ORIGINAL POST April 10: Foodies have been clamoring for an Ethiopian restaurant in Asheville for years now, and it looks like one might finally be in the works. Word on the street is that an Ethiopian eatery is coming to the former Firestorm Cafe location on Commerce Street in downtown Asheville. (Basically right behind Thirsty Monk in downtown.)
Right now, you can get some awesome Ethiopian at DeSoto Lounge in West Asheville, but only on Tuesdays. (They still offer that, right?) Anyway, more as I get it.
Firestorm Cafe recently closed, with the owners saying they plan to re-open in a new location in West Asheville. No word yet on where they’ll land.
31 Comments
really glad to see the trolls from the citizen times comment section have found a new home…
Sweet. Filling in the ethnic cuisine gap in downtown!
My apologies to anyone from Ethiopia who read Harry’s comments below. He is what we call an Ignorant American: very sheltered about the world outside of the US, thinks that jokes about hunger and famine are funny, because he’s always had a big mac to turn to; thinks Ethiopia is a funny shape on a map and has ‘skinny people’ there, and probably has no idea that the the culture and cuisine of Ethiopia dates back over 3000 years,(12 times as old as USA) and that early hominids lived there millions of years ago, lending the land a much deeper and richer significance than anything he’ll ever appreciate.
LOL, I’m sure there are a lot of Ethiopians here who were thrilled with your apology.
ethiopian was a favorite and plentiful in sf when I moved here from there 13 years ago! it’s very exciting, I love the many spicy vege dishes and injera and the family table presentation.
I don’t understand all the hubbub about this Ethiopian food. It can’t be all that good. Hell, the Ethiopians don’t even eat it. Ever seen the size of them little buggers? They ain’t as big around as a nail!
I was going to say the same thing but was afraid it would sound unnecessarily cruel.
Of course, Ethiopia was not always a famine-stricken country, mostly in our lifetime.
I always seem to say what others think. Too old to change now. Besides, I fu@king hate political correctness!
By which you mean “not being an @sshole.” Which is fine enough, as long as you don’t mind being thought of as an @sshole.
Go f@ck yourself.
He obviously doesn’t mind.
Yeah, some folks have this annoying thing called a “filter” that allows them to think about what they are going to say before they blurt out their initial reactions.
That must be annoying, eh?
What’s annoying are sniveling little PC twits who can’t take a joke. Hopefully you and Matt the apologist never turn on Comedy Central.
Sorry that I don’t pay myself on the back for saying the first thing that crosses my mind without considering it. See, I’m apologizing again. Guess you are correct.
Anyways, yay for more diverse ethnic food in Asheville. Boo for twerps who are proud of spewing vile hate-speech.
That would be fantastic… I’ve really been missing Ethiopian food. I’m just amazed no one’s tried it in Asheville yet. There are some great Ethiopian places in Atlanta, and even a couple of fair ones in Charlotte. It’s time! Yay!
That should be a good fit beside Kathmandu and Jerusalem Garden.
Whoa, whoa, whoa… Wait just a darn minute. Ethiopian? Not a pizza-taco fusion place, our 38th Italian joint, or our 80th Mexican restaurant?
Sorry, that’s just too radical.
And it goes without saying their food had bloody well better be gluten free, fair trade, shade grown and organic. Or else.
You forgot “sustainable” and “local.” You’ve gotta hit all the buzzwords if you’re going to start.
What about paying a Living Wage?
(Not that I care, just gettin’ in the spirit.)
Maybe we should commission a study or ten about it before moving forward. If we’re lucky, the people who want to open the restaurant will give up by year 15 or so as the studies grind on, and we can get back to the serious business of opening multiple clones of the restaurants we already have.
And more hotels.
You guys, we need to force affordable housing into this space.
If there isn’t a section of the menu dedicated to vegan and vegetarian options, I’ll be organizing a protest at Pritchard park.
And you bring up another good point, Harry. A very, very good point: parks. What with the obvious lack of green space in downtown Asheville, wouldn’t it be better to put a park in there instead of some dumb old restaurant?
If we can’t have an electric car charging station, I guess a park will be ok.
Must have mac and cheese so useless, vile comments can be made by self appointed restaurant reviewer.
Do you know who’s involved? I know Addissae has been looking for a viable location for at least a year.
don’t know yet…
I believe it is the Addissae folks. I ran into Vicki, one of the owners of Addisae, about a month ago, and she told me they were very close–that they had found an investor and were actively looking for a location again.
It seems that you mean Commerce Street, not Congress Street.
You had me all excited, thinking there was some district of downtown I didn’t know about.
yes, thank you orulz
No, sadly Desoto has not had this option on Tuesdays for a while now. I’m looking forward to the new place!