Exeter Restaurants to See Expansion

Three popular restaurants in the town of Exeter—The Green Bean, Good Karma Cafe, and Las Olas Taqueria—are in the process of completing, or have recently completed, expansion plans. These changes were driven in part by the stores’ popularity among both Exeter residents and Exonians.The news was met with delight by students, who frequently flock to the restaurants for a casual meal with friends or on days when dhall food doesn’t seem appealing.The Green Bean is seeking to expand to the back of a building connected to the current restaurant, where Trends, a card and gift store that recently moved across town, was formerly located.Currently, during meal-times, especially throughout the winter, the Green Bean gets crowded, leaving many customers without a place to sit. The renovation, set to be completed sometime within the next six weeks, will add thirty new seats for customers, many of which will have a beautiful view of the Exeter River.The Green Bean is also increasing their kitchen size so the staff will be able to keep up with the increased flow of customers. This renovation is expected to be completed by the end of this week.“We will have more space back there and just more room to do new specials,” Jordan Dodier, the manager of the Green Bean said.“Hopefully we will be able to add to our dinner menu if we do stay open for dinner and we will be able to bring in a little more diversity of food in Exeter.”Upper Elsa Chinburg, a regular customer, commented on the necessity of the expansion. “I think the expansion is a great idea because its often crowded and there aren’t enough seats,” Chinburg said. “It’s especially crowded around lunch.”Good Karma is a largely vegan cafe and grill in Exeter that recently went through some renovations, as well. A week ago, Good Karma rearranged the restaurant by moving the smoothie bar from inside the kitchen to the first floor dining room, to create more space for a larger variety of foods to be offered in the restaurant.“We have a whole new menu thats out and we are introducing a burger line,’ explained Casey Kitchens, the general manager of Good Karma.“So we want to make room for that in the kitchen; all of the smoothie stuff was in the kitchen before, but now we do it right there in front of you.”Kitchens went on to explain how the renovations should also help Good Karma run more quickly.“It was just to make things easier,” she explained.“Flow is really important in the restaurant, just because we are a quick service and we had a lot of groups standing right in the middle of the restaurant. It was designed poorly in the beginning and this helps with that.”Exeter students played an important role in Good Karma’s decision to undergo this construction, which will cause the restaurant to be closed from March 23-29. Kitchens hoped that with the new arrangement, Exonians will explore other areas of the restaurant, especially the upstairs dining room.“The Academy kids, we get a lot of you guys in here and we wanted to encourage people to sit upstairs because a lot of people don’t realize that we have it,” he said.It has also been confirmed that Las Olas Taqueria will be receiving some sort of renovation or expansion soon, although the details are not yet available.For many years Los Olas has served as many Exonians’ favorite restaurant in town, and is known for its wide variety of tacos and burritos.Many Exonians are excited to see Las Olas expand. “I think expansion would be a good idea,” lower David Larar said.“Their food is really good—it’s probably the best mexican food around this area. They are expensive, but they offer benefits such as offering a free drink discount to students, so I would be happy if they expanded.”