Hurricane Beryl closes restaurants in Houston

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Hurricane Beryl may have already passed through Houston, but it left behind power outages that have impacted residents and restaurants across the city.

Many restaurants in the city were without power because of the Category 1 storm that hit Houston on Monday and killed at least nine people in the United States. Some of those restaurants have since had power restored, among the more than 1 million homes and businesses that have had their power restored, Jason Ryan, executive vice president of CenterPoint Energy, the city’s largest utility, told The Associated Press on Thursday. But another half-million customers will be without power at least until next week.

As of Friday afternoon, restaurants such as Jūn, Bludorn, Little’s Oyster Bar, Feges BBQ and all Goodnight Hospitality locations (March, the Marigold Club, etc.) were still without power. Aaron Bludorn, the chef-owner of his eponymous restaurant, said: Robb Report In a text message, his two other locations, Navy Blue and Bar Bludorn, had power restored Wednesday. But after unsuccessfully trying to use a generator to get Bludorn back up and running, the restaurant is still closed for service and it’s unclear when they’ll be able to reopen.

“We haven’t really heard anything,” Bludorn said, echoing the frustration other restaurateurs have expressed with the power company in the wake of the storm. “It’s all shrouded in secrecy!”

Luckily for many restaurants, Beryl was deployed on a Monday, when many establishments were already closed. And because there was advance notice that the storm would hit Houston, restaurants were able to plan ahead and ensure they had fewer perishable items on hand, a spokesperson for several of the aforementioned restaurants said. Robb Report In an email, Jūn, for example, was able to close up her building to avoid flooding, and most of the food was placed in the freezer, which hasn’t been opened since the storm began, chef-owner Evelyn Garcia said. Robb Report.

But even then, once the power is restored, a restaurant simply can’t resume business as usual. If power had been restored Thursday afternoon, the spokesperson said, a restaurant wouldn’t be able to open until Friday night or even Saturday. That’s because once the power issue is fixed, a restaurant still has to order and prepare food, and get staff back into the space. At a restaurant like Feges BBQ, the wait could be even longer, because dishes like the signature brisket take hours to prepare.

For some restaurants, Beryl’s blow is compounded by the fact that a derecho that hit Houston in May also led to closures. Feges and Jūn, for example, were both closed for a full week at the time, and are now dealing with the hurricane’s effects just two months later.

“We haven’t recovered from last month,” Garcia said. “We’re learning a lot and trying to plan for more because this is going to continue to happen… So the question is, how do we turn this around — and quickly?”

Restaurants, many of which are small businesses, will certainly be affected by a week of lost revenue, but so will some of their employees. As hourly workers, they could lose about a quarter of their monthly income due to a weeklong closure, the restaurant spokesperson said. Robb ReportOrganizations like the Southern Smoke Foundation (which is accepting donations) are working to get money to these workers, so they can pay for things like groceries, gas, bills, etc. After the May derecho, the group was able to provide more than $329,000 to about 370 people in the area. And it has already received more than 100 requests for help in the Beryl case.

Restaurants are helping out, too. Goodnight Hospitality is preparing its stockpile of ingredients today before the food spoils, using a large smoker provided by Southern Smoke, and serving them to its staff and other industry professionals affected by the storm. And at Navy Blue, Bludorn is serving meals to hospitality workers tonight, thanks to donations from the spirits brands that work with the restaurant to cover dinners.

There’s no easy solution to a natural disaster, especially in an era where they’re becoming more frequent, but Houston restaurants are simply hoping to get their power back soon so they can continue to provide for themselves and their communities.

“As a business, we’re trying to figure out how we’re going to come back,” Garcia said. “Obviously, once we come back, it’s just begging our customers to come back. Go to the small restaurants. We’re really struggling. And we’re not going to realize that until we’re back up and running.”