August is Little Rock Restaurant Month, and the Little Rock Convention & Visitors Bureau has instituted a new format for its seventh annual celebration of local restaurants. Each week will focus on one city district and the participating restaurants therein.
The schedule:
• Aug. 1-7: Downtown (River Market, Main Street Creative Corridor, East Village, SoMa)
• Aug. 8-14: Midtown (west of downtown, east of Interstate 430 and north of Arkansas 5), the Heights, Hillcrest, University Avenue corridor, Rebsamen Road and Rodney Parham Road
• Aug. 15-21: West (west of Interstate 430, north of Arkansas 5, including the Chenal Parkway and Arkansas 10 corridors)
• Aug 22-28: Southwest and Airport districts
• Aug. 29-31: Food trucks (locations vary)
Participating restaurants will offer a special price or discount for a breakfast, lunch or dinner option. Visit DineLR.com or the Facebook page, facebook.com/ExperienceLR.
The Little Rock Planning Commission has approved a conditional use permit for the construction of the first Arkansas location of the New Orleans-based dine-in movie theater chain Movie Tavern in the Gateway Town Center, where Interstates 430 and 30 meet, Little Rock. The theater, scheduled to open next year, will have 11 screens and 1,100 recliner seats, a full-service lobby bar and a menu of chicken wings, mac and cheese, burgers and pizza, with breakfast options for early showings.
Stephen Burrow, previously executive chef at Chenal Country Club and Forty Two at the Clinton Presidential Center, has signed on as general manager for Stratton's Market and Skye's Little Bistro, 405 E. Third St., Little Rock. He'll be instituting a rotating chalkboard menu in the bistro that will incorporate more of the offerings from the market, which moves a lot of local produce. The phone number is (501) 791-6700.
Chip's Barbecue, 9801 W. Markham Street, Little Rock, has closed, with a sign on the door stating, "Please Notice: Effective July 6, 2016, This location will be closed. Thank you." At last check the phone -- (501) 225-4346 -- had not yet been disconnected but nobody answered it. The website, chipsbarbeque.com, baldly proclaims only, "Our Markham Street located (sic) is now closed." (If there are any other locations for the venerable barbecue joint, which has been around since 1961, we're not aware of them.) Chris Harcrow, an old friend of the Chipman family, who founded the venerable establishment in 1961, took it over in August 2013 following the 2012 death of paterfamilias Thomas Chipman. Bankruptcy listings for North Little Rock in Monday's paper include this filing: "Christopher Jay Harcrow (dba Honest Integrity LLC), ... July 6, 2016, Chapter 7."
11 Arkansas restaurants made Wine Spectator magazine's annual Restaurant Awards list, recognizing outstanding wine programs on three levels: the Award of Excellence (symbolized in the magazine by one wine glass, with 2,414 winners), the Best of Award of Excellence (two glasses, 1,093) and the Grand Award (three glasses, 88). So Restaurant-Bar, 3610 Kavanaugh Blvd. Little Rock, earned two glasses, an upgrade from previous years; one-glass Awards of Excellence went to repeat Little Rock winners Copper Grill, 300 E. Third St.; Anderson's Cajun's Wharf, 2400 Cantrell Road; Ciao Baci, 605 N. Beechwood St.; and Capers, 14502 Cantrell Road; and to Bordino's Restaurant and Wine Bar and Vetro 1925 in Fayetteville, Postmasters Grill in Camden and the River Grille Steakhouse in Bentonville. New on the list this year: Arthur's Prime Steakhouse, 27 Rahling Circle, Little Rock, and the Little Rock outlet of Del Frisco's Grille. The complete list is available in the magazine's August issue, on newsstands Tuesday and online at Restaurants.WineSpectator.com.
The Pizzeria @ Terry's Finer Foods is about to make its move from 5018 Kavanaugh Blvd. to 4910 Kavanaugh, into the former Revolution Gym. It will reportedly close after dinner service Friday; no estimate yet on just how long it will be before it reopens, but it could take several weeks. The biggest part of the move will be the slow roll down the street of the brick-floor, wood-burning, 1,000-degree Mario Acunto pizza oven that took a couple of months to transport by sea from Naples, Italy. Another as-yet unanswered question: What they're going to call the place now that it's no longer affiliated with Terry's Finer Foods. One possibility: Returning to Pizzeria Santa Lucia, the name co-owners Jeremy and Jacquelyn Pittman used when it was a food truck. (That's still the URL for the website, by the way: pizzeria-santalucia.com.) The restaurant phone number will stay the same: (501) 551-1388.
Core Public House, 411 Main St., North Little Rock, is expanding its kitchen equipment and its menu, which will feature high-end pub food, including share-able tapas plates, burgers, sandwiches on house-made bread, and fish and chips, debuting in mid- to late August, says general manager Erin Vickers. Hours are 3-9 p.m. Monday-Thursday, 3-11 p.m. Friday, noon-11 p.m. Saturday, noon-9 p.m. Sunday. The phone number is (501) 372-1390. There are also Core brewpubs in Fayetteville, Rogers and Fort Smith and a separate pub and taproom in Springdale. Check out the website: corebeer.com.