Have You Heard?

If you happen to have a gift certificate for BG Bolton’s, which closed this morning, it’s still good.

Bolton’s owner Bud Gates also owns Heroes Sports Bar & Grill, and you can use the gift certificates there.

Please indulge me for just a minute to share a laugh over an e-mail I received.

Its subject line proclaims: “Carrie Rengers to participate in Pancake Competition.”

Breaking news!

It’s true, though. An unnamed (what, no one else has said, “Yes,” yet?) group of other “celebrities” and I will be designing, flipping and, at one point, even tossing pancakes Wednesday to promote an April 16th event to benefit Youthville.

Reporters don’t often get press releases where they themselves are the news, so that was kind of fun.

But the thought of another food competition panics me a bit.

Read More »

Sandpiper Healthcare and Rehabilitation is undergoing extensive remodeling and is adding an Express Recovery Unit, which is a place the senior population can get around-the-clock rehabilitation care and then go home.

“It’s actually kind of turning into a big thing,” nurse liaison Angie Von Feldt says of the trend toward these units. “A lot of places are specializing in that now.

“It’s kind of for the population that doesn’t want that nursing home feel.”

There will be 29 beds, 15 of which will be in private rooms. There will be hardwood floors, flat screen TVs and a gym three times the size of the one the facility has now. There will be new therapy equipment, too.

“It’s going to be really nice back there,” Von Feldt says.

The unit will have its own entrance to make it more accessible to visiting families.

Sandpiper, which Skilled Healthcare purchased in April 2008, is moving its Alzheimer’s wing to make room for the new Recovery Unit.

Other areas of the building are getting a makeover, too.

“We’re revamping, remodeling, making it look a little more up to date,” Von Feldt says. “It’s just going to be great when it’s done.”

As of late Saturday night, Wichita is once again without an Amarillo Grill.

By customer demand, Amarillo owner Danny Nguyen, who bought the restaurant at 306 N. Rock Road early this year, is converting it into a Pho Hot Bistro.

It’ll be more of an upscale version of his successful Pho Hot restaurant near Pawnee and the Canal Route.

Former Amarillo owner Alan Bundy, who founded the popular Amarillo Grill chain in 1982, brought the restaurant back to Wichita in early 2008.

Bundy sold the chain in 1996, and the new owners eventually closed all the restaurants.

Nguyen says the restaurant did all right in its North Rock space, but he says his customers were disappointed he wasn’t opening a Pho Hot.

His new concept will feature the same fresh and often healthy ingredients Pho Hot offers, and the menu will be the same for lunch — pho, noodle dishes and Vietnamese sandwiches.

But dinner will have an expanded menu that prominently features fresh seafood that Nguyen buys on weekly trips to Houston.

Dishes include some not-so-typical entrees for Wichita, such as blue crab-stuffed avocados, crab cake po’ boys and tableside hot pots to cook your own shrimp and beef.

And, unlike the Pawnee location, there will be beer and wine on the menu.

Military discounts will continue as well.

The interior of the restaurant will be remodeled, too. Nguyen plans to raise the ceiling, create a new entrance and add seating to accommodate about 100 diners.

Look for the new restaurant to open in early summer.

Nguyen says his existing location won’t change. Contrary to what some concerned customers fear, he says, “Pho Hot is not for sale.”