Allan Appel Photo
Mozzarella, basil pesto, balsamic vinaigrette, tomatoes, on a ciabatta: That’s the Tempesto, one of the most popular items on the menu at The Book Trader Cafe. With a little help from the blueberry muffin, the sandwich will put owner Dave Duda’s two kids through college.
Duda with photo of daugher Skyler, now 16, in background.
Duda made that educated guess as a steady stream of customers, never overwhelming the space but never leaving it feel empty, ordered their coffees, teas, pastries, and sandwiches.
“When we opened there were five used bookstores in town. Now we’re the only one left,” he said.
Duda founded the anchoring downtown eatery and used book emporium at York and Chapel 16 years ago. In his native Philadelphia, Duda had managed bookstores and restaurants, but decided it was time to move on to something of his own. A brother, photographer Paul Duda, who had made a beachhead for himself in town already, suggested he try the Elm City.
Duda took the advice. That was 20 years ago. In his first years in town, Duda managed a book store on Chapel Street for Charles Negaro, the founder of Atticus. When a DVD/record business, which had been sharing the space, skipped town, a moment of decision arrived.
“I had an idea of a bookstore with maybe coffee and pastry, but I never envisioned our menu,” Duda said. As it turns out, however, “the food supports my book habit.”
Justine Tobias at the sandwich board.
There was no guarantee that Duda’s idea would take off, especially given the sorry state of the block he had his eye on. At that time many of the storefronts on Chapel Street west of York were shuttered, Duda recalled as he sat on one of the stools looking out from Book Trader’s big glass windows. He lifted his arm and pointed toward the southeast corner of the York-Chapel intersection. No one came down the block, he said. “Everybody walked kitty corner” from the Yale Rep to the architecture building. “This building was vacant for three or four years.”
But Duda had picked up some intelligence: The former Jewish Community Center was soon going to reopen as the home of Yale’s graduate art school.
As he built out the restaurant and bookstore, he didn’t cover the windows, so a buzz developed, especially among Yale students. He recalled a line going out to the end of the block on opening day. Within two weeks his first daughter Skyler, now 16, was born. She was followed by Brooke, now 12.
“I was working a hundred hours a week,” Duda said. He’s more relaxed now. “People ask me to open stores in Madison, but I prefer to spend time with my girls. I’m a socialist who just happens to be a capitalist. We have many loyal employees because we treat them well; it is an extended family.”
In The Kitchen With Jen
Part of the Book Trader family is restaurant manager Jen Tift. She was last to be hired when Book Trader opened in January 1998. She began with the wait staff, noodled her way into the kitchen, and then left for a few years. She returned with baking and other culinary experience, some at Judie’s European Bakery on Grove Street, to become kitchen manager and restaurant manager. “She performs miracles in that eight-by-14 kitchen,” said Duda.
He ascribed those miracles to fresh ingredients, and especially good vegan baking, but there’s something more.
“Anyone I’ve mistakenly hired to just pay bills doesn’t work out,” said Tift, as she prepared the zucchini, butternut squash, and tomatoes for one of her vegan seasonal favorites, harvest stew. Tift said that just as Duda has given her free rein to be creative, “I encourage everyone to put themselves into it” — the work being preparing Book Trader’s menu.
Perhaps that’s one reason why the establishment seems always to have artists, musicians, or arts appreciators making the coffees, teas, and sandwiches.
Former Yale School of Mngmt Prof Bruce Judson stopped by to autograph his own used book, and buy six others.
“We always dabbled in vegan baking,” Tift said, “but when Sara [Neal] came, she’s a vegan. She left her mark.”
Another cook who had been trained at a macrobiotic cooking school “taught me a lot about cooking with simplicity. She taught me really tasty tofu,” Tift recalled.
As for that Tempesto sandwich, Tift said she’d heard the story before of the power of that item, and not just from Duda. A lot of people make a sandwich like it. However, when she came back from a food show, she realized she could make a lot of the ingredients involved from scratch. Result: “Our own pesto” and “our own balsamic vinaigrette” contribute to the sandwich’s not too moist, not too crunchy, well-balanced taste.
“I get a lot of people who come back for the five or ten-year reunion,” at Yale, she said, “and they say, ‘I need a Tempesto. It’s been so long!’”
Up Front With Naomi, Ben, and the Books
Duda estimated that his revenue from the books that he and chief buyer Kelly Pyers purchase and sell add up to at most 35 percent of the business. And online buying and selling have certainly been a new challenge.
“There was a Monet art book we sold for $14.95 in 2004. Now we charge $5.95” for it, Duda said.
What hasn’t changed is that he pays cash for the books. “Because we’re the only bookstore that pays cash, we get tons of books. I have 180 boxes at my house,” Duda said.
But with 12,000 to 15,000 books always on premises, the store is not a place where books feel like decoration. Duda is proud of that and of the number of titles he carries.
“If I took out the shelves and put in tables, I could make more money,” he said, “but the bookstore wouldn’t have a sense of community about it.”
It would just be a restaurant.
Tift said most of the people on staff love books, make recommendations, and share their favorites. Ben Widener, who’s been at Book Trader for about a year after a stint in the kitchen at Miya’s, said he liked the books looming over the food prep area “because it slows you down, it’s different from the internet.”
Jungden and Widener: Books and food mix well
Two-year employee Naomi Jungden took it a step further as she separated out a large container of greens for the salads and sandwiches: “It creates a more relaxed atmosphere. And it’s cool that they’re used.”
Sometimes when they unpack books or shelve them, they find personal photographs or pressed flowers. “I like to think, without being ironic, that each book has its own story, has had different owners,” Jungden added.
This summer, likely in August, you may see the Book Trader Cafe closed for a week or so. That’s because after many years of wear and tear, the tiles and carpets need replacing, said Duda.
Afterward it will reopen with coffee, blueberry muffins, the Tempesto, and books. As always.
Thank you so much for the thoughtful article Allan. When you see a local institution like the Anchor closes, it makes me appreciate the ones that are left all the more. Well done!