ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times
DATE: Sunday, January 12, 1997 TAG: 9701130012
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-3 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
DATELINE: BLACKSBURG
SOURCE: KENNETH SINGLETARY STAFF WRITER
Gillie's, a "real" restaurant?
Perhaps Blacksburg's last bastion of tie-dyed hippie-dom, that place of laid-back bottomless cups of coffee, of teetering ice cream cones, of groovy if undefinable music, is undergoing its biggest change in 21 years in business on College Avenue in downtown Blacksburg.
Waiters? Micro-beers and merlot? Seafood?
It's true, says Ranae Gillie, who opened the restaurant with her husband, Jan, in the mid-1970s.
"It's been scary. This, to me, is an unknown entity," Ranae Gillie said at the restaurant this week, over the din of power saws and construction work.
Financial pressures have forced her to end ice cream sales and become "a full-fledged restaurant. I think we had to go with that decision."
Despite the changes, Jan Gillie says, Gillie's will stay "basically the same." Though seafood will be served, most of the fare will remain vegetarian. An unused antique counter will now seat up to 10 people, and the restaurant's familiar wooden tables will accommodate dozens more. But if the couple aren't exactly nervous about the change, they realize they are venturing into unknown territory.
Good thing they have help.
A crew of twentysomethings, with energy, vision and experience, will exert more control over day-to-day operations. In the kitchen will be two chefs trained in culinary schools. Keeping the books will be a recent Virginia Tech graduate who has an eye for numbers. And managing the wait staff and tables will be longtime employee Shane Rasco, who became partner with the couple when he invested a five-figure sum, a gift from his parents, into the restaurant.
"At some point you have to take a step toward your future that in the long run will pay off," he said.
He thinks his investment isn't a complete gamble. He knows the restaurant has a great location and loyal customers. He has more than a dozen years in restaurant work and a sharp focus on what he wants Gillie's to become. "There's a lot of potential here, and I think we can offer something Blacksburg really needs and we can look forward to."
The renovations and new kitchen equipment will cost more than $20,000, but the biggest changes may be intangible. Rasco, 28, and chef Stephen Shires, 26, will emphasize presentation, atmosphere and service. (The other chef has not yet started work.)
That means no more employee selections as background music. Now it will be National Public Radio, light jazz, and, perhaps, live music someday. Get ready to be greeted at the door and a new Gillie's attitude. "We'll still have an attitude, but it will be a professional attitude," Rasco said.
Get ready for broiled and glazed grapefruit halves, Belgium waffles with a fresh-fruit topping, blintzes, crepes and seafood omelets on the breakfast menu. Lunch will include choices like lox sandwiches and citrus salads. Dinner entrees may include basmati rice cakes with a red lentil sauce and a pan-fried seafood selection, sun-dried tomato pesto, and grilled sea bass over couscous, depending on seafood availability.
But the times have not completely a-changed.
Gillie's is not about to become a yuppie fern restaurant, and management does not want to scare away its traditional customers. Pretense will remain out. Comfort and relaxed style will always be in. The restaurant's management thinks they can keep one foot in the communal '70s while having another in the cost-conscious '90s.
"We're still going to be laid-back. I don't want people to be afraid to come We're still going to be the same Gillie's," said Rene Gillie, 47, hastening to add, "We're never going to be greedy, money-oriented people."
Still, in the last couple of years, she has had to adjust to evolving consumer habits, more food choices at Tech, and competition from restaurants around the New River Valley Mall. She knows "we have to make some changes if we want to stay here."
That's in part where Julie Couser will come in. She's a recent Tech graduate in English and is only 23, but can handle the books. Perhaps more importantly, she knows Ranae Gillie's at times quirky bookkeeping system. "Efficiency," a word Ranae isn't completely comfortable with, may remain at least somewhat anathema.
More organized is Ranae's goal, she said, and that means constructing a nook-like office, complete with an actual computer.
Rasco knows the changes will make the restaurant a "work in progress" for six months or more. "One of the biggest thing's will be changing the town's attitude toward Gillie's," he said.
But he is confident, and he knows an opportunity is before him. Indeed, part of his mission is to make the new Gillie's "One of the greater moments in [Ranae's] life."
LENGTH: Medium: 91 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: ALAN KIM/Staff. Ranae Gillie shows off the work that'sby CNBgoing on behind store windows that have been papered over. The
familiar ice cream cases have been replaced with a bar counter
(right), and the kitchen has gone through a complete overhaul.
color.