By Kate Hill
Staff Writer
On Oct. 5, the Pewter Spoon Café and Eatery on Albany Street in Cazenovia celebrated its seventh anniversary.
Pewter Spoon is a family-owned and operated business focused on locally sourced coffee and fresh ingredients.
The café is owned by Pat Carmeli and managed by her daughter Ava.
Throughout the years, Carmeli’s three other children, Keren, Ben and Dana — who no longer live in town — have also contributed to the business in a variety of ways, from working behind the counter and in the kitchen to handling the sales tax, designing logos, creating promotional videos and making gift cards.
“Everyone’s been able to pitch in from wherever they are,” Ava said.
According to Carmeli, Dana will be returning to Cazenovia — and to the café — very soon.
The café’s offerings include drip coffee, espresso drinks, tea, breakfast sandwiches, egg scrambles, panini, wraps, salads, homemade soups and baked goods, and daily specials. Vegetarian, vegan and gluten-free options are always available.
Pewter Spoon uses eggs from local, free-range chickens; bread from Patisserie Bakery in Skaneateles; and as much local produce as possible.
In addition to serving food and coffee at the café, Pewter Spoon also caters for a variety of groups and events.
According to Carmeli, who also works as a real estate salesperson, the idea of opening a café came out of nowhere.
“It must have been divine intervention that led me to say ‘let’s do a café,’” she said. “It wasn’t like I had a formal plan or concrete vision for it. I just said ‘let’s just get our hands on the best coffee we can. Let’s keep the menu simple, fresh and as local as we can.’ Our menu is pretty short, but we want to keep it that way.”
On Ava’s recommendation, Carmeli reached out to Gimme Coffee, of Ithaca. In addition to agreeing to supply their coffee, the company also helped the café to procure the necessary coffee-related equipment.
According to Carmeli, the Cazenovia community has supported the cafe from the start.
“We have a lot of people who come in and thank us, saying things like ‘I don’t know what we did before the Pewter Spoon,’” she said. “That’s really cool. I think we fill a niche in the community for people who just want to come into a comfortable space, chat, hang out and enjoy a cup of coffee.”
Since opening, Pewter Spoon has gained a considerable number of regular customers.
“The Pewter Spoon is my Cheers — ‘where everybody knows your name, and they’re always glad you came,’ — except I drink coffee instead of beer,” said Jill Ryan of Ryan & Ryan CPA. “They could put almost anything in the middle of their delicious bread, and it would taste good.”
Longtime Pewter Spoon supporters James and Alicia Shomar share a particularly strong connection to the business.
“The café will always be a special place for our family,” James said. “It’s where Alicia and I had our first date. Fast forward a few years later and — with Pat’s help making sure everything went according to plan — it also became the place where we got engaged. To this day when we visit with the kids we always sit at the same table. It’s a real gem that place.”
Pewter Spoon also has a number of dedicated employees, including several individuals who have moved on from the cafe, but make a point of stopping by every time they are in town.
Emma Coronado, a Cazenovia High School graduate, has been working at the café on and off since day one.
“We have really been very fortunate with the kind of workers we’ve had through here,” Carmeli said. “We ask a lot of out of people. They’re in the back doing dishes, preparing food, prepping, organizing, taking orders and making espresso drinks.”
Although the café has found many solid, reliable workers throughout the years, employee turnover has been an ongoing challenge, according to Ava.
“It seems like as soon as we find a really good team, they start moving on to college or new things,” she said.
In addition to keeping Cazenovia caffeinated, the Carmelis continually strive to give back to the community that supports them.
Every year, the café offers candy to trick-or-treaters on Halloween and hosts a free ornament-decorating event during the Christmas Walk.
In the past, Pewter Spoon has donated large pots of coffee to volunteers during special community events, such as the Friends of the Library annual book sale.
On a number of occasions, the café has also donated all of its drip coffee sales to a specific organization or cause, such as the ACLU, Doctors Without Borders, UNICEF, hurricane relief, Yemen relief, and most recently, 350.org.
“A couple of weeks ago, one of our customers offered to match our contribution to 350.org,” said Ava. “Because it was a climate-related issue that we were supporting, we gave people their coffee or tea for free if they brought in their travel mugs. We also encouraged people to make donations. We raised a lot of money that day.”
Although Carmeli never expected to own a café, she is thankful she does.
“I am so happy I thought of this . . . it really saved me, and it helps me to be able to help my kids and to be able to have a house that I’m in love with,” she said.
The café is open Monday-Saturday 7:30 a.m. to 8 p.m. and Sunday 7:30 a.m. to 3 p.m.
To learn more about Pewter Spoon, visit pewterspooncafe.com.
