Foodies Clan

Kena Peay’s endlessly customizable crunchwrap is a perfectly portable, eat-it-later lunch

Dishes like 16-layer goat neck biryani and aromatic goat testicle, kidney gurda kapoora have delighted critics and diners alike

Chintan Pandya, chef and co-owner of New York City newcomer Dhamaka, usually starts his day at the butcher, bringing his haul — in today’s case, of goat neck, liver, kidneys, and testicles — back to the Lower East Side restaurant. “[In the U.S.] it becomes a very novelty product when using kidney, liver, and testicles,” he says. “In India it’s a part and parcel of it. [Here,] a lot of people want to do it, but they’re afraid of doing it. We aren’t scared of anything, the fear of failure is not present in our universe.”

The Indian restaurant prides itself on taking chances, even when they flop. “We actually fail so many times,” says Pandya. “We keep on trying new things and we keep on failing. But after failing multiple times, you get it right once. So that’s what we keep in our mind, that failure is part of the process.”

What began as “failures” have evolved into the restaurant’s best dishes, like the 16 layer goat neck biryani, an aromatic goat testicle and kidney gurda kapoora, murgh kofta — a bright curry with a soft boiled egg encased in a tender ball of minced chicken — and more. Pandya and his staff also prioritize using as much of the animal as possible and leaving little to waste, like in the restaurant’s dohl kleh, or pig face salad, in which the head of the pig (often discarded) is pressure cooked, grilled, and added to a bowl of chopped onions and herbs. It’s dishes like these that have many, including Eater NY critic Ryan Sutton, calling Dhamaka one of the city’s most exciting new restaurants.

Many dishes at Dhamaka are served in the vessel they were cooked in. The pressure cooker pulao is made to order, and served right in the individual-size pressure cooker itself. A Champaran mutton dish involves marinating mutton meat in a small clay pot before adding herbs, an entire garlic bulb, and baking the entire vessel, which is what lands on your table. Serving the meals this way captures the spirit of Dhamaka. “In today’s time it’s hard to find something simple,” says Pandya. “I feel it’s a very honest product. It’s done with a lot of heart, and I think that’s what excites people.”

From an easy-to-set-up tent to an utterly indispensable Very Big Spoon

Chef Lucas Sin shares the best way to gussy up a plain can of beans: Spicy Sichuan flavors borrowed from mapo tofu

Moving is a giant pain, especially when it comes to the kitchen. But it doesn’t have to be.

I’ve moved three times in the last eight years. Two of these moves were cross-country. All three of them were a pain in the ass, in large part because they meant moving my fully stocked kitchen. I cook a lot, and (pandemic notwithstanding) enjoy hosting dinner parties, which adds up to both a lot of tableware and a lot of stuff in my pantry, refrigerator, and freezer. And so each time I’ve moved, the bulk of my packing efforts has been directed toward the contents of my kitchen.

As such, I’ve learned a few things about how — and how not — to pack up. These lessons can be generally grouped into three categories: Things That Break, Things That Spill or Rot, and Spices.

Let’s start with spices. People who care about spices will tell you that they can last for a year at most, after which they’re basically the sad ashes of something that once lived. Although I can personally attest to the greater longevity of certain spices, I will say that if you’re moving, stick to the one-year rule — after all, fewer spices means fewer things to pack. To pack what you do end up keeping, I’ve found that tucking a few jars snugly into empty kitchen canisters, plastic food storage containers, or zip-top freezer bags works well; if you’re using the latter, you can then bundle the bags into something soft like a towel or sweatshirt to prevent the jars from breaking. (We’ll address the beauty of textiles in a minute.) No matter what you do, the key is to keep the spices completely sealed so that they don’t spill everywhere.

That brings us to Things That Spill or Rot, meaning oils, vinegars, condiments, and really any perishable food. My personal MO is to go on missions to finish almost every edible thing in my kitchen before I move, but that, for any number of reasons, often isn’t practical. Obviously, you want to throw away any unfinished perishable food, but if you have, say, a bottle of nice olive oil or vinegar or an unopened jar of Brooklyn Delhi garlic achaar that you just can’t part with, I recommend the Russian doll packing method: First seal the item in plastic wrap, then put it in a regular plastic bag (old bread bags are great for this) or zip-top plastic bag, then wrap it in bubble wrap (or a towel/item of clothing you’re not particularly attached to), and then snuggle it, right side up, into whatever box you’re packing. Of course you have no idea what will happen to the box in transit, but the less room its contents have to move around, the better.

And that leads to Things That Break. After one early, semi-disastrous move that killed almost all of my dishware, I became somewhat fanatical about how I pack dishes. First, I line the bottom of each box with a towel, blanket, or coat — puffy winter coats are great for this, though because of their bulk they work better in larger boxes. (Also, a brief aside about towels, bed linens, cloth napkins, and clothing as packing material: They are way cheaper — and more sustainable — than bubble wrap, and for that reason I use them to wrap all but my most fragile glassware. True, you’ll end up with your clothing dispersed throughout who knows how many boxes, but life is full of compromise.) After lining the bottom of the box, I use packing paper to individually wrap each plate and bowl, and then stack them on top of each other, being careful to pack them snugly without cramming them together. After that, I cover the dishes with more towels, sheets, or clothing, working it around the edges of the stacked dishes to minimize how much they move around.

I pack appliances, pots, and pans in more or less the same way, and always end up distributing them in boxes with non-kitchen stuff, mainly because a lot of pots and appliances are heavy and can create a waking nightmare for movers if they’re all packed together. (Also, you can pack certain things inside of lidded pots and pans — lidded baking trays, for example, are great for packing silverware and various kitchen utensils. Just remember to tape the lid shut.)

Another big part of my kitchen packing strategy is timing, meaning what I pack first, and last. I start with appliances, tools, and dishes I haven’t used much in the last few months — the last time I packed, my ice cream maker, springform pan, grandmother’s dessert plates, and Jadeite citrus juicer were the first things to go. The closer I get to my move date, the more I pare down, until all I have left the day or two before is a plate, bowl, drinking vessel of some kind, knife, spoon and/or fork, and maybe a frying pan. I realize plenty of people will have already turned to takeout by this point, but that’s what works for me.

Oh, a brief word about knives: just wrap them, wrap them, wrap them, and then wrap them again. Doesn’t matter what you use, just keep those blades (and yourself) protected.

One last thing: At the risk of stating the obvious, pace yourself. Packing a kitchen isn’t that different from making Thanksgiving dinner, minus the leftovers and inappropriate questions from people you don’t live with. Moving sucks, but it’s going to be okay.

Determining who controls the work of delivery drivers has major implications for the future of the business

Third-party delivery apps depend on an entire gig workforce of drivers, bicyclists, and motorcyclists — the people on the go, handing you your food at your doorstep. More than one-third of U.S. workers are a part of the gig economy.

The major delivery apps often describe that workforce, their drivers and delivery workers, as partners. That’s the word Uber uses on its website. Meanwhile, Doordash’s pitch to potential delivery drivers is: “Your time. Your goals. You’re the boss.”

But many drivers and critics are saying that’s not necessarily true — that the relationship between gig worker and app is not an equal partnership. What the relationship truly is is up for debate right now and could be radically redefined moving forward — by voters, lawmakers, and the presidential administration.

All the tensions in the “partnership” between driver and delivery app come out in a bunch of small — and big — ways, in the daily lives of the people just doing the work. So in this episode of Land of the Giants: Delivery Wars, our podcast collaboration with Recode, we hear from those drivers as well as the experts on both sides of the debate.

Listen to episode three to hear about the tradeoff between flexibility and stability; the ways in which the apps, through incentives and punishments, control the actions of the drivers; and how legislators and voters are getting involved in this dynamic.

Subscribe to Land of the Giants: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Spotify | Stitcher | TuneIn

Jordan’s lengthy July 3 Instagram post acknowledges that his initial mea culpa “lacked depth” and “compassion,” while vowing to make amends

A group including the famous rapper recently dined at the award-winning San Francisco Thai restaurant Nari

The fund earmarked money for marginalized restauranteurs, but conservative-backed discrimination lawsuits redirected it away from those who needed it most

Throughout the pandemic, restaurants have struggled to access financial support from the federal government, so when the American Rescue Plan stimulus bill, which was signed into law in March 2021, included a $28.6 billion Restaurant Revitalization Fund, it was considered a lifeline. Unlike the much-maligned Paycheck Protection Program loans, this money was to be distributed as grants, not loans, and would not have to be paid back by restaurant owners if used by March 2023. Though it sounded like a promising program to desperate restaurateurs, the program came to a shuddering halt on June 30 when funds were depleted, leaving a trail of distressed, confused, and angry restaurant owners unsure what’s next.

According to the Los Angeles Times, the Small Business Administration, which is responsible for overseeing the program, had received more than a quarter of a million applications by early May, adding up to a need of $65 billion in financial aid. That was already more than double the amount of total money in the fund and by the time it closed, according to the New York Times, 370,000-plus business owners had applied for grants totaling upwards of $75 billion in funding. Only about 105,000 businesses were approved for grants, averaging just slightly above $272,000 per restaurant.

Though the restaurant industry was hit harder than perhaps any other — with customers urged not to dine out, and restaurant workers at high risk of contracting COVID-19 in the tight confines of kitchens and dining rooms — food workers and restaurant owners were not prioritized for federal bailouts or industry-specific relief programs.

The Paycheck Protection Program loans, rolled out last year to help restaurants cover staffing costs, left a lot to be desired. For these loans to be forgiven, a majority of the money had to go toward keeping staff on payroll, even though limited capacity and restrictions on indoor dining made it nearly impossible to retain a full staff. And before many small restaurant owners could even get their hands on a loan, huge chain restaurants drained the fund.

Unlike the PPP program, which left loopholes for major chains to apply for enormous loans (franchise locations can still apply for these grants), the Restaurant Revitalization Fund aimed to reach businesses owned by women, veterans, and people from economically and socially disadvantaged groups — many of whom missed out on earlier rounds of financial relief. The Small Business Administration prioritized these businesses’ applications for the first three weeks of the fund’s existence.

In theory, this was a great way to support businesses that were overlooked in earlier rounds of funding. Only, some white business owners sued on the basis that the prioritization of these specific communities was discriminatory. Complaints were raised by white business owners in Tennessee, Texas, and Pennsylvania, and in late May, as reported by the Times, the Small Business Administration halted payments on the originally prioritized applications. Thousands of marginalized business owners who thought that they were going to be prioritized had their approvals revoked. These business owners were told their applications would be approved “once [the SBA] completes processing all previously filed non-priority applications, and only then if the [Restaurant Revitalization Fund] is not first exhausted,” according to the Times. The lawsuits, backed by conservative groups in all three states (including one brought by former Trump administration officials including Stephen Miller) resulted in the white-owned restaurants receiving grants. Conservative groups have fought tooth and nail to ensure COVID-relief funding is not distributed and prioritized on the basis of race and gender.

In this case, thousands of restaurateurs of marginalized and oppressed communities who made investments and rehired staff assuming they would soon see money deposited into their accounts were left reeling. For businesses that were lucky enough to receive this latest round of SBA funds, grants may be equal to the amount of revenue a restaurant lost during the pandemic, capped at $10 million per business, and $5 million per location. In reaction to frustration at the very limited and restrictive ways PPP money could be spent, restaurant owners have been given more autonomy to decide where they need to direct these funds to keep their businesses open and their staff employed.

When the program was first proposed by Rep. Earl Blumenauer of Oregon last year, he hoped the fund would distribute $120 billion in grants. Blumenauer suspected from the fund’s inception that it would be quite popular, and that his colleagues might have to approve more funding once they saw how high demand was in relation to the drastically slimmed-down fund that passed through Congress. Had the Revitalization Fund been infused with even a portion of the additional $90-plus billion that was first proposed, it would still have the resources to help many more restaurants.

Blumenauer released a statement on July 1, saying that “Hundreds of thousands of local restaurants still desperately need help to keep their doors open.” The representative says that he’s introduced legislation to “add $60 billion to the Restaurant Revitalization Fund, enough to cover all outstanding applicants. In two weeks, we’ve secured more than 175 bipartisan cosponsors, but time is ticking. We need to act now before it’s too late.” If the Revitalization Fund is indeed revitalized, it’s unclear whether it will prioritize the many marginalized and overlooked business owners that it originally intended to help (and that still need funding), or whether a stream of lawsuits have permanently transformed the fund.

Updated on July 2, 2021 at 1:15 pm.

Gabe Erales’s win was overshadowed as allegations about his behavior at Austin restaurant Comedor circulated on social media

Freeze-dried meals have come a long way from their bland beginnings. These are your best (and worst) options.

Chef Lucas Sin shares how he creates the perfect picnic at one reliable grocery store

Every meal tastes better around the campfire, but cooking full, filling campsite meals often feels out of reach. It shouldn’t.

In the midst of a widespread labor shortage, restaurant workers have an opportunity to advocate for themselves and learn more about where they want to work

After more than a year of widespread uncertainty for the restaurant industry, the arrival of multiple COVID-19 vaccines has prompted local and city governments to begin the reopening process for in-person businesses. NYC has allowed full-capacity dining since May 19, one of the earlier cities to do so, with places like Los Angeles, Chicago, and Austin following close behind.

While reopening is an exciting step towards post-COVID normalcy, it also runs the risk of becoming a retreat into the status quo of past times. But a widespread labor shortage within restaurants at large is prompting some necessary conversations about the nature of restaurant work — the hours, the stress, and corresponding pay are simply not equitable or sustainable. And right now, restaurant workers have a significant opportunity to advocate for themselves and be particularly intentional about their workplaces.

As food industry professionals collectively push for structural overhaul in the service industry at large — raising the minimum wage, for example, or experimenting with new ownership models like co-ops — we can also use this recovery period to renegotiate and reimagine the relationships between restaurant workers, owners, and consumers.

With the lens of someone who works at the intersection of food and social justice, I spoke with experts in the hospitality field to learn more about how workers can seize this opportunity to find the right restaurant job, gathering questions prospective applicants can ask to ensure they are making a good choice.

Ask about pay, time off, benefits, and management structure

The pandemic has reminded us just how critical it is to take care of ourselves — not just physically, but also emotionally and mentally. Knowing how a restaurant’s standard processes — like base pay, tipping, scheduling, benefits — are run helps lay a foundation of understanding and trust for a continuing relationship, not to mention will give you peace of mind. For example, ask:

• How is tipping handled at this restaurant? For front of house, what is the base pay before tips? Are tips pooled? For back of house, are tips shared?
• Who manages scheduling, and how are shifts decided? How does scheduling for paid time off (PTO) and unpaid leave work?
• What are the available healthcare benefits? Does that cover vision and dental?

Establishing a clear understanding of the power dynamics within an organization is also critical for a sustainable relationship. Since many restaurants have run on skeleton crews for the last year, the influx of new hires — and with that, more levels of middle managers — can complicate understanding of who really has decision-making authority at the organizational level. Ask:

• What is the ownership and organizational structure? Who is my direct supervisor, and who do they report into?
• What is the process for giving managers and management feedback? How have changes from that feedback been implemented in the past?
• Who is able to make major decisions for the restaurant? How are they made?
• Who is able to veto those decisions? When/how?

Ask how the restaurant plans on keeping workers safe

The previously accepted norm of restaurants abdicating responsibility for workers’ health and safety is one aspect of restaurant work that certainly needs to change. The high level of exposure that hospitality staff have to face every day, even if many folks are newly vaccinated, makes it more important than ever to formalize a plan for keeping restaurant workers (and by extension, customers) safe and healthy. Certain groups, like those with underlying conditions, are also exposed to more harm and should be centered in organizational protocol around safety.

Matt Espiritu, sous chef at Rustic Canyon in Santa Monica, California, suggests asking the following questions to gain a sense of the restaurant’s ongoing COVID preparedness:

• What is the restaurant doing their part to keep employees safe? Are they doing the same for the customers that are dining in?
• Are there safety protocols in place? How is the restaurant kept clean? Are staff still wearing masks, gloves, and social distancing?
• How are workers’ health and jobs protected if someone in the restaurant gets COVID-19?

Eric Rivera, chef-owner at Addo in Seattle, suggests the following questions to understand how restaurants are proactively thinking through safety scenarios for staff members:

• What renovations or improvements have been made in the restaurant to address ventilation and properly spaced working stations?
• Is hazard pay made available if guests and/or employees are not required to be vaccinated before entering the restaurant?
• If a guest is not following our safety protocols, will the restaurant take the side of the guest or the employee?

Kiki Louya, executive director of the advocacy group Restaurant Workers’ Community Foundation, also adds that restaurants should “have a list of resources in case something happens” to its staff, customers, or community members. This can include information about de-escalating conflict without relying on police presence, for example, or how to handle microaggressions from customers, or ways to support unhoused neighbors in the area.

Ask how the restaurant ensures employee well-being

Well-being is more than just physical health. The pandemic offered a rare time for workers to reevaluate their futures in the food and beverage industry, and it’s necessary for restaurants to demonstrate a tangible commitment to the careers of their employees. Devita Davison, executive director at FoodLab Detroit, says all organizations should discuss worker well-being — and from multiple perspectives, or even talking with folks who have left the restaurant. Some of her suggested prompts include:

• How does your restaurant demonstrate that it cares about the well-being of its staff?
• Can I speak with another team member to hear about their experience working here?

Ask about your potential career growth

Ensuring workers have a clear understanding of their trajectory at an organization is an important step in redistributing power from owners and executives. For too long, workers on the front lines have been given little agency over their schedules, work conditions, and career progression. Kapri Robinson, bartender and 2021 Eater New Guard member, says applicants should not feel intimidated asking for details on how a restaurant “understands self-care outside of work.” Applicants should also evaluate the organization’s investment in its staff by asking about educational and training initiatives. She suggests asking:

• What are the educational opportunities while working here? For wine and spirits professionals: Do you schedule tastings? Bring in ambassadors to teach spirits?
• How are the above trainings conducted? How am I meant to learn the menu?
• Is there room for upward mobility?
• What are ways in which the organization tries to alleviate the industry’s high turnover rate?

Ask how the restaurant engages and invests its community

In a time where government systems have repeatedly failed to provide social safety nets for working folks, restaurants have shown us that they are more than just places to eat; they’re also spaces to foster community support and growth. From operating as food pantries and offering free hot meals to providing a centralized location for relief from the police, restaurants can be active players in transforming our society. As such, workers should ask how their workplace is investing in its immediate community. Two questions Davison says potential employees should ask in this vein are:

• How are you leaning into being in community with the residents who live in the surrounding area?
• Are you in touch with other restaurants in the community? Do you look at them as competitors or colleagues?

Jenny Dorsey is a professional chef, author, and speaker specializing in interdisciplinary storytelling fusing food with social good. She leads a nonprofit community think tank called Studio ATAO and runs her own culinary consulting business.

From the kind of ice to use to how to waterproof your food, every cooler-packing trick in the book

How to achieve fluffy, icy perfection, with some help from pastry chef Michelle Polzine

Come summer, my freezer is stocked with pints of ice cream. While it almost always hits the spot, these days, I find myself craving a granita. Something about the idea of fluffy, crunchy pile of flavored ice feels particularly refreshing, more accommodating to a mid-day cool-down snack or an it’s-so-hot-out-I-don’t-even-want-to-eat dessert.

Granita is the Italian version of shaved ice — not entirely dissimilar, but also very distinct from, Filipino halo-halo, New Orleans sno-balls, Japanese kakigori, and Hawaiian shave ice. From Puerto Rico to India to Mexico, you can find variations of shaved ice, all equally delicious (yes, it’s 85 degrees outside as I’m typing this).

Granita itself is incredibly easy to make at home, requiring mostly an abundance of fruit and time. There are, of course, tons of recipes out there (and even this non-recipe, which I love for riffing when I’m looking to use up farmers market hauls on the decline).

But for a (slightly!) more scientific understanding — and for techniques that apply whether you’re following an officially tested recipe or winging it with what you have — I spoke with Michelle Polzine, the owner and chef of San Francisco’s 20th Century Cafe. Her debut cookbook, Baking at the 20th Century Cafe, came out last year, and features two granita recipes (one tangerine, one coffee). Still, her thinking about the sweet goes beyond exact flavors and measurements.

There are, Polzine says, different approaches to granita, and all are equally valid. Still, the tips she lays out here for a successful granita are both smart and useful, even if you’re following step-by-step instructions.

The Choice of Fruit Matters (But You Really Can Do Almost Anything)

Melons, berries, stone fruits, even cucumbers and tomatoes — they’re all fair game. “What you need to watch for is how much fiber is in the fruit,” Polzine says. Fiber makes things thicker, which is why it’s great for sorbet. But when you want smooth ice particles to form, aim for a smoother liquid to start with. If you are making granita out of, say, watermelon or cucumber, neither of which is a particular fibrous specimen, you can puree them directly. If you’ve picked something like peaches or tomatoes, what you’re really after is the juice. Literally: you want to squeeze the heck out of them and then strain them through a strainer or cheesecloth. (Heads up: You may need to add some water to those more concentrated fruits once they’re juiced, too.) Across the board, the more pure the liquid, the better the finished product will be.

Sugar Is More Than a Sweetener

“Sugar is a freezing disruptor,” Polzine explains. It stops your granita from solidifying in one rock-hard mass. (Imagine scraping an ice sculpture; there’s a reason you need heavy-duty tools for that.) Similar to alcohol, which is also a common addition to granita, sugar disrupts the freezing process, and is necessary to achieve perfect flakes.

Sometimes you’ll find recipes that tell you to make a simple syrup, but Polzine prefers to add the sugar directly to the fruit puree or liquid instead of heating it up to dissolve. Even once it’s cooled, simple syrup changes the structure of the liquid as it freezes, making it harder to achieve perfect flaky consistency. “Again, with sorbet, I make a simple syrup because I want the final product to be super smooth,” she says. “With a granita, I want the sugar crystals still present so that it stays fluffy.”

A Fluffy Texture Also Comes Down to the Perfect Scrape

When making granita, the main thing you’re doing is controlling crystallization. Mid-way through the freeze, once it reaches a slushy consistency, Polzine recommends stirring with a whisk, instead of using the traditionally-recommended fork tines. Either will work, but a whisk breaks up the forming ice particularly well. If you nail the timing, you really only need to stir it once, she says.

Add Salt, and Maybe an Acid

Like pretty much all desserts (and, you know, every other food), granita benefits from salt. Without it, the final product will taste flat. “I think of it almost like salting pasta water,” Polzine says. It creates a backbone that balances the flavors of the fruit, ultimately letting them — and the granita’s sweetness — come to the forefront. Acid is also an important component. Sometimes, of course, you’ll have a naturally acidic fruit. Other times you’ll want to add citrus to the mix. Again, it’s all about balance.

Fruit Is Great, But So Are Herbs

Herbs are the sleeper hit of the summer — they’re abundant, generally more affordable than fruit, and also a great option for granita. “I love the idea of a lemon verbena granita, or a mint one,” says Polzine. To infuse the flavor of herbs into a granita, you first steep them in boiling water, and then add sugar after the water has cooled. Polzine suggests serving an herb granita with fresh fruit, and maybe some fresh herbs as a garnish, a layering of flavors that makes a particularly decadent dessert.

With very little warning, New York and Pennsylvania have rolled back mandates that made it possible for restaurants and bars to survive the pandemic. The businesses aren’t ready.

At the height of the pandemic, struggling restaurants were hanging on by a boozy lifeline: Though they were largely unable to serve patrons or do the kind of business that allows a restaurant to thrive, temporary takeout alcohol mandates across states at least provided a bit of relief. Sure, a bar or restaurant might not have been able to pack in patrons like they used to, but at least they could serve cocktails out of makeshift to-go windows, or convert spaces into something resembling a wine store. But as city and state governments proclaim the pandemic over-ish, some of the loosened liquor laws that helped restaurants turn a profit and remain open are being reversed. For restaurateurs still clawing their way back from the losses of 2020, the change can feel too soon, and too abrupt to sell off all their inventory.

Recent rollbacks of these lenient to-go cocktail and liquor laws have taken effect in both New York and Pennsylvania, where restaurant owners have, for more than a year now, been adjusting constantly as mandates and restrictions forced them to adapt and improvise. In Pennsylvania, to-go liquor laws were rolled back on June 15 without notice, following the Republican-controlled state House and Senate’s move to limit Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf’s power in times of emergency. At a press conference on Wednesday, June 23, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced that the state of emergency which had allowed restaurants to sell alcohol to-go was over and that the practice would end the following day. “The emergency is over,” Cuomo said in that conference. In both states, restaurateurs are adjusting as best they can to government regulations that don’t take into account — or simply don’t care — how precarious it is to run a restaurant on the tail end of a pandemic.

Before the pandemic, patrons practically sat on top of each other at Shaka Shaka, a studio-sized Brooklyn tiki bar. When restrictions were put on indoor dining and drinking in New York, owner Garrett Mukai took advantage of the city’s newly implemented to-go liquor law, which allowed him to sell containers of pina colada, and bike through the neighborhood delivering jugs of mai tai. For Mukai, the abrupt end of to-go liquor in New York is an economic blow, but even more than that is the impact it will have on his relationship with regulars. “We have developed relationships with wonderful neighbors who I know are taking their to-go drinks home to enjoy safely with their family,” Mukai told Eater in an email. “While I’m sure I’ll still get to wave hello to them as they pass by the bar on their way home from work, they will likely no longer be regular customers of ours.” Mukai says that the financial losses won’t be enormous but, “as a very small business, it adds up.”

Shaka Shaka used to-go cocktails as a means to find some of that community during a time of isolation, but never transformed into a liquor and wine store like some bars and restaurants. Owners who invested in refurbishing their spaces and stocking up on wine and liquor are facing some serious challenges as mandates are rolled back; Eater NY reports that some restaurants are now stuck with as much as $15,000 of stockpiled alcohol. Some restaurateurs estimated that the retail businesses they’d invested time and money to build out were still accounting for 10 to 30 percent of their restaurant’s total sales, even as indoor dining makes its return.

When Gertie, a modern Jewish deli in New York’s Williamsburg neighborhood, resumed indoor dining during Memorial Day weekend, some patrons thought the dining room was still shut off. That’s because Nate Adler, the restaurant’s owner, had erected such an impressive wall of wine and liquor bottles that the view of the space was obscured from the front register. With both indoor and outdoor dining back in play at the expansive restaurant, Adler doesn’t rely on to-go liquor sales to keep his business afloat. Nevertheless, the 24-hour notice he was given of the reversed policy is a big blow, and feels like an insult to the time he put into adapting his business. “Last month, we sold 100 bottles to-go,” says Adler. “Roughly $3,500 [in wine], and spirits were another $700, and then there’s to-go cocktails. It’s a 24-hour notice after 16 months… It’s not understanding or consulting the restaurant business at all.” In a recent interview, Adler told Eater NY that he had “close to $2,000 worth of inventory coming today, that I’m going to either need to refuse or figure out another way to sell.”

Instead of working with state and local governments throughout the pandemic, restaurants have too often had to operate in spite of them. Restaurant owners, for the most part, were not optimistic that loosened liquor laws would stretch on forever. But with a pandemic still affecting business, and the taste of seemingly endless start-and-stop mandates still bitter in their mouths, this latest policy change in both New York and Pennsylvania is unpleasantly familiar.

Before the pandemic, Hart’s, Cervos, and The Fly were three of New York’s buzziest and most reliably unscorable tables. At the onset of the pandemic, all three restaurants were transformed into markets and wine shops. Though Cervos and The Fly transitioned back to serving dine-in customers, Hart’s remained a market and wine shop for the entirety of the pandemic — until now. Nialls Fallon, one of the restaurant group’s founders, suspected to-go liquor laws wouldn’t last forever in New York, but he’d hoped there would be more than a day’s notice to adjust. “As a small business in the pandemic, we have consistently had to think of ways to handle things better and more proactively than the guidance or regulations being issued from government leadership, at all levels, from the city to the federal,” he told Eater in an email. “It’s unfortunate that at this stage in the pandemic, leadership is issuing and changing rules with 24 hours notice.”

In Pennsylvania, the restaurateur Nicholas Elmi was deeply frustrated when liquor laws were rolled back without notice. Elmi, the chef-partner of Restaurant Laurel and In the Valley in Philadelphia, and Lark and The Landing in Bala Cynwyd, Pennsylvania, voiced his displeasure on Instagram after the reversal. “The state of Pennsylvania and the city [of] Philadelphia specifically has made the past year so unbelievably difficult to survive and it’s because of the people we elect to represent us,” he wrote in an Instagram caption on June 17. “The communication has been terrible. There has been no empathy from the top, down. This is a biased power play that doesn’t take into consideration any ramifications and I’m embarrassed for our city.”

Elmi noted to Eater that he generally avoids making politically charged statements on social media, but didn’t feel like he could stay quiet as Pennsylvania restaurants were forced into a corner. In addition to the limits on to-go liquor, Pennsylvania restaurants that didn’t have permits for their outdoor dining spaces before the pandemic are no longer allowed to sell alcohol in the outdoor dining structures that some spent thousands of dollars building. To do so now that the state of emergency is over (at least officially), they’ll have to apply for new permits. “We all went through the process to get permitted to build outdoor dining facilities and spent various amounts of money over the past year to keep our neighborhoods lively,” Elmi told Eater. “Then without warning we are told that we can continue using our venues, we’re just not able to sell beer, wine and cocktails in those structures, which will essentially cut revenues in half depending on the business model.” This would be a tough pill to swallow no matter the circumstances, but Elmi says the short notice feels like an added blow. “The fact that it was dropped on us as ‘starting today!’ without a wind down period or warning just shows the short sightedness of our state reps strictly voting down party lines without stopping to think to themselves ‘How is this going to affect my constituents?’... It all goes back to people getting out to vote not just every four years, but in their local elections as well.”

The Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board says it’s planning to smooth out the rushed process for restaurateurs scrambling to apply for permits. “We’re working on expediting temporary approval,” says Shawn Kelly, press secretary for the Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board. “…We understand it’s important, which is why we’re working to grant temporary operating authority. We’re working through this. We’re getting quite a few of these now.”

In states where to-go cocktails are broadly popular but pre-pandemic laws have been reinstated, it’s a safe bet to point to the highly effective efforts of liquor store lobbyists who want to cut back on the competition restaurants have introduced during the pandemic. This, as Eater NY’s Luke Fortney writes, “could explain how legislation supported by 78 percent of New Yorkers failed to pass.” Fortney notes that at least 15 states have made takeout alcohol sales permanent, but that in New York, lobbying efforts have stalled legislation. Advocates for liquor stores argue that allowing restaurants to continue selling bottles of liquor and to-go cocktails threatens the stores’ profitability. “The liquor store industry spent a lot of money falsely claiming that the world would come to an end if we allowed alcohol to-go by restaurants,” said Assemblyman Steven Cymbrowitz of New York’s District 45, in a comment to VinePair. It is still possible that New York legislators could introduce a bill reinstating to-go alcohol for restaurants. If that happens, the liquor store lobby is sure to oppose it with all its weight.

Restaurant owners in cities where takeout alcohol is once again forbidden are scrambling to figure out how to sell off their inventory, or, in some cases, are hoping they can sell the rest of their stock without officials noticing. A year and a half ago, it would have been hard to imagine that favorite restaurants would become almost unrecognizable, turned overnight into impressive wine stores and cocktail-slinging window-service operations. But this year showed that — with tireless innovation and crisis management on the part of owners and workers — a restaurant can adapt, even with the most limited resources. In an ideal world, governments would see that many restaurants still need to be markets and wine shops and casual liquor stores to generate the minimum required to stay open In the absence of that leniency, restaurants will have to adapt again with the hope that they can endure whatever comes next, even if there’s no warning.

All the country’s neighbors lay claim to a national beverage. Now it’s Ecuador’s turn.

You can see the equator from the garden outside the Agave Spirit Ecuador distillery on the outskirts of Quito. Or at least you could if it was visible — and there weren’t enormous blue agaves blocking the view.

Under a high equatorial sun, Mayra Espinoza leads a tour of visitors to one of the plants, removes a precut section from the center, and exposes a sweet well in its core. “We take what we find, then we use this to scratch the agave,” she says, holding a small tool called an aspina, which looks like the head of a spoon. “Each plant has to be 10 years old before we can start,” she continues. “They can each generate up to 300 liters, but after that they die.”

For centuries, women of the Indigenous Quechua people in Ecuador have harvested wild agave for dozens of uses, including medicines, soap, and weaving. About 50 years ago, residents in the countryside found another application: distilling it into an alcoholic spirit called miske. In the last few years, distillers have brought the spirit into the city, pushed it into bars, and launched an educational campaign, including the demonstration led by Espinoza, to teach locals and foreigners about the uniquely Ecuadorian way to drink agave — all while trying to work with Quechua women to transition from foraging wild agave to establishing sustainable farming practices.

Drinkers can now find it throughout Quito, as well as at bars and liquor stores in Florida, New York, and Texas. Or they can go to the source at the agave garden where Espinoza works, part of the museum tour at Agave Spirit Ecuador, a burgeoning tourist attraction and one of two modern distilleries leading the charge on miske in the capital. Miske’s resemblance to other agave spirits is obvious: It’s clear, smells and tastes like a rounder, softer version of tequila, and goes down easy in a shot. Agave Spirit Ecuador also produces a sippable oak-aged version, which is approximately the color of brandy and has rich aromas of caramel and citrus.

“More restaurants are starting to use it in place of tequila, to have something more Ecuadorian,” says Tadeo Agama of Somos, a cocktail bar in Quito’s La Carolina neighborhood. “It’s still a little hard to sell as shots because people don’t really know what it is yet, but in the margarita they love it. We’re starting to experiment with it in other drinks. We tried to make a version of a bloody mary with it and it was super interesting. We’re going to try and make a new drink with cacao nibs too, to make it extra Ecuadorian.”

Like tequila, miske is made from blue agave. Whereas distillers break down a harvested plant and roast the piña to produce tequila, the Ecuadorian drink utilizes the nectar from the center of a living plant, which lives for about three months after draining begins. Distillers insist miske’s distinct flavor comes from this especially sweet sap, and from the particular growing conditions on the equator, where plants receive more direct, overhead sunlight than those in Mexico (each Agave Spirit bottle is labeled with the satisfying latitudinal coordinates of 0°0’0”). Without tequila’s global demand, there has never been much pressure to introduce harmful harvesting practices for miske. Until recently, virtually all of the agave used for miske was wild and organic. Guests at Agave Spirit Ecuador can even pot and bless their own baby agave, which the facility later plants a little further out of town in the Pomasqui Valley.

Diego Mora, founder of Agave Spirit Ecuador, sees his mission as something grander than simply making quality alcohol. Ecuador doesn’t have an official national drink, a symbolic designation that can drive real-world economic investment in a region, draw tourists, and expand cultural awareness both at home and abroad. The absence seems especially glaring when you realize most of Ecuador’s neighbors lay claim to one big beverage or another. Brazil has cachaça, while Chile and Peru squabble about who invented pisco. Argentina produces enough malbec to claim the wine as its national drink, while Colombia does the same with aguardiente, an anise-flavored firewater that’s produced across Latin America and the Iberian Peninsula. Ecuador, meanwhile, is comparatively bereft, and Mora wants miske to fill the void.

“We’re working toward changing that. What we’re making is the most cultural drink in Ecuador,” says Mora. “Most South American liquors come from sugar cane, and it is not native. Sugar came with the Spanish and has only been on the continent for 500 years. Agave has always been here.”

Mora and his team have plans to establish a Denomination of Origin (DO), which could provide legal guidelines for how miske should be made, give the spirit prestige on the world stage, and attract drinkers at home and abroad. But not everyone agrees that’s the right move, including Eliot Logan-Hines, owner of Quito’s other primary miske distillery, Chawar. “I kind of think it’s stupid. I mean, to me [the DO classification] is just a bunch of Europeans thinking their cheese is so cool,” he says, laughing. “At the moment, no one knows what miske is, so how is [the DO] helpful?”

Even as Mora and Logan-Hines seek to educate consumers about miske, the community debates exactly how the spirit should be made, marketed, and even named. In transliteration from the Quechua, it could be “chawarmisqui” or “chawarmiski,” translated as “raw-sweet” or “agave-sweet.”

Logan-Hines prefers “Andean agave.” Like Mora, he spends a lot of time on education. When he launched his business in 2019, he had problems convincing potential investors at crowdfunding events to give miske a shot. “If it’s so great,” they asked him, “then why doesn’t it exist already?”

One of his main challenges has been differentiating miske from tequila, the defining reference point on agave spirits for most consumers. But Logan-Hines, who has Mexican heritage, has found that tequila’s history actually helps explain what he hopes will happen with miske. He says that tequila didn’t become popular among Mexican elites until it was widespread in America, and he’s hoping the same will prove true for miske. “Tequila not only became the national drink of Mexico, but a core part of Mexican identity,” he adds.

Tequila may also provide a roadmap for the budding miske industry, helping distillers navigate challenges of sustainability and cultural ownership.

As an outsider in Ecuador, Logan-Hines is particularly cognizant of how he might fit into miske’s national identity. The native Texan originally came to Ecuador a decade ago to work in the Amazon on a conservation project, when he noticed the extraordinary number of blue agaves in the valleys around Quito. He also noticed who was harvesting the nectar.

“In the mountains it’s really the women who maintain the traditions of agave harvesting,” he says. Logan-Hines spent three years learning about agave from a community of women in Cayambe, who sold raw agave juice on the side of the highway. Today, in keeping with the pre-distilling traditions, all of Chawar’s nectar is harvested exclusively by indigenous women as part of Mishkita, the country’s first all-female harvesting co-op. Once the agave arrives at Chawar, it’s spontaneously fermented with no added yeast, then double-distilled, to provide an unmediated taste of the Ecuadorian plant.

“I am a strong believer in the cooperative model of agricultural production in Latin America,” Logan-Hines explains. “Similar to labor unions, co-ops serve as a way to organize producers and give them stronger negotiating power in supply chains.” A background in agriculture and forestry has helped Logan-Hines plot a sustainable path for his miske, both for the agave plants in the ground and the people harvesting them.

“One of the biggest issues we face as we grow is how to ensure that these women continue to benefit from the supply chain,” he continues. “As smallholder farmers, there is a natural limit to how much agave each farm can produce and therefore how much income each farming family can make. By working together to create sustainable, polyculture farms, the women will be able to plant agave for the future and harvest annual crops in the meantime for supplemental income or for family consumption.”

Despite the uphill battle of marketing a new product during the pandemic, the values and goals behind miske are already clicking with customers in America. “We’re really geekily into mezcal, and this isn’t the same, but it comes from the agave culture, too,” says Josh Bloom, owner of Duke’s Liquor Box in Brooklyn, one of the outlets already importing miske to the U.S. Duke’s customers tend to be relatively knowledgeable and curious, and miske offers something new. “The microculture around the agave juice is great and I love that it’s groups of women in co-ops doing so much of the work. That really excited us,” Bloom adds. “Plus, the product is good so when it came time to import it to the States, it was a no-brainer.”

And, just as Logan-Hines hoped, exporting to America may help miske find a place in its home country too. “It’s been interesting how much it resonates with Ecuadorian expats,” he says. “When we launched in Miami, some Ecuadorians just happened to be walking past and came in. They ended up partying with us all night.”

Jamie Lafferty is a travel writer and photographer based in Glasgow, Scotland. He is the Consumer Travel Writer of the Year for 2020. You can find more of his work at jamielafferty.com and instagram/travel_journo. Elena Boils is a freelance illustrator based in London.