Welcome to our food column, Corner Booth, where each month Layla Khoury-Hanold will guide us through what’s happening in Roanoke’s food scene. We’ll feature restaurant openings and closings, trends, changes in cuisine concepts or locations, a first-impression of a new eatery, and our Ask Layla section, where Rambler members can get their burning questions answered on the best places to eat or drink for any occasion. Simply leave a comment with your question or email us at editor@roanokerambler.com. Enjoy! 😋

Anticipated Roanoke Restaurant Openings for 2026

Roanoke’s culinary forecast for new restaurants looks optimistic early in the year, with anticipated January openings including Dorothy & Frank’s, a two-story concept from bloom chef/owner Nate Sloan and business partner Thomas Ceddia that’ll include Frank’s Wild Years, a listening bar and late-night menu upstairs, and Dorothy, a full-service restaurant downstairs, anchored by a rotisserie and locally sourced fare. The Haven, which took over the former Awful Arthur’s space in downtown Roanoke, plans to open mid- to late January with a menu of craft cocktails and creative comfort food twists like a hot honey cream cheese dip appetizer.

A crop of a new establishments is targeting early spring for their debuts, including Parkway Brewing Company’s downtown Roanoke location, ¡Suerte!, a Spanish restaurant with Madrid-style tapas inside new boutique hotel The Promissory, and Woodshed, where the café concept, serving Appalachian-inspired eats like trout toast and chow chow melts, will join the now-open craft and food and drink retail section. I missed my chance to sample Mexican pop-up La Shunca’s carne asada and tacos and quesadillas on homemade tortillas when they debuted this past fall, but co-owner Jose Guzman shared that he and his business partner (who is also his mother) Reyna Flores, will be back on the festival circuit in April with an expanded menu and hopefully a food trailer in tow. 

Further afield in Catawba, The Homeplace Restaurant is slated to bring back its homestyle Southern cooking by Easter. And Chris’ Coffee and Custard shared via their email newsletter that their new location in the former Starkey School building will open spring 2026. 

Restaurant Food and Drink Trends for 2026 

In order to predict where we’re going, we have to look at where we’ve been. Here are five emerging trends that I think have staying power in 2026:

An Increase in Multi-Concept Spaces

Places that combine multiple concepts in one space, or establishments that offer different concepts at different times of day started to appear last year, including Canvas & Coffee Art Café, an art studio/coffee shop in Grandin Village. This year, Dorothy & Frank’s will open downtown; Dorothy will occupy the lower space, anchored by a rotisserie turning out roasted chicken and crispy porchetta in sandwiches by day and casual entrees by night, while upstairs, Frank’s focus will be a listening bar with a late-night menu serving shareable snacks. And I think there’s potential for The Promissory, a boutique hotel with a concert venue and Spanish restaurant, ¡Suerte!, to find other ways to utilize the space to expand its food and beverage offerings to cater to both downtown denizens and visitors alike.

Diversified and Specialized Global Eats

In 2025, the diversity of Roanoke’s dining scene continued to expand, including more eateries focused on signature specialties, like Sudha’s Kitchen, a South Indian food truck where you’ll find craveworthy dosas, savory lentil-and-rice crepes, and idli, steamed cakes made from a fermented rice and lentil batter. Last year also saw the addition of homemade flour tortillas for tacos and quesadillas at La Shunca and burritos and machetes at Burritos Paso Del Norte, plus  Mexican tortas at El Mexa, best-in-class birria from Taco Riendo, chicken shawarma at 525 Shawarma and Argentinian empanadas at Familia Argentina. I predict that more food trucks, pop-ups and restaurants will double down on dishes that were previously hard to find or not available here. (Putting my wish for dim sum out into the dining-verse here. Have a restaurant on your wish list? Drop it in the comments!)

More Niche Food Retail

I couldn’t have predicted that by the end of 2025 we’d have multiple micro sourdough bakeries, a downtown specialty shop with a floor dedicated almost exclusively to local food makers (Hot Stuff) and a farm market slinging raw milk and gluten-free goodies (Basil’s Farm Market & Gifts). By the end of January, Halalcom Grocery & Butcher, a halal butcher shop and grocer in Cave Spring, will stock its cases with freshly slaughtered lamb, beef, veal, goat and chicken. For now, you can peruse the case for sweets like bakalava and stock up on shelf-stable pantry essentials like spices, condiments, olives and rice. I hope to see support for local, small food businesses continue to grow and I am excited to see what other specialty products and concepts launch as a result.

Buns Will Reign Supreme

Some of my favorite baked goods of 2025 took the form of morning buns; think of them like a croissant, but spiraled and baked in a muffin tin with sugar or fillings in between the layers. I dream about Poser Bakes’ Earl Grey morning buns speckled with lemon Earl Grey sugar and am eager to return to The Albemarle Bakery & Coffee House for their breakfast bun du jour, a ham, egg and cheese combo the day I sampled it, but I’ve got my sights set on the sausage and chili crisp number. And though it’s not a laminated pastry (so technically not a morning bun by my earlier definition), I am curious to sample Rising Grace Baking’s perennially sold-out cardamom buns (which strike me as an ideal afternoon pick-me-up). This year, I’d love to see more local bakers experiment with pastries in bun form and play with flavors like matcha, tahini and miso.

Cocktails Will Go Tropical 

I’m still holding out hope that my predicted 2025 trend of savory cocktails will continue to flourish, with more bars borrowing ingredients like miso, pepper and saffron from the kitchen to infuse spirits and syrups. But I also think we’ll see more tropical flavors on beverage menus this year, a trend that started in 2025 with the opening of Show Pony, where tiki-style cocktails became the crushable, Instagrammable tipples we didn’t know we were missing, and finished with frozen painkillers at Mama Jean’s Barbecue and Lucky transforming into a tiki-inspired cocktail den for the holidays. Expect to see more menus incorporating classic tiki ingredients like light, dark and blended rums, orgeat (an almond-based syrup with subtle floral notes) and falernum (a sweet, spiced Caribbean liqueur or syrup). Something about the escapism vibes that come with sipping from a glass garnished with fruit, flowers or umbrellas feels right for these times.

First Impressions: Kirk & Soul

This month’s dining review was inspired by reader Cas M., who wanted to know the scoop on Kirk & Soul, a Caribbean and soul food restaurant that opened last November at 312 2nd St. SW in downtown Roanoke. 

In a nutshell: Kirk & Soul is a casual, café-style restaurant with seriously good food. My mom, daughter and I stopped in for lunch on a recent Sunday and were warmly greeted and directed to approach the host stand at the back of the restaurant, just past the bar. Peruse the menus at the counter before placing your order and paying; food is then brought to your table. Choose from among the ample tables or booths in the expansive space, flooded with generous lighting from the large glass windows, or snag bar seating facing two flat screen televisions. 

We shared an order of the excellent jerk chicken ($13.99), featuring tender marinated-then-grilled pieces of chicken which boasted a pleasing creeping heat (which owner Justin Hayden confirmed is from the Scotch bonnet peppers in the marinade), topped with homemade jerk sauce and served over a bed of coconut-milk infused rice and beans. Scene-stealing sides included a creamy baked mac ‘n’ cheese ($4.99) and spiral-cut French fries ($4.99), crispy outside and fluffy within, with a thickness that lands somewhere between steak fries and potato wedges, making them a sturdy base for the popular loaded fries with jerk chicken, pico de gallo and queso ($10.15). 

When I told Hayden I’d be back to try the fried catfish sandwich ($9.50 with chips or fries), he said that it has been a recent popular order, along with early fan-favorites like the jerk chicken grilled cheese and oxtail dishes (oxtails with rice and beans dish is $17.99; oxtail rasta pasta is $13.99). I could see stopping back in for lunch downtown for a quick sandwich or lingering over warming plate of oxtails and rice and beans, tucking into an early dinner (and bringing more dining companions for optimal sharing) or sitting at the bar and pairing a cocktail ($11 to $14) with an order of loaded fries and a wing basket ($10.99 for a 6-piece; $17.99 for a 12-piece) paired with enticing-sounding sauces like spicy peach or Carolina tangy gold. 

Ask Layla: Where to Eat

Of all the places on Williamson Road, which do you think has the best Mexican food, tacos in particular? – Mary H., Christiansburg

My pick for best tacos and Mexican fare on Williamson Road is Taco Riendo. What started as a fan-favorite food truck expanded last March into a brick-and-mortar space (5234 Williamson Road). Pick a table or a booth in the bright, airy dining room, then order a sampling of tacos to share, especially the excellent quesabirrias ($10.50 for four), starring beef slow-braised with guajillo peppers, then tucked into tortillas with mozzarella and griddled in the rendered beef fat and served with a lush beef consommé for dipping and sipping. I also really like their tacos with al pastor with pineapple ($12 for four), lengua ($15 for four) and carne asada ($13 for four), but the proteins also shine in other formats, particularly gorditas, hollowed-out, stuffed and fried corn rounds ($12 for three). If a platter is more your vibe, order the carne asada platillo ($14.99), where the marinated meat is char-grilled then plated with rice, refried beans, salad, pico de gallo and tortillas.

Taco Riendo also serves one of my favorite bites of 2025, the hamburguesa Mexicana ($9.99), a dish that co-owner Angeles Sifuentes Reyna had long wanted to add to Taco Riendo’s menu (and finally could once the brick-and-mortar opened). It’s modeled after a street food dish from her and co-owner Jaime Sifuentes’ hometown of Moctezuma and features a juicy beef patty stacked with sliced ham, Mexican sausage, mozzarella and American cheese, lettuce, tomato and avocado on a mayo-slicked bun. Note: there are no chips and salsa served here, but do order the bright, creamy guacamole served with freshly fried tortilla chips.