Going mobile: Green Light Café has closed its Lexington Ave. location, but the owners will continue to cater.
Asheville's vegetarian food scene lost one of its fixtures on Saturday, Sept. 8, when Green Light Café moved on from 22 Lexington Ave. Shanon Blair, who owns the eatery with her husband, Michael, said real estate difficulties caused them to close, at least for now. “There's no option to renew at this time,” she said. “We couldn't find another location quick enough, so we'll have to just pull out and then maybe in the future try to reopen somewhere else,” she says.
The owners plan to continue cooking for their catering and special events projects. Diners can satisfy their Green Light cravings at upcoming events such as the Jomeokee Music and Arts Festival in Pinnacle on the weekend of Sept. 15 and the Lake Eden Arts Festival in Black Mountain in October.
The Blairs have experience navigating their business through changing environments. They opened Green Light in Black Mountain in 1998, where it remained for 10 years. In 2002, they expanded into catering and events. In 2008, they took a two-year hiatus from the restaurant and focused on catering. They reopened the brick-and-mortar restaurant in Asheville in 2010. Here's hoping the move is just one more opportunity for the eatery to reinvent itself.
Green Light will continue its catering and mobile café activities. For more information, visit http://greenlightcafe.com.
