Good Morning Fredericksburg! It’s been over a year in the making, but Kickshaws Kitchen is FINALLY open. For those of you who don’t follow too much on social media, here is the official update:
- We worked diligently for a year on the permitting for 103.5 and hit EVER wall imaginable. I guess its not that easy turning a dog grooming space into a functioning kitchen.
- We finally got all the permits in place to begin building and BOOM 1002 Sophia became available, the space formerly occupied by Charlie and Grace.
- We leased the space with the help of our landlord (who has had amazing faith in our business since day 1) and our awesome commercial real estate agent.
- We worked feverishly for 3 weeks to get the space ready!
- We opened Kickshaws Kitchen on Monday (9/26/16)!
A number of folks have asked- “well what is happening at 103.5 William Street now?” No worries that little space will definitely still be utilized, just for a different purpose. After the year of planning the 103.5 space, it came to our attention that the demand for clean and safe foods was much larger than we anticipated and the 1002 Sophia street space will really let us better meet that demand. However, there is a large demand for our dedicated gluten-free baked goods as well! So 103.5 William street will become Kickshaws’ Bakery later this year. The space will not be open to the public, but on the average morning you will probably be able to walk by and watch all the delicious bakery goodies being produced in the big window facing William Street. The Bakery will serve Fredericksburg and the surrounding area with dedicated gluten-free baked goods like the breads and desserts that we produce for the Market and Kitchen as well as some of the local restaurants like Orofino and Legume. We are very excited to help our local restaurants offer safe bread and dessert options for Fredericksburg diners.
What is Kickshaws Kitchen?
Exactly what makes Kickshaws Kitchen special?
As in the Market, we are dedicated to sourcing local, non-gmo, organic, untreated and no junk added foods. This means that ALL produce sourced for the Kitchen is NEVER sprayed or treated and is always non-gmo. All our meats are from either certified organic sources or our wonderful local farms like Earths Echo (Fredericksburg), Renewed Pastures (Caroline Co.), Whiffletree Farm (Warrenton), Polyface Farms (Swoope, Va) who practice humane animal husbandry and never ever treat with antibiotics, growth hormones or GMO feeds. Additionally, Kickshaws Kitchen is a dedicated gluten-free kitchen which means that from the source to the plate, we are following our materials to know that they are safe for the gluten-free community. If I can’t eat it- I will not put it on a plate for you. Our Kitchen is also nut-free (tree nuts and peanuts) and overall pretty allergen friendly. (if you have any questions please don’t hesitate to ask!)
We are very excited to have Kickshaws Kitchen open for our community. Thank you for all the continue support- we hope to see you at the community table soon!
Kathy & the Kickshaws Team
It has been one week since the Indiegogo campaign ended and we have lots of annoucenments! First and foremost, thank you SO much for all those who championed our cause. Without such amazing and supportive folks in this community we would never have opened Kickshaws to begin with, let alone planned on expanding for Kickshaws Kitchen. We raised a total of $3,421, just under 20% of the funding goal. Sure that seems low, but we did set the goal considerably high. We went back and forth on how much we should set it for and went for the whole amount because we wanted to be completely transparent with our supporters. So really, 20% isn’t terrible!
A number of folks have come to us asking if we would still take contributions after the Indiegogo Campaign ended. The answer is- of course! We would love your support. Through the end of June, we are still going to be honoring our supporters with the same prizes available through the Indiegogo campaign for any in-store donation. To check out those prizes go to the Indiegogo page here.
Slow Food RVA Microgrant
On May 17th, we attended GRAZE, a Slow Food RVA event at Origins Farm in Hanover Virginia. If you are unfamiliar with Slow Food, Slow 
Food is an international organization that is focused on growing and maintaining sustainable food sources, supporting local agriculture, consumers and our environment. They have a big focus on education, which makes Kickshaws Kitchen a perfect fit for this year’s Microgrant program. On the 17th, Kickshaws received a $1000 grant from Slow Food RVA to support the educational focus of the kitchen. Thank you SO much Slow Food RVA for all your support. Once we get Kickshaws Kitchen set up, we hope to get Slow Food FXBG going!
Fredericksburg City Economic Development Authority, JumpStart Grant
This month we were also awarded a matching grant for $10,000 from the City of Fredericksburg’s EDA JumpStart Grant program. This grant will help support a large chunk of the build out cost for the kitchen with our general contractor including a costly ventless hood. The city is excited about our plans for Kickshaws Kitchen and the continued development of the historic district and we are excited to be part of it all.
The Plan
This week we are in the throes of preparing for the ground-breaking of construction for Kickshaws Kitchen. With all our funding sources, we are at about 60% funded for the build , so if you do want to make a contribution it would help immensely. Our contractor is ready to get moving so we just need to give the go ahead. We hope to have all our ducks in a row by the end of the week and start the permit process either next week or the following. Because permitting and such can take time in Fredericksburg, we don’t want to anncounce a definitive timeline, but we are projecting completion by Fall 2015.
Again- THANK YOU SO MUCH for all the support as we work towards opening Kickshaws Kitchen! It is a new and exciting time for downtown Fredericksburg!
IT IS OFFICIAL…
This week we signed the lease for our new space at 103 ½ William Street, Fredericksburg Virginia. (aren’t half addresses awesome!? We think Harry Potter….)
If you haven’t heard yet, we are building Kickshaws Kitchen- a kitchen serving food and education in Fredericksburg. Kickshaws Kitchen will offer breakfast and lunch service (always completely gluten-free with vegetarian and vegan options always available) via window and in the late day and evening we will host our educational workshops.
Over the last year that Kickshaws Downtown Market has been open we have met so many amazing people, many who are working on improving health and wellbeing through nutrition. That is why we started to offer our workshops on various whole foods and living subjects. Through these workshops many of our great customers have found direction and help, but they want more. We want to offer Fredericksburg more, but to do that, we need more space.
In the new space we will be able to expand on our classes with more times available and many more subjects that we cannot currently do in our current space. We will also be able to consistently provide excellent vegan and gluten-free baked goods which we currently have a hard time keeping up with in our tiny store kitchen.
Our goal is to continue to not only provide access to healthy foods and products, but to provide the education that is needed to utilize those products for better health and living.
Are you tired of being sick and tired? Help us open Kickshaws Kitchen!