TPB IS PUTTING IN A KOSHER RESTAURANT!

Zylberschtein's expansion to Seward Park is an all-caps occasion.

After Zylberschtein’s announced on November 1 that it would be opening a kosher branch out of Third Place Books in Seward Park, the internet almost broke. “Yes!!!yes!!!yes!!!” someone enthused on Facebook. “I am SO excited for you!!!! smear that bagel joy all over the city” someone responded to the Instagram announcement.

Word of the Pinehurst bakery’s expansion to the space left vacant by Raconteur during the pandemic ripped through every Jewish virtual space in what seemed like seconds. (Full disclosure: Zylberschtein’s has been a Cholent partner from the beginning, but it doesn’t support this newsletter financially.) When it opens in early 2022, it will be a huge win for a kosher scene in Seattle that has suffered from a historic lack of kosher options, not to mention the recent closure of the vegetarian Chinese institution Bamboo Garden.

“I’ve always been interested in opening a Jewish deli,” says Zylbertschein’s owner Josh Grunig. “We’re in this moment — there’s this invigorated interest in Jewish food right now.”

The cafe and restaurant, which will be called Muri’s after Grunig’s grandmother, Muriel Stein, will have pareve and dairy options and exist in partnership with Chuck’s Hop Shop in the ground-level space. (The lower level, formerly a bar, will house the bottle shop.) Chuck’s, which has locations in the Central District and Greenwood, reached out to Third Place Books and then brought in Zylberschtein’s.

“When I originally started the bakery [seven years ago], we did a popup across from Chuck’s Hop Shop,” Grunig says. “[Owner Chuck Shen] was kind of one of the first food industry people I met when I moved to Seattle.” Previous attempts to partner fell through, but this one stuck. And while not everyone would naturally pair beer with bagels, Grunig thinks it’ll work. “Everyone loves bagels,” he says. “No one doesn’t like bagels. I’m putting all my stock in that.” The restaurant will also serve classic Jewish staples like whitefish and lox, comfort food like tuna melts, challah grilled cheese, soup, and some Israeli/Sephardic dishes.

Beer is almost always kosher, which is a huge factor in why this restaurant-bar combo could clear the kosher hurdle. Without food or alcohol that requires more complicated certification, the process was relatively easy. Grunig is in the process of “kosherizing” the space, as he puts it.

“We are delighted to have had the opportunity to work with the owners to make this happen, especially given the challenges that Covid has brought to the food service industry,” Vaad Av Beit Din Rabbi Moshe Kletenik shared in a statement. “The bakery and restaurant are in an ideal location for the Seward Park community and the Vaad is excited to be able to bring this kosher establishment to the neighborhood.”

Seattle has had a notoriously hard time securing kosher restaurants. The kosher-keeping community is small, the requirements from the Vaad HaRabbanim of Greater Seattle are strict, and the price of kosher meat would put a pastrami sandwich well into the double-digit price point, hence the glaring absence of meat options. Restaurants, as it is, are already notoriously failure prone. Furthermore, that there has not been a kosher eatery in the Seward Park area, with its relatively large Jewish population, for years is on the face an oddity. But it makes sense: It’s easiest to encourage establishments to go kosher when the barriers are low — which means vegetarian. So you have Teapot Vegetarian House in a shopping strip in Kirkland, Pabla Indian Cuisines in a shopping strip in Renton, Island Crust Cafe in a business park on Mercer Island; but the South End remains a kosher food desert.

Grunig looks to Muri’s not just as a new location, but as a community hub; in fact, “Community” is the first listed tenet on the fundraising page. Kim Hooyboer, store manager of Third Place Books Seward Park, also stresses the community vision. (“Third place” refers to that space for gathering outside of home and work.) Chuck’s Hop Shop is “the place you go with a board game to play with friends,” she says. “There are kids running around. It’s the perfect kind of community place. It’s not a sports bar. It’s extremely family friendly.” She’s looking forward to bringing back book clubs, like PJ Library story times, and hopes that as things get back to normal the space will become a hub of activity once again. “Chuck is also marvelous,” she adds. “When he mentioned Zylberschtein’s, I was like, we need to do that.”

While Muri’s will be the in-house restaurant, Hooyboer adds that Chuck’s reputation for bringing a rotating caravan of food trucks to his locations will follow — lest anyone not beholden to Jewish dietary laws might want to sample some of Seattle’s tastiest treif. Muri’s will be open Tuesday-Sunday and will use a kashrut legal procedure to remain open on Shabbat. (In addition to the food being kosher, it must also be prepared by a Jew, which is impossible on Shabbat even if the Jewish cook is not observant, meaning that Grunig basically has to turn the business over to someone else once a week.)

As Third Place returns to a new post-pandemic normal, Hooyboer stresses that she’s open to hearing any and all ideas to make it more inclusive. “We’ve got such an incredible neighborhood,” she says. “I’m always available for additional ideas for how to make ourselves even more of a community space.”

Listening to the community is something Grunig has learned along the way, and in part, Muri’s is a response to the frequent calls he’s gotten about making his provisions kosher. “You go into a neighborhood, and you listen to what people want, and you make adjustments,” he says. “We want to be a place where people gather and have community. There’s no better way to do that than over some beers.”

Grunig’s fundraising goal is $50,000, which according to the fundraising page will go toward a total of $80,000 needed to get the restaurant space and staff in shape for opening. It’s also about community buy-in. “Half of it is the money; the other half is the, ‘Hey I got this Muri’s shirt,’” he says. Donors on various levels are entitled to perks, from social media shoutouts to free food to swag like a canvas tote bag. The funding won’t make or break the business, but if we’ve learned anything from the past 18 months it’s that anything can happen between now and tomorrow.

“Being a small business owner, you have to be optimistic,” he says. “It’s a given at all times. I’m putting a lot of optimism into this, too.”

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