Indianapolis, IN

Openings and closings: Carmel gets Euro fine dining, downtown loses Mexican spot in February

Published

1 year ago

March 3, 2025

Openings and closings: Carmel gets Euro fine dining, downtown loses Mexican spot in February

After a few frigid weeks, February concluded on a mercifully warm note. As blades of grass and a few brave flowers emerged from the snow, so did a fresh crop of new eateries around Indianapolis, including coffee on the east side, fine dining in Carmel and a pair of trendy chains in the rapidly developing Nora Plaza. Meanwhile, a decades-old westside bar and a downtown Mexican spot said good-bye.

Here are some of the restaurants that opened and closed around Indianapolis last month, with a couple of holdovers from January.

Restaurants that opened in February

Corridor (formerly Nicole-Taylor’s Pasta)

1134 E. 54th St., (317) 257-7374, corridorindy.com, opened Jan. 21

Named for the “corridor” of Mediterranean countries whose cuisines inspire its menu, this high-end SoBro lunch and and private dinner spot is the successor to Nicole-Taylor’s Pasta. Chef-owners Erin Kem and Logan McMahan, who purchased Nicole-Taylor’s from founders Rosa and Tony Hanslits in July 2023, have continued the restaurant’s renowned private dinners that run Wednesday through Saturday every week and regularly sell out months in advance.

Corridor’s lunch menu (served 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday) has expanded upon its predecessor’s focus on Italian food to include dishes from Portugal, Spain and the Middle East, with plenty of vegetarian and vegan options. The small, upscale plates include roasted sweet potato wedges with garbanzo beans and tahini butter ($8), pumpkin- and sage-filled cappelletti ($16) and a bitey citrus-forward maitake mushroom shawarma-style sandwich ($18). Corridor also operates a small market (10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Tuesday through Friday, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday) that offers deli meats and cheeses, spreads and a selection of Nicole-Taylor pastas.

Milk and Honey Coffeehouse drive-thru

8511 Southeastern Ave., opened Feb. 1

Owner Taylor Hummel last year told IndyStar she hopes her coffee shop will one day become a Wanamaker staple akin to longtime fish fry spot Wheatley’s, which closed in December. Milk and Honey currently operates a two-lane drive-thru vending craft lattes, smoothies and other beverages, with plans to eventually open a quick-service café in the spacious Southeastern Avenue building.

Cafe Oztara

1446 E. Washington St., cafeoztara.com, opened Feb. 7

The Damien Center, Indianapolis’ largest and oldest organization specializing in support services for people with HIV or AIDS, bills Cafe Oztara as a “welcoming space for everyone,” with an emphasis on Indianapolis’ LGTBQ+ community. The coffee shop/event space serves hot drinks and smoothies ($3 to $7), plus a slim food menu including small breakfast dishes, salads, sandwiches and soups ($1 to $9), in a colorfully furnished brick building on the Damien Center’s eastside campus.

Josephine

110 W. Main St. Unit 100, Carmel, (317) 548-3589, josephinecarmel.com

Josephine is a French-inspired eatery from Ambrosia Hospitality Group, which also operates Italian eateries Ambrosia in SoBro and Bocca in the Near Northside, plus speakeasy-inspired cocktail bars Nowhere Special on Mass Ave and The Commodore in Fountain Square. Offerings at Josephine include steak frites ($47), ratatouille ($12) and escargot ($16), with an expansive wine menu and select cocktails.

Freeland’s

875 Freeland Way, Carmel, (317) 316-9875, freelandsrestaurant.com, opened Feb. 12

The project of Tinker Street co-founder Tom Main, this fine dining spot in Carmel’s North End community occupies an 1845 house once home to generations of Carmel’s Freeland family. The staff includes sommelier Ashlee Nemeth and bartender Grace Donlon, both formerly mainstays at Tinker Street, as well as a handful of employees with intellectual and developmental disabilities who live in the North End apartments just steps away — and whom Main credits as the reason he decided to open Freeland’s in the first place.

Head chef and Fort Wayne native Matt Hamilton (formerly of farm-to-table eatery Rosie Cannonball in Houston), brings a nostalgic Midwesterner’s tilt to traditional Central and Eastern European flavors; menu highlights include lamb-stuffed Russian dumplings (pelmeni, $18), braised beef tongue with grilled and pickled cabbage ($18) and charred carrots in a smoky Balkan vegetable spread called zacuscă ($16).

Bovaconti Carmel

2 W. Main St., bovaconticoffee.com, opened Feb. 14

Nearly a year and a half after it announced a projected spring 2024 opening, Fountain Square-based Bovaconti finally opened its second location in Carmel’s Arts and Design District. Bovaconti brings a European flair to its coffees and Italian-style sodas, though guests will also find more familiar lattes and sweets on the menu.

Culinary Dropout at Nora Plaza

1320 E. 86th St., (463) 231-8050, culinarydropout.com, opened Feb. 19

As the Nora Plaza continues to develop, this eatery by Phoenix-based Fox Restaurant Concepts is among the new tenants. Culinary Dropout offers an upscale take on gastropub fare with items like slow-cooked pork ribs ($31) and Korean-style ribeye ($37) joining sandwiches, salads and a robust cocktail list. The Nora Plaza location is the chain’s 13th nationally.

Flower Child at Nora Plaza

1340 E. 86th St., (463) 336-9556, iamaflowerchild.com, opened Feb. 25

Joining Culinary Dropout at the Nora Plaza is Fox Restaurant Concepts’ health-centric eatery, Flower Child. The restaurant offers plenty of vegetarian, vegan and gluten-free options including salads ($10 to $15), grain bowls ($11 to $16) and protein-forward entrées (around $15).

Circle City Kolaches

1521 N. Green St., Brownsburg, (317) 456-2643, circlecitykolache.com, opened Feb. 28

This new Brownsburg eatery specializes in the Czech and Slavic pastries known as kolache (or as the savory variety are known to purists, klobásník), which rose to prominence in Texas and surrounding states around the turn of the 20th century. Located in the same storefront as Ritter’s Frozen Custard, Circle City Kolache offers sweet and savory pastries with fillings including spicy polish sausage and cheese ($4.25), assorted fruits ($2.50), Half Liter BBQ pulled pork ($4) and Nathan’s Hot Dog ($3.50). The eatery also offers coffee, and diners can add a scoop of Ritter’s custard to their order for $1.

Restaurants that closed in February

Grindstone Charley’s

5383 Rockville Road, closed Jan. 13

This small American bar and restaurant chain started in Noblesville in 1985 under Clancy’s Hospitality, which at one point managed more than 30 Clancy’s Hamburgers locations across four states. The second Grindstone Charley’s opened on Rockville Road on the west side in 1985. Another on Crawfordsville Road in Speedway has also since closed. The Rockville Road location’s closure leaves just one Grindstone Charley’s, in Kokomo, although Clancy’s Hospitality still operates upscale offshoots of the eatery with Grindstone on the Monon in Westfield and Grindstone Public House in Noblesville.

La Margarita (temporarily)

1043 Virginia Ave., lamargaritaindy.com, closed Feb. 8

After 14 years in Fountain Square, the storied Mexican eatery will move to the Near Eastside’s Factory Arts district with a projected March reopening. The move to the Factory Arts District will be La Margarita’s fourth in its 41-year history; the restaurant opened in Speedway in 1984, moved to the intersection of 86th Street and Township Line Road in 1990, to 96th and Meridian Street in 2006 and then to Fountain Square in 2011.

Nada

11 W. Maryland St., closed Feb. 23

A sign posted to the entrance doors of this cocktail and taco spot announced its Feb. 23 closure and thanked customers for nine years at the Circle Centre Mall. A spokesperson for Wisconsin-based Hendrick’s Commercial Properties, which acquired Circle Centre Mall in April 2024, said before the acquisition that Hendrick’s expected street-level businesses including St. Elmo, Harry and Izzy’s and Nada to remain Circle Centre tenants throughout the mall’s extensive redevelopment projected to begin this year. But Nada, a small chain from Cincinnati-based Bocca Restaurant Group, will not be among those tenants.

Know of a restaurant that opened or closed in your neighborhood? Let dining reporter Bradley Hohulin know at bhohulin@indystar.com. You can follow him on Twitter/X @BradleyHohulin.

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Indianapolis, IN

Unsettled Friday and Saturday, then summer heat returns early next week | July 10, 2026

Published

5 hours ago

July 10, 2026

Press Room

TODAY

Partly sunny and warm with scattered showers and thunderstorms likely through much of the bookends of the day. Highs reach the mid 80s, with a west southwest breeze around 5 mph. It does not look like nonstop rain from start to finish, but this is the least reliable daytime period in the forecast, and any stronger storm could drop a quick heavy downpour with a gusty burst of wind.

TONIGHT

Scattered showers and thunderstorms remain possible through the evening, then another lower-end storm chance lingers late overnight. Lows settle near the upper 60s, with light wind. The severe risk looks lower than it is Thursday night, but a few pockets of heavier rain are still possible if a boundary stalls close enough to central Indiana.

TOMORROW

Mostly cloudy and not quite as hot, with another chance for showers and thunderstorms developing mainly after mid afternoon. Highs reach the low to mid 80s, with a light northeast breeze around 5 mph. Much of the first half of the day should be usable, but later afternoon and evening plans will still need a weather eye.

TOMORROW NIGHT

A few showers and thunderstorms may linger early, then the trend turns quieter with mostly cloudy skies overnight. Lows fall to the upper 60s, with an east northeast breeze around 5 mph. It is a calmer setup than Friday night overall, even if an early interruption is still possible.

SUNDAY

Mostly sunny and warmer with highs in the mid 80s. An east breeze around 5 to 10 mph keeps the day from feeling too stagnant, and this looks like one of the cleaner forecast days of the stretch. Most of central Indiana should stay dry from start to finish.

SUNDAY NIGHT

Mostly clear and seasonably mild, with lows around the mid 60s and a light east northeast breeze. Quiet weather continues overnight with no meaningful travel concerns.

MONDAY

Sunny and hotter, with highs climbing into the upper 80s. A light east wind around 5 mph holds through the day. After the unsettled end of the workweek, this looks like a very usable summer day with heat becoming the main story instead of storms.

MONDAY NIGHT

Mostly clear and warm, with lows near 70 and only a light breeze. There will be little trouble overnight, and the warmer pattern settles in more firmly.

TUESDAY

Sunny and hot again, with highs near 90. Wind stays light, becoming east southeast around 5 mph in the afternoon. This is another day where the weather looks broadly quiet, with heat the main thing to plan around.

7 DAY FORECAST

The main concern in the near term is the unsettled Friday into Saturday period, when repeated rounds of showers and thunderstorms could bring quick heavy rain, especially Friday afternoon and evening. After that, the pattern trends warmer and drier from Sunday into at least Tuesday, with highs returning to the upper 80s and lower 90s while heat index values stay more manageable than the late-June heat. By Wednesday and Thursday, isolated afternoon and evening storms begin to creep back into the forecast, with a more noticeable thunderstorm threat showing up later next week into next weekend.

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Indianapolis, IN

Indiana Workforce Pell Grant options limited so far

Published

15 hours ago

July 9, 2026

Press Room

Indiana Workforce Pell Grant options limited so far

INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — Education leaders on Thursday said waiting for rulemaking limited the number of programs approved for a new grant program, but they expect more approvals soon.

Created as part of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act that President Donald Trump signed last year, the Workforce Pell Grant program allows students to use Pell Grants for short-term, direct-to-workforce training programs. The program began on July 1. Ivy Tech Community College of Indiana and Vincennes University, which are Indiana’s two two-year vocational and technical institutions, are the only institutions in the state authorized for the program so far, though state officials have said they’ll consider expanding it to other institutions depending on the results of the first year.

So far, state education officials have approved three programs for Workforce Pell Grants: certified clinical medical assistant programs at Ivy Tech and Vincennes, plus an electrical maintenance technician bootcamp Vincennes offers. Final approval must come from the federal government, which has not yet green-lit any of those programs.

Molly Dodge, Ivy Tech’s senior vice president for workforce and careers, said Ivy Tech leaders needed to make sure they thoroughly understood the requirements they would face. To be eligible, a program must have at least a 70% completion rate and a 70% job placement rate. It also must lead directly to a job in a high-growth, high-demand job sector. Dodge said the rules were finalized this spring. After that, she said Ivy Tech leaders began going through each of their courses to see which ones would be eligible.

“Workforce Pell has a significant requirement related to job placement and wages, and so we need to backward design from an employer, in many cases, to make sure that we’re successful in launching these Workforce Pell programs,” she said.

Tony Hahn, Vincennes University’s vice president for government and legal affairs, said July 1 was the earliest under federal statute the program could begin. In practice, he said the rollout will take some time because programs must be offered for one year in exactly the same format before they become eligible for the Workforce Pell Grant.

“These are often programs that we have offered through Next Level Jobs programs and other Department of Workforce Development funding, but didn’t have the exact same requirements on number of classroom hours or number of total weeks offered,” he said. “And so, we made some modifications and we’ll be able to expand this list.”

Both Dodge and Hahn said leaders at their respective institutions are reviewing their course catalogs for other potentially eligible programs. They said they expect to add approved programs in the coming months.

Dodge said Workforce Pell-eligible programs are often designed with the expectation that you will go to work with a partner employer upon completion of the program, but that doesn’t mean education ends there. She said Workforce Pell Grant programs are stackable and can be pursued as part of a longer-term higher education strategy. Students can qualify for both traditional Pell Grants and Workforce Pell Grants, though not at the same time.

Hahn said prospective students won’t be able to apply for Workforce Pell Grants until this fall or next spring. If you’re interested, he said you should fill out a federal student financial aid form. He said Vincennes University leaders expect to add information about eligible programs to their application website once approved.

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