Photo: Anne Lakeman/Mediamatic ETEN
Testing the Serres Séparées safe-eating concept at Mediamatic restaurant in the Netherlands.
My husband keeps saying he can’t imagine that going to restaurants will ever be the same after coronavirus. In fact, he says, if nice restaurants continue doing takeout, maybe we should just stick with that.
Of course, restaurant owners are already thinking about these issues.
Byron Mühlberg reports from the Netherlands that the possibility of future guests requesting their own separate spaces has got some restaurateurs thinking creatively.
“With Dutch restaurants, bars and other catering services engulfed in uncertainty over how they might adjust to the 1.5-meter society,” he writes, “one Amsterdam restaurant is set to experiment with a brand new way of condoning off its guests: Using enclosed greenhouses.
“Mediamatic ETEN, part of a larger arts and entrepreneurship center focusing on sustainability, is a vegan restaurant. … From May 21, the restaurant will begin taking in guests, only this time they will be seated inside Serres Séparées (‘separated greenhouses’), enclosed glass structures, each equipped with a table for two or three diners.
” ‘This was one of the most feasible ideas from a large list of ideas we had when brainstorming,’ Mediamatic’s founding partner Willem Velthoven told NL Times. …
Initially, no more than three guests will be allowed to dine inside each greenhouse, even though there is the capacity for more. ‘[This is] is because we are now careful with our optimism,’ Velthoven explained. …
” ‘Bigger groups could [come] now, but then they should be families. For now, bigger groups are being discouraged because, from our experience, they are just louder and then you get the excited behavior causing spittle to fly and so on, and that’s the kind of behavior that would make the virus spread faster,’ Velthoven said. …
“Catering industry association KHN told NL Times, ‘We sent a protocol to the government two weeks ago, containing advice on how best to open the 1.5 [meter] distance. It is crucial that the government provide perspective quickly.’
“While KHN said it would not yet advise restaurants to reopen on June 1, renowned catering tycoon Laurens Meyer … questioned the idea of people becoming too careful with space.
” ‘We have to realize that there will always be some kind of virus. Whether it is worse than the flu, we have to see. If there is nothing left of our economy, we will no longer be able to afford health care and that will also cost human lives,’ explained Meyer.
“Velthoven, on the other hand, disagrees with Meyer’s approach, urging caution before advising restaurants to open their doors to the public without careful examination. ‘It’s about others and not just yourself in this case,’ he said. …
“Velthoven also understands the business argument, even though he has spent a career looking for creative solutions to problems instead of blunt responses. He ultimately wondered what the government’s plan is for the catering sector if those businesses are ordered to stay closed for a longer duration. If billions of euros are being diverted to KLM, he wonders what the government will be able to do to bail out his industry.
” ‘If I am not allowed to do anything the rest of this year, it’s finished,’ he lamented.” More at NL Times, here.
If you have heard of other good ideas for restaurants and bars in our cautious Covid-19 world, please share them in Comments. Pretty sure that there’s a large group of potential patrons who will be looking for the safest way to dine out — at least until a vaccine is widely available.
Suzanne's Mom's Blog 
I would rather stay home than eat in such a tiny space.
LOL. If it’s outdoors on the water on a warm evening it might not be bad, though.
Innovative idea!
In today’s paper I saw that there will also be more emphasis on drive-thru food. I hope it is not just fast food, which is fine, but some nicer restaurants, too.
None of our restaurants are open, not even drive thrus.
Along with killing people, this virus is smashing the economy flat. I feel for them. I think they should try whatever is safe and might keep them afloat until a vaccine arrives.
In our area, a couple high-end restaurants are offering a limited menu a couple days a week for curbside pickup. It seems to be tiding them over. You order online at a certain hour. For one restaurant, you have to wait in your car with the number of the order on your dashboard. Whatever works!
Yes! Read a very discouraging article in The Atlantic about how many, many small businesses are going to tank because of the lack of help from the government. Sigh, sigh, and sigh. I have been afraid of this. Hope it’s not as dire as the article suggests.
I own a restaurant and we are trying to think of ways of adapting to the new normal that has to come. Outdoor is great until the bad weather comes in!! We are in Scotland!
O, I laughed! But it’s not funny. I’d be very interested to know what solutions you come up with.