The Renaissance Café, at 195 Mulberry Street in Newark, serves Hispanic and American foods and entertains guests with jazz and Latin music on weekends. The mixture is tailor-made for a city with a large black community and a growing Latino population.
Established in 1978, the Renaissance Café belongs to Ramón and Myrna Montalvo, two Puerto Ricans who moved north in the 1950s. Their customers are culturally diverse, a mixture of Latino, Caribbean and American-born people. They hire employees from their immediate family with the skills to maintain their traditional Puerto Rican dishes. The café is a place where friends and family members meet to relax, eat, drink, socialize and listen to jazz and Latin music.
The Renaissance Café usually welcomes 30 customers for lunch and dinner, seven days a week. But, according to Myrna, their peak gathering is on Friday night, when 50 to 60 guests always come to listen to music. From 7 to 11 p.m., the café offers dinner. Free parking is available to accommodate guests.
Latino customers mostly order menu items such as paella marinera, mofongo, camarones al vino and churrasco. American and Caribbean customers order salmon ala parilla, broiled sirloin steak in garlic sauce and chicken breast sautéed with Marsala wine and mushrooms.
The café, said Myrna, the daughter of Ramon, “is among the few Latin places that offer jazz music in Newark.” In general, jazz is performed every Friday night from 7 to 11. Saturday night, from 10 p.m. to 3 a.m., said Ramon, is always reserved for Latin music. Guests at that time dance accordingly. Salsa attracts a Latino and Caribbean audience on Saturday.
Flossy Desorneaux, a Haitian immigrant who has been working for three years at Catholic Community Services, which is not too far from the café, said: “I come here almost every Friday with my boyfriend to eat, especially paella, a combination of seafood. It is a small place, but the quality of jazz music makes it nice and very attractive.”
For information about the “Renaissance Café,” call (973) 623-0002.
Pierre A. Louis is a student at Rutgers-Newark.
