The Bittersweet Comfort Food of Post-Sandy Astoria

In one of the safest places to be during the Northeast's "Storm of the Century," overwhelmed business owners both profited and gave a little back.

Photo by Michael Stahl

The only purchases I made the day Hurricane Sandy hit were of a couple of six packs and (when my friends and I got tired of the seemingly sensationalized news coverage) some On Demand movies.

It was a Monday off in Astoria, sixty-nine feet above sea level. With the subways down, it became a week off.

By Tuesday, October 30th, we Astorians were ready to get the hell out of the house. We only had to brave a moist, heavy breeze to find our way into the neighborhood’s reopened coffee shops, Euro cafes, gastropubs, and ethnic restaurants – establishments for which the post-Sandy aftermath proved an emotionally taxing bonanza.

“We learned from Irene that people get stir crazy,” said George Rallis, co-owner of William Hallet, an American bistro on 30th Avenue that was up and running at the regular 2:30 pm start time that Tuesday, in an interview earlier this week. “We had to open to capitalize and we did double, maybe triple our usual business.”

At 11 AM that Tuesday, Ryan …