This old-school, family-style eatery is serving up classic dishes that taste like home

I take pleasure in a very good food — where ever it may perhaps come from — but aged-faculty, loved ones-model eateries will normally maintain a exclusive put in my coronary heart. When I go dwelling to Hawaii, I make a stop at the diner I grew up viewing and if I’m traveling to a new location, it is these forms of eating places that I seek out out.

Kayrouz Café is that kind of put. Set on the corner of Willis and Wiltshire Avenues, the homey spot originated in the 1920s and has been in St. Matthews due to the fact 1976. Tyler Conway and his mother Holly took above the business 12 years back these days, Conway is the sole owner and runs the cafe with a skeleton crew, which incorporates supervisor Madison Rhyne.

“(It is been) just the two of us for about the very last yr and a 50 percent,” Rhyne informed The Courier Journal. “And two dishwashers.”

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Conway is no stranger to the staffing challenges impacting places to eat all over the place. He states they’ve had “help wished” signs hanging on the doorway for at least a 12 months, but only a handful of purposes have trickled in. However, the applicants’ availability didn’t sync with Kayrouz Café’s hours — several hours that have presently been reduced and will not be ready to get back again to ordinary until finally Conway can employ more people.

“A tiny kitchen assistance or a little entrance-of-dwelling enable would be massive,” he reported. “I’ve in no way … in (the) 10 pre-pandemic many years of possessing and working this location … (knowledgeable) anything like (this) as significantly as the labor lack goes.”

He adds that supplying shift meals and extra income for each hour hasn’t served, considering the fact that most other compact dining establishments are executing the very same, and large firms deliver supplemental added benefits.

“We’ve tried using to continue to be competitive,” he informed the Courier Journal, “but in some cases (we) just get outspent by the more substantial box stores. … On major of the scarcity … a large amount of persons have just seriously adjusted professions. They have adjusted work opportunities they’ve modified mindsets.”

Tale continues

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He suggests, nevertheless, that the struggles of the previous two many years have pushed him to set his wondering cap on and determine out new ways to prevail over challenges.

“I imagine it is a superior thing,” he reported. “I believe it’s really about time (for) the cafe market in basic … to halt and feel about what we have been carrying out, and our interactions with our personnel — (to) fine-tune it, and take care of it up a little bit, and get it again to an beautiful job prospect for folks to be intrigued in and invested in.”

Rhyne provides that they’re both favourable men and women and stay hopeful that factors will carry on to enhance. With the climate warming up and a lot more consumers rolling in, they come to feel confident about organization currently being on the uptick. For the time currently being, they’re simply modifying in which they can. In addition to shifting their several hours, Conway experienced to take away pasta dishes and a handful of other goods from the lasting menu.

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“Some of it was (since of) pricing,” he mentioned, “and just the means to make it in the kitchen area. (I’m) the only a person back again there … (and) it can be a very little intensive and time-consuming when you are making an attempt to knock out a bunch of other things. But what we’ve performed with the goods that we’ve had to take away from the menu, is operate them as specials as frequently as we can. It is wonderful … since individuals kind of know that when a week we’ll attempt to hit a several issues and they will arrive in specially for it. It’s a way to even now deliver back again a number of old favorites right here and there and variety of toss them in the spotlight.”

Offering the type of purchaser company that only a modest, relatives-owned diner would, Rhyne will typically make cell phone phone calls to normal patrons when their favored dishes are being served as a weekly distinctive.

“It’s been extraordinary,” Conway claimed. “We did that with the roast beef the other working day and I consider she termed five or six people today. A superior the greater part of them were being below within just an hour. The fanfare is a neat sensation. It just tends to make you really feel superior.”

When it will come to the normal menu, Rhyne states one of the most-purchased items is the Reuben, which is created with piping incredibly hot sauerkraut, Swiss cheese, and tremendous-slender sliced corn beef that’s brined and cooked in-residence. It is served on crisp grilled rye bread, with either house-made thousand island or spicy mustard dressing.

The warm brown sandwich, haddock filet, and quesadillas are other well-known picks — and as restaurant regulars know, the handmade carrot cake is some thing to continue to keep an eye out for.

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“My grandmother tends to make it, and she is incredible,” Conway reported. “It’s a three-layer carrot cake, and she’s been building that since I started off in this article. It’s these kinds of a neat little take care of, and people just certainly love it. You can’t get a great, selfmade cake (at) a good deal of spots.”

Rhyne adds that Kayrouz Café is extremely family-oriented. When organization started out obtaining hectic very last summer months, Conway’s sister arrived in to assistance her host.

“Everybody is incredibly loving of each individual and it is a quite optimistic perform surroundings to be in,” she explained. “It’s what is kept us likely in tough moments.”

Given the evolving mother nature of the coronavirus pandemic, our weekly cafe evaluation column’s concentrate will shift for the foreseeable future. Each individual 7 days, Lennie Omalza will job interview dining establishments that are fighting to adapt and survive although serving our group. Please deliver protection recommendations to Way of living Editor Kathryn Gregory at [email protected].

Kayrouz Café

WHAT: This is a locally owned, neighborhood café that serves consolation foods, which includes Reubens, sizzling brown sandwiches, haddock filet, and quesadillas, and do-it-yourself carrot cake.

Where by: 3801 Willis Ave.

Services: Indoor dining, outdoors seating, carryout, and catering 11 a.m. to 3 p.m., Monday 11 a.m. to 8:30 p.m., Tuesday by Saturday closed Sunday. The restaurant will be closed from April 4-7 for a family family vacation.

Get in touch with: kayrouzcafe.com, 502-896-2630

This write-up originally appeared on Louisville Courier Journal: Kayrouz Café in St. Matthews is an outdated-college, loved ones-fashion eatery