New café offers a hub for Merrill

(Sentinel photo by Magdalene Landegent) Hustle, bustle, burgers and pie abound at Emma Rae's Café, opened in Merrill officially this week by Peter and Larry Luschen. The restaurant has been busy ever since. The grand opening is slated for April 6. [Click to enlarge]

Pretty good for day four of Emma Rae's Café. Especially considering the fact there's no sign outside, except for "Open."

The new Merrill cafe opened its doors officially Monday.

As you wait for your hot beef sandwich, you might find that the man serving your food is Pete Luschen -- the man who opened the restaurant with his father Larry.

They'd been talking about this idea for four years.

"Merrill doesn't have a place to eat," said Luschen, who grew up in Merrill. "The community was drifting, not coming together like it should."

They tried once, but the deal fell through. Then an opportunity came up to buy George and Rosemary Barclay's former antique shop on Merrill's main street.

The wooden-floored shop was perfect, Luschen said.

"It's nice and small. It's homey," he added.

Luschen's plan is to decorate with pieces of Merrill's history.

Literally.

The shell wall of the kitchen is actually the brick and tin soffit from the old Merrill post office. Luschen and his dad rebuilt it inside the café building.

"It even still has bullet holes in it," Luschen said of the tin. "At one time the post office was across the street from the bank, this is back in the day when they rode horses."

The bank got robbed, he said, and apparently stray bullets hit the post office.

Luschen paused in his story to answer a customer's question: "What's tomorrow's special?"

The answer: The Big Bill Bob's Belly Buster, a piece of codfish about a foot and a half long.

"Should we have fries or mashed potatoes with it?" Luschen asked.

"Fries," the customer said.

"Alright, fish and chips Friday it is," Luschen grinned.

That means he'll be peeling another 50 pounds of potatoes in the morning. Everything is made from scratch at Emma Rae's.

"We patty our burgers, our potatoes don't come from a box, and we make our own pancake batter," Luschen said.

One Merrill man, Clayton Rohmiller, said he's been coming to the café since it opened.

"It's real food," he said.

A menu feature is the Emma Rae Ciabatta Burger. It's a half-pound beast of a burger on a giant ciabatta bun.

"It's tough for some of the guys to get down -- I can only eat half of it," a waitress said with a grin.

"Go big or go home," Luschen hollered from across the room. "That's the way we do it here."

That includes the big screen TV in the corner for a real at-home feel.

Luschen and his dad Larry work with two others, the chef, Tom Evanoski, who's resumé includes restaurants in ski resort town Killington Vermont, the spot as head chef in a Nantucket restaurant and a job in a four-star Santa Cruz, Calif. eatery.

The fourth person on the staff Luschen calls the "special chef." Eliese Hoffman makes all the daily specials.

And Hoffman was his answer to prayer for waiting tables, he added.

Starting with the café's soft opening last week, Luschen was waiting tables by himself, so he prayed for four days straight for someone to help.

On Monday Hoffman walked in and tied on an apron.

"She is a God-send," Luschen said.

Luschen tipped his hat to his dad, the chef, the community and finally to Jesus for getting the restaurant open.

"He was the one who made this all possible," Luschen said. "There was lots and lots of prayer."

The prayer has been answered every day, morning and afternoon when the restaurant's neon sign reads "Open."

The café, he added, was named after his daughter Emma Rae, two grandmothers Emma and Rae and a grandpa Ray.

The community is really supporting the place, Luschen said.

And since the restaurant opened, he added, the community is growing closer.

"Everybody has a place to go," Luschen said. "In the morning when people go to get their mail, they come here and visit with everybody. Before they just go their mail. We just wanted a little café where people feel at home."