Ballston Quarter

Announcements about new openings for the much delayed food hall at Ballston Quarter (it was originally scheduled to open in the fall) led me to make a stop there this afternoon. Or try to. The "getting there" was difficult. Wilson Blvd was shut down from Henderson to Randolph and walking from a parking spot a few blocks away meant trying to cross an intersection without functioning signal lights, traversing through a recently sodded field and using a sidewalk that has big signs around it saying "will close April 1st." No foolin. When you finally get there you have to navigate through and behind a covered walkway to access the plaza, and finally the food hall. Inside are the following: A sports bar. A barbecue joint. A sandwich place with four sandwich offerings -- all meat. A pizza place with no pizza. A "bao bun" shop with one veggie option. A rice bowl place which had run out of salad greens and was running low on rice. And an ice cream place. Four of the establishments had no visible menus. If one were to pull out glasses and squint, you could see the offerings at the ice cream place and if you didn't mind cutting the line you could borrow a paper menu from the register at the rice bowl place. I ended up with a decent rice bowl and a scoop of ice cream but the bottom line is that this place is nowhere near ready for prime time. Don't buy the hype and wait a few more months.

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