Ben's Chili Bowl is a popular restaurant in Washington, DC, located at 1213 U Street, next to Lincoln Theater, in Shaw neighborhood in northwest DC. It is known locally for chili dogs, half smoke, and milkshakes, and has been an integral part of environmental history since its inception in 1958. It was frequented by police and protesters during the 1968 Washington DC riots, and was regularly visited by celebrities , such as Bill Cosby and Chris Tucker.
In January 2009, Washington, D.C. Mayor Adrian Fenty takes on President-elect Barack Obama to eat at Ben as part of his speech to the city.
Video Ben's Chili Bowl
Histori
Ben's Chili Bowl was founded on August 22, 1958, by Ben Ali, a Trinidad-born immigrant who had studied dentistry at nearby Howard University, and his Virginia Virginia-born Virginia Rollins fiance. Both married seven weeks after opening the restaurant. The building they chose was the first cinema building in Washington, Minnehaha, established in 1911. It is a property that contributes to the Greater Street Historic District. Mostly furnished in the original restaurant for the 1950's. At that time, U Street was known as the "Black Broadway". Many jazz fans today, such as Duke Ellington, Miles Davis, and Nat King Cole, will stop by the restaurant when they perform at U Street club.
The U Street corridor was ruined by the 1968 riots that followed the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. During the riots, black activist Stokely Carmichael, leader of the Non-Violence Student Coordinating Committee, asked Ben to keep the restaurant open, and Earn earned it. permission to stay open past the curfew. The restaurant feeds both police officers and firefighters who work to impose order in the neighborhood, as well as black activists. Violence and arson so far Ben wrote "Brothers of the Soul" in the soap at the front window in the hope that it would stop the angry mob.
The destruction of so many businesses led to a population escape to the suburbs and a downturn in the economic environment around the mid-1970s until the mid-1980s. When the area became famous for drug addicts, Ben's Chili Bowl reduced its staff to one employee. Ben and Virginia's son, Kamal, remembers, "We stayed behind and had followers, because the Cabe Bowl is like an environmental barber, people are going to sit here and talk, there's always a presence of families and locals protecting us." The restaurant stopped serving cookies and cakes, which attracted addicts, while police conducted surveillance of drug dealers from upstairs windows.
The extensive construction of U Street Metro station across the street from the restaurant, which was completed in 1991, forced more U Street businesses to close, but Ben's Chili Bowl remained open to feed the construction workers. The Washington Post commented that Ben's Chili Bowl is "probably the only business on this strip that survived well in 1968 Riot and Metro Metro Line construction phase". Metro and lower crime rates help the gradual revitalization and gentrification of the environment. From the early 1990s, business revenues grew 10% annually, to $ 1.5 million in 2005, and the number of employees in the restaurant also increased, to 20 staff.
In the summer of 2007, Ben's owners led a coalition of ten small local businesses to mediate deals with local energy companies to turn operations into 100% wind energy. The New York Post quoted Nizam Ali as saying, "We see this as part of an engagement in what is good for the environment, what is good for the city.... It is a great idea that helps the environment and, , makes economic sense to us all. "
In 2008, Ben's Chili Bowl opened a second location in the newly built Nationals Park, although it has a more limited selection than its original restaurant.
On October 7, 2009, Ben died at the age of 82. He and his wife, Virginia, had retired from the restaurant business, after passing Ben's Chili Bowl's daily operations to their sons, Kamal and Nizam. The death of Ali mourned in many ways throughout the city, including a written statement by Mayor Adrian Fenty, part of which read: "I am deeply saddened by the death of the founder and the name of Ben's Chili Bowl, one of the greatest treasures in the District of Columbia Ben Ali is the man who invested his life in a small business that goes through many storms and becomes the soul of the environment and the pride of our city. "
In 2009, Ben's sons, Nizam and Kamal, opened a restaurant and upscale bar, Ben's Next Door, at 1211 U St, NW, adjacent to the original building. Featuring alcohol (something not available at Ben's), the restaurant's goal is to "complement" Ben, according to Nizam, who said that his goal was to remain "honestly" to ourselves. The restaurant offers everything on the Ben's Chili Bowl menu ranging from 11 Ã, to closing, next to lunch, dinner and late night menus.
Maps Ben's Chili Bowl
Customer and acknowledgment
The Boston Globe describes Ben's diverse customers as "punk-looking kids and fashionable business people and everyone in between." In 2001, Ben and Virginia's son Kamal commented on what changes people eat at the establishment: "You hear comments, even white customers, they want to think they are the only white people who are hip enough to go to the Chile Bowl Now they are looking around and there are many other whites and they are not that happy about that. "
The most famous regular customer is comedian Bill Cosby, who brings his future wife to Ben when they are dating. He remembers that he first became a frequent visitor when serving in the Navy and stationed in Bethesda, Maryland in 1958, and frequently visited U Street jazz club. Cosby recalled that during several of his visits with Camille, who was then a student at the University of Maryland, he would "eat six and a half smoke at a time." Cosby returned to Ben in 1985 to hold a press conference at the restaurant to celebrate the success of his television series, The Cosby Show. He kept stopping by Ben's house in town to serve half a smoke. The restaurant-installed sign states that Bill Cosby is the only person who eats for free at Ben's Chili Bowl. On 3 November 2008, a new sign was posted to add "Obama's family". In January 2017, amid allegations that the actor was sexually assaulting dozens of women and statements in court documents that Cosby admitted that he intended for a drug lady she wanted to have sex with, Ben's Chili Bowl painted over a large mural of comedians who had stood for more than 5 years.
Many other celebrities, including Chris Tucker and Bono, have been visiting for years. When journalist Ted Koppel discontinued his Newsline hosting program, he held a farewell party in 2005 at the restaurant. Then-President-elect Barack Obama ate at Ben on January 10, 2009.
The Washington Post asserts, "In the late 1990s, no D.C. politician dreamed of running in office without falling into Ben." Anthony A. Williams appeared in Ben soon after the successful mayoral election.
However, celebrities in Ben are not limited to Americans. In 1998, former DC mayor Marion Barry described having traveled to Ghana and meeting Mayor Accra, a Howard University alumnus, whose greeting is, "Glad to have you in Accra. Is Ben's Chili Bowl still there?" And when French President Nicolas Sarkozy and his wife Carla Bruni-Sarkozy visited Washington, D.C. in March 2010, they reportedly each had two of Ben's half fumes during their visit to the restaurant.
Scenes from the film including the The Pelican Brief and State of Play have been filmed in the restaurant, and have been in "dozens of TV shows." The short film, Breakfast At Ben's was filmed almost entirely in the restaurant. In addition, it has been used in novels as a setting for fictional encounters - especially meetings involving individuals from "different legal sides" - such as those in George Pelecanos's King Suckerman.
Ben and Virginia Ali were inducted into D.C. Hall of Fame, and in 1999, the passage adjacent to the restaurant was named "Ben Ali Way". On the occasion of the death of Ben Ali 2009, the mayor of D.C. Adrian Fenty released a statement calling the restaurant "one of the greatest treasures in the District of Columbia".
In popular culture
Washington-based Travel Channel Episode Man v. Food (S02E12), which was first aired in the summer of 2009, featured Ben's Chili Bowl as one of the stops. The host, Adam Richman, helped Nizam Ali prepare his chili before trying the Half Smoke chili; Richman sat in the same chair that President Barack Obama was sitting earlier this year.
In the 2009 State of Play movie, reporter Cal McAffrey (Russell Crowe) visits Ben's Chili Bowl and appears to be a regular customer. He ordered his "ordinary": Chili Cheese Burger, Chile Cheese Fry, and Smoke Half Smoke. The scene displays a sign: "Sign up who eats for free at Ben's: Bill Cosby, NO ONE ELSE".
Reviews
In 2004, the James Beard Foundation referred to Ben as one of the "under house dining houses that have carved out a special place in the American culinary landscape". Michael Stern, a writer specializing in US regional food, wrote a scrambled 2008 review, "Half the smoke is sensational!" and "Ben's presents one of the best sweet potato pies everywhere," and describes chili as "sensational stuff: thick, spicy, full of flavor, and highly addictive". In January 2009, the food magazine Bon Appà ©  tit titled Ben as one of the ten "Best Chili Places" in the country, asserting, "There is no reasonable discussion about the great chili that can happen without mentioning this U Street institution... "In the Washington Post 2016 restaurant reviews, Ben's received one star and his food was described as" terrible. "
References
Further reading
- Ben's Chili Bowl: 50 Years of Washington, D.C., Landmark , by Tracey Gold Bennett, Arcadia Publishing, 2008, ISBNÃ, 0-7385-5424-3
External links
- Ben's Chili Bowl official website
- "The People Are Hungry", by National Public Radio
- "'People Run out of Control': Remembering the 1968 Riot," by Washingtonian
- "Ben's Chili Bowl Founder Remembered Fondly", video by The Washington Post
- Maurice, General Manager, showcased his new "veggie dog" in a YouTube video, October 6, 2010.
- President Obama visits Ben's Chili Bowl.
- The YouTube video from Nizam Ali explains why the restaurant switched to 100% wind energy.
- Guides for Chilean Chili Records, 1943-2014, Special Collection Research Center, Estelle and Melvin Gelman Library, George Washington University
- Ben's Chili Bowl Documentary is produced by WETA-TV
Source of the article : Wikipedia
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