Food Flash

Colorado Kitchen, the Betty-Crocker-meets-Cordon-Bleu restaurant in Washington's Brightwood neighborhood, is closing soon.

It opened seven years ago on an empty stretch of Colorado Avenue, attracting locals and destination diners with its home-style meatloaf and cornflake-crusted pork chops. "What we're most proud of is that, like Michael Jackson, the restaurant had crossover potential," says chef Gillian Clark, who co-owns the restaurant with her business partner, Robin Smith.

Clark, 44, would not confirm a specific closing date when reached today, but says "it's sometime soon. And if it's your heart's desire to eat at Colorado Kitchen, now is the time."

The news was first reported Wednesday on Washingtonian magazine's Best Bites blog.

Clark says the building that houses the restaurant was sold in April and that the landlord has new plans for the space. But it was also time for her to move on, she says: The kitchen itself is just 300 square feet (tiny by industry standards), with a 4-by-6-foot walk-in refrigerator that limited the number of menu items and the kind of food Clark could prepare.

"We've maxed out what we can do here. Our sales goals were $500,000 a year and while that sounds like a lot of money, it means I still have to be the chief cook and bottle washer. It's time for me to walk around in a clean chef's coat. I think I've earned that."

Clark, who in 2007 published a cookbook and memoir "Out of the Frying Pan: A Chef's Memoir of Hot Kitchens, Single Motherhood, and the Family Meal," is not leaving the restaurant business. In the fall, she and Smith plan to open a two-concept spot in Silver Spring. The upstairs will be a casual dining and carryout called The General Store, while the downstairs will be a bar and restaurant called the Post Office Tavern.

Though there will be more space, Clark said that the food will be much simpler than it is at Colorado Kitchen. For example, she's currently designing an all-waffle brunch that will include items such as a savory corn-flour waffle with herbs and seafood and an eggs Benedict waffle. On Sunday evenings, there will be one menu item -- something like pot roast or fried chicken-- served family-style.

The partners also plan to open a restaurant on Carroll Avenue in Takoma Park, though, Clark says, it's too early to talk about the details.

Clark, who has often warred with customers -- she famously has a rule that children must be in their seats at all times -- warns her fans that neither new restaurant will be the same as her first one.

"Colorado Kitchen could reemerge if the right property comes along. But for now, our baby has grown up and she's ready to go to college," Clark says. "She is moving on."