Dear Feastlings,
I promised a guest I would do this, against my better judgement, only because I know this means I’ll be generating another few score of emails to answer, but it’s a funny thing about a pandemic: I’m suddenly wracked with self-doubt. Not that I haven’t been wracked with self-doubt since I was seven, but after 38 years in the restaurant biz, I felt pretty confident that I knew what I was doing up until, well, the pandemic.
It was a lot of work to shift the menu to something takeout- and cryovac-friendly when we were constrained to switch to a takeout-only format, but it wasn’t difficult to figure out, and we felt like we had a handle on it, but as business keeps shrinking, I can’t tell anymore what’s acceptable and what’s terrifying. If we do a quarter of the sales volume we normally do, it that about right for a pandemic? I have no idea- I don’t have restaurant numbers from the Spanish Flu. And are we slow on a given night because of the pandemic, or it it because it’s August in Tucson? Or is it, as one guest suggested, because our food isn’t any good anymore, or as another suggested, because we’re not serving the KIND of food people want right now? So here it is. when May rolled around and it was hot and miserable outside, we pulled a lot of comfort food from the menu in favor of lighter, cleaner dishes more suitable to summertime, but now I’m wondering if the demand for lasagne that I got the other day was a vocal minority, or a tiny glimpse of a silent majority. I preface my question to you with this caveat: I’m busy. Really busy. I now do about twice as much work to bring in a quarter of what we normally do. So if I don’t answer your email personally, it’s because I’m swamped, not because I’m mean-spirited, or too sensitive, or insensitive, or too stupid to run my own business properly, all of which have been suggested before by one person or another, and all of which, given the moment, may have a kernel of truth in them. My question is: hearty comfort food, or no? Regardless of the answers I get, the menu will never be 100% comfort food, nor will it be 0%, comfort food, but I’d love to only work twice as much as before and bringing 50% of what’s normal instead of 25, so I’m relying on Collective Intelligence to get us where we need to be. And so, with more than a little bit of trepidation, I ask the opinion of 4500 people at once. Let me know what you think; just don’t get your feelings hurt if you don’t hear back. Pretend you put it in the suggestion box at a chain grocery store and respond accordingly.
If you’ve read this far, you might be looking for some other information, though, so here’s a quick rundown:
-we’re still getting the hang of bread, but Dave baked some pretty sweet-looking baguettes today, which are available with your order;
-there’s still time to order not only your wine tasting for tomorrow
but also delivery to one of our delivery hubs in Oro Valley, Dove Mountain, Marana and theri environs
Those order need to happen today, though, so give us a call. the number is 326-9363 and the regular menu is here.
There’s also still the remainder of today and all of tomorrow for you to order if you live in or near Green Valley, Sahuarita, Vail or Academy Village, as that delivery run will happen on Sunday:
And if you’re feeling benevolent, there’s nearly a week to call in a donation to our donation run to the VA Hospital a week from today:
Meanwhile, drop me a line and vote for the menu you want to see, and vote on November 3rd as well, for everything else you want to see.
Thanks, all.
Doug