After all the bureaucratic hassles, Capital City Diner breezed through its final health inspection today, obtained its business license, and plans to open for business on Tuesday. So how does it feel to finally start slinging hash, Matt Ashburn? "Scary as hell," he says. "Actually, I think it's a relief, and I couldn't be happier." [...]

Matt Ashburn gets a head start on sippin' mud at Capital City Diner. It's taken a long, long, long, long time to reach its grand opening, but Capital City Diner is close. How close? It's a question that co-owner Matt Ashburn has answered so many times, he's hesitant to give a specific date anymore. Let's [...]

Not officially, of course.  But servers at restaurants often labor under more rules than a slaughterhouse worker. Well, definitely more than a slaughterhouse worker actually follows. I mention this because of Bruce Buschel's latest post on his delightful Start-Up Chronicle blog for The New York Times. (If you haven't read his posts yet on starting [...]

A view of Cap City Diner from across the street If the tone of Matt Ashburn's e-mails indicates anything, the Capital City Diner owner sounds a lot calmer than he was back in August when he and business partner, Patrick Carl, were battling with Washington Gas over the installation of a new line. Ashburn has [...]

When Y&H last chatted with Capital City Diner co-owner Matt Ashburn, he was trying to convince Washington Gas to waive the $5,600 "contribution" fee that the utility was requesting to lay a new pipe from the gas main to the forthcoming restaurant at 1050 Bladensburg Rd NE in Trinidad. Ashburn's argument for waiving the fee [...]

On Monday, Y&H reported that Capital City Diner couldn't even get Washington Gas to return a phone call. Today, e-mails co-owner Matt Ashburn, the gas company told Cap City that it will cost more than $5,600 to install an underground pipe from the main line to the diner in Trinidad. That's cash that Ashburn and [...]

If the owners of Capital City Diner had to endure several painful crash-course lessons back in May as they moved their diner to D.C., the partners are now just playing the standard waiting game as the Department of Consumer and Regulatory Affairs reviews their restaurant plans. Most of the DCRA comments are in, says co-owner [...]

Giaimo and Von Hengst opened the first Silver Diner in 1989 Bob Giaimo doesn't come right out and contradict my assertion that classic diners are recession-proof, but he believes those diners that cling to a greasy nostalgia, at the expense of innovation, are bound to lose customers, plain and simple. Giaimo should know. He's the [...]

Waffle Shop 3864 Mount Vernon Ave, Alexandria, VA 22305 (703) 836-8851 The Waffle Shop, which occupies a strange, triangular peninsula of cement, like Alexandria’s own tiny Flatiron Building, is one of the city’s few 24 hours a day/7 days a week operations. A few years back, the Alexandria Gazette Packet wrote a story about the [...]

Bob & Edith's Diner 2310 Columbia Pike, Arlington, VA 22204 (703) 920-6103 Bob & Edith's offers, depending on how you count them, five or six different steak-and-egg combinations, in addition to breakfast platters that include turkey, bologna, and half-smokes. Such a wealth of wacky options allows you to never order the same thing twice, but [...]