Spotlight: La Speranza Restaurant, A New Italian Gem in Twinbrook
La Speranza Restaurant, a new Italian eatery in Rockville is already making waves. Nestled off the beaten path at 806 Baltimore Road on the edge of Twinbrook, this charming spot is part of a strip mall better known for Jonathan’s and 7-11. Despite its unassuming location, La Speranza boasts a bright and inviting interior with a dozen tables, a small bar, and a view into the kitchen showcasing its wood-fired oven.
The highlight of La Speranza is undoubtedly its homemade pastas with tomato sauce, complemented by Neapolitan-style pizzas. This culinary excellence is thanks to chef and owner Neptali Mendoza, who brings a wealth of experience from his time as the sous chef at Baronnessa in Rockville, kitchen manager at RedRocks Pizzeria in Alexandria, and his training with Peter Pastan at Obelisk in DC at the start of his career.
As a frequent diner over the past month, I’ve had the pleasure of sampling their diverse pasta menu. While the cream sauces are a bit too heavy for my taste, every other dish from the chicken alla marsala to the lasagna to the eggplant alla parmigiana have been terrific. The wine selection, especially the Montepulciano, is a cut above most Italian restaurants in town. A boscaiola pizza to-go has become a regular treat for me. Additionally, La Speranza offers a variety of chicken, veal, and seafood entrees, panini, soups, salads, daily lunch specials, and even an American-style brunch on weekends. Pizzas $12-19, lunch specials $13, dinner entrees $17-27.
If you’re on the hunt for an exceptional Italian restaurant and want to support a local business, La Speranza is the perfect choice.
Mayor and Council to Discuss 68% Increase in Car Thefts
At its Monday, February 26, 2024 meeting, the Rockville Mayor and Council will discuss 2024 state legislation and community engagement plans. On the Consent Agenda (items approved without discussion) are a transportation grant agreement and purchasing of three different types of trucks, among others. The Mayor and Council will also receive reports on police statistics and recognize the Richard Montgomery High School Girls Varsity Volleyball Team on winning the state 4A Championship.
For the first time, the Rockville City Police Department (RCPD) shared its annual statistics on crime and their report states that “thefts of automobiles and thefts from automobiles remain one of the highest reported criminal offenses in the region and across the nation. The RCPD noted an increase in theft of automobiles by 69 from 2022 to 2023, an increase of 68%. Thefts from automobiles were up by 19 from 2022 to 2023, an increase of 2%. The most noteworthy change in crime reporting was Carjackings. Carjackings have been on the rise, locally, regionally, and nationally.” Furthermore, “Montgomery County Department of Police re-deployed personnel assigned to the Rockville District to other areas of Montgomery County. This has left parts of the city that once had dual police coverage between the RCPD and the Montgomery County Department of Police to be policed solely by the RCPD.” That resulted in a significant increase in calls for help to RCPD and a significant reduction in response time (“on average, for every additional 1,000 calls dispatched to police per month, officers arrive nine minutes slower”). More on pages 12-20.
The City Council will discuss legislation being introduced at the state level and which they will support or oppose. Under discussion are SB484: Housing Expansion and Affordability; SB537: Restrictions on Cannabis Licensee Locations; SB 783/HB 1435: Renewable Energy (Net Energy Metering Aggregation, Solar Renewable Energy Credits, and Taxes on Solar Energy Generating); HB 601/SB 442: Prohibiting Street Racing and Exhibition Driving; and HB 1306 Taxing Food and Beverages. These bills are complex and continually revised, so if you have an interest, read the staff report for a summary and recommendations (pages 190-200) or contact Senator Kagan or Delegates Palakovich-Carr, Vogel, and Spiegel.
Potential topics for the March 4, 2024 meeting is a presentation on the FY2025 budget and approval of taxes and fees.
The Mayor and Council are conducting hybrid meetings. If you wish to submit comments in writing for Community Forum or Public Hearings, please email the comments to MayorAndCouncil@RockvilleMD.gov by no later than 10:00 a.m. on the date of the meeting.
More details in the 205-page agenda packet are available at https://www.rockvillemd.gov/AgendaCenter/ViewFile/Agenda/_02262024-7117.
Say “Hello Vietnam!” in Twinbrook
Opening at the start of August is “Hello, Vietnam!,” a Vietnamese restaurant open for lunch and dinner from Tuesday to Sunday from 11 am to 8:30 pm (closed Mondays). Their ambitious menu includes spring and summer rolls; pho (soup); noodle and rice dishes with grilled chicken, beef, pork, shrimp, or vegetables; banh mi (sandwiches); milk tea (with tapioca, crystal, or popping boba), and of course Vietnamese coffee (American available, too). They’ll fill out this menu eventually with shaking beef, caramel fish, crispy noodles, fried rice, and fruit smoothies. If you’ve never had Vietnamese food before, I suggest you start with the banh mi sandwich, summer rolls with peanut butter sauce, spring rolls with sweet sauce, and maybe a rice noodle dish. The interior is entirely new and clean with large photo murals decorating the walls. The staff is working hard during these start-up weeks and happy to explain the menu to you. Their website at hellovietnamfood.com includes a menu and map.
You’ll find Hello Vietnam in the middle of the Twinbrook Shopping Center at 2200 Viers Mill Road at Atlantic Avenue, midway between Lotte Grocery and the Twinbrook Library. Parking is always a little crazy, so I’d avoid trying to park in front of the restaurant and instead choose a spot away from the stores. This shopping center is a bit ragged-looking, but don’t let that discourage you. When it was built in the 1960s, the appeal of this “California style” shopping center threatened the businesses of downtown Rockville. It just needs some painting and a good powerwash to remove years of bubblegum from the sidewalks. Today it serves as the unofficial “old downtown Twinbrook” with a wide range of international grocery stores and restaurants, enriching the diversity of the neighborhood.
Only One “Very Best Restaurant” in Rockville?
Washingtonian magazine just released their annual “100 Very Best Restaurants” and it includes only one in Rockville: A&J Restaurant at 1319 Rockville Pike. Just outside of Rockville, they include Inferno Pizzeria Napoletana in Darnestown. I don’t want to diminish these honors, but geez, they’ve been listed many times before—is anyone at the magazine venturing out further? To provide some inspiration, here are some of my suggestions:
O’Donnell’s Market, 1073 Seven Locks Road, “Potomac” (officially in Rockville off Seven Locks Road, across from the Potomac Springs neighborhood). Among the best seafood in town and a very straight-forward preparation, and you can also buy fish and oysters, along with prepared side dishes and baked goods to take home.
Mosaic, 186 Halpine Road, Rockville (south end of the Rockville Pike, near Twinbrook Metro). The owner is from Lyon, France and it promotes itself as an “authentic French restaurant,” but more accurately it’s French-inspired. So they serve classics such as salad niçoise, duck confit, and beef bourguignon (alas with noodles, not potatoes) as well as a crab cheddar quesadilla, cajun shrimp omelette, and parmesan chicken picatta. Light, airy Belgian waffles dominate the menu and show up by themselves, in sandwiches, and the “bread” for entrees. I love ’em!
Java Nation, 11120 Rockville Pike, “North Bethesda” (across from the White Flint Mall, just south of Rockville). It’s an exemplar for independent coffee shops but it also serves terrific meals for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, plus wine, beer, and signature cocktails. The “very best” food doesn’t have to be expensive.
Il Pizzico, 15209 Frederick Rd, Rockville (north end of the city at East Gude Drive). Friends love this restaurant and claim it serves the best Italian food in the region. I rarely visit because it’s across town and takes me more than 30 minutes to get there. It’s in a dull office building and parking is limited but inside you’ll find meals that are a step up from the usual fare, such as tagliatelle al ragu’ di vitello or filetto di maiale al balsamico).
Any other suggestions that you’d consider among the very best?
Rockville Farmers Market Opens on Saturday
Rockville’s Farmers Market opens this Saturday, May 13 from 9 a.m.-1 p.m. and runs through Nov. 18 in the jury parking lot at East Jefferson (MD 28) and Monroe streets in downtown (that’s across from the Americana). This weekend will probably feature various salad greens, asparagus, and strawberries, as well plants and flowers, herbs, baked goods, local beer and wine, knife sharpening, meat, and coffee. For more information, including a list of participating vendors and approximate harvest dates for select fruits and vegetables, visit www.rockvillemd.gov/farmers or call 240-314-8620.
If you’re new to Rockville, in addition to this Saturday morning market, there’s a second but smaller market downtown in front of Continue reading →
La Limena Named One of the Region’s 100 Best Restaurants
The February 2017 issue of Washingtonian named La Limena, a Peruvian/Cuban restaurant in Rockville, among the “100 very best” in the DC region. This listing includes it among such Michelin-starred restaurants as Pineapple & Pearls, Minibar, Fiola, Rose’s Luxury, and the Inn at Little Washington, but it’s far less expensive. If you’ve already eaten there, you know it’s popular and packed nearly every hour. Thankfully, they’re opening a second restaurant later this year in the Talbott Shopping Center just north of the Woodmont Country Club on the Rockville Pike.
La Limena is located at 765 Rockville Pike (northwest corner at Wooton Parkway/First Street) but it can be hard to find because it’s deep in the corner of a strange two-part shopping center (how did the Planning Commission allow this?). The shopping center contains a CVS, PNC Bank, and IHOP, and you’ll want to park close to the furthest back corner of the northern shopping center (you won’t be able to see the sign from the street).
Alas, no other restaurants in Rockville are included in this year’s “100 very best” but close by are:
- Black Market Bistro, 4600 Waverly Avenue, Garrett Park
- Inferno Pizzeria Napoletana, 12207 Darnestown Road, Darnestown (no reservations)
- Jaleo, 7271 Woodmont Avenue, Bethesda
- Kapnos Kouzina, 4900 Hampden Lane, Bethesda
Happy eating!
The Domino Effect of the New Safeway on Rockville Pike
Former Safeway grocery store in the Twinbrook Shopping Center.
The new and larger 24-hour Safeway store that opened in December on Rockville Pike near the Twinbrook Metro in Rockville is having a domino effect on other businesses in the area. When it opened, it made the Safeway in the Twinbrook Shopping Center at 2200 Viers Mills Road redundant, so it closed a couple months ago and left another empty store in the shopping center. Recent rumors suggest that it soon be filled by Lotte Mart, a South Korean market chain with more than 200 stores worldwide, including Gaithersburg and Wheaton, but its arrival won’t be welcomed by everyone—the nearby small Asian Market will close, leaving another hole in the shopping center.
As the owner of Asian Market explained, “between the increased rent and the new competition [Lotte Mart], I can’t stay in business. It’s already hard enough to make a profit while working 16 hour days, so I’ll be closing at the end of August and looking for a job working for someone else.” Although it’s small store with just three aisles, it represented a wide range of culinary cultures, including Chinese, Thai, Japanese, Cambodian, Korean, Philipino, and Indonesian, that are not typically found in the larger Lotte Mart or Great Wall. To clear out its inventory, it is selling its bottled, canned, and dry goods (except rice) at a 20 percent discount. The soy sauce and sambals are all gone, but there still was plenty of Thai curry, coconut milk, and noodles on the shelves when I visited a couple days ago.
The former Safeway store, just like the Twinbrook Library, is on a parcel that is owned separately from the rest of the shopping center but serve as anchors that attract customers. The building is almost twenty years old but still serviceable, but too small for today’s major grocery, department, or hardware stores. An Asian or Hispanic grocery store seems to be the most likely candidate, especially with the demographics of the neighborhood, and when it comes in, it too will have a domino effect on the rest of the shopping center. Whether it will be good or bad remains to be seen. It’s pushed one business out but could attract others—and it badly needs to fill the half dozen stores that are empty.
Rockville’s Twin Valley Distillers Debuts at Olney Farmers Market
Twin Valley Distillers, the first distillery to operate in Montgomery County since Prohibition (that was nearly a century ago!), debuted four of its spirits today at the Olney Farmers and Artists Market thanks to a recent loosening of Prohibition Era regulations (when can we eliminate the county’s liquor department?). They offered tastings of their 1812 Maryland Bourbon whiskey, Aged Wimsey gin, Dirty Apples cinnamon flavored whiskey, and Black Joe coffee liqueur, offering special discount prices of $25-35 per 750 ml. They also produce rum, rye, and vodka, but didn’t bring them along for this debut. Twinbrook neighbor Matt Von Hendy mentioned this place to me a couple months ago but I couldn’t fathom a serious distillery business was actually in operation in our hometown. Boy, was I wrong. The owner is serious and the products are much better than expected.
The Bourbon whiskey and coffee liqueur were surprisingly good, so I picked up a bottle of each. If you want to try some yourself, I suspect they’ll be returning to the Onley Farmers Market on Sunday mornings but you can also experience a tasting and a tour at the distillery on Friday, Saturday, or Sunday afternoons at 711 East Gude Drive, Bay D in Rockville. This is in an industrial area, so you’ll need to watch the address numbers and be a little adventurous. To find it, look for Maaco and Abka Marble & Granite Countertops and pull into the parking lot. At the back of the parking lot is a blue and white “White Flint Collision Center.” Drive through the gates on the left and go around to the rear of the building to park and enter the distillery. Twin Valley has plenty of orange signs leading you there but that area is full of signs and they just get absorbed in the clutter.
For those of you that support “farm to table,” you can now expand your pantry to include liquor! The spirits are not only made in Rockville, but the ingredients are sourced locally as much as possible. Local farmers supply all the grain for the spirits and Mayorga, which is also based in Rockville, provides the organic coffee. On October 1, Montgomery County will allow Twin Valley and other distillers to sell directly to restaurants and bars, so you’ll see it appear more frequently (right now, there’s no place in Rockville to buy or drink these Rockville-made spirits except at the distillery. Ugh.).
MoCo Beat Podcast Launched
Rockville residents Tom Moore and Dana Tofig recently launched MoCo Beat, a podcast about “the news, the politics, and the life of Montgomery County.” Moore is an attorney with the Federal Elections Commission and recently concluded four years of service on the Rockville City Council. Tofig works in the research arm of the US Department of Education was formerly the Public Information Officer with Montgomery County Public Schools. Their first episode looks at the Rockville Pike Plan, the recently adopted Montgomery County budget, places to buy beer, and new restaurants in downtown Rockville. The first podcast is just short of 40 minutes and looks like it might be a weekly production.
With the demise of the Gazette newspaper and spartan coverage by the Washington Post, it is difficult to locate news about Rockville but here are the ones I know: Continue reading →
Hometown Holidays on Memorial Day Weekend Features 30 groups across 6 Blocks
More than 30 groups will take to four stages across six city blocks in Rockville Town Center for the city’s Hometown Holidays Music Fest on Saturday, May 28 and Sunday, May 29, 2016. The weekend will once again feature favorite food from local restaurants at the Taste of Rockville, kids amusements and the 72nd Annual Memorial Day Ceremony and Parade on Monday, May 30.
Two hometown area bands will headline the 28th annual festival on Sunday. Baltimore’s Kelly Bell Band will play at 6:30 p.m. and then join the original “Bad Boys of Bethesda,” The Nighthawks, at 8:30 p.m. in the headlining slot on the Bud Light Stage. Other artists on the Bud Light Stage include:
- Alternative band Knox Hamilton at 2 p.m. on Saturday.
- Soul/rock band Sister Sparrow & The Dirty Birds at 6:30 p.m. on Saturday.
- Flow Tribe, playing funk, rock and psychedelic at 4 p.m. on Saturday.
- “BluesAmericanaRock” artist Ted Garber at 4 p.m. on Sunday.
Additional acts include rock band Radio Birds, reggae favorite Jah Works, the roots rock of The Alternate Routes, and the U.S. Navy Band Country Current, playing country and bluegrass. Find a full schedule of performances at www.rockvillemd.gov/hometownholidays.
The festival is just a five-minute walk from the Rockville Metro station. Festival-goers who drive or bike will find parking in the City Hall lots, Montgomery County Council office building garage on Fleet Street and the Metro station lots.
Learn more at http://www.rockvillemd.gov/hometownholidays or at “City of Rockville Hometown Holidays” on Facebook.
Max for Rockville 