A downtown restaurant is set to re-open after a cataclysmic fire nearly shut it down last month. “I want all our customers to know we’re alive,” said co-owner Ed Fasani, 42, of Downtown Eddy’s Mixed Grill, a city establishment for the past six years. “The bar is open now, and we’re opening for food one way or the other by Monday.”
Ever since the Sept. 12 fire, which ravaged the entire Jersey Avenue kitchen, the restaurant has been limping along, continuing to cook and deliver lunch from Johnny’s Prime Meat & Deli in Hoboken.
Fasani is grateful for the help.
“As soon as the fire happened,” he said, “Johnny’s called and said they would do our business.” Ed Fasani estimates he’s lost $100,000 as a result of the fire.
It all started when some wood in the wall caught fire, said Fasani, and quickly spread. “Five minutes into the fire, I realized I couldn’t put it out,” said Fasani, who used five extinguishers. Fasani said a manager climbed on top of the roof to battle the flames.
“If it wasn’t for the staff, the kitchen would have completely burned down,” Fasani said. The fire department arrived quickly afterward.
But after the flames were put out, the damage had been done, both physically and emotionally.
“This is my place,” said Fasani. “I waited a long time for this place. And to see it burn like this, there’s a lot of emotion involved.”
Fasani and his co-owner and wife, Jill, 42, focused on the arduous process of getting the place fixed up. Contractors are working around the clock to get the 90-table restaurant running, Fasani said.
Originally from Union City, Fasani, now a Jersey City resident, intends to bring back all of the 33-person staff, many of whom are helping to get the restaurant cleaned and refurbished.
“My cooks were making six to seven hundred dollars a week,” he said. “Now, they make only $150 per week. They’re cleaning the dining room.”
Fasani, a former truck driver, said he always had a knack for cooking, but got started in the business after he hurt himself driving.
His favorite dish to prepare and eat? Chicken topped with broccoli. It’s a francaise chicken with roasted peppers and mushrooms. “It’s a popular dish,” he said.
Another favorite is chicken, peas and pasta.
Fasani received a large delivery before the fire and lost $16,000 worth of food in the blaze, in addition to some paper goods, he said. The owners are still wrangling with insurers over payments from the fire, but he hopes to have that settled soon.
Downtown Eddy’s Mixed Grill is located at 516 Jersey Ave., Jersey City. Call 451-8883.