Quakertown construction delayed
Public market development halted due to coronavirus pandemic
While thousands of Lehigh Valley small businesses — gyms, salons, restaurants — continue to feel the financial pinch amid the coronavirus pandemic, other retail ventures are just waiting to welcome their first customers.
In Quakertown, the ongoing crisis has halted construction of the highly anticipated Trolley Barn Public Market, pushing back its tentative opening from June 1 to midsummer, developer Chris LaBonge said.
“We’re now looking at maybe July,” added LaBonge, who’s been developing the property at East Broad and Front streets with partner Ian Jeffery for the past two years.
Despite delays, excitement for the market continues to grow, with three more established businesses — Bethlehem’s Rakkii Ramen, Center Valley’s Red Door Coffee Roaster and Easton’s Sweet Girlz Bakery — recently signing on as tenants.
They will join a mix of around 15 vendors, including previously announced tenants Easton ice cream shop Bank Street Creamery and Lower Saucon Township vineyard and winery Black River Farms ,in renovated buildings surrounding a dormant SEPTA train station.
“We want to make sure that not everyone is chasing the same dollar,” LaBonge said. “We feel there’s going to be a number of people who will come out and eat dinner at Rakkii Ramen and then maybe get a cupcake or dessert from Sweet Girlz and then maybe get a drink from one of our vendors to enjoy outside. So, we’re really doing a very diligent job of trying to find the right balance and chemistry among the vendors.”
Rakkii Ramen, offering traditional as well as modern Japanese cuisine, opened in December 2018 at 328 S. New St. in south Bethlehem.
After studying the art of ramen-making in Yokohama, Japan, owner and chef Marco Lu decided to leap into the growing ramen craze with his growing restaurant brand, which also has locations in Doylestown, and Smithtown, New York. Another restaurant, in New Brunswick, New Jersey, is expected to open this spring.
Menu highlights include appetizers such as chashu buns, karaage chicken and seaweed salad; curry chicken and sukiyaki rice bowls; and seven noodle dishes, including seafood udon and spicy miso ramen. Info: 610-4198007. Sweet Girlz, offering cupcakes, cake pops and other confections, was established in 2008, when founder Kari Kirchgessner started making homemade jams from locally sourced fruit.
Kirchgessner expanded the business to include cake pops in fall 2010 before opening a brickand-mortar bakery at 40 N. Third St. in downtown Easton a year later.
Other sweet offerings include brownies, cupcakes, cannolis, cookies, macarons, sticky buns and whoopie pies. In Quakertown, Sweet Girlz also plans to offer a line of glutenfree and vegan sweets.
“The bakery has grown drastically since December 20th, 2011 but we continue to keep our values of serving the freshest items, making everything from scratch and making every order like it would be something we would serve to our families,” Kirchgessner wrote on the business’ website. Info: sweetgirlzpa.com.
Red Door Coffee Roaster, established in 2017, offers single-origin coffees, blends and flavored coffees.
The business is the product of Diana and Jim Hall-Yurasits’ love of coffee and serving customers as well as the couple’s desire to spend more time together, according to the business’ website.
Diana operates the 22-yearold Diana’s Café on Route 309 in Center Valley, while Jim has owned local remodeling company Clean-Cut Construction since 1989.
The pair’s joint operation roasts a variety of specialty grade Arabica beans, including those from Sumatra, Ethiopia, Colombia and Peru, throughout the week.
Flavored coffees, available in regular and decaf, include vanilla nut, caramel crème, Rainforest Crunch, Jamaican Me Crazy, Jazzy Java, chocolate amaretto, chocolate coconut, hazelnut and blueberry. Info: reddoorroaster.com.
The 19,000-square-foot Trolley Barn, comprised of about three interconnected buildings, will feature around 15 vendors, including three craft beverage anchor tenants: Easton brewpub Two Rivers Brewing Co., Lower Saucon Township vineyard and winery Black River Farms and Pipersville distillery Hewn Spirits.
Full Earth Goods, founded by Quakertown native Sarah Collins, will be “a thoughtfully curated wellness shop featuring high-quality goods and handmade gifts honoring the Earth and her seasons.”
It will offer local kombucha, CBD oil, organic produce, to-go food from Trexlertown’s Café Santosha and ingredients for affordable dinners at home. There also will be goods from local farms, purveyors and makers.
LaBonge and Jeffery, who have spent about $4.5 million converting the late 19th-century building into a public market, plan to announce two more food vendors in the coming week before nailing down a few final nonfood vendors later this spring.
“We’re getting so many food vendors, so we’re really searching for a couple of other things that are not food vendors — maybe like a small craft furniture location or a flower shop,” LaBonge said. “… As you’re eating or waiting for your food to be finished, you might want to walk around and look at other things. So what interesting items could we put in there that someone may want to browse or learn about? We were thinking olive oil, flowers or soaps — something along those lines that’s not going to be consumed on-site. We would also like a chocolatier.”
The Trolley Barn property also features a former freight house building, which LaBonge and Jeffery are thinking of turning into event space for weddings and other gatherings, as well as “The Yard,” a 10,000-square-foot outdoor area comprised of picnic tables and fire pits atop crushed stones. Info: trolleybarnpublicmarket.com.
Kosher winery opens in Allentown
Running low on wine during the pandemic?
Whether you’re celebrating Easter, Passover or a secular affair, a new Lehigh Valley winery specializing in kosher varieties aims to keep the good times flowing year-round.
Binah Winery, established in 2019, last week bottled its first wines — a dry and dark rosé and lightly oaked white wine blend — at its new production facility at the Bridgeworks Enterprise Center in Allentown.
Owner and winemaker Kevin Danna began the operation last year when he leased a 5-acre Williams Township vineyard, growing, harvesting and processing nearly 17 tons of grapes over an eight-month period.
The rural property was previously home to Vigna del Monte, a vineyard that produced grapes and juice for home winemakers in the region for more than three decades.
Danna, who spent several years as an assistant winemaker at Pinnacle Ridge Winery near Kutztown, opted against renewing the Easton area vineyard’s lease in 2020.
Instead, he’s choosing to source grapes from elsewhere in Pennsylvania and possibly other nearby wine-producing areas such as southern New Jersey and Long Island in the future. Spotted lanternfly infestations that have wreaked havoc on local wineries in recent years also played a part in his decision.
“In the future, I’m just going to buy grapes because it’s more cost-effective for me to do that,” Danna said.
The 64,000-square-foot Bridgeworks, at 905 Harrison St., is a business incubator that’s also home to other craft beverage producers The Colony Meadery, County Seat Spirits and HiJinx Brewing Co.
Unlike those businesses, however, Binah is a production-only facility and does not feature a tasting room for the public to visit.
Danna is focusing on direct sales to customers through Binah’s website, and he also plans to offer samples at local events and approach local restaurants about carrying the winery’s products.
“People can order directly through us and come pick it up at the winery or we can deliver, even if it’s out of our state,” Danna said. “We also plan to be in the grocery stores — Giant, Weis and Wegmans — and the Fine Wine & Good Spirits stores.”
Binah, which means “intuitive understanding” in Hebrew, will eventually offer around 10 varieties of wine at any given time, Danna said.
This year’s reds will include a cabernet Franc varietal, Chambourcin varietal and a very limited quantity of pinot noir, while whites will include a chardonnay, viognier, muscat and two blends, including a Germanic-style, semisweet blend that is “very aromatic and similar to a riesling,” Danna said.
Binah wines are certified kosher by the Orthodox Union, meaning they comply with the dietary standards of traditional Jewish law. Info: binahwinery.com.
Retail Watch, appearing every weekend, keeps track of retail and restaurant news in the Lehigh Valley. Contact Ryan Kneller at 610-820-6597 or retailwatch@mcall.com.