are in motion for a “Olive + Bellevue” project, a planned seven-story “multi-family building with ground floor commercial space” to rise along E Olive Way above the property currently home to City Market and its laundromat sibling.

Developer Barrientos Ryan and architect Caron have begun the process of planning the new project. Charlie Bauman of Barrientos Ryan tells CHS his firm is “very early in this process.” Continue reading →

CHS Pics | The Capitol Hill Friends couch will still be there for you

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No complaining! You deserved that headline! (Image: Ada’s Discovery Cafe)

Hundreds of otherwise likable people lined up on E Thomas last Sunday for a few selfie-filled seconds on the couch from Friends.

Why was this particular orange couch in the middle of a Capitol Hill street so popular when so many others go unloved? CHS reported here on the nostalgia-rich marketing underway for the show’s 25th anniversary at The Lounge by AT&T project that has temporarily converted Ada’s Discover Cafe into the onetime hit sitcom and now top-streamer’s Central Perk.  Continue reading →

With carts of meatballs and salumi, ‘fancy and simple’ Altura sibling Carrello now open on Broadway

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With numbered carts full of rabbit meatballs, roasted peppers, alici anchovies, fried artichokes, and albacore crudo, and salumi sliced “until it’s gone,” chef Nathan Lockwood’s Carrello is now open on North Broadway.

Watching him carefully but forcefully slicing a robust mortadella from Olympia Provisions out of Portland, you might get the idea that he opened Carrello just to showcase the blade passing through the loaf of pork, pistachios, and “warm spices.”

“I got one of these slicers about 15 years ago for a different restaurant. You sort of never forget them. They’re magical,” Lockwood told CHS Wednesday night on the restaurant’s second night of business. “I just wanted to put it in the dining room.” Continue reading →

With Urban Animal vet clinic expansion, sun will set on Cafe Solstice Capitol Hill

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(Image: Cafe Solstice)

(Image: Urban Animal )

Capitol Hill’s cats will love it. For the students and neighbors who hang out there for hours cramming, talking, and hanging out in one of the neighborhood’s largest, most bustling coffee houses, it will be a sad day.

Staff are telling friends and regulars that the Capitol Hill Cafe Solstice will shutter at the corner of 10th and Thomas mid-month. CHS has learned that neighboring veterinary clinic Urban Animal is set to expand into the space bringing an end to its five years as a cafe. It’s a much needed expansion, Dr. Cherri Trusheim tells CHS.

“We just don’t have enough room for the volume that comes through the door,” Trusheim said. “Quite frankly, it’s been crazy sometimes.” Continue reading →

Firings, an employee walkout, and a row over homelessness at Capitol Hill’s Caffe Vita — UPDATE

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(Image: Caffe Vita)

Two employees were fired — and another five reportedly quit in solidarity — after a disagreement over how homeless people should be treated at Caffe Vita’s flagship E Pike shop.

Liz McConnell confirmed the firings and walkout with CHS as social media efforts have spread calling out the Capitol Hill-headquartered coffee chain for firing a trans employee and criticizing a Vita manager’s message about homeless people receiving free coffee or food at its cafes.

McConnell, citing legal concerns, said she could not confirm details of the firings other than they were “with cause” and involved both a manager and en employee. She also confirmed that a Vita manager had sent the message about the free handouts being shared on social media. Continue reading →

After nearly 25 years, Capitol Hill’s classic Roanoke Park Place Tavern to get new owners

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(Image: Roanoke Park Place Tavern)

After nearly 25 years, one of Capitol Hill’s oldest of old school bars is getting new owners.

Chris and Jeff Price tell CHS they are stepping away from the Roanoke Park Place Tavern, the North Capitol Hill bar they have owned and run together since May of 1995.

“It’s become a place with a lot of ghosts,” Chris tells CHS about the decision.

Stepping out from behind the bar to take over the Roanoke will be a couple who have also served many a drinker from behind the pub’s bar. The buyers are Sean Donovan and Teresa McElhinney. While the deal hasn’t yet closed, Price says she believe the bar is in excellent hands to keep the good times coming and help extend the building’s reported 89 or so years as a tavern and 39 years as the Roanoke. Continue reading →