Lexington’s Red Hen lures local culinary talent
Write a letter to the editor
The Red Hen in Lexington, VirginiaPHOTOS COURTESY RED HEN
Back in January, aspiring restaurateur John Blackburn told Dish he was looking for a talented chef willing to “flee the big 5-star kitchens” of Charlottesville for Lexington, where Blackburn has finally opened the Red Hen, a gastro-pub style restaurant in a renovated 150-year old former chapel.
“I’m hoping to identify and hire a chef in the next five months to take this on and make it her/his baby,” said Blackburn. “In other words, we’re looking for somebody who wants more than just a job.”
Well, that willing chef turned out to be OXO’s ex- empresario Tucker Yoder.
“I was blown away by how fast news traveled after that Hook piece,” says Blackburn. ” I got resumes from DC, New York, and one from Aspen. Ultimately, Tucker fit the profile we were looking for… smart, sane, ambitious, and ridiculously talented.”
However, it appears that Blackburn, founding editor of Blue Ridge Outdoors and a former journalist for C-Ville Weekly in the early days, was not content to lure just one of our culinary pros to far away Lexington; he’s recruited former Boar’s Head employee Janelle Clark to manage, and hired former OXO and L’etoile sous-chefs Michael Perry and Tyler Teass. In fact, the journalist in Blackburn couldn’t help feeding us a headline when he sent news of Ren Hen’s debut– Cville Dream Team Takes Lex by Storm!
And according to early returns, that appears to be what they’ve done. On his blog, The Humble Chef, Yoder writes that the Red Hen had 41 covers on its first night a month ago. Since then, the place has been “packed,” says Blackburn.
“They’re doing progressive fine dining in a way that has never been done here,” he says, “serving local beef, lamb, chicken, and vegetables, and people are going crazy for it.”
Indeed, a reviewer on Trip-Advisor writes, “We had heard this restaurant was opening soon and ate dinner there on its first Saturday night– definitely worth the wait. A meal made with fresh, local ingredients is supposed to be costly, but we were delighted with the entrée prices. The heirloom tomatoes on our amuse-bouche were delicious. We will be back frequently.”
Sadly, it’s unlikely that Yoder will be “amusing our mouths” at the Ren Hen frequently, seeing as Lexington is an hour away, but next time you feel your own desire to flee, perhaps a pilgrimage to the place where Lee and Traveller are buried is in order.
�
Is restaurateur Blackburn of the Red Hen the guy with whom Hawes had a falling out over funneling money from the C’ville Weekly partnership to Blue Ridge Outdoors, thus leading to the creaton of the Hook, or is that somebody else?
No way. I think the parties involved in that falling out were named Chapman and Jiranek (sp?). I love Hawes and the Hook. Always have.
And I love John! He was our one man newsroom/BRO founder/photographer/darkroomTechnician/essayist– a man of many talents. The only falling out we had was when I fell out of my chair upon seeing all his skills. So if he’s half as good a restaurateur as he was a journalist, that’s gonna be one tasty Hen!–hawes spencer
First of all. There is no such thing as a 5 Star Fine Dining Restaurant in Charlottesville. Any place mentioned on the Downtown Mall is fair at best. An example of fine dining would be the Willard Room located at the Willard hotel on Penn. Ave in D.C. not Carmello’s on Emmett St. in Charlottesville. The people of Charlottesville are so convinced that their little town is very upscale. So much that they refer to the city as C-ville. I can only come to the conclusion that they refer to it as C-ville because 80% of the UVA students can’t spell Charlottesville. Remember people it is a left wing, college town where most only where flip flops when they go out for “FINE DINING”.
DC Gunner: Is this the same Willard Room that received 1 1/2 stars from the Washington Post’s Tom Sietsema in a review summarized as:
The Willard Room serves up a fabulous setting but less-than-fabulous food.
Oh, and the Post’s readers give it on average two stars.
But on a more serious note, I thought that the usual standard for stars went from zero to three on the Michelin scale with an establishment such as the French Laundry receiving three stars and a restaurant such as Berkeley’s Chez Panisse receiving one. As far as I know, the DC area does not have a Michelin guide, unlike NY, SF, LA, and LV.
The Mobil people, on the other hand, do give out five stars. The only restaurant in Virginia receiving five, or at least four, stars in 2008 was the Inn at Little Washington. I don’t really consider that to be in the Charlottesville area.
This is a late addition to this thread, but I want to support WestBerkeleyFlats’ comment about the Willard Room. I felt very special to be brought there several years ago by my dad, but I remember nothing-at-all about what I ate.
One man’s “ornate” is another man’s “stuffy,” and depending on who you are, the diners are either significant or privileged. It’s subjective, right?
Or is it?
Anyway, I sort of get excited when a food critic suggests that extreme snobbery, like parsley, can’t cover up bad food. It’s just another unattractive part of the experience.
Tom’s Willard Room review in the WP
Frank Bruni’s Michael’s review in the NYT