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Ipanema Cafe owner Kendra Feather inside the restaurant in its early days (Photo courtesy Ipanema)
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Citrus-marinated cauliflower cutlet at Ipanema with coconut corn, Caribbean baked black beans and rice (Photo courtesy Curtis Childress)
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Korean-style barbecue tempeh from Ipanema Cafe on a bed of warm rice beneath sauteed bok choy and cucumber salad (Photo courtesy Curtis Childress)
Twenty years ago, the 900 block of West Grace Street was home to a XXX theater, a strip club and a heavy metal concert venue. Fans of music and art were attracted to the area, and the block offered a funky hodgepodge of counterculture outlets.
Twenty years ago, one of the top songs on the Billboard Charts was "Doo Wop" by Lauryn Hill, and the protein-heavy, high-fat, red meat-embracing Atkins diet was gaining popularity.
Twenty years ago, Kendra Feather, today a Richmond restaurateur, was 28, and although she had spent the previous 12 years working in restaurants, she'd never imagined opening one of her own.
“When you’re 28, you think you know a lot, and it gives you the guts to do something,” says Feather. “I look back and think, I didn’t have any of the basic skills I needed to open a restaurant.”
Skills or no skills, Ipanema Cafe found a lasting home at 917 W. Grace St., and Feather revived vegetarian and vegan options on the block after the departure of Grace Place, the city's first vegetarian restaurant, making her mark on a city street that has done nothing but evolve since the business opened in 1998.
Twenty years ago, Feather had worked as a server but never behind the scenes. She didn’t know how to cook (although she did take lessons after Ipanema opened and became a solid baker). She didn’t boast a business background.
However, her determination and naive, youthful gutsiness paid off, and Ipanema Cafe turns 20 on Sept. 15. The restaurant, well ahead of its time, has sought to do more than simply serve food; it seeks to serve a community of like-minded individuals.
“It was back when Richmond was great, and dirty, and wonderful, and fun, and it seemed like there should be a vegetarian restaurant,” recalls Feather. “It was one of the things that was missing.”
The cafe rests below a tattoo parlor, where a set of brick stairs leads to a basement entrance with a steel door, reminiscent of an East Village restaurant: quaint, bohemian and, some may say — even Feather herself — slightly seedy.
Two weeks prior to opening in 1998, Feather’s chef quit. Luckily, a friend and chef, Rick Alverson, who would later become an independent filmmaker, literally stepped up to the plate and solidified the restaurant's presence as a vegetarian eatery.
Those early days at Ipanema also saw a young Patrick Phelan, now chef and co-owner of Longoven, who at the time "didn't know much," learning how to make seitan from scratch and playing “as much Morrisey as possible" in the kitchen.
Although some things at Ipanema have remained constant, like the tempeh reuben sandwich and tofu Caesar, others have changed drastically.
Twenty years ago, it wasn’t abnormal to find a drunken stranger or a homeless person peeing on the restaurant door, unaware it was even a business.
“It was a lot crazier. I was young, and it didn’t bother me,” says Feather, who recalls an employee’s car ending up with a bullet through the windshield. “I knew all the people on the street by name, and it was our little community.”
A community that, at the time, also wasn’t smack dab in the middle of a large, expanding university.
“VCU built up all around us,” says Feather, a VCU Public Relations graduate. “Now we’re in the middle of VCU; it surrounds us.”
Today, a Walmart is across the street from Ipanema, and further down are a slew of national chain restaurants and a 7-Eleven.
When Feather opened Ipanema, veganism wasn’t necessarily trendy or a part of common dining culture.
“People would come in and say, ‘What can I eat?’,” says Feather about the meatless menu when it first debuted. “I remember Anthony Bourdain said, ‘I want to punch vegans in the face,’ and if you can imagine it, [veganism] wasn’t cool by any means, except for the people that did appreciate and like the counterculture on Grace Street.”
When Feather opened Ipanema, "V" or "VG" indicators weren't seen on menus, vegetarian and vegan restaurants like Richmond's Fresca on Addison, Strange Matter, 821 Café, The Daily or NuVegan Café didn’t exist yet, and chefs weren’t making a deliberate point to include those options on their menus.
Of the vegan and vegetarian community, Feather admits, “They don’t need us as much as they did 20 years ago.”
Today, Feather has enmeshed herself in the Richmond dining scene with several restaurants and businesses under her ownership, including Garnett’s, The Roosevelt, WPA Bakery and Laura Lee’s.
"It's really impressive," says Chef Will Wienckowski, who joined Ipanema in 2010, "and I think all credit goes to Kendra for having the tenacity to keep [Ipanema] running. I never imagined I'd be here this long, but that's just a testament to how much I've enjoyed working here."
Longevity speaks volumes, to last implies deep-seated roots in the community, that a concept, originally appreciated by a small group of people, is now appreciated by many.
A lot can change in 20 years.
Chef Will Wienckowski has crafted a vegan/vegetarian cookout menu available Saturday, Sept. 15, from 5:30 to 11 p.m., dependent on the weather. A special saison brewed specifically for Ipanema by Ardent Craft Ales featuring local pears, cardamom and black peppercorn will be tapped, and music will begin around 10 p.m.
