17 minute read
FOOD & DRINK
FOOD
& DRINK
Starlight Doughnut Lab just opened a brick-and-mortar in Norwood.
PHOTO: STEPHANIE SCARBROUGH
Sweet Success
Norwood’s new Starlight Doughnut Lab sells out of its creatively avored baked goods in less than two hours on opening day
BY MAIJA ZUMMO
If opening weekends are any indication of success, Starlight Doughnut Lab’s future is glaringly bright.
On Jan. 15, Starlight opened up shop at 4603 Carter Ave. in Norwood, the rst brick-and-mortar for the popular pop-up.
“On opening day we had a line out the door and around the block from when we opened at 9 a.m. until we sold out at 10:45 a.m.,” owner/baker Ben Greiwe tells CityBeat. “My co-owner Jack Nowlin and I scrambled to make free donut cards to give to the people that waited in line but missed out on donuts. We wanted to make sure people knew we appreciated them coming out and supporting us.”
Starlight has been in operation since the start of January 2019, when Greiwe made some donuts for a New Year’s Eve party at Nine Giant Brewpub in Pleasant Ridge. After positive feedback, he began selling them weekly at the brewery. Since then, Greiwe’s smallbatch baked goods have been available at destinations including Nine Giant and its Fermentorium, Apricot Co ee House in Pleasant Ridge, Proud Hound in Silverton, Copper & Flame in Overthe-Rhine and more. He even made donuts for CityBeat’s annual Brunched event — a raspberry mimosa donut featuring a champagne glaze with “dry ice to carbonate the raspberries to give the donut that bubbly, mimosa feeling,” Greiwe says.
Starlight’s treats are made a little di erently than your average donut. Greiwe uses mashed potatoes in the dough, which “boosts moisture, sweetness, avor and adds a crispy outside layer thanks to the potato’s natural sugars caramelizing in the fryer,” he says. He says the avor combos and that unique texture set Starlight apart from other local donut purveyors. e Norwood storefront o ers both cake donuts and 48-hour brioche donuts. Greiwe hopes to eventually expand the menu to include cinnamon rolls, fritters and more pastries. But for now, guests can look forward to six “staple” avors and six unique monthly avors. e always-on-themenu options are a churro donut, a vanilla-glazed donut with sprinkles, a chocolate-glazed donut with sprinkles, a double-chocolate donut with sprinkles, a raspberry-lemonade donut and an everything bagel donut with garlic-herb goat cheese.
“My favorite avor we’ve ever done is our everything bagel with garlic-herb goat cheese lling,” Greiwe says. “ is is made with our 48-hour brioche and is a late addition to our staples. I made them for my family’s Christmas Eve party this year, and after I tried them, I knew we had to have these in the store every day.”
For January, patrons can also try donuts in the following avors: carrot cake, dreamsicle, lemon poppyseed, maple butternut squash, brownie batter and raspberry-jam- lled (this
Starlight founder Ben Greiwe
PHOTO: STEPHANIE SCARBROUGH Starlight sold 700 donuts its fi rst day in business.
PHOTO: STEPHANIE SCARBROUGH
There are six staple donut fl avors — including an everything bagel brioche donut with garlic-herb goat cheese fi lling — and six monthly specials.
PHOTO: STEPHANIE SCARBROUGH
is a brioche donut). Greiwe also plans to have one vegan avor available per week and, starting in March, one gluten-free avor per month. “We still have to do a couple test batches to get it perfected,” he says of the gluten-free option.
In addition to donuts, Starlight serves local Proud Hound co ee.
For two years, Greiwe and his team have been renovating the petite white building where Starlight is located.
“When picking out our storefront location, I was looking for a neighborhood that was on the rise, close to my house and didn’t have any direct donut competition,” he says. “In the time we have owned the building, we have seen Norwood grow with new restaurants, new apartments and want to be a part of that growth. We plan on being an active member of the Norwood family.”
While the majority of space is taken up by baking operations, the shop does o er a front counter area for ordering grab-and-go, plus a table and two chairs. Greiwe also just made room for more baking supplies to be able to increase the amount of donuts Starlight can make.
“On Saturday, we sold roughly 700 donuts. And on Sunday, we sold roughly 750,” he says of opening weekend. “After we closed on Sunday, we ordered a proo ng cabinet, 12 more pans and racks and another pan holder. In the coming weeks, when all the new equipment arrives, we will be able to increase our production. ”
While he doesn’t have a background in baking, Greiwe says he fell in love with it after his brother, Nick, “sparked a passion for cooking in me.”
“Getting to see him have fun in the kitchen with his friends is one of my favorite memories,” he says. “I lost my brother when I was 18 and (it) really changed my outlook on life. I no longer wanted to just work at a job; I wanted to nd my passion. It took me a while, but when I cook, I’m at peace. I feel like Nick is right there with me.”
Starlight’s donuts will still be available at Nine Giant, with the possibility of adding more stops in the future. Greiwe also hopes to expand his relationship with local farmers to grab more fresh veggies and fruits to add to his baked goods.
But, for now, he is ready to focus on his storefront.
“To be honest, (opening this bakery) is one of the most exciting/terrifying things I’ve ever done,” Greiwe told CityBeat before opening. “Up until Saturday, this has been a dream — we’ve been able to work other jobs and have this as a growing side hustle — but that all changes on Jan. 15. We get to nd out if this donut shop can succeed and support our family operation.”
So far, it looks like his dreams are coming true.
“After the opening, we are over the moon with excitement,” Greiwe says. “ e amount of love and support shown to us over the weekend is insane. So many Norwood natives came out and welcomed us to the neighborhood. And, honestly, we feel hopeful that this turnout will allow us to keep growing and experimenting with avors.”
Hailey Bollinger contributed to this story.
Starlight Doughnut Lab is located at 4603 Carter Ave., Norwood. Get more info at facebook.com/starlightdoughnutlab.
THE DISH
BY LEYLA SHOKOOHE
Greater Cincinnati’s Asian Food Week returns for its third iteration Jan. 31-Feb. 6, coinciding this year with the Lunar New Year.
Created by Asianati, an out t dedicated to promoting and advancing Asian restaurants and businesses in the region (operating in tandem with the Asian American Cultural Association of Cincinnati), Asian Food Week is an expansion of Asian Food Fest. But in its third iteration, it’s safe to say Asian Food Week stands on its own merits.
“It’s overall a celebration and representation of our culture,” says Sam Burke, the social media manager and photographer for Asianati. “ is year, we decided to pair up Asian Food Week along with Lunar New Year, which is Feb. 1, and a holiday celebrated by a lot of Asian countries and a lot of Asian-Americans, so we thought it would be a natural pairing.” e last two years have been particularly challenging for restaurants and the service industry as a whole, but the wave of anti-Asian hate crimes in late 2020 and 2021 have made navigating a pandemic and staying a oat even more challenging for Asian-owned businesses.
“Some restaurants deal with prank calls and large orders that are never picked up or receive calls of harassment, so (this o ers) overall a sense of support and solidarity,” Burke says.
Asian Food Week highlights the diverse array of Asian restaurants in the Greater Cincinnati region; this year, more than 40 restaurants are participating. Customers can order a three-course prix xe meal at $20 or $30 or “secret menu” items not typically o ered at the restaurant. e secret menu special is a nod to the unlisted menu often found at many Asian restaurants across the country that includes traditional dishes that may not conform to mainstream American tastes.
“You could see that a lot with ChineseAmerican restaurants,” Burke says. “ ere was a time where the American palate wasn’t as into traditional Chinese food — (they) were trying to appeal to American palates, which skewed sweet. ese places would have a secret menu for their customers that did want more authentic, traditional reminders of home.”
“So the secret menu is a fun way for these restaurants to do something di erent that you can’t normally nd on their menus,” Burke continues. “ ankfully now, you’re seeing more of a welcoming and curiosity toward more authentic and more adventurous takes on Asian food.” e countries represented by participating restaurants span the whole of the Asian continent. While the Far East is the region of Asia with the most populous restaurant representation locally, Asian fare also means Indian food, Middle Eastern food, Tibetan food and various fusion o erings.
Dope! Asian Street Fare has made its reputation by melding the popular street foods of several Asian cities, citing Kuala Lumpur, Tokyo, Bangkok, Singapore and more among its inspirations. In the two years since the Dope! coterie participated in the rst Asian Food Week, they’ve expanded from their original location in the Kroger On the Rhine food hall into Anderson and Hyde Park and also opened Decibel, a new Korean fried chicken out t with a brick-and-mortar location in Walnut Hills. eir success was not without pandemic-related pitfalls.
“It’s brutal,” says Kam Siu, owner and founder of Dope!. “I think Mapi (De Veyra, operating partner of Decibel) and I, we put in — I think we lost count. At some point we just stopped counting how many hours we put in, just so we could control labor, ll in the shortages and just keep the operation going. We knew we had to get through it, and we were just fortunate to have the team that we have underneath us.”
Maintaining ve restaurants with a great team is ne, but the food has to be good, too. Luckily for Dope!, their fusion menu — including ramen, bao buns, wings, okonomiyaki and more — has hit a sweet spot, occupying the middle of the Venn diagram of the appeal of street food with the panache of in-house attention. But if the recipe for success had already been so clearly laid out, why venture into a more narrowly focused cuisine, like that of Decibel and its unique Korean fried chicken o ering?
“Because Dope! encompasses so many of the di erent countries and avor pro les around Asia, it didn’t really make sense to do a similar concept to it, because it’s already been done,” says Siu. “But we knew the Korean fried chicken, at the time we looked at it, was just expanding and growing really, really fast. All the statistics, everything is there. ere’s no reason why we need to go beyond Korean fried chicken.”
“Let’s just really focus on one concept, one particular style of cooking, and be the best that we can be at this,” Siu continues. “And now, we’re the rst Korean fried chicken here in Cincinnati, with two locations. We’re hoping to do more locations later on.”
Korean fried chicken is wildly crunchy and incredibly good, thanks to its twicefried airy batter. At Decibel, you can select from four di erent chicken “preps,” including dry spice, gochujang barbecue, spicy or garlic soy, served as tenders, wings or drumsticks. You also can select a KFC sammie, gojuchang and soy-cured cukes, zesty wa e fries, Korean rice and a few other side dishes.
Decibel’s Walnut Hills location recently began o ering a Sunday brunch, including a Korean fried chicken and ube wa e.
For Asian Food Week, Dope! shines a spotlight on di erent Asian cultures (Vietnamese, Chinese and Japanese) with three-course meals featuring wings, dumplings and ramen or rice bowls, all for $25.
Part of the Homeskillet Corp. restaurant group, Dope! may have started out as an Asian food venture, but it has become a panoplist representation of individual Asian countries. e group’s ascension in the region’s restaurant culture has transcended any kind of lingering cuisine restrictions, and their ethos and attitude toward food calls to mind a younger, scrappier version of the underdome Restaurant Group (Bakers eld, e Eagle, Maplewood, Pepp & Dolores, Currito, CityBird and Krueger’s).
Siu, De Veyra and other members of the Homeskillet team aren’t resting on any laurels. ey recently acquired the Pelican’s Reef in Anderson — which Siu says they purchased for its welcoming culture and 20-plus years in business — and have robust future plans, including another Dope! location and a move into the Filipino food market.
Bridges Nepali Cuisine is one of 40-plus restaurants participating in Asian Food Week.
PHOTO: CATIE VIOX
Dope! has seen tremendous growth since they participated in the fi rst Asian Food Week.
PHOTO: CATIE VIOX
Maki Express Ramen House is offering a secret menu item for Asian Food Week.
PHOTO: CATIE VIOX
Asian Food Week runs Jan. 31-Feb. 6 in Greater Cincinnati. More info: asianati.com.
THE DISH Restaurant News: Recent Openings and Closings
BY SEAN M. PETERS AND CITYBEAT STAFF
Downtown’s Fred & Gari’s, Total Juice Plus to Close
Lunch won’t be the same in the Central Business District, as two decades-old staples are being told to leave their storefronts. Both Total Juice Plus and Fred & Gari’s have said they will close their doors by the end of January.
Emil Mallat received a note from his landlord on Nov. 12 saying that Total Juice Plus, the business his father Joseph started 24 years ago and which he co-owns, had to vacate its storefront at 631 Vine St. by the end of this January. Fred & Gari’s, the deli soup and sandwich takeout joint next door, received a similar ultimatum.
Mallat tells CityBeat there was one option their landlord, 1W7 CARPARK, LLC, o ered him: Total Juice Plus could move to an adjacent location in the building it has occupied since June of 1998 if Mallat and his father agreed to a 300% rent hike. e letter to Total Juice Plus, which Mallat provided to CityBeat, reads in part: “On June 1st, 1998 Landlord and Tenant entered into a lease which currently stands as a month to month agreement, where the landlord or tenant may give 30 days to terminate the lease. We ask that you would be out of the space no later than January 31, 2022. We do, however, have another option if you would like to remain a tenant in our building in an adjacent space. We’d like to the (sic) opportunity to discuss future building plans and review the following terms with you as soon as possible.” is comes at a time when Total Juice Plus is only seeing 50% of its regular income due to the pandemic’s in uence on city foot tra c, says Mallat.
Total Juice Plus has been a mainstay of the weekday lunch rush downtown for more than two decades, o ering healthy menu items like wraps, freshly-squeezed fruit and vegetable juices and all-natural nonfat smoothies. e Mallat family has owned and operated this business at the Vine Street location since it opened.
“When we moved in and up until about three years ago, we were leasing and had a strong relationship with Macy’s,” Mallat says, referring to the building’s previous owner. “We never missed payments. We were paid ahead, in fact, by three months.”
“Now this, the timing and neglect of compassion or decency,” he says. “ ey never gave us warning or a heads up of a project or anything. Sent us a note like an elementary student.”
Fred & Gari’s has served food at 629 Vine St. since 1987, rst as a ZZ’s Pizza Company franchise, then independently in 1994. e business’s daily rotating assortment of soups, pizza and classic deli sandwiches draw lines out the door on a regular basis.
“I knew that it was going to happen sooner or later, but I didn’t know when,” says Gari Jager, owner of Fred & Gari’s.
“ ey had the option to do that,” he says of the terms of the lease.
Macy’s sold the garage and merchant levels of its building on the 600 block of Vine Street to 1W7 CARPARK, LLC in 2018, according to property records. 1W7 CARPARK, LLC did not respond to multiple CityBeat inquiries.
According to 1W7 CARPARK, LLC’s note that Mallat shared, Total Juice Plus was engaged in a month-to-month agreement where either the landlord or the business could give 30 days notice to terminate the lease. Mallat has sought legal advice but doesn’t believe anything will change the outcome. He says his father su ered an anxiety attack over the holidays because of the note instead of celebrating as the family had hoped.
“Twenty four years serving Cincinnati, only to be shrugged o as if we were college tenants in an apartment,” Mallat says. “We are absolutely crushed, but we are making it, smiling, going on as best we can.” ere’s no certainty as to what will happen next for the two businesses; neither are sure what the public could do to help them at this time, though Jager says he will start to look for a new location to reopen after taking a much-deserved vacation in February.
“ ings happen for a reason,” Jager says, “and it’s going to get better.”
Total Juice Plus, 631 Vine St., totaljuicecincy.com. Fred & Gari’s, 629 Vine St., facebook.com/FredGaris.
After announcing earlier this month he would have to close his agship restaurant, chef Christian Gill says Boomtown Biscuits & Whiskey in Pendleton is getting a second chance.
In a Jan. 21 Facebook post, Gill wrote, “ e outpouring of love and support from the community has been overwhelming and we are taking another shot to save the biscuits that Christian and PJ worked so hard to bring to downtown Cincinnati.”
Earlier in January, Gill said he was going to have to shutter Boomtown’s Pendleton restaurant due to fallout from the pandemic and “all of the surrounding circumstances that have plagued the industry over the last two years.” ( ere is a second Boomtown location in Union, Kentucky.)
Now, he says he’s looking to implement a crowdfunding formula to support Boomtown and to let the public own shares in the eatery. e news comes just after the one-year anniversary of Boomtown proprietor PJ Neumann’s death, whom Gill mentions in his post. Previously, Gill called Boomtown “PJ’s dream come to fruition,” and said in his post, “With the anniversary of PJ’s passing, we knew we had to come up with something to try and keep the gold in Pendleton.”
“We are grateful to have this chance to risk it for the biscuit and provide 24k service for Biscuit Brunch in downtown Cincinnati,” he added. e restaurant will be adjusting its hours for now, reopening Jan. 27 and starting daily service Jan. 31. 1201 Broadway St., Pendleton, boomtownbiscuitsandwhiskey.com.
Total Juice Plus
PHOTO: FACEBOOK.COM/TOTALJUICEPLUS
Boomtown Biscuits & Whiskey
PHOTO: HAILEY BOLLINGER
Alabama Fish Bar Reopens After Renovations
A shy favorite has reopened in Over-the-Rhine.
Alabama Fish Bar announced on Facebook that the restaurant would be back serving the “best fried sh in Cincinnati” starting Jan. 19. e three-decade-old eatery closed in October of 2021 to undergo renovations after entering a new lease with 3CDC. e acquisition was part of 3CDC’s $50 million Willkommen project, which includes building/rehabbing several buildings across Over-the-Rhine to create 163 residential units (with some a ordable units) and nearly 20,000 square feet of commercial space.
Out of the deal, Alabama Fish Bar got a refreshed storefront, new ooring and paint and some new kitchen equipment. Another update? e business now takes credit cards.
Anna Fillis, owner of Alabama Fish Bar, said at the time of the closure that planning had taken a little while but the renovations would be worth the wait.
“ ings take time, and if you want something done right, you can’t rush into it,” Fillis said. “It’s been about three years in the making, but I’m happy for the change and excited for the future.”
Alabama Fish Bar actually started as a pizza-by-the-slice shop (which served other bites as well), but after a successful sta meal of fried whiting became a regular occurrence in the kitchen — with a Fillis’ family-recipe batter — the establishment eventually found its niche.
Alabama Fish Bar now o ers three di erent sh on its menu: cod, whiting and ocean perch, as well as french fries and slaw.
Alabama Fish Bar, 1601 Race St., Overthe-Rhine, facebook.com/alabama shbar.
