Hampton Roads Black Restaurant Week is on now — with plenty of new spots to try

After a flood of special menus during city-sponsored weeks, restaurant week season continues with Hampton Roads Black Restaurant Week, ongoing through Sunday. Held since 2019 during Black History Month, the week highlights Black-owned restaurants from Suffolk to Newport News to Virginia Beach.

Each participating restaurant offers $10 lunches and $20 dinner menus. And so Got Fish? in Hampton is offering a $20 dinner of crab cake, side and banana pudding dessert. And for lunch, newly opened Charlotte’s in Hampton — from the owners of Mango Mangeaux — might hook you up with a $10 plate of baked chicken, two sides, bread and lemonade.

This year’s list of participating restaurants features a lot of new names. Wall Street Cafe, in downtown Suffolk, is a new restaurant devoted in part to the history of prosperous Black-founded businesses in Oklahoma and elsewhere. Louisiana-inflected Roux Raw Bar and Grill opened late last year in Hampton with some seriously good honey-Cajun fried chicken.

Canvas Social Cuisine, a bright-painted Soul-Caribbean spot in the former Sweet Teas space on Granby Street in Norfolk, is also aboard — part of a new crop of Black-owned restaurants to open in downtown Norfolk this year that also includes Cherry-O To Go, Suite 1200, Brothers restaurant, and Major Phillie Cheesesteaks.

More established names taking part in the restaurant week include J & K Style Grill in Virginia Beach; Beyond Vegan Cell Food in Portsmouth; and Pinkfish Seafood Bistro and Wing Bistro in Hampton.

A full list of participating restaurants, with links to menus if available, can be found at hamptonroadsbrw.com/participating-restaurants.

The Black Owned Restaurant Association, which organizes Black Restaurant Week, is also offering a chance at a grand prize for diners who make it to at least five restaurants this week: a hotel stay, meals at Mango Mangeaux and the Wing Bistro, a $50 restaurant gift certificate and museum tickets. Find your bingo card at hamptonroadsbrw.com/hrbrw-bingo.

Matthew Korfhage, 757-446-2318, matthew.korfhage@pilotonline.com