This is a post by N&O restaurant critic Greg Cox:

The original Café 121 in Sanford has been a popular dining destination for locals since 2008. So popular, in fact, that owner/chef Gregg Hamm is taking his show on the road. The Johnson & Wales-trained chef opened a second Café 121 (140 E. Chatham St.; 919-468-9884; chefhamm.com) in downtown Cary on Valentine's Day.

"We tried to keep the opening quiet," says Hamm. "We're still hanging pictures on the walls, and the exterior renovations to the building aren't finished." Even so, those who remember the last incarnation of the space as EJ's Soul Food will be astonished at its transformation into an inviting, casually romantic spot with fresh flowers and white linens on the tables.

Café 121 serves lunch Tuesday-Friday, brunch Saturday and Sunday, and - at least for now - dinner Friday and Saturday nights only.

The chef's signature Jala-Ribeye (grilled to order and topped with jalapeño-spiked pimento cheese) highlights a mostly traditional offering of steaks, seafood and pasta dishes. An extensive selection of sandwiches, wraps, salads and homemade soups should attract a lunchtime following in short order.

And with eggs Benedict, jumbo pancakes, and Southern fried chicken with gravy and eggs your way among the brunch options on weekends from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m., Café 121 just might succeed in bringing people into downtown Cary on weekends.

Send restaurant news to Greg at ggcox@bellsouth.net. Be sure to tune in to Greg's radio show at 11 a.m. Saturdays on WPTF.

Go HERE to see Greg's list.

Go HERE to read the list Greg Cox compiled a list for those who are looking to dine out on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day.

Wow! Another 4 or more star review from Greg Cox. (He's having a good dining year, and so are Triangle diners with such great new options.) This time, Greg visits Little Hen, a farm-to-table restaurant in Apex, which earned 4-1/2 stars. Go HERE to read his review.

(Earlier this year, Greg gave a 4-1/2 star review to Mandolin and 4-star reviews to Batistella's and Hayashi-Ya, all in Raleigh. Those are rare and so worth noting. Click on those restaurant names to read those reviews if you missed them.)

Oro Restaurant and Lounge, a new tapas place in downtown Raleigh's RBC Plaza building, will open Sunday night.

I got to walk through Oro yesterday afternoon with co-owner Cara Zalcberg Hylton. I have to say it is beautiful inside: sleek white leather chairs, a 17-foot wooden wine carousel in one corner and two huge light fixtures dangling from the ceiling that dominate the space. The lights are these bronze cylinders decorated with circles. (I can't do them justice so go to the restaurant's website and there are photos on the front page.)

The decor will make you feel like you are enjoying a sophisticated adult evening but with more reasonable prices. The tapas cost between $7 to at most $15. (To see the menu, go HERE.)

The restaurant is for evenings when "you want to feel like you are in a big city but with Raleigh prices," says Cara Zalcberg Hylton. 

They offer six local beers on tap and 16 wines on tap. The wines on tap allows you to "taste wine that you wouldn't otherwise buy by the bottle," she says.

Hylton's husband, Chris, is the chef and worked most recently at The Mint restaurant, which has since closed in downtown Raleigh. (Go HERE to read an earlier post about his background.) He's joined in the kitchen by Lauren Smaxwell, who most recently worked at The Pit with barbecue legend Ed Mitchell.

The Raleigh City Council today approved a rent restructuring for The Mint restaurant located in the city-owned building One Exchange Plaza on Fayetteville Street.

The revised agreement between the city and Raleigh Restaurant Group reduces the rent by $1,159.63 per month for three years and then recoups much of that money with higher rents in the later years of the lease.

The restructuring reduces the overall value of the 10-year lease by $339.

The Mint opened in January 2008, shortly before the economy tanked and consumers severely cut back on eating out.

Now usually, we're not in the business of reporting rumors, but this one comes from a highly reliable source: there were tables spotted outside the fabled Mecca restaurant in downtown Raleigh Friday afternoon. We checked with other long-time devotees of the Mecca and they had not heard of this before, either.

The Mecca is a gathering place for the Raleigh courthouse crowd, and the state Supreme Court (which we thought deserved a separate mention, being supreme and all). Former Gov. Jim Hunt usually comes by once a week when he's in town, sometimes in the company of former Chief Justice Burley Mitchell.  And politicians have long met at the Mecca to do a little deal-making. They like the upstairs, which provides privacy, not that these are secret deals or anything, of course. Perhaps now, they'll take advantage of the opportunity to sit outside, what with the need for open government and all.

The restaurant is also a favorite of The N&O, by the way. (I'm a chicken salad plate man myself, though the lasagna and cheesburger are favorites of colleagues.) I'm not sure we'll be able to adjust, either. We like downstairs because we can see everybody coming and going. Still, we must stand up for open reporting and opinionizing.

For a spring evening downtown, dining al fresco doesn't seem like a bad idea. One thing: we realize it may be al fredo, and we may have it spelled wrong, which usually happens when we try to bring out a highfalutin' vocabulary.