BOOT STRAPS Owners Dave Hausmann and Josh Wright

Describe the transition from Relative Theory to The Boot. We were trying to have a better environment for live music. And also we wanted to expand our associations with local vendors, which had started with the little cafe we had at the record store.

When you were creating the menu (with former chef Brendan Vesey), what inspired you to explore slow food and local ingredients? We wanted to make things seem antiquated but not kitschy. We weren’t reinventing anything. Almost everything we do, we take from some sort of traditional inspiration-things that have been done for a hundred years or more.

Like what? Like a coffee table that was a sidecar, or a pasta dish that’s been around in old sea towns for centuries. And that’s what we feel that Norfolk is.

You’re very involved in Ghent. How important to you is your role in the community? Very. It’s a much more efficient way of taking care of yourself-by taking care of your neighbor. Being involved in local events, community support and action, you can just better develop that sustainability.

NOODLE EXTREME MAKEOVER Classic and cutting-edge dishes like traditional lasagna get a new spin with local, seasonal ingredients.

Do you have any big goals for the next few years? I would really like to get Local Food Tidewater off the ground. That would be a local food network to help other restaurants use the products of local agriculture in a much more efficient manner so that it’s not as troubling. It can be very difficult to be in a restaurant, especially an independent restaurant, and deal with 20 different food vendors. It’s very time-consuming and you don’t get to spend a lot of time focusing on the food. And these would be products that are made within a hundred miles rather than from California, or imported.

So what do you like to prepare for yourself when you’re not here at The Boot? Um… well… that doesn’t ever happen.