Ever since I read Hooni Kim’s gorgeous memoir/cookbook My Korea, I’ve been interested in Korean flavors. Ann Arbor is blessed with a number of Asian food shops, and last week, I decided to stop by Galleria Market to browse its Korean selection.
To my surprise, it was closed, except for curbside pickup. That sent me on an exploration of other places whose interiors are not open, whether for shopping or dining. And, dear readers, there are a lot of them. Entire cities full, in fact.
The Silver Lining Of COVID-19 Restrictions
Last week, Chicago declared a ban on indoor dining. Restaurants and bars can still serve outside, but they must close by 11 pm. The new ban comes as cases of COVID-19 are soaring again, nationally, in the Great Lakes region, in Illinois, and Chicago itself.
Essentially, as soon as people began to gather inside, the cases spiked.
But, the ban comes as restaurants continue to struggle with limited capacity. As you might think, the Illinois Restaurant Association isn’t happy, because the group doesn’t believe there’s irrefutable proof that their members are at fault.
Some restaurants aren’t even going to attempt to offer carry out or delivery. On Friday, the Boka Restaurant Group said it was temporarily closing a bunch of its restaurants, including GT Fish & Oyster, Cira, Lazy Bird, Swift & Sons Tavern and Bellemore.
There is a likelihood the situation in Chicago will be echoed across the United States as COVID outbreaks worsen. It’s about to happen in London, where pubs and restaurants have been ordered closed except for takeaway as of this Thursday.
The developments have a number of restaurant people believing that they’ll need to get by on carry out and delivery alone for at least part of the coming months.
A chance to rethink a business model
But there can be surprising outcomes. As I was watching the Chicago situation, I got an email from Rob Hess at Go Ice Cream in Ypsilanti, Mich. I profiled Rob last week in this Forbes story, and he was kind enough to share it with his customers.
In the email, Rob said he does not expect to reopen the ice cream parlor to diners until at least March. However, it isn’t the small business disaster you might expect.
Rob will continue to sell pints, ice cream pies, cookies and other pre-packaged treats to go. They can be ordered ahead picked up at his store window on Saturdays, or else found at seven local markets.
“While I look forward to the day when I can offer you a sample of ice cream or a banana split in person, I won’t do it at the expense of risking the health of Go! workers,” Rob wrote.
He’s exploring additional ways to sell his products, including indoor pick up or curbside service, pick-up appointment scheduling, delivery, or even shipping.
The good news is that Go is enjoying so much pre-pack business that it can now afford to offer health care coverage to its full and part-time employees.
“You might be surprised to learn that we weren’t profitable enough to do this before,” he wrote.
“The truth is, when COVID hit, Go Ice Cream just starting to hit break even daily financials, and we were struggling to pay back about $40,000 in debt. I won’t mince words: We were in trouble.”
Rob sent his staff home, and initially decided to handle the workload himself. “The combination of selling only pints, which increased our average ticket price significantly, plus vastly decreased staff costs, meant we were actually profitable for the first time ever,” he says.
“I put every dollar into paying off debts, and through a combination of grants and lots of 80-hour work weeks, I was able to decrease our debt load to near zero.”
Before COVID, Go was achieving his dream of a community space, with fundraisers and events as often as possible. But that, plus running the shop, was stressing out everyone involved.
“Now, thanks to our new business model, all this has changed. It’s a strange silver lining, but COVID has, in a way, allowed us to be a better, stronger, healthier business for everyone,” he wrote.
“Our pints-only, grab-and-go model, forced on us in a pandemic, has made us better than ever. Who could have guessed?”
Making contingency plans
Like Rob, other places are making it work. Barry Sorkin, one of the co-founders of Smoque BBQ in Chicago, told me he’s never re-opened his dining room, even though he could have operated at partial capacity over the summer.
Smoque has an outdoor terrace, and it has always done plenty of carry out business, so it knows how to be successful based on a to-go model.
In New Orleans, Michael Gulotta has yet to re-open Maypop, the restaurant in the Central Business District that earned him a James Beard Award finalist spot this year as Best Chef-South.
Instead, he’s been operating out of Mopho, his casual restaurant near City Park that focuses on Asian inspired noodle dishes. Like Chicago, New Orleans has dealt with COVID outbreaks that severely limited restaurant service.
I asked Michael how he would cope if New Orleans also forced restaurants to clos their dining rooms. He said he would cut back to four staff members, including himself, and would plan to be back in the kitchen every day to pitch in.
“That would be the only way to do it, and we would have to work around the clock,” he says.
Other restaurants should plan for that kind of a world, at least temporarily, and there’s plenty of proof that they already are.
I’m sure you’ve been bombarded, as I have, by emails from restaurants offering complete Thanksgiving meals.
I had already ordered my turkey, but now I wonder whether it wouldn’t be easier to just buy one of those all-inclusive dinners.
Normally at this time of year, the restaurant industry would be gearing up for the holidays, with office parties and family gatherings and things that keep places humming until the New Year.
Now, they have to gear up in another way — for the possibility that they can’t have anyone in the dining room.
But as Rob and Barry have shown, for some, an adjusted business model can be the silver lining to the COVID crisis.
A Gorgeous Cookbook About Southern Baking
The Good Book of Southern Baking
By Kelly Fields with Kate Heddings
I’ll never forget the first meal I ate at Willa Jean, the cafe that James Beard Award winner Kelly Fields runs in New Orleans. I was on my way to the airport, but I’d heard so much about it that I made time in my schedule to stop in.
I wanted something quick and simple, so I ordered a bowl of fruit and some biscuits. But I had an ulterior motive.
I have certain ways that I test out a place. For French bakeries, it’s a croissant. Pizza places, a margherita pizza. Down South, it’s a biscuit. If you can’t get those things right, then the fancier things don’t matter.
Well, that bowl of Willa Jean fruit tasted as if it had just come in the door from a farmer’s market and the biscuit was sheer perfection, as Mary Berry would say.
Now, you can learn to bake those biscuits, and lots of other wonderful things, in Kelly’s new cookbook, The Good Book of Southern Baking.
There are 100 plus recipes inside, and they range from basics like biscuits and cornbread, to muffins, cookies, cakes and puddings.
Lots of them are easy, but there are some that are a little tougher that experienced bakers will want to attempt. I find it helpful to be able to start with something with just a few steps, and build up my confidence to try a recipe that requires more effort. There are plenty of fun projects to last through the winter.
You can follow Kelly on Instagram @kellyfields and Willa Jean’s Instagram is @willajeanneworleans.
The cookbook link goes to Itinerant Literate Books in North Charleston, S.C., not far from where Kelly grew up. Itinerant Literate can ship you one, or you can make an appointment to shop there.
Be sure to support indie bookstores, especially as you’re doing your holiday shopping.
What I’ve been writing
Last fall, I took a trip to a McDonald’s in St. Thomas, Ontario, to try the new P.L.T. — which stood for plant-based, lettuce and tomato. It was McDonald’s first attempt at a plant-based burger, and it’s since disappeared from the menu, so that’s a rare photo of it above.
There’s no sign when McDonald’s will try a plant-based burger here. But in the meantime, it’s brought back the McRib, yet again. I wrote about whether McDonald’s is falling behind the way the food world is headed.
A Sale At City Tips Vintage
Did you know I sell vintage jewelry on Etsy?
My City Tips Vintage shop is having a sale. You can get 20% off your purchase of $25 and up, and there’s free shipping above $35. Use the code FALLSALE.
Stop by and do some early holiday shopping, or treat yourself. Books are not included, but feel free to browse those, too.
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This will be a far different Election Day than in the past, as I wrote at Medium. Vote, and then keep these things in mind as you watch, listen and read election coverage.
Stay healthy, wear a mask and see you next Sunday!