Salvador Sanchez and Cameron Heathcoat
Salvador Sanchez and Cameron Heathcoat, the new owners of Alfalfa Restaurant, plan to maintain it as a community-focused dining spot highlighting locally sourced cuisine.
Before there was farm-to-table, before there were locavores, before there was anguish over gluten, Alfalfa Restaurant was serving up wholesome dishes like its signature Hoppin’ John, buckwheat pancakes, tomato bisque and a long list of herbal teas. That was more than 40 years ago. Now, the legacy that began in 1973 continues as new owners Salvador Sanchez and Cameron Heathcoat take over the iconic Lexington eatery.
Sanchez opened the coffee shop A Cup of Common Wealth in 2013. Perhaps best known for its “Pay It Forward Board,” where a future drink can be bought for anyone to redeem at any time, the business emphasizes its mission of “embracing community, serving others and creating culture.” Sanchez, originally from Kalamazoo, Michigan, also owns Magic Beans Coffee Roasters, and in February, opened Chocolate Holler, a coffee and chocolate bar on Old Vine Street. “Alfalfa is a Lexington institution that we wanted to keep alive,” he said. “It’s similar to A Cup of Common Wealth in that it isn’t about pageantry — it’s about community. And Cameron’s spirit and energy and her ties to the community made perfect sense for the partnership.”
Heathcoat, who hails from Cynthiana, spent 15 years in sales before meeting her husband, Kevin Heathcoat, co-owner of Bourbon n’ Toulouse and The Chevy Chase Inn. “I wanted free food, and he wanted corporate health insurance, so we decided to get married and have two children,” she jokes. “Somewhere in there, we fell in love.”
Heathcoat and Sanchez met at A Cup of Common Wealth. She explained that when she first heard Alfalfa was for sale in November 2016, she and Kevin discussed buying it, but decided the timing wasn’t right. The next time she visited the coffee shop, she had a “gut feeling” to tell Sanchez they were thinking about buying the restaurant, and Sanchez said he was considering the same thing, and in fact had been toying with the idea of opening a breakfast café for some time. A potential sale was in progress, so they agreed that if it came back around, they’d buy it together. In April, Sanchez called Heathcoat and said, “Guess what? It came back around.” Two months later, the restaurant was open for business under the new ownership.
While Alfalfa has been delicately rebranded, with a new minimalist logo, a revamped website and a few cosmetic changes, including white walls, new flooring and repurposed courthouse benches donated by the city, Heathcoat and Sanchez have declared that the fundamentals of the much-loved dining establishment will remain the same. Paul Nowacki will continue on as chef, and they will continue to serve locally sourced foods for meat lovers and vegetarians alike.
Old favorites will remain on the menu, paired with new dishes like jackfruit tacos (a Southeast Asian fruit that mimics pork) and cheddar-filled Lexington Pasta pierogies; along with non-vegetarian dishes like chorizo breakfast tacos (available as a rotating special), the Alfa Burger (local beef with caramelized onion, lettuce, tomato and sprouts), and breakfast poutine (two poached eggs atop fries with local bacon, mozzarella and gravy). “I think that has been the biggest misconception — that we are a vegetarian restaurant,” said Heathcoat. “Alfalfa has served meat since the ’70s.”
Stories about Alfalfa’s early years are plentiful. Short of chairs on opening day in April 1973, they offered free meals to customers who donated them. Contributing a set of salt and pepper shakers earned a free dessert. And, for a short time, Susan Saxe, who went by Lena Paley, one of the only women to make the FBI’s Top 10 Most Wanted list, worked as a cook in Alfalfa’s kitchen. No one knew her true identity at the time. Sanchez and Heathcoat have started collecting material for a history wall, which will span an entire wall at the restaurant.
For many Lexingtonians, the name Jake Gibbs is synonymous with Alfalfa. The city councilman and semi-retired history professor has been involved with the business on-and-off since 1979. He started working as a dishwasher while in graduate school. “It was a really laid-back place to work, with interesting people,” he remembers. “A lot of the dishwashers were working on Ph.Ds, something you don’t often see in a restaurant. The management was hands off. It was very much like a family.”
In 1973, a group of students had pooled $2,000 and opened Alfalfa’s first location at 557 South Limestone (it moved to 141 East Main St. in 2004). It was soon sold to Marina Ubaldi. In the spring of 1987, Ubaldi sold it to Gibbs, along with Tom and Cathy Martin, and Peter Fleming (an egg dish called “Peter and Jake” is still on the menu). Gibbs also convinced his college friend, Jim Happ, to invest. Gibbs remained an owner until 1999. “My two daughters were getting older, and I was also teaching full time, so I wanted out,” he said. Happ and his wife Betsy wanted to keep the restaurant going, so they bought Gibbs out for the same amount of money he’d originally invested. The Happs met at Alfalfa in 1990, and have a daughter, Helen, named after Helen Alexander, who is still a part-time cook there.
One of the cornerstones of vintage Alfalfa, according to Gibbs, was Tom Martin, the quiet, bookish man who served as a baker from 1978 to 2013. Working overnight, Martin baked all of the restaurant’s bread for the following day. “He was just marvelous,” said Gibbs. “He worked with no supervision, and there were people who worked there for years and never saw him. He always made just enough bread for the next day, and his wife, Cathy, who was really the heart of the place, worked as a server and night manager. His Italian cream cake was to die for.”
Artist John Lackey, who worked at Alfalfa from 1987 to 1992, has similar stories to tell. “It was home and family, and it’s been a springboard for authors, punks, hippies, dancers. It was a joy to work with those people. We had so much fun,” he said. “I think [Jim Happ] believed that Alfalfa was a social experiment that facilitated connectivity between interesting people.” Lackey was commissioned to create the painted windows and the logo featuring a woman holding a bundle of wheat. While working as a server, Lackey would draw daily menu inserts, sometimes in the form of comic strips. His wife, Jenny, also worked at the restaurant, as did their sons, Quinn and Dylan.
Gibbs agrees that one of the major reasons Happ, who lives in Sonoma, California, kept Alfalfa going for 30 years is because he believed in the community the restaurant created. “He’s a great guy. He cared about the employees and not necessarily about making money,” he said. “And since he is the president of another, very successful business [Labcon, a sustainable labware manufacturer in Petaluma, California], he was willing to take some losses.”
With Sanchez and Heathcoat at the helm, Gibbs believes that same passion will go into Alfalfa’s daily operations. “I’m so delighted they’ve decided to take over. They’ve got a tough battle, but I think they’re up to it,” he said. “There is a lot of competition now. In the ’80s, Alfalfa was the only place that served ethnic food, and that was on our international nights. We had it easy in some sense in those early years, but they are really smart and energetic people. I’m sure they’ll do well.”