VIRGINIA BEACH Hump day is one of my favorite days, and the fact that it marks the halfway point of the work week is only part of the reason.

Without his companion and business partner, Keith Large said, keeping the Oasis Cafe going just became too difficult.
On Jan. 27, less than four months after losing Richard Grether Jr. to lung cancer, Large closed the downtown breakfast and lunch restaurant. A few days later, the landlord locked the business.

The dish Bandejita El Desorden The cost $9.50 (menu items for dine-in are discounted 15 percent Monday through Friday, 2:30-5:30 p.m.) The eatery El Desorden Columbian Cuisine, 665 Newtown Road, 497-4141, www.eldesordenva.com Why I liked it El Desorden, located near Newtown and Baker roads, bills itself as 100 percent Columbian. Our server was helpful and hospitable.

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Cheers! Prost! Salud! Salute!

Over at a neighborhood sushi bar the other day, we smacked the table, toppled a glass and added the Japanese word for “cheers” to our railside repertoire.

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In the last Beach Eats column, we reported about changes at The Lucky Star restaurant in The Westin Town Center Virginia Beach.
Some new information: The Lucky Star is being converted into meeting and banquet space, and will not reopen; however, the hotel bar area, just outside the dining room space, will be renovated and retooled, opening in March as Westin Restaurant and Bar.

I’m fairly adventurous when it comes to cuisine, but I’d somehow gone 30-plus years without tasting pho, the Vietnamese noodle soup. That changed when Pho 79 came to town, setting up shop on 21st Street in Ghent. I could no longer resist, and now that I’ve tried the salty, hearty dish, I’ll be back – regularly.

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I get a little nervous when I drive up to a restaurant at 7 p.m. and there are no cars in the parking lot. So as we approached a sparse lot, we prepared ourselves for the worst. Little did we know we were in for a most memorable evening at Lola's Caribbean Restaurant in Ghent.