H eadlines
Restaurants Continued from Page 1
the shop’s takeout-friendly
hummus and falafel are avail-
able at his restaurant on Friday,
Saturday and Sunday. Frizwit
will return as an offsite pop-up
once a month.

Musi is offering the “Jew-ish
Dinner,” a multi-course meal
inspired by the Jewish holidays
that is available until the end
of November in both takeout
and dine-in iterations. Menu
items include chopped liver
croquettes, Jerusalem artichokes
and pretzel ball soup.

The restaurant only started
offering outdoor seating in
September. “We just felt completely
unsafe in trying anything
before we felt comfortable that,
you know, we could handle it
and do it safely and with inten-
tion,” Miller said.

There is also a chef’s counter
menu option, Ari’s Two Top,
which allows two people to dine
inside with the whole restaurant
to themselves. This can only
happen once an evening.

Miller plans to extend
outdoor dining options into
the fall by providing diners
with laundered blankets and
outdoor heaters. Even so,
he doesn’t expect to offer it
20 OCTOBER 15, 2020
Cheu Fishtown is not seating guests inside.
past November, when the
business will return to offering
primarily takeout. He said he
may continue to offer Ari’s
Two Top as an indoor option
depending on safety.

“We’re working to be as safe
as possible. We’re not looking to
be aggressive or trying to pack
people in or doing anything
more than just serving food
with as minimal interaction
possible,” he said.

A lack of outdoor seating
won’t change much for Espresso
Cafe & Sushi Bar, owner Sharon
Abergel’s kosher eatery in
Rhawnhurst. Although outdoor
seating has been allowed for
several months and indoor
seating at limited capacity has
been allowed since September,
many of Espresso Cafe & Sushi
Bar’s customers still seem to
Photo by GraceD Photography
prefer to order in.

Before the pandemic, the
business relied on catering Jewish
events, but new restrictions led
them to turn to takeout.

“Catering is not really there
like it was before. There’s a little
bit here or there with brises or
small parties that are starting
to open up, but not a lot,”
waiter Yoram Beniflah said. He
estimated that 90% of sales were
takeout orders, which means
business could remain stable
into the winter months.

He also said the restaurant
has been relying more on social
media, particularly Facebook
groups, to post advertisements
for takeout and delivery options.

Ben Puchowitz, chef and
co-owner of Asian fusion restau-
rants Cheu Noodle Bar, Cheu
Fishtown, Nunu and Bing Bing
Dim Sum, said his restaurants
streamlined their menus to cut
down on prep time and lower
labor costs in the spring. Over
the summer, they slowly added
items back, and now they are
taking them away again in antic-
ipation of decreased business.

He said his restaurants
will continue to seat patrons
outside as long as possible with
the help of the outdoor heaters
he bought.

“The saving grace of all this
happening is we wouldn’t have
been able to survive without
doing outdoor seating,” he said.

Cheu Noodle Bar and Cheu
Fishtown’s main menu items
are soups, including brisket
and matzah ball ramen. As a
result, these restaurants see a
dip in business every summer,
JEWISH EXPONENT
Musi chefs and co-owners Nicole Suanlarm and Ari Miller prep food in
their kitchen.
Photo by Mike Prince
Brisket ramen from Cheu Noodle Bar
when a hot bowl of noodles and
broth may not appeal as much
as a refreshing salad. This
could be a potential advan-
tage during fall and winter,
however, as diners who still
want a restaurant experience
might prefer heartier dishes.

Bing Bing Dim Sum, which
serves dumplings, small plates
and other Chinese dishes with a
Jewish twist, typically performs
well in the summer and
continued to do so this year as a
result of ample outdoor seating.

“Bing Bing does even better in
the summer because we add on
42 outdoor seats in addition to
the 55 we normally have. So you’re
almost doubling your potential
revenue,” Puchowitz said.

However, he foresees a huge
dip in business once outdoor
seating declines. Even if
indoor dining is allowed and
customers decide to go for it,
seating at 50% capacity is a
significant loss.

Photo by Jessica Kourkounis
Still, takeout may help keep the
falafel steamed buns and matzah
meal turnip cakes coming.

“We’re going to have to
either get lucky and sell a lot
of takeout food, and luckily
that place does sell a lot of
takeout, or shrink our labor
model, shrink costs, shrink
everything,” he said.

Puchowitz thinks many
restaurants are going to close by
the end of February. His business
has already suffered one casualty:
Cheu Noodle Bar’s last day of
service was Oct. 11. The business
model of serving a large number
of customers in a short period of
time was not pandemic-friendly,
and the owners decided it was
time to close.

The other three restaurants
are still performing well.

“One out of four ain’t bad,”
Puchowitz said. l
spanzer@jewishexponent.com; 215-832-0729
JEWISHEXPONENT.COM



H eadlines
Reunite Continued from Page 1
met as children in the displaced
persons camp of Hallein, Austria,
after WWII. Their families
shared living quarters and soon
realized they both hailed from
the town of Ciechanów, Poland.

Brandspiegel’s family fled to
Ukraine when the Germans
took over in 1939. Both families
were transported to labor camps
in Siberia during the war, but
did not cross paths while they
were there.

Brandspiegel, who was then
known by her Polish and maiden
names, Regina Puter, went back
to Poland briefly with her parents,
where they learned of the horrific
fate of the Jews who had not been
able to escape from Europe. They
were forced to flee anti-Semitic
violence after only a few months
and ended up in Austria in 1946.

The families met when
Brandspiegel was 12 and Eisenberg
was eight. Brandspiegel’s father
took the boy and his little brother,
Motek Eisenberg, under his wing
after their father died in a car
accident. “When my father died, her
father, who was a very religious
Jewish man, he was the one who
took me to the little synagogue
that the refugees in Hallein
established. And he would take
me there to say Kaddish, which
is a prayer for the orphan,”
Israel Eisenberg said.

Their families would often
have Shabbat dinner together
and reminisce about their old
home in Poland. Brandspiegel
and the Eisenberg brothers
also attended school together.

“They formed a school where
we were learning whatever we
could. Some people spoke Hebrew,
and this is where I learned to speak
Hebrew. Some people taught us
geography, some people taught us
math,” she said. “It didn’t matter
how old you were.”
The Eisenbergs eventu-
ally left the camp to move to
Israel in 1949. Brandspiegel
remained with her parents
until 1952, when they moved
to Philadelphia to be with her
JEWISHEXPONENT.COM Ruth Brandspiegel as a child
Courtesy of Ruth Brandspiegel
mother’s family.

Eisenberg left Israel in 1964
to go to college in New York.

He met and married his wife
Marsha Eisenberg in 1967 and
settled in Monroe Township,
New Jersey.

He had no idea that his old
friend was living about an hour
away in Philadelphia. He and
his wife joined East Brunswick
Jewish Center in the 1990s, and
Larry Brandspiegel joined the
staff in 2018.

The chain of events that led
to the friends’ reunion began
on Yom Kippur. Due to the
pandemic, the Jewish center
decided to make the virtual
services free and asked attendees
for donations. If congregants
donated, they would receive a
dedication, or shout-out, during
an ark opening or Torah portion.

Marsha Eisenberg decided to
make a donation even though she
and her husband did not attend
services very frequently. Instead
of writing her husband’s given
first name, Israel Eisenberg, she
submitted his Russian nickname,
Sasha, which is how he is known
to friends and family, and how
Brandspiegel knew him all those
years ago.

Larry Brandspiegel helped
Ruth Brandspiegel use Zoom to
attend the virtual services. As she
watched her son daven from her
home, she was stunned to hear
Rabbi Jeff Pivo call a name she
hadn’t heard for many decades.

“All of a sudden, he called
‘Sasha Eisenberg,’” she said. “And
this got into my mind, because
how many Sasha Eisenbergs
Israel “Sasha” Eisenberg as a child
Courtesy of Israel Eisenberg
are there? There are a lot of
Eisenbergs, but not Sashas!”
After the service, she asked
her son to find out if Eisenberg
was a member of his synagogue,
and if so to get his phone number
and give him a call.

Larry Brandspiegel got
Eisenberg on the phone.

“He said, ‘Did you know a
man, Puter, from the displaced
persons camp? And he said,
‘Oh, my God, of course I know.’
And then my son said, ‘Well, I
am Puter’s daughter’s son.’
“Sasha called me and both
of us were crying on the phone.

Seventy-one years since, I
haven’t seen him or talked to
him,” she continued.

Larry Brandspiegel hosted his
mother and sisters for lunch on
Oct. 3 and invited the Eisenbergs
over to join them for a masked
meeting in a sukkah. When
they arrived, the old friends
couldn’t recognize each other, but
Eisenberg joked that Brandspiegel
looked exactly the same.

“We were so excited, both of
us. I was crying. And if I would
have seen him on the street,
I would never recognize him,
of course not. He’s an older
man now. And I remember him
being so cute,” she said. “I mean,
it’s so unreal. My son is more
excited than anything that it
happened in his synagogue.”
They shared stories about their
lives and photos of themselves
and their families. Eisenberg told
Brandspiegel the story of her
father taking him to say kaddish
in the little camp synagogue.

“She didn’t remember that
event. And when I told her that
we both had tears in our eyes, it
was so emotional,” he said.

They were overjoyed to see
each other, but fear of corona-
virus prevented them from
embracing. Larry Brandspiegel
said they look forward to the
day they could give each other
a hug, and that he hopes to host
a special service in their honor
after the pandemic.

“It’s a testament to the survi-
vors. That’s what it really comes
down to. No matter how long
it’s been, no matter what you
go through, with perseverance,
love, all these things, miracles
can happen,” he said. l
spanzer@jewishexponent.com; 215-832-0729
Regardless, your retirement years should be all you’ve hoped and planned for. Masonic Village can
provide peace of mind during trying times so you can continue to thrive and enjoy life, even amidst a
pandemic. Put your concerns to rest, because you have a team of people who care about you. Inside the
safety and security of our beautiful campus, all necessary services are available - and if needed,
delivered to your doorstep - so you can live worry-free.

JEWISH EXPONENT
OCTOBER 15, 2020
21