'I see nothing but promise in Ward 8:' Restaurant owners bring new eateries to Anacostia

When you walk into Grounded plant shop and café in Anacostia, you are immediately hit with a shock of green. Green plants surround the space. Two shades of green paint adorn the walls. Even green exit signs add an extra pop of color to the place. 

“With us, everything is done with intention,” says Mignon Hemsley, who co-owns the shop with her business partner Danuelle Doswell. The duo wanted green walls so “when people walk in, they immediately have a mood boost,” Hemsley tells The 51st. 

Grounded is part of MLK Gateway, a development plan to revitalize the commercial corridor at the intersection of Martin Luther King Jr. and Marion Barry avenues. The plant shop and cafe is one of several new eateries that have popped up recently or are in the works for the neighborhood, which has long had a dearth of sit-down restaurants and a proliferation of fast-food spots. Ward 8 is also considered a food desert with its limited number of affordable, healthy food options and three grocery stores (with only one east of the river) for over 73,000 residents. 

Although new sit-down restaurants have come to Anacostia and other Ward 8 communities in recent years, the pace has been slow, with roughly one new opening annually. The corridor’s current growth is part of a combined effort from optimistic business owners, local leaders, and government officials to ramp up dining options in the community. 

“This local D.C. government … has infused more funding, more focused investment east of the river than ever before,” says Kristina Noell, executive director of the Anacostia BID. “There has definitely been an infusion of attention, and we're super grateful for that.”

Culturally, restaurants and shops are “the heartbeat of any neighborhood,” she says. “And having [this] diversity of food options is key for any neighborhood, and for people that are visiting.”

While Grounded’s storefront officially opened in late October, Hemsley and Doswell began growing their business in 2020 as an online shop — first shipping plants to everyday people, then to businesses across the U.S. and abroad. 

The partners faced an uphill battle navigating a company through the pandemic while operating out of a 1,000-square-foot studio in Northwest. But eventually the company gained traction and  decided to plant roots in a brick-and-mortar space — in part through a grant from the Office of the Deputy Mayor for Planning and Economic Development’s (DMPED) Neighborhood Prosperity Fund. 

After scouring the District for a location, they landed on Anacostia. “Ward 8 was an easy decision for us,” Doswell says. First, there were no plant shops located east of the Anacostia River. Second, they found a nearly 3,400 square-foot storefront on MLK Ave.  

Most importantly, Doswell says it was a chance to make a change in the community, not only with the plant shop but a small studio for wellness classes like yoga, reiki, and meditation. And while the cafe currently serves coffee, tea, and snacks, the partners are planning a menu of toasts with healthy ingredients like avocado, bananas, strawberries, and smoked salmon. Long term, they want to establish a nonprofit with a program to teach young people how to grow their own food and launch a pop-up fridge where locals can access food from farms and food access collectives. 

On Grounded’s opening day, a line of customers stretched down the block near Marion Barry Ave. Since then, word has spread on social media apps like TikTok, where Alexandria, Va. residents Dalia Pace and Michael Humprise learned about the shop. “The last couple of weeks, I've prioritized supporting Black businesses, especially with what's going on in the country,” Pace tells The 51st, adding she wanted to find “a space where I feel like I'm at home, I'm comfortable, but still I can get some work done.”

Humprise was taken aback by the space. “We were immediately just in awe,” he says. “The green space, the coffee was good. There’s obviously a wellness aspect to it as well. It's really cool to see.”

Community has always been important to Melvin Hines, owner of DCity Smokehouse, a barbecue restaurant serving up smoked meats like brisket, ribs, and wings along with a dozen sides. The 51st caught up with Hines as he was about to feed folks at an event in Barry Farm. “To me, it's important to be at these things to show that we are part of the community,” he says. 

The serial entrepreneur launched his first DCity Smokehouse on Florida Avenue NW in 2013. But his eyes were always set on Southeast. “It was always a dream for me to open in Ward 8, specifically in Anacostia, because that's where I've been living for the past 15 years,” Hines says. 

But he wasn’t naive to how the community’s food challenges would affect him, both as a resident and a restauranteur. “When I first moved into the neighborhood, it was a food desert, in its truest form,” he explains. 

For years, Anacostia’s food options mostly consisted of Asian carryouts and Mama’s Pizza Kitchen, which opened in 2010. For a short time, Uniontown Bar and Grill was the only sit-down restaurant in the neighborhood, but it shuttered in 2013. And when food delivery services became popular, they were slow to service communities east of the Anacostia River. 

Hines credits local bloggers for bringing attention to the lack of food delivery services, which he’s seen increase over the years. “But in my mind that wasn't enough,” he says. “We need to have the same services that you could find in the rest of Washington, D.C.”

By the time DCity Smokehouse opened on Marion Barry Avenue in May 2023, Anacostia had seen a slow crawl of new openings. Turning Natural opened in 2015 and Busboys and Poets and Open Crumb opened in 2019 — the latter in a space formerly occupied by Capitol Hill Crab Cakes. Starbucks and Capital One Cafe opened in 2020 and 2021, respectively, and locally-owned Kitchen Savages opened in February 2023. But in comparison to another Southeast neighborhood, Capitol Hill, which boasts over 140 restaurants alone, the choices remain sparse.

On November 18, the Go-Go Museum and Café celebrated a soft launch after several years of planning, fundraising, and activism. The venue will offer a restaurant with backyard seating, a recording studio and performance space, and of course, a museum dedicated to the history of go-go music. 

Chef Angela Bethea, who has run kitchens for several luxury hotels, will oversee the cafe and a culinary and hospitality mentorship program. It will officially open in February 2025, coinciding with the anniversary of the day go-go became the official music of D.C.

“What's happening right now in Anacostia is a miracle,” Ronald Moten, co-founder of the museum and Don't Mute DC, tells The 51st, adding that he wants people to brag about the neighborhood’s growing commercial corridor instead of focusing on “crime, despair, and poverty.” 

Both Moten and Hines received funds from DMPED’s Food Access Fund, which launched in 2021 to increase D.C. residents’ access to fresh, healthy, and affordable food options, particularly in Wards 7 and 8. SaPoDilla's Caribbean Restaurant, which is set to open in December on Marion Barry Ave, and Tasting Lab DC, a food incubator and restaurant under construction on MLK Ave, also received grants from the $58 million fund. 

As a longtime Anacostia resident, Hines is encouraged by the other eateries being developed alongside DCity Smokehouse, even though it’s taken years. “It's like, okay, there's an investment going on here. And you look at the neighborhood a little differently, both for people driving through and the people that live there,” he says. “I see nothing but promise in Ward 8, in Anacostia, and on Marion Barry Avenue.” 

This story has been updated to reflect that there are three grocery stores in Ward 8 and that the current population size is 73,000.