Let a Perfect Breakfast at The Pancake Underground Lead You to Strasburg, Virginia
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By Madeline Weinfield
It was one of the last warmish weekends of 2020, and to escape our small apartment in DC, my fiancé and I decamped for a camping weekend in woods of West Virginia.
We emerged from our tent our first morning eager for breakfast, and as we were more glampers than campers in our breakfast mind-set, we drove to find it. As we drove along Route 11 and crossed over the Virginia state line, we turned in to the postage-stamp-size town of Strasburg, pulling over at the beacon of a sign that read simply: The Pancake Underground.
There are few things that hold as much satisfying promise as that of a perfect breakfast. The sweetness of syrup streams adorning a stack of fluffy yet crisp pancakes, the tang of a savory omelet or breakfast bowl, presented harmoniously with a mug of rich, fragrant coffee. That kind of morning joy can be rare to find, but there in Strasburg—population 6,600—we found it.
The Pancake Underground is owned and operated by Shenan Hahn and Christopher Kemp, Virginia natives who met while living in Portland, Oregon. Their mutual love of creative breakfasts (and their combined 20+ years working in the restaurant industry) led them to open a breakfast-only food truck—the first iteration of The Pancake Underground—out of a converted 1957 Jewel travel-trailer camper. After two years in the food-truck-mad city (theirs was just one in Portland’s sea of 700 registered food trucks), they set their sights on home. They hauled the camper 3,000 miles to the Shenandoah Valley (from which Shenan gets her name), with plans to live on and care for a tract of 20 acres that has been in Shenan’s family for decades and to give their sweet and savory breakfast creations a second chapter in a brick-and-mortar establishment.
Christopher Kemp and Shenan Hahn, proprietors of The Pancake Underground.
Moving back to Virginia and setting up shop in Strasburg also meant the opportunity to make a mark on a small community. As Shenan says, “We felt we could maybe make a bigger impact in a smaller town and—something we tried to do in Portland but weren’t really able to fully do—source our ingredients locally and support local farmers and local purveyors of other types. [In Virginia] we’re within an hour of most of our ingredients. We try to source as much as we can from the Shenandoah Valley.”
Their bacon, sausage, beef and scrapple—which Christopher describes as “the Appalachian version of head cheese”—are locally butchered by Crabill’s in Tom’s Brook, Virginia. Their salt comes from JQ Dickinson Salt Works, a working salt mine in Malden, West Virginia. Their coffee is roasted by Chestnut Ridge Coffee Roasters in Harrisonburg, Virginia, their sodas crafted by a former brewer in town, and their produce, when in season, comes from a variety of nearby farms.
Like many restaurant tales of 2020, theirs could have been a tragedy.
After three months meticulously renovating a small space right off the main road in which they planned to serve six tables with the food truck parked out front, the novel coronavirus hit. After months of halted starts, they opened with to-go breakfast kits, eventually adding outdoors dinning, serving their breakfast creations like chicken and waffles, country potato bowls with vegetarian sausage and vegan cheese options and, of course, pancakes (available with or without gluten) to locals and people from DC and Baltimore passing through for a day or weekend in the fresh air.
What began as false starts and changed plans turned into waits sometimes lasting up to two hours, a welcome demand they hustled to keep up with. Before long it was clear they had outgrown their space and they set their sights on a vacant venue in town that had once been home to Cristina’s, a local favorite that operated for 20 years before shutting its doors.
Asked if she and Christopher see themselves as helping to reinvigorating the region, Shenan immediately demurs. “I don’t know as revitalizers so much as carrying on the tradition of people who have come before us who are no longer here. But the town is growing a bit in itself. Strasburg has always had a history of entrepreneurship and small locally owned businesses, which is a great environment.”
The Pancake Underground isn’t just unique in the fact that it’s one of the few places to eat in town, but that it serves breakfasts that offer vegetarians and vegans something worth traveling for. They plan to host local country and folk musicians, showcase local artists’ work on their walls and, when they get a beer and wine license, turn their outdoor patio into a pancake and beer garden.
When The Pancake Underground opens its doors (again) this summer on June 9, it’ll be a new dawn of this long pandemic year. And if they’ve learned and proved anything, there may not be a lot that has gone right or been easy, but a stack of pancakes makes it go down a little easier.
The Pancake Underground
219 W. King St.
Strasburg, VA 22657
If you go:
Strasburg
A stroll through Strasburg is short and sweet. Walk down Massanutten and King Streets and take in the murals created through a local and international artists exchange organized by Strasburg-based art group Staufferstadt Arts. Stop at Clementine Vintage (148 E. King St.) for antiques and local treasures. Try Nancy’s Coffee Bar (175 E. King St.) or Box Office Brewery (177 E. King St.) for an afternoon pick-me-up. The Strasburg Emporium (160 N. Massnutten St.) is an antiques maze worth looking through while the Strasburg Flea (110 N. Massanutten St.) and the King Street Flea (327 N. Massanutten St.) are lesser-known gems.
Farm Markets
The region is rich in farm markets, many of which offer U-pick and events throughout the summer. Strasburg’s Woodbine Farms & Market (5199 John Marshall Hwy.) sells local produce and baked goods as well as an impressive variety of locally made jams, preserves and barbecue sauces. Capon Crossing Farm, further afield in Wardensville, West Virginia, (12279 Carpers Pike), runs a “Bluegrass in the Barn” monthly summer series of music and dancing.
Get Outside
For tubing, canoeing, kayaking and rafting, head to Downriver Canoe Company in Bentonville (884 Indian Hollow Rd.). They offer trips ranging from an hour to two nights.
George Washington National Forrest is a short drive away. For hikes with great views, try Signal Knob and Buzzard Rock. Signal Knob is right outside Strasburg and you can see the peak from town.
Stay
Camp at Hawk Recreation Area near Capon Springs in West Virginia or try the Inn at Vaucluse Spring, a bed and breakfast in Stephens City (231 Vaucluse Spring Lane) or the Wayside Inn, a historic inn in Middleton (7783 Main St.).
