Restaurants & Bars
Harlem's Ponty Bistro Owner To Open New Coffee Shop
Harlem Cafe, a new coffee shop on Adam Clayton Powell, Jr. Boulevard, will be the latest restaurant by neighborhood chef Elhadji Cisse.
HARLEM, NY — Elhadji Cisse's Harlem restaurant empire is set to expand again: the chef-owner of Ponty Bistro and Renaissance Harlem will soon open a new coffee shop in the neighborhood.
Known as Harlem Cafe, the shop will be on the southeast corner of Adam Clayton Powell, Jr. Boulevard and West 133rd Street — home most recently to First Health pharmacy. It is slated to open by the end of June or early July, Cisse told Patch by phone on Friday.
Cisse first revealed his plans Thursday evening at a Community Board 10 meeting, where he was seeking a committee's support in order to obtain a license to sell beer and wine at the cafe.
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"All my life I’ve been dreaming to have a good coffee shop in Harlem," Cisse told the board. "We don’t have anywhere you can get good coffee from 145th to 125th [streets]."
A native of Senegal, Cisse moved to New York at the age of 17 and has now lived in Harlem for nearly 30 years. An initial location of Ponty Bistro in Gramercy opened in 2008 and closed a few years later, while the Harlem version has thrived since its 2014 opening, followed by French-inspired Renaissance Harlem.
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Harlem Cafe will be just up the block from Renaissance and five blocks south of Ponty Bistro. Cisse said the cafe will be "on the upscale side," focusing on coffee drinks and light food such as sandwiches and salads.
Still, he said, the prices will be affordable to the community — aiming for around $3 for a cup of coffee, $4 for a cappuccino and $10 to $12 for sandwiches.
"Just classic French coffee with a little bit of African touch," he said.
The roughly 1,000-square-foot space will seat 10 to 15 people. It will include a traditional sidewalk cafe, but not a pandemic-era roadside enclosure, Cisse said.
The new cafe will also continue Cisse's record of service to the neighborhood, which included giving away hundreds of free Ponty Bistro meals during the pandemic.
"We always give back and that’s what we plan to do," he told the board. "I’m here for the neighborhood."
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