[Image via Instagram]
Chef-owner Ali Sahin is selling off the tables and chairs in the back of C&B Cafe at 178 E. Seventh St. between Avenue A and Avenue B. (Details below!)
When restaurants are able to reopen for dine-in service following the COVID-19 crisis, C&B will remain a take-out only spot. However nice it was to sit back there and listen to the cafe's turntable playing some classic jazz, R&B or disco... Sahin has plans for that space.
His bread-making has gotten quite popular, and he is in the process of buying a larger oven with the help of a crowdfunding campaign.
As he noted in the campaign pitch:
I always made homemade bread for the cafe, but since the virus hit I’ve been making 30 loaves a day myself to keep the cafe afloat. What I came to realize is that the cafe needs to adapt in order to survive. I want to bring a bread oven in the back so that I can transform the cafe into a bakery and keep the essential supplies coming for the community, while keeping my own people on their feet.
Here's more from an Instagram post this morning:
It is a strange feeling getting rid of these things that gave more comfort to me the last 5 years than any bed or couch I lay down since I left my parents’ home.
Now I need to make some room for the oven as well as some cosmetic upgrades to the back room. So most of our furniture, and tableware are for sale now. Tables are $50 chairs are $30 each. Plates and bowls are $5. If you really need something like this but can’t afford it I will give you a pair for free.
Sahin has been putting in 80-hour weeks — mostly by himself — to keep C&B afloat during this crisis. He continues to pay his staff, whom he didn't want to put in harm's way by coming to work. One C&B employee did volunteer to return to work. The other C&B staffers continue to get paid.
Meanwhile, Sahin's bank informed him this week that there weren't any funds left for his small business in the SBA's Paycheck Protection Program. Eater yesterday reported on some of the NYC "small" businesses who did receive the loans, including $10 million for Shake Shack and Potbelly. [UPDATED 4/20: Shake Shack is returning the $10 million.]
oh, just a $1.6 billion dollar burger chain getting $10 million in government-loans, and which smaller independent venues got shut out from b/c there isn't any more money left in the program.
— ryan sutton (@qualityrye) April 17, 2020
no big deal. https://t.co/sZMrv4Dz0c (by @TanayWarerkar)
C&B is open Saturday to Thursday from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m.