Scenes From The Soft Opening Of Lea

Saturday night was the soft opening of Lea, the new restaurant at 1022 Cortelyou Road (corner of Stratford Road, formerly Vox Pop) from Ben Heemskerk and Avi Shuker of The Castello Plan. Around 60 friends and family joined Avi, Ben, chef Daniel Soskolen, Mimi Kitani of Mimi’s Hummus, and the rest of the crew to get a look inside the space, as well as to experience menu items from partners with Dutch and Israeli roots and a chef who’s cooked his way across the world.

Before attending the event (and before tomorrow night’s open house for neighbors and official opening December 26), we sat down with Ben and Avi to discuss what neighbors can expect from the long-beloved address, what the months held leading up to the opening, and cultivating the feeling for a word with no English equivalent.

Let’s start with a name. Lea (pronounced Laya) is called such after Avi’s 97-year-old grandmother, who moved to Paris from Algeria in the 1940s and then in 1947 to the state that would soon establish itself as Israel. It was there that Lea started a family, having 10 kids–and today, she is grandmother to 60 and great grandmother of 44.

“She’s not just my grandmother; she’s a special lady–a character,” says Avi, who explains missing the large family dinners that used to take place at Lea’s house, but don’t anymore.

Ben says the idea to name the restaurant after Lea came naturally as he and Avi considered how they wanted their next endeavor to feel, although it didn’t yet exist. “We looked at this space and saw a community space for food, drink, and conversation,” Ben says, “and Avi said, ‘Like my grandmother’s house!'”

The feeling conjured up in Avi when he thinks of those family dinners is what Ben’s dad, a contractor who helped build Collyer’s Mansion, as well as being heavily involved in Lea, calls “gezellig.”

Gezellig, from the gezelligheid, is a popular theme in Dutch culture, but better known here as a word with no English translation. Luckily in Lea, no single word translation is necessary; the space (which holds 60 seats now and will have another 25 outside in warmer months) is inviting, warm, full of familiar chatter and laughter–and because of its location in Ditmas Park, a place to run into neighbors and meet up with friends.

Even the furnishings, many with previous lives of their own (the crew bought and dismantled an entire Long Island water tower, using the wood to construct their bar and ceiling), evoke an incredibly homey feel–including the ornate tiles on the floor, which came from Mexico but Avi says are similar to the floors of Lea’s house.

Indeed, Lea came easily to Ben, Avi, and company not simply because of their previous experience opening businesses, but because of their comfort and rapport with one another.

Avi has his own gezel at the helm in chef Daniel Soskolen, whom he has known since their teenage years in Israel, and Ben says Lea’s staff consists mostly of Ditmas Park locals and Castello Plan regulars. Lea is in many ways very different from Vox Pop, the neighborhood institution that came before it–but it’s also, in some ways, an answer to the familial space some have expressed missing.

As such, Avi, Ben, and Daniel have worked hard to create accessible dishes at a number of price points, gathering like family in one another’s homes every Wednesday for the past six months to fine tune the perfect menu. Ben says one of Daniel’s great strengths as a cook is using a small number of simple ingredients, allowing each of their flavors to emerge naturally and wonderfully.

He cites a charred beet dish (above) garnished with coarse sea salt, pepper, and creme fraiche–which we can vouch for, having tried it at the soft opening, is outstanding even for those who generally prefer to skip right to dessert.

He goes on to explain that Lea will be a great place to sit down and have handmade pasta and signature cocktails, or stay at the bar for pizza and beer. The restaurant’s fritti, including giant olives stuffed with lamb ragu, range from $5-6; their antipasti, including salad, roasted tri-tip (below), and lima beans cooked in olive oil and sage run $7-12; and their main courses, including ravioli stuffed with pork sausage and kale as well as proscuitto and arugula pizza, range from $15-18. They’ll even be serving farinata, a pizza-esque option that happens to be gluten free but that Ben and Avi insist, multiple times, was not chosen specifically for that purpose at the sacrifice of taste.

In addition to Lea’s savory dinner options, they’ll be serving a rotating selection of drafts from their four beer taps, signature cocktails (including grappa, gin, rye whiskey, and bourbon-filled varieties), wines by the glass, carafe, and half carafe, and desserts that Avi says fans of Market‘s sweets will love. Daniel, an accomplished pastry chef, will be making cannoli and cookies for the restaurant as well as dishes with fresh fruit and cream, and is perhaps most excited about experimenting with different doughs–notably, homemade phyllo.

Daniel is also enthusiastic about Lea’s custom-made, wood-burning oven by third-generation manufacturer Stefano Ferraro, which will be lined with hickory, ash, oak, birch, and maple, and will be in use 24 hours a day. At cooler temperatures, the oven is ideal for braising meats; then toasting bread and veggies once it begins to warm up; and once it’s reached 900°F, it’s time for pizza.

In general, Daniel says, the food he’s making is inspired by the Italian cuisine he loved during his time studying in Naples–items less likely to be found on a typical New York takeout menu than at a boisterous, overcrowded Italian dining table brimming with gezellig.

The crew behind Lea is inviting Ditmas Parkers to feel the meaning of the word themselves at an open house the night of Tuesday, December 24, which will feature pizza and beer for neighbors starting at 8pm. Lea will officially open on Thursday, December 26, and will serve dinner from 5-11pm on weekdays and 5-11:30pm Fridays and Saturdays, with 10am-3:30pm Saturday and Sunday brunch starting the first week in January. Later on, they plan to include more daytime service as well.

While they’re not yet delivering, pizza and salad will be available for takeout (their number is 718-928-7100), and credit cards will be accepted. They will also be open for a pre-fixe New Year’s Eve dinner, with details to come.

Congratulations to Ben, Avi, and Daniel–it’s nice to see the space open again, and we can’t wait to see what else is in store.