Pharrell’s Something in the Water wasn’t the only major Beach comeback this year. The Belvedere Coffee Shop & Diner has been resurrected in The Moxy Virginia Beach Oceanfront, two dozen blocks from where it was founded.
Locals and serial vacationers who were crushed when the half-century-old greasy spoon at 36th and Atlantic was demolished in 2020, deeming it a landmark on par with King Neptune and the Norwegian Lady, are rejoicing over their “Eye Opener” breakfast sandwiches at the rechristened Belvedere South. They marvel at the similitude: identically-oriented blue booths, swivel stools, gleaming griddle. It’s a retro look (and was even back in the day) complementing Moxy’s verve.
It whisked me back to the 1980s, scrunching into a booth with my family to breakfast on the signature, kitchen sink-ish Belvedere omelet and creamed chipped beef over toast. While bricklayers and lawyers, New Yorkers and North Enders argued politics, swapped tales of last night’s benders and sopped up gossip, we’d pore over the menu like it was a treasure map, debating what to order when we returned for lunch that afternoon. The BLT? Patti melt? Another omelet?
BelSouth’s kitchen manager, Tim Scheetz, can relate: “There’s so much more when memory is attached to food.” He shared his fondness for the original’s pancakes, triumphantly announcing that he was able to snag the recipe.
Chris Perry recalls, “Almost everyone who grew up in Virginia Beach like I did is familiar with the Belvedere. Nothing better than sitting at the counter as a teenager and watching them make your favorite food!”
Perry is the CEO of Suburban Capital, developer of the Hyatt Place that replaced the Belvedere and its adjoining hotel. He really tried to make the coffee shop fit there to no avail. But it clicked with Moxy, another Suburban operation.
The newbie is a smidge larger than its progenitor, seating 56 (including outdoor tables), but its old-school vibe reverberates. The menu’s faves conveyed, augmented by some updated items, to be washed down with mimosas and bloodies.
Best of all, the thrill of witnessing short-order cooks’ flattop calisthenics—prepping hashtag-worthy hash browns, frying eggs, flipping flapjacks, then scraping it all down and doing it again—lives on.
“Bringing it back to life hopefully gets us some redemption,” says Perry. Hmm…restoration with a rasher of bacon. Welcome back.
Belvedere South is attached to and accessible through the lobby of the new Moxy Hotel at 1201 Atlantic Ave. and open 6:30 a.m. to 2 p.m. daily.
Learn more at BelvedereSouth.com or @belvederesouthvb.
Marisa Marsey
Marisa Marsey is a food, beverage and travel writer whose awards include 1st place Food Writing from the Virginia Press Association. A Johnson & Wales University representative, she has sipped Château d'Yquem '75 with Jean-Louis Palladin, sherpa-ed for Edna Lewis and savored interviews with Wolfgang Puck and Patrick O’Connell.
