1st restaurant week in B.G. to aid pantry

BOWLING GREEN — Come hungry to the city’s first-ever restaurant week and help a food pantry at the same time.

Ardy Gonyer and Tim Emmerich, co-owners of Easy Street Cafe and Call of the Canyon downtown, are organizing restaurant week, which runs Monday through Friday.

“I saw other cities have restaurant week. Why don’t we have restaurant week?” Mr. Emmerich said. “I’ve been to the one in Toledo, and we’re foodies. ... We saw how much they were able to raise for charity, and we really wanted to make that happen in B.G.”

Apparently, it just took someone to take the initiative because over a dozen businesses have come on board.

Restaurant week is timed for when the Bowling Green State University campus is not bustling as it is during the fall and spring semesters.

“The summer is a little slower for us in B.G., and we thought it would be a good opportunity to invite the community and people from outside the community to come try one of our great restaurants,” Mr. Emmerich said.

This is also a good time of year for people who will come from Toledo or out of the area to ensure there is plenty of parking and it is easy to get a table, Mr. Emmerich said.

For those who do like a crowd, the last day of the promotion is the one to mark on the calendar.

“The first Firefly Nights is June 21,” Mr. Gonyer said, referencing the twice-a-year downtown festival that features children’s activities and live music. It’s from 5:30 to 9:30 p.m.

“They’ll have the road shut down. There will be music, beer, and food. I don’t know what else you need right there,” Mr. Emmerich said.

During restaurant week, Easy Street will serve its well-known French onion soup and other soups or a salad with a sandwich and dessert as a special. Other participating restaurants will feature ice cream blizzards, special coffee and beer brews, and burgers.

George Strata, owner of Beckett’s and SamB’s, said they are still working out the specials menu for restaurant week, and he plans to try out some new items. Beckett’s is known for burgers and a bourbon bar, while SamB’s serves seafood, steaks, and sandwiches.

The Brown Bag Food Project will receive 10 percent of the proceeds.

“As restaurants, we need to do everything we can for people who can’t afford to go out to eat,” Mr. Strata said.

Brown Bag director Amy Holland said the food pantry’s clients have grown immensely since the nonprofit started out of her mother’s garage in 2015 serving about 10 people a week.

“Our numbers keep getting higher and higher, we’re much closer to the 350-family [a month] range,” Ms. Holland said. “We don’t turn anybody away.”

The pantry is now located at 530 Sand Ridge Rd.

Brown Bag gives a five to seven-day supply of food to anyone in urgent need, she said. The supply includes canned goods and fresh food, such as bread, milk, eggs, meat, and produce.

The proceeds from restaurant week will go toward supplying hygiene items and pet food, Ms. Holland said.

“A lot of the fresh stuff is what we use our monetary donations for,” she added.

Brown Bag partners with 211 for delivery to anyone within 10 miles who has a need, she said.

Mr. Gonyer and Mr. Emmerich, who have been friends since they were 4 years old, said they have a history of giving back to the community.

They sponsor a T-ball team and support the chamber of commerce. Mr. Emmerich serves on the city’s zoning board of appeals and traffic commission. Mr. Gonyer was recently elected to the school board.

In high school, they both worked in fast food, then took vastly different career routes. Mr. Gonyer was a university administrator and has his doctorate in university administration. Mr. Emmerich, who also has a Ph.D., was in the U.S. Marine Corps and worked in geographic information systems at Marathon Petroleum.

“Then COVID happened, and they sent me home,” Mr. Emmerich said.

Around the same time, Mr. Gonyer left his university job to care for his mother and was washing dishes at Call of the Canyon to stay busy.

When the opportunity arose to buy the North Main Street restaurant, he and Mr. Emmerich purchased it in 2020. They bought Easy Street, which is on South Main Street, in October.

The two have done a lot of cosmetic work at the restaurants but have been reluctant to make menu changes.

“At Call of the Canyon, our plan has always been to shrink the menu, but each time we go to do that, we end up adding two to three more items — especially mac and cheese,” Mr. Emmerich said.

They hope restaurant week will be as popular as another Bowling Green event, which also started as a grassroots effort.

“That is the hope that in 25 years, people will look forward to restaurant week BG every year, just like they look forward to the Black Swamp Arts Festival every year,” Mr. Gonyer said.

For more information, visit www.brownbagfoodproject.org and fireflynightsbg.com. The restaurant week event has a Facebook page.

Contact Debbie Rogers at drogers@theblade.com