How a Church Hill Fishmonger Inside Market at 25th Is Quietly Becoming Richmond’s Most Talked-About Food Destination

The fishmonger isn’t the first thing you see when you enter Market at 25th. It’s the mural by the entrance, the one with the neighborhood map of Richmond and the phrase “one team, one voice, one goal” taken from the nearby middle school. East End Fish Co. is tucked into a 400-square-foot corner as you pass the produce, the bakery, and a few neighbors chatting while leaning on their carts. It’s tiny. Surprisingly tiny. However, the fact that people continue to walk back to it—sometimes twice in one trip—indicates that something is going on here.

The man behind the counter, Forrest Spaits, has thought about the ocean in one form or another for the majority of his life. That portion is evident. The way he handles a fillet, the way he leans in when someone asks what’s good today, and the way he doesn’t oversell all exude a certain carefree confidence. That might be the key. His counter feels almost out of place—in the best way—in a city where seafood has traditionally required a lengthy drive to the suburbs or a meticulous examination of grocery freezer dates.

This is something that Church Hill has long awaited. After Community Pride closed in 2003, the neighborhood was without a full-service grocery store for sixteen years. Even after Market at 25th opened in 2019, the main topics of discussion surrounding the store remained equity, access, and the long-promised return of fresh food to an area of the city that had been written off by larger chains. That early story didn’t really include a boutique fishmonger. It is now. Additionally, the change is intriguing.

Unexpected sources tell you about East End Fish Co. At a downtown dinner, a chef casually brings it up. The scallops they purchased there last weekend, according to someone in Scott’s Addition, were the best they’ve found in years. Walking around Richmond’s food scene at the moment gives me the impression that the word is spreading more quickly than Spaits probably thought. It was only a few days ago that he opened the counter. Local media outlets’ Facebook posts are still current. However, the foot traffic indicates that people have already made a decision.

I believe that the place works in part because it doesn’t attempt to be sophisticated. The Market at 25th was founded on a different tenet: Norm Gold and his group kept prices reasonable, hired locally, and relied on community feedback. Rather than opposing that ethos, East End Fish Co. fits within it. You don’t have to feel like you’ve stumbled upon something valuable to purchase a few pieces of flounder for a Tuesday supper. It seems that you can also find sea bass, which home cooks speak of with a hint of reverence.

There are still many unanswered questions regarding how this scales. There are inherent limitations to a 400-square-foot operation. Despite its advancements, Church Hill is still a neighborhood with significant economic pressures, and sustainable sourcing is not inexpensive. It will be interesting to see if the counter can continue to be both outstanding and easily accessible in the long run. This raises the question of whether other small specialty vendors might adopt a similar strategy, relying on the foot traffic and goodwill of Market at 25th as a sort of incubator.

For now, though, it’s difficult to ignore how much quieter and more fascinating Richmond’s culinary narrative has become on a slow Tuesday afternoon with light streaming in sideways through the front windows and someone asking Spaits how to cook an entire branzino.