Opening Up: Restaurants

Odd Couple Restaurant

I went to the Saskatoon Farmers’ Market Co-operative’s first live market since the Covid lockdown this morning. I was a little concerned that masks, social distancing, and one-way traffic would take all the joy out of going to the market. But that wasn’t the case. Behind the masks were farmers, producers, and shoppers – happy to see each other again, happy to be able to buy and sell local food.

The next challenge will be reopening restaurants. Some bakeries, restaurants, and coffee shops have done an amazing job at pivoting to online orders and curbside pickups. That creativity and willingness to adapt will be badly needed as restaurants try to stay in operation while maximizing employee and customer safety. From what I’ve been reading, we’re going to see a wide variety of different approaches.

Remain Closed
Calgary's Prairie Dog Brewing has chosen to remain closed until they feel ready and able to address all the challenges, which they outline very effectively in a recent post. The issues range from how to clean dirty dishes to covering operational costs when the restaurant is partially empty, to policing customers.

Pivot to a New Business Model 
One Edmonton restaurant is pivoting from in-house seating to market/deli as a result of Covid. ““I see my 3,000 square foot space turned into more of a market setting, with a wall of carefully-selected wine, a cabinet refrigerated with our vacuum-sealed charcuterie, so it looks like a nice deli or meat market. There is a bakery shelf, and perhaps the patio opens, because we’re easily able to physically distance out there, and it’s been very successful over the years.” Hearth Restaurant in Saskatoon is doing something similar – we can only wait and see what they will do post-Covid.

Dine Al Fresco 
Fortunately, we’re heading into warm summer weather when meals can be served outdoors, which reduces the risk of infection. Some cities are fully supporting this approach: “Vilnius has become a big open-air cafe, with well-spaced places to eat in the city’s public square. In a two-week experiment in Tampa, Florida, businesses in some neighborhoods are allowed to put tables at 6-foot intervals and operate in what were once street parking spaces, even without a permit. It’s gaining support in San Francisco, which already has a program doling out parking spaces for small street-side cafés.”

There are issues that must be addressed for this approach to work. Is there still room for people to get around on foot, on a bicycle, in a wheelchair? Does the community support the initiative? Are you giving public space back to local residents (in residential neighbourhoods, for example) as well as supporting local businesses?

Support Local
The Bristol Food Union was formed to help the food community survive the Covid crisis. They’ve been providing food to those who need it most, developed an online directory of local food producers and providers.

In the UK, cheese stores and cheesemakers were facing disaster as restaurants were no longer purchasing their cheese. With help from Jamie Oliver, they took matters into their own hands and started a Save British Cheese campaign. But this is just the end of the beginning: “Tom’s biggest concern—the big concern of all cheesemakers right now—is ‘how to sustain this sporadic sales pattern, with so many unknowns out there, and the instability of trying to prepare for and navigate what the world will look like as everything starts to wake up again.’”

At a time when supermarket chains were unable to keep their shelves stocked with products such as flour and yeast, customers have turned to local bakeries and food co-ops. The Night Oven Bakery in Saskatoon has always sold flour, but they’re selling more of it these days, along with sourdough starter kit.

Community food co-ops have been able to stock in-demand items and have seen increased traffic: “The best thing about the local food movement is that we have a different supply chain, and when demand increases, we’re able to move more quickly with local suppliers,” says Jeremy DeChario, general manager of Syracuse Cooperative Market in upstate New York. “We’re also going onto Facebook groups for farmers that have seen a decrease in their wholesale business and saying, ‘Give us a call if you’ve got product,’ so we can help them stay afloat.”

The question remains whether this support for local farmers, producers, and businesses is a short-term solution or a long-term trend.

Prairie Pasta Lady, SFMC, May 23, 2020

Look Different 
How do you make your business look fun and exciting when it’s operating at 50% capacity? How do you ensure that customers keep their distance? Some restaurant owners are coming up with creative solutions – from individual greenhouses with tables for two to elegantly dressed dining mannequins, hats topped with foam pool noodles, and bumper tables (you stand in the middle surrounded by a giant inner tube, but you can move around to visit with other customers).

Order Ahead
Vancouver’s St. Lawrence restaurant is re-opening May 28 but customers will pre-order from a 3-course menu. I would guess that this approach eliminates some of the customer/staff interactions and takes some of the guesswork out of ordering the appropriate quantities of food.

Let It Die 
Writer, cook, and artist Tunde Wey has stirred up debate about the future of restaurants by outlining “its racial and economic segregation, its reliance on destructive agricultural practices, its central role in gentrification and community displacement—and argues that, after past destabilizing tragedies like Hurricane Katrina, the rebound of culinary culture only reinforced and deepened those inequities.” Read this article – or others on this topic – they raise questions I hadn’t even considered and that deserve our attention: Are precarious jobs the same as security? Should we bail out specific industries or focus on government programs and policies that support people generally?

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