New York City restaurants reopened indoor dining at 25% percent capacity on Wednesday (September 30), greeting patrons hungry to socialize amid the ongoing pandemic and tightening safety measures in candle-lit dining rooms and behind kitchen doors.
At Il Gattopardo, an upscale Southern-Italian restaurant on Manhattan’s Upper East Side, owner Gianfranco Sorrentino said extreme health precautions were essential to pulling his eatery through what has been one of the toughest times he has faced in 30 years in the restaurant business.
“We change the mask every 15, 20 minutes,” Sorrentino said of the wait staff serving diners who were sipping red wine at white cloth covered tables.
“Everybody has to wash their hands every 15, 20 minutes. We change the filter of the air conditioning, they are special filters so the circulation of the air is done in a different way.”
Customers beamed, smiling at one across tables that have been unoccupied since a lockdown was ordered in March in New York, once the U.S. epicenter of the deadly coronavirus.
“I’ll never forget September 30th, 20…It was the first day we returned to socializing – it’s wonderful,” said Lisa Sasson, a New York City resident seated with about a half dozen others luncheon guests at the restaurant’s renovated Manhattan townhouse with a garden.
“It’s fantastic to be with people, to actually have an enjoyable meal with friends and family and acquaintances and fellow workers,” said Reid Rosen, an attorney seated at the table.
Bringing the city back to life after more than six months of quarantine is the duty of all New Yorkers, Sorrentino said.
When the shutdown was ordered in March, he assumed it would last two weeks and he was stunned when it continued for more than six months.
“Financially, it’s been a disaster,” Sorrentino said.
The restaurant was forced to furlough 155 workers, although the business was able to maintain the staff’s health insurance. By the time the eatery was allowed to reopen in August for take-out orders and outdoor dining, some workers had taken other jobs and some had returned to their native countries. With only 92 of the 155 employees coming back to work at the restaurant, Sorrentino is being forced to rebuild the business, he said.
“We have to do it. We are here. We are going to stay here. And we’re going to see this city coming back with all the splendor that used to be,” Sorrentino said.
The restaurant still boasts an outdoor section, which a mother of two school-age kids, Cristin Bolsinger, said she hopes continues
“For those people who are comfortable eating inside, I say go for it,” Bolsinger said. “For me, having kids in school is more important than eating a meal inside.”
A plan to reopen indoor dining was initially scheduled for July, but was delayed due to COVID-19 concerns.