RESTAURANT TRANSITIONS: Blue Canoe's new space to debut; Core Brewing on South Main; Brewski's now open

Blue Canoe Brewing Co. opens its warehouse facility, at 1637 E. 15th St., Little Rock, which includes a game room and beer garden, on Saturday.
Blue Canoe Brewing Co. opens its warehouse facility, at 1637 E. 15th St., Little Rock, which includes a game room and beer garden, on Saturday.

Blue Canoe Brewing Co. will hold a grand opening, noon-10 p.m. Saturday, for its warehouse facility at 1637 E. 15th St., Little Rock, with games, music, a prize raffle. Blue Canoe's Macie Fellows says the warehouse, primarily where the company's brewing will take place, will have an open-to-the-public game space (pool, foosball, shuffleboard and darts) and will serve a variety of new beers in its beer garden and outdoor bar (made from an old shipping container), 4-10 p.m. Friday, noon-10 p.m. Saturday and noon-8 p.m. Sunday. There won't be a kitchen, but they'll have food trucks. They will continue to operate their River Market District taproom, 425 E. Third St., 4-9 p.m. Tuesday-Thursday, 4-11 p.m. Friday, noon-11 p.m. Saturday and noon-8 p.m. Sunday. The phone number for both facilities is (501) 492-9378; Blue Canoe's website: bluecanoebrewco.com.

And speaking of area craft breweries, Lost Forty Brewing is unveiling its "biggest, baddest, boldest 3 Barrel-Aged 2017 batch of Nighty Night Imperial Stout" at a "Festival of Darkness: Nighty Night Release Party & Celebration of Dark Beer," 4-8:30 p.m. Saturday on its parking lot at 501 Byrd St, Little Rock. In the "dark beer garden," at least 15 local and regional breweries will pour samples of their darker brews. The event will also feature a Zombie Adult Tricycle Race, a Log Jam Joust, Big Arse Street Beer Pong, music (by Colour Design, Big Piph and Tomorrow Maybe, Dazz & Brie and the Emotionalz), a cash-prize costume contest, food trucks (Loblolly Creamery, Excaliburger, Count Porkula and Slader's Alaskan Dumpling Co.), makeup artists and magicians. There will be raffle for a bicycle from Allied Cycle Works (tickets: $1; all proceeds support Recycle Bikes for Kids). Tickets are $10 in advance (includes a swag bag; visit tinyurl.com/darkness40), $12 at the door. And, of course, you must be 21 to attend.

And still talking about area craft breweries, Jessie Core, the namesake of Springdale-based Core Brewing Co., says he's looking at a November opening for his second central Arkansas Core Public House, his 10th location, in the SoMA area of Main Street in Little Rock (we're still fishing for the actual address). That has pushed back to January the planned opening of the Core outlet at 833 Central Ave., Hot Springs, in the former home of Banjo Dan's Vintage Guitars, which he originally expected to complete by the end of October. Another reason for the delay: The pub has required the "complete renovation of upstairs and downstairs." Core opened a pub at 411 Main St., in North Little Rock's Argenta District, last year; he has brewpubs in Fayetteville, Rogers and Fort Smith, plus a pub and a separate taproom in Springdale.

And though it sounds like it could be an area craft brewery, but isn't, Brewski's Pub & Grub, the sports bar that replaced Club Level, 315 Main St., Little Rock, opened last week on schedule. Current hours are 3 p.m.-midnight Monday-Wednesday, 3 p.m.-2 a.m. Thursday-Friday, 11 a.m.-2 a.m. Saturday and 11 a.m.-midnight Sunday. The phone number is now (501) 372-2739.

On that same block, a $618,300 building permit has been filed with the Little Rock planning & development for "tenant improvement of existing lease space for new restaurant" at 311 Main. That corresponds to the new downtown branch of west Little Rock Asian-fusion restaurant A.W. Lin's.

And while we're downtown, Agasi 7, the area's first rooftop, open-air restaurant and bar, on the seventh floor of the Hilton Garden Inn Little Rock Downtown, 322 Rock St., is expected to open in early November. That's what hotel staff told Business section reporter Noel Oman.

Also filed this week, a $500,000 building permit for a "new ground-up" (meaning built from the ground up, not ... well, the other thing) Popeye's Louisiana Kitchen at 4908 W. Markham St., Little Rock (northwest corner of Markham and Monroe streets). The site's previous occupant has been a vacant bank branch. Meanwhile, we've been trying to corral an opening date for the Popeye's at 824 Broadway, Little Rock, the site of a former Back Yard Burgers kiosk, but it appears to be getting close.

A surprising new twist has emerged in the saga of Captain Hooks Fish & Chicken, 6725 John F. Kennedy Blvd., North Little Rock, next to Indian Hills Shopping Center. You will recall we mentioned a few weeks ago that work had resumed, or at least started, on the interior and exterior of the building, which most recently had housed a Dunkin Donuts/Baskin Robbins hybrid. Now we've turned up on the website of Charleston, S.C.-based Sands Investment Group (signnn.com/landings/restaurants) a for-sale-or-lease notice, listing the the 3,003-square-foot restaurant at $800,000. "Tenant Recently Spent Over $100,000 in Rehabbing, Facelift, New Pumps, Lights, Flooring, Signs and Rebranding," the website's sales pitch observes. We haven't yet managed to track down any more specifics, but we'll keep you posted.

Honeybaked Ham franchisee Marc Ansel says the official target opening date is Nov. 8 for his outlet in the Lakewood Village Shopping Center, 2733 Lakewood Village Drive, North Little Rock, "but my best guess is probably a week past that." The new location will have a new online order system that will save customers from having to stand in line: "That is going to be the fastest way to pick up your products." And, he says, "We will have a much larger lobby for lunch customers than the Little Rock location," 9112 N. Rodney Parham Road.

And this update on Feltner's Whatta-Burger, 1410 N. Arkansas Ave., Russellville, marking its golden anniversary, 10:30 a.m.-1 p.m. on Thanksgiving Day by "rolling prices back to the original 1967 menu board price, giving away door prizes for everyone and even a few huge prizes!" That original 1967 menu, which you can see at the Facebook page, facebook.com/FeltnersWhattaBurger, prices a regular hamburger at 25 cents and a cheeseburger at 30 cents; a Whatta-Burger at 40 cents (50 with cheese, 55 with double meat, 65 with double meat and cheese); soft drinks at 10-25 cents (depending on size) and shakes at 15-35 cents. The restaurant phone number is (479) 968-1410.

You still have until Oct. 31 to nominate, via ArkFoodHOF.com, restaurants and restaurateurs for the Department of Arkansas Heritage's second class to enter the Arkansas Food Hall of Fame. The other categories: Proprietor of the Year, Food-Themed Event and Gone But Not Forgotten. A 13-member committee of historians, chefs, foodies and food authors -- Paul S. Austin, Evette Brady, Chip Culpepper, Cindy Grisham, Stacy Hurst, Montine McNulty, Tim Morton, Rex Nelson, Tim Nutt, Kat Robinson, Christina Shutt, Lisa Speer and Swannee Bennett -- will select finalists; a specialized subcommittee chooses the winners, who will get their just desserts, you might say, at a March 6 ceremony. You, the people, will choose, by number of votes, the People's Choice.

And speaking of foodie nominations, the James Beard Foundation is accepting entries for its 2018 awards. The deadlines: Dec. 1 for Restaurant and Chef Awards; Dec. 8 for Book Awards; Jan. 3 for Journalism and Broadcast Media Awards (new this year: the Feature Reporting Award recognizing "excellence for engaging, in-depth and enterprising reporting in food and/or drink features" and, for broadcast media, the Documentary Award for entries that have been screened at a North American film festival); and Jan. 26 for Restaurant Design Awards. The foundation will announce restaurant and chef semifinalists Feb. 14 and the nominees for all categories March 14. For more information and to view the full list of awards programs, criteria and deadlines, visit jamesbeard.org/awards. Entries for all categories can be submitted via the online portal here. The foundation will hand out the media awards April 27 at Pier Sixty at Chelsea Piers in New York City; the restaurant awards ceremony and gala reception will take place May 7 at the Lyric Opera of Chicago.

The Thanksgiving 2017 edition of Cooking With Paula Deen magazine, picking pecan pies across the country for a feature titled "Pecan Pie Perfection," includes the caramel pecan pie at Memphis-based Soul Fish Cafe, which has three outlets in the Memphis area and one at 306 Main St., Little Rock. "Baked fresh daily, [it] has a rich, buttery flavor with a heaping dose of nuts stirred into the filling. Don't forget to order it a la mode for a big scoop of vanilla ice cream on the side." The Little Rock restaurant phone number is (501) 396-9175; the mini-chain's website, soulfishcafe.com.

And speaking of pie, deadline is 4 p.m. Nov. 17 to register for the Mosaic Templars Cultural Center's sixth annual "Say It Ain't Say's" Sweet Potato Pie Baking Contest, 2-5 p.m. Dec. 3 at the center, 501 W. Ninth St., Little Rock, in conjunction with its annual Holiday Open House. Between 12 and 16 bakers will compete for bragging rights for central Arkansas best sweet potato pie, with first- and second-place prizes in professional and amateur categories. Attendees will vote for a people's choice winner. It's free to sign up; take a toy to donate to Robert "Say" McIntosh's "Black Santa" toy drive. Forms and criteria are available online at MosaicTemplarsCenter.com. Call (501) 683-3593 or email info@mosaictemplarscenter.com.

And Angia Cox, owner of Platnum BBQ -- and that is "Platnum," not "Platinum" -- in the northeast corner kiosk of the River Market Ottenheimer Market Hall, 400 President Clinton Ave., Little Rock, says the printer made a couple of errors in the initial to-go menu that we perpetuated in this column: Operating hours are 7 a.m.-2:30 p.m. Monday-Saturday. And the phone number, which Cox says the printer scrambled, is actually (501) 246-9277.

Has a restaurant opened -- or closed -- near you in the last week or so? Does your favorite eatery have a new menu? Is there a new chef in charge? Drop us a line. Call (501) 399-3667 or (501) 378-3513, or send a note to Restaurants, Weekend Section, Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, P.O. Box 2221, Little Rock, Ark. 72203. Send email to:

eharrison@arkansasonline.com

Weekend on 10/19/2017

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