Home Care In West Hartford, CT

West Hartford is in a state of flux. Staples like the bistro fare at Max Oyster Bar remain neighborhood institutions, but the steady hum of fresh talent is hard to miss. Displaced by pandemic, lured by family support, an exodus of top-tier talent from New York City and fine dining elsewhere is breathing new life into the downtown.

Union Kitchen is one of many such breaths popping up in Connecticut.

For general manager and wine director, Vish Badami and chef Tim East, making Union Kitchen into what it is today has been a journey of teamwork and shared vision.

“There are a lot of places in West Hartford that do American comfort food, but it’s not particularly what I am most excited by, neither is Chef Tim,” says Vish. “We wanted to do something different while keeping it seasonal, highlighting different techniques and cultures.”

Vish came to West Hartford by way of notable restaurants which include Rasika in Washington, D.C. under James-Beard-Award-winning chef, Vikram Sunderam. He caught the wine bug in New York City at Indian Accent, known for an impressive wine list of over 450 selections, including a rare collection of Madeira.

I ask Vish how he ended up at Union.

“I thought this place had potential, and I believe in West Hartford. I thought if we could bring a great wine list here, and pair it with an amazing tasting menu, that it might be the first of its kind in this area.”

No small achievement, the list Vish has curated has received two consecutive Awards of Excellence from Wine Spectator. Rumor has it, he’s gunning for a third.

We leaned into what most excites Tim, opting for the tasting menu, and Vish brings our first course, a coconut curry pumpkin soup.

I spoon comforting bites of spiced soup and listen to a round-the-world odyssey of how 16th-century sailors transporting Madeira wine washed up on shores of the far east. The wine in my glass smells like gingerbread and orange zest, liquid honey on the palate.

“It’s as if two Portuguese explorers ended up on the same shore of India, this is the soup they would eat, and this is the wine they would drink,” he says. A perfect dish for the dreary doldrums of winter, and even better, a perfect pairing.

As the bar starts to fill up and it’s hard not to notice the attention to detail in the space – a richly colored coffered ceiling, bright storefront windows, touches of art nouveau style, an impressive wall of craft spirits and amaro that spans the length of the bar.

“We have the largest selection of amaro in the state,” says Vish. There are bar classics, like Fernet Branca, but also truly rare gems — I won’t name them here, but do yourself a favor and discover them for yourself. You’ll thank me later.

We hop into the chef’s tasting menu. Next is East’s Chawanmushi, a savory Japanese egg custard. Meaning “steamed in a tea bowl,” Chawanmushi is unlike egg custards that you may see in western cultures, like crème brûlée. Served on a striking piece of Imari pottery, instead it is silky, smoky and umami all in one bite, garnished with fresh oyster mushrooms and a briny fresh oyster with a dash of whiskey barrel aged shoyu. Not one to say no to bubbles, Vish offers a stunning Champagne from Lelarge-Pugeot, an unusual selection aged for six years on its lees. My first sip is toasty and textured. An out-of-the-box pairing and again a bullseye for me.

Badami chats about the beginnings of his partnership with Chef Tim.

“He is a really quiet chef, but he has worked in a lot of legendary restaurants.”

In my short time sitting in the leather banquette, I can tell that East’s technique is pristine.

“He’s a food nerd”

— a trait they seem to share, and it is exciting to watch someone so passionate light up when talking about what they love the most.

As I meander my way through the menu, other stand-outs include the aptly-named “pleasure course,” a savory risotto with black winter truffles, pecorino romano and cracked black pepper. It arrives and my mouth waters as the smell of black truffle wafts through the air. It is paired with a cool-kid cult favorite wine from Italian producer, Iulli, made from Nebbiolo grapes. I swirl the wine and am rewarded with tell tale aromas of tobacco and roses. Another perfect pairing, Mr. Badami.

But Chef Tim has the last laugh when my date notices a favorite cheese offered as a dessert course. I opt for pot de crème.

Epoisses — a French wash rind — is not for the faint of heart, and not my personal favorite, but I laugh as I watch my partner joyfully stick his face in what he describes as “a stinky ass cheese from Burgundy.” Mild on the palate, however it may smell, Tim tempers the cheese with honeycomb and balsamic. The pot de crème is a delight. And both desserts are elevated by Vish’s pairings.

Union Kitchen champions excellence in West Hartford, and it is a cherished spot for locals and a gathering place for the people of West Hartford. Great restaurants only get that way when they operate as team sports, culinary teams and hospitality working together in lock-step. And it’s clear there is a heaping dose of collaboration between Badami and East. It’s a pleasure to watch two talents work towards a common goal of excellence. I will stay tuned to see what their future holds.

WEST HARTFORD — Even on a dreary, rainy weekday, a stream of customers filed in and out of Crown Market, the grocery store specializing in Kosher food.

It's no surprise that the Bishops Corner market has become a beloved neighborhood staple in the decades it has served the community, so much so that local owners saved it from nearly shuttering 10 years ago.

And in the year that the newest owners have taken over Crown Market, West Hartford couple Khen Raviv and Debra Raviv, along with Yitz Rabinowitz, have been working to enhance and further cement the market into both the Kosher community and West Hartford scene.

On Thursday, the owners unveiled the Crown's brand new Schmooze Cafe, a hub right in the heart of the store where customers can sit down and enjoy the market's speciality of authentic kosher items and extensive array of fresh offerings.

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Inspired by Yiddish roots, the term "Schmooze" means to gather, and embodies the spirit of lively conversation and community, Debra Raviv said.

"The name we've chosen really encapsulates the essence of The Crown," she said just before the cafe sign was revealed Thursday. "It reflects our commitment to fostering the camaraderie and community right here."

A West Hartford native, Raviv said she has always viewed the Crown as an important institution in her life and the community, and she's not alone in thinking this.

"I just want to thank you for investing in this treasured community institution," Mayor Shari Cantor said at the unveiling. "It's not a grocery store, it is really a cultural center."

The business opened in 1940 on Albany Avenue in Hartford and moved to its current location in town in 1967, and since then has been a landmark of West Hartford, known for its locally-produced kosher groceries and popular 5 O’Clock Shop and Deli that offers items like pastrami sandwiches, latkes and matzo ball soup.

"So the longevity of it is huge," Raviv said, "and we don't want it to go away."

The addition of the new cafe aims to fill a hole in West Hartford's kosher scene, she said.

"The kosher community has no kosher restaurants," she said. "So I think this really fills their need of being able to come with a friend and share a meal. And I think that's the biggest thing, is that we're giving that community a way to get to be part of this dining out."

And that's exactly what inspired Schmooze Cafe, Raviv said, and why she believes it's going to be so meaningful to this community.

"Because I think the biggest thing in our culture is food, right?" she said. "And so sharing a meal with somebody, it can be an intimate experience, it's a fun experience, it's a community experience."

Essentially, it's the closest thing to a kosher restaurant in West Hartford, Raviv said. Customers can go to the five o'clock shop and custom order a sandwich or other deli provision, or grab one of the store's gourmet ready-to-eat meals, quick bites or freshly-baked goods.

And although it's not a table-service cafe, it's not exactly intended to be a solely grab-and-go situation either.

"We don't want you to go. It's grab-and-schmooze," she said. "We would like this area to be more than just a spot for food, but also a vibrant hub, where friends meet, artists flourish and community comes alive."

Surrounded by the grocery isles, Schmooze Cafe is open during normal market hours, but can also be booked after-hours as a space for community events, Raviv said, helping the Crown Market reach more people outside of its loyal customer base. "It's not just a grocery store," Raviv said, "it's for everybody."

In addition, the cafe will showcase the work of local artists on its walls, with the inaugural exhibit highlighting landscape photographs by resident Allan Weitz.

"The kosher and the Jewish community is thriving in West Hartford, but where we're also really gaining traction is with the non-Jewish people, which is really what we want," she said.

Providing a social destination like this has been one of Raviv's goals since taking over the business, she said, as they work to address the needs of the community and enhance the historical landmark that is Crown Market.

April 11, 2024

Cookie chain Chip City will open its third Connecticut location April 5 in West Hartford, marking its first in Hartford County. The store will open at 67 Memorial Road in Blue Back Square after a 10:30 a.m. ribbon cutting, joining the other Connecticut outposts in Darien and Fairfield.

Chip City rotates more than 50 flavors, according to its website, like banana cream pie, chocolate peanut butter, Nutella sea salt, red velvet cheesecake, wild berry strudel and white chocolate macadamia nut. Each week, the menu changes to offer classic flavors and seasonal varieties. The current offerings include a "Teddi-Fetti" graham cracker cookie with rainbow sprinkles and Teddy Graham crackers, s'mores, cannoli and a "brookie" swirled with brownie batter, as well as a classic chocolate chip.

The brand now has 35 stores in seven East Coast states, according to its website. There are stores in Florida, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York and Virginia. Future locations are planned in those states, as well as Illinois and Pennsylvania.

Connecticut has seen signs of a national cookie craze in recent years, as Crumbl locations expand at a clip. The Utah-based chain has opened stores in Manchester, Danbury, North Haven, Fairfield, Milford, Norwalk, West Hartford, Stamford and Avon since December 2021. Local bakeries with cookie focuses have also enjoyed success, like Norwalk's Rebel Daughter, which offers gourmet flavors like Fluffernutter and White Unicorn, with fruity cereal and a rainbow white chocolate Nerds candy center.

Chip City cofounder and chief brand officer Teddy Gailas told Hearst Connecticut in February there were lines out the door for the Darien opening in late January. He credits that, in part, to choosing locations wisely.

"We love to be very selective when it comes to opening a location, and we draw a lot of data from our currently open locations," Gailas said at the time. "We look at the parallels with future locations. And both Darien and West Hartford are great little communities with tons of dining and entertainment and people."

With prior reporting by Layla Schlack

WEST HARTFORD — The reconstruction of the bustling West Hartford Center is looming. Sidewalks are narrow and hazardous, trees need to be replaced, and the existing pedestrian infrastructure is outdated and at times unsafe.

The question that remains, though, is just how far the reconstruction of LaSalle Road and Farmington Avenue — two roadways lined with restaurants and stores attracting residents and visitors to the area — will go.

The West Hartford Center Infrastructure Master Plan was first revealed a year ago, with plans to elevate the popular dining and shopping destination to a higher level by replacing and enhancing sidewalks, crosswalks, and other infrastructure.

But in November, at a meeting intended to inform local business owners about the plans, concerns were brought about losing parking spaces, as well as the disruption that construction might bring, taking the town back the drawing board — though the original plans are still very much in consideration.

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On Wednesday morning, the town showed off potential design options, ranging from keeping the status quo but still replacing sidewalks and trees while enhancing pedestrians safety, to fuller transformations that include a shift in parking from angled to parallel that would leave more space for wider sidewalks, permanent expanded outdoor dining, and even buffered sidewalk-level bike lanes.

LaSalle Road

Duane Martin, the town's director of community development, confirmed Wednesday that no construction will be taking place in 2024. But next year, it's likely that work will start on LaSalle Road. What that works entails rests on a decision yet to be made by the town manager's office.

Currently, LaSalle Road has two-way traffic and features angled parking on both sides of the street. Its sidewalks are narrow, with only 4 to 6 percent of the streetscape being devoted to pedestrians compared to 70 percent of the streetscape being devoted to parking and travel lanes.

That could be altered substantially by turning the road's angled parking into parallel parking, which would increase pedestrian sidewalk space to 10 percent and reduce vehicle space dramatically to 36 percent of the streetscape. More room would also be made for dedicated outdoor dining, which since the pandemic has been done in parking spaces.

But to do that, the town would need to remove 37 on-street parking spaces, something that concerned business owners whose restaurants and storefronts line the street. Since 2020, the town has been temporarily removing dozens of parking spaces each spring, summer, and fall to accommodate expanded outdoor dining. There also isn't a lack of parking in West Hartford Center, the town's consultant Stantec said, with over 2,500 parking spaces available in the area between surface lots, street parking, and parking garages. Another 2,700 parking spaces are also available in Blue Back Square.

New designs posed on Wednesday showed one option, called a baseline reconstruction, keeping the sidewalk widths as is, but repairing and enhancing other features. Another design, called a hybrid option, would combined keeping angled parking while still expanding sidewalks.

"In this scenario, we slightly widen the sidewalks by reducing the overall curb to curb dimension from 70 feet to 60 feet, so that gives us five feet extra on either side," said Travis Ewen of Stantec, about the hybrid proposal. "That allows for a little bit wider outdoor dining, some more landscaped areas and from the original parking of 107 spaces we go to 88 spaces, and that again accommodates for loading zones and the bumpouts to make safe crosswalks."

Farmington Avenue

A similar decision about whether to give more space to vehicles or to pedestrians and cyclists will also need to be made on Farmington Avenue.

Currently, 57 percent of Farmington Avenue is devoted to vehicle traffic and parking. Another 4 to 8 percent, depending on which side of the road you are on, is dedicated to pedestrians. Initial designs would shift that by making all parking parallel, leaving only 37 percent of the streetscape for vehicles. That would widen sidewalks to 9 percent of the streetscape on each side of the street, but also introduce buffered sidewalk-level bike lanes taking up 14 percent of the street.

"It's something we consider for all of our roadway projects," Martin said about bike facilities. "We are responsible for designing the roads, as best we can, for all users. There are challenges, especially in the Center, where we have a lot of conflicting needs for space with parking, outdoor dining, and bicycle facilities. We don't want to ignore safety for all users."

Like with LaSalle Road, the town has also included a baseline reconstruction that would only widen sidewalks slightly and do away with proposed bike lanes. A proposed hybrid design option would include a shared pathway for low-speed cyclists and pedestrians. A fourth proposal would feature parallel parking with "conventional" bike lanes painted onto the roadway not buffered or protected by anything.

No matter what designs are chosen, attention will be paid to pedestrian safety. The town is planning to shorten lengthy crosswalks with curb changes and new bumpouts, meaning pedestrians crossing both LaSalle Road and Farmington Avenue will walk shorter distances. There are also plans to raise sidewalks, which could be a useful tool for slowing traffic and increasing pedestrian visibility.

"A lot of the materials for the crosswalks are at the end of their useful life," Ewen said. "There's been utility work that's gone on, snowplowing is a constant issue with that, so there's some upgrades that should happen in order to create better surfaces. As part of this project, we analyzed and highlighted traffic and pedestrian safety concerns. That really started to correlate with the street widths and the crossing distances. Once we started to see crossing distances over 50 feet, that's when we saw a spike in the crash locations."

Construction and cost

A lingering concern for business owners who attended the meeting hovered around how exactly construction, and any disruption that comes with it, would be handled.

Martin said the project will utilize night work when possible, which should alleviate some of the disruption businesses might face.

The plan will also be done in phases, meaning that when work begins on LaSalle Road next year that the entire street and sidewalk won't be disturbed all at once. Instead, work will be done in bits and pieces, continuing down the roadway until complete. But with no plans in place or designs chosen yet, the exact construction process hasn't been finalized.

Cost was also a concern from some who attended the meeting. At the low end, consultants estimated the project could cost $8 million if the town elects to opt for baseline reconstructions that don't alter the streetscape design too much. The more alterations needed, the more the project cost would increase. But Martin said none of it will be footed by taxpayers, with the town prepared to propose using its American Rescue Plan Act funds for the project, which would need to be approved by the Town Council.

The full presentation can be viewed on YouTube and includes interactive polls that will remain open for a few more weeks. Design option will also be posted to the town's website. No decisions have been made yet and Martin said another public meeting would be held within the next two months before decisions are made by the town manager.

Feb 8, 2024

By Michael Walsh

Michael Walsh is the editor of the West Hartford News. Previously, he worked for The Hartford Courant for nearly 10 years, covering West Hartford and the Farmington Valley, among other towns. He also loves horror movies, the band Phish and fast food restaurants. Michael can be reached at [email protected].

A concert is slated for Saturday, April 13, on campus with a free workshop with the noted musician slated for earlier that afternoon.

Patch Staff

University of Saint Joseph

WEST HARTFORD, CT – A West Hartford-based university is hosting a special concert Saturday, April 13, in conjunction with an ongoing celebration of Puerto Rican culture and the arts.

The University of Saint Joseph’s evening concert series "Noche Boricua" that evening will feature William Cepeda, who will also lead an afternoon "Bomba/Plena" family workshop.

Cepeda, a four-time Grammy-nominated musician and composer, is celebrated for hisgroundbreaking Afro-Rican Jazz, blending traditional Puerto Rican musical forms withprogressive jazz.

"His music transcends borders, captivating global audiences," wrote USJ in an announcement.

Find out what's happening in West Hartfordwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

Cepeda’s "Puerto Rican Explosion: Musical Roots and Evolution" presents an evening ofPuerto Rican music and dance, ranging from the traditional forms of bomba, plena, danza,musica jíbara, and musica Taina, to the internationally popular contemporary styles into whichthey have evolved.

The performance will take place at Hoffman Auditorium in Bruyette Athenaeum on the University of Saint Joseph’s West Hartford campus at 7:30 p.m., Saturday, April 13.

It will be preceded by light refreshments at 6:30. Tickets are $15 for advance purchase, generaladmission, and $20 (cash only) at the door. For tickets visit www.showpass.com/noche-boricua.

Noche Boricua is supported in part by the NEH Humanities and Arts Fund at the University ofSaint Joseph and the Vincenza A. Uccello ’56 Lecture Fund.

Earlier on April 13, Cepeda will lead a workshop in which participants will explore the culture ofPuerto Rico through poetry and learn authentic drumming and dances of traditional Afro-Puerto Rican bomba and plena music.

The workshop will take place from 1 to 4 p.m. in the Middle Dining Room of McGovern Hall on the university’s campus.

Admission is free of charge but advance registration at ArtMuseumUSJ.eventbrite.com is encouraged.

This event is supported in part by the Peter Brazeau Poetry Fund and the NEH Humanities and Arts Fund at the University of Saint Joseph.

These events are presented in conjunction with the exhibition "(R)evolution: Identity and Powerin Puerto Rican and Diasporican Art" on view at the USJ Art Museum, University of Saint Josephthrough June 8.

For further information on the exhibition and related programming visit www.usj.edu/artmuseum/revolution.

To order tickets for the concert in advance, click on this link.

To register for Cepeda's workshop that Saturday afternoon, click on this link.