East Rock | Economic Development | Arts & Culture | Food Business
U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal, contemplating a jar of Oh Shito!, and Charlie Negaro. Lucy Gellman Photo.
A New Haven culinary mainstay has received federal recognition for its work—and is celebrating by helping budding local foodways grow their footprint.
That business is Atticus Bookstore Café and Market, which straddles well-loved storefronts on Chapel Street downtown and Orange Street in the city’s East Rock neighborhood. Earlier this month, the Connecticut District Office of the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA) named it the “Family-Owned Small Business of the Year,” in a nod to the father-son pair that has kept it running through two generations.
Last Friday, the Orange Street satellite received a visit from U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal, who arrived with a formal certificate lauding the business. The market opened in March 2021, almost exactly one year into the pandemic, in the former home of Romeo & Cesare’s at 771 Orange St.
Frank Alvarado, senior area manager at the U.S. Small Business Administration, helped coordinate the event.
“It’s intimidating,” said Chief Executive Officer Charlie Negaro, Jr., who took over the business from his dad, Charles Negaro, Sr., and Chabaso CEO Trish Karter in November 2019. “It’s always a lot to live up to … I’m happy to be doing it. I’m happy to have the opportunity.”
It is the latest chapter for a business that has weathered economic storms, changes in leadership, and most recently a global pandemic. Negaro, Sr. founded Atticus as a downtown bookstore in 1975, and added a cafe six years later in 1981 (a beloved black bean soup remains on the menu three decades later). Chabaso, which pays homage to Negaro’s children Charlie, Abigail and Sophia, opened in Fair Haven 1995. Its James Street hub, which remained operational during Covid, ships bread across the Northeast.
Negaro, Jr. grew up around Atticus’ humming ovens and bustling, fragrant kitchen—but he didn’t become part of the business until the early 2000s. After leaving college, he worked a string of jobs at Chabaso, and then took the helm at Atticus’ downtown restaurant in 2016. He became Chabaso’s CEO three years later, during a larger shift to whole grain ingredients, longer fermentation processes, and new recipes that both Chabaso and Atticus still employ. During his tenure, it has become more common to see small-batch, regionally milled flours from Maine Grains, Thrall and Bass Family Farms, and Still River Farm among others.
When Covid-19 hit New Haven in March 2020, Atticus shuttered for the first time in four decades. The store went from 52 to just four employees in a matter of days. Negaro, Jr. began to wade through an alphabet soup of federal relief programs, from Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) funding to the Covid Economic Injury Disaster Loan (EIDL). Meanwhile, he, chef Matt Wick, and General Manager Brandi Hawkins cooked up a new take-out program. They called it Atticus Market, an early prototype for the space they now have on Orange Street.
Blumenthal, Reed Immer, and Charlie Negaro, Jr.
Atticus was “lucky,” Negaro said Friday. The business qualified for almost every form of relief it applied for. He was able to bring back members of the cafe’s staff, and now employs 72 people between downtown and East Rock (Chabaso employs dozens more, including 18 new Afghan refugees). Last March, Atticus Market opened its doors, and found neighbors excited to nibble happily on its pre-made foods, sweet treats, and small-batch grocery items from tinned fish in olive oil to sweet, wafer-thin Tortas de Aceite. The market is also known for its weekly pizza nights, which take place every Thursday and Friday evening until the pies are sold out.
Both Negaro, Jr. and Reed Immer, director of sales and marketing at Chabaso, called the market an exciting opportunity to figure out a new business model, from small-scale, locally made grocery items to flaky experiments in laminated dough, whole grains, and the perfect pint-sized pan de muerto.
Negaro added that he may be proudest of Atticus' role in the CT Food Launchpad, through which small food businesses have been able to gain traction through the cafe's partnership and advocacy. In the past 14 months, those have included Kwame Asari’s Oh Shito! hot sauce, Sanctuary Kitchen and the Huneebee Project, Fairfield-based ILSE Coffee, KD Crop Farms and East Rock Apiary among others. Businesses that are part of the launchpad work with Atticus to place those products in larger grocery chains like Stop & Shop and Whole Foods. It means that Immer, like Negaro, is in constant motion.
“It’s really exciting,” Immer said. “It’s a constant whirlwind.”
Blumenthal, who has visited Atticus for decades, praised Negaro for his commitment to growing the business. He remembered taking his wife to the storefront for the first time many years ago, when it was still in its infancy on Chapel Street. She left with a coffee, three brand new books, and a love for “a magic place” that they’ve returned to many times since, he said.
Atticus Market is his speed, the senator added. If he could get away with it, “I would have bread and cheese, cheese and bread” every day. Inside the store, he examined jars of preserved red and yellow hot peppers, jam the color of molasses, loaves of seed-flecked, golden challah and sticky cinnamon raisin bread. Cookbooks from Korean Vegan to Gastro Obscura: A Food Adventurer's Guide peeked out from shelves behind him. He later accepted a crisp white bag from Negaro, Jr., inside of which was a flour-dusted loaf of sourdough.
“Charlie’s dad is an iconic figure in Connecticut, and I’m very proud to know him,” he said as he peered surreptitiously at the bag’s contents. “His son is not only carrying on the tradition, he’s also bringing it into this century. I think what unites them is really a labor of love.”
Mina and Monica Banoub.
Nearby husband and wife Mina and Monica Banoub walked along the white tile aisles, picking out a bag of black truffle chips that would double as an afternoon snack. After moving to New Haven from Durham in 2020—Monica is a clinical trial researcher at the Yale Cancer Center and Mina works remotely—they discovered the market last year.
While the two live closer to downtown, they make the trip into East Rock on the weekends or days off. Monica said they like the number of meat substitutes at the market, which made observing Lent a little easier this year.
“I love this kind of market,” she said. “It’s a modern, eclectic type of feel.”
As they spoke, Blumenthal made his way to the cafe counter, where he schmoozed with kitchen staff about their everyday routines. He looked over a cold case with apple and roasted beet salads, neat containers of hummus and two lonely tofu banh mi sandwiches before moving on.
Joe Rodriguez and his daughter Aliyah watched the scene unfold with matching smiles. While Rodriguez is Blumenthal’s deputy district director in Hartford, he and his family also live in Fair Haven, just blocks away from Chabaso’s James Street hub. In the morning, Aliyah can smell yeast and garlic from the bakery. It gets her out of bed.
“It’s what makes the morning worth it,” she said.