Photos and reporting by Stacie Joy
It's official — Veselka is returning to an overnight schedule on weekends at Second Avenue and Ninth Street.
Starting April 17, the East Village mainstay will be open around the clock again, starting with just Fridays and Saturdays for now.
Before the pandemic, Veselka served customers 24/7 for nearly 30 years. When indoor dining resumed, the restaurant scaled back hours, with Birchard previously citing staffing challenges for all the shifts.
Owner Jason Birchard (above) shared the news with us yesterday.
Now, overnight service is making a comeback — at least at the Second Avenue location (not Brooklyn) — as staffing continues to come together.
So what is the power order during those late-night hours?
"Fried pierogies, borscht, potato pancakes — good starters," Birchard said.
Birchard will be on hand for the reopening night, along with VP of Operations Vitalii Desiatnychenko, a featured staff member whose journey we followed in the "Veselka: The Rainbow on the Corner at the Center of the World" documentary.
Now, late-night pierogies and early-morning borscht are back on the schedule, at least for part of the week.
Now if we can get some vegan options on the menu, I could actually hang out there again! (Yes, I know they offer oatmilk for their world-class coffee.)
ReplyDeleteI will voluntarily go there when they figure out how to serve actually hot food. I don't think I have ever gotten something that arrived at the table hot, just warm. I want my bowl of soup to be steaming even if the room is warm.
ReplyDeleteOk I'll start - Congrats! Sounds great!
ReplyDeleteThis is great. I miss the olden days when we had all night diners, where you could eat for less than $50, and I was awake past 9pm.
ReplyDeleteThe death of the nyc diner is tragic. Covid I think was the death knell.
DeleteYeah, it was the lockdown. :(
DeleteI like this place and I love the Ukrainian people. I just wish they would carry better wine, specifically the Cabernet. What they offer sucks.
ReplyDelete