Astoria's Zenon Taverna Closes, Citing Pandemic-Related Struggles

ASTORIA, QUEENS — A beloved Greek-Cypriot restaurant in Astoria served up its last order of homemade sausage and soup this weekend.

Zenon Taverna has operated at 34-10 31st Avenue for over three decades. On Sunday, however, the family-owned business permanently closed its doors; an announcement that the restaurant made on social media a couple of days beforehand.

"We hope that we were able to bring our culture, traditions and of course delicious cuisine into your lives and hearts," the restaurant posted, thanking its dedicated base of supporters and saying that the decision to close came with "heavy hearts."

The post did not cite a particular reason for closing, but in the comments Zenon Taverna mentioned that the pandemic took a toll on their business.

"Unfortunately the last almost 2 years have been very difficult for small businesses like us," Zenon Taverna commented in response to someone who asked why the restaurant was closing.

The restaurant has alluded to pandemic-related business issues in the past, too.

In March, Zenon Taverna joined a local delivery platform as a more cost-effective alternative to third-party delivery companies, Eater reported, and in July owner Harry Ioannidis told NY1 that the restaurant only had one waiter.

"I was on the grill, cooking, prepping, garbage everything," he told the outlet, adding that staff shortages kept the eatery operating at just 40 percent capacity even though they were allowed to fill up. "It is just another hurdle for us. And it is unfortunate for the restaurant business because we were hurt the most," he said.

While some locals weren't surprised to hear about the closure — noting that the restaurant has been short staffed — all were devastated about the news.

"Absolutely gutted to hear this. I've celebrated so many special occasions here over the years. No one does proper mezedes like you guys do and there are so few Cypriot restaurants in the city," wrote one local. "Thank you for feeding me, my family, and my friends so many times."

Many others echoed this sentiment, writing about the special events and occasions that they'd celebrated at Zenon Taverna. Others still begged the restaurant to stay open, or release a cookbook.

In response to the outpouring of love, Zenon Taverna promised to stay active online and post periodic updates.

"We may even convince mom to start up our virtual cooking classes again," the restaurant wrote, alluding to a popular Cypriot cooking class that co-owner Elena Ioannidis taught in February.

Patch reached out to Zenon Taverna for comment, but did not hear back by the time of publication.