THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, November 30, 1995 TAG: 9511290048
SECTION: FLAVOR PAGE: F3 EDITION: FINAL
COLUMN: A LA CARTE
SOURCE: Donna Reiss
LENGTH: Medium: 73 lines
TAKE A TRIP to Timbuktu.
Chef-owner Willie Moats and manager Jeannette Scherer have spruced up the restaurant at 32nd Street and Atlantic Avenue in Virginia Beach (in the Days Inn).
Moats' new-American bent shows up in red pepper pasta with a cilantro-corn butter sauce, portobella mushrooms and eggplant on charred romaine leaves, as well as sandwiches of marinated tuna, chicken breast or crabcake with roasted fennel remoulade. The restaurant is open for lunch and dinner. Call 491-1800.
At the other end of the Boardwalk, new chef Jimmy Rabb is cooking Cajun at Three East Cafe, 215 Atlantic Ave. (in the Schooner Motel). Co-owner Monica Purkey says customers longed for the New Orleans style cuisine that had been the hallmark of previous restaurants at the site. So the menu now includes Southwestern and Southern specialties. Three East is open for lunch, dinner and Sunday brunch. Call 425-3278.
Special occasions
A wine dinner will feature five courses of David Watts' eclectic continental fare at 7 p.m. Monday at Cafe David, 1423 N. Great Neck Road, in Virginia Beach.
The event costs $60, with tax and tip, and will include Laurent Perrier Extra Dry and chicken curry soup; Banfi brut champenoise and crab stuffed jalapeno; Moet Brut Rose and seafood fra diavolo; Chandon Etoile and chicken with wild mushroom-rice stuffing; Gloria Ferrer Blanc de Noir and triple chocolate layer cake.
At 7 p.m. Dec. 11, Watts will conduct a holiday cooking class. Cost is $50; the menu will include spinach oyster bisque, apple walnut salad, stuffed duck with cranberry glaze, and crepes with ice cream and flambeed cherries. For reservations for either event, call 496-3333.
Art Center benefit
Be a friend of the Virginia Beach Center for the Arts and meet the author of ``The Angel Tree,'' Linn Howard of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.
Howard will sign books and show slides after a 6:30 p.m. cash-bar reception and 7:30 p.m. dinner Wednesday at Le Chambord, Great Neck Road and Virginia Beach Boulevard in Virginia Beach. Wines from Williamsburg Winery will be featured. Proceeds from the $60 event will benefit art center educational programs. For reservations and information, call 428-5495.
Taste of Louisiana
The fall menu at Bienville Grill, 723 W. 21st St., in Norfolk is replete with flavors from Louisiana.
Cold-weather salads include garlic roasted turkey with apples, raisins, bacon and carrots or roasted vegetables with couscous and grilled pita bread.
Chef-owner Mike Hall is adding chorizo sausage to starters and main dishes; the gumbo is hearty with duck, turkey, andouille sausage and okra; and substantial cabbage and vegetable mixes accompany hot dinners. Call 625-5427.
New at the Banks
Sam McGann, who cooked in Virginia Beach restaurants, is a star of Outer Banks cuisine with the Blue Point Bar & Grill, which opened in July 1989 in Duck, N.C.
This year, McGann opened a second restaurant, Ocean Boulevard, in Kitty Hawk
Eclectic New American is the approach at each: Maine lobster comes with corn and wild mushroom risotto, for example, and Smithfield Lean Generation pork with cranberry coulis. Prices average $17. Call Blue Point at (919) 261-8090, or Ocean Boulevard at (919) 261-2546. MEMO: Send restaurant news, along with your name and a daytime phone number,
to a la carte, c/o Flavor, The Virginian-Pilot, 150 W. Brambleton Ave.,
Norfolk, Va. 23510, or send e-mail to dreiss(AT)infi.net.
by CNB