In this first installment of 86’d: How A Global Pandemic Rocked The World’s Culinary Capital, Rob Petrone takes us back to the beginning of COVID-19 in New York -- and how the restaurant industry was responding in those early days last March.

• Take a trip to “Ground Zero,” New Rochelle, to see how one restaurant in the containment zone -- Jerry DeJesus’s North End Tavern -- fared before the government-mandated shutdown.
• Meet a mom-and-pop ice cream shop owner, Ellen Sledge of Penny Lick Ice Cream Co., who believed she had the virus.
• Go to Chinatown to learn how the virus impacted businesses -- and life -- there before the rest of New York through the eyes of Wilson Tang of Nom Wah Tea Parlor.
• Visit with one restaurant industry leader, Chip Wade of Union Square Hospitality Group, grappling with safety concerns.
• And hear from a celebrity chef, Dale Talde, whose Goosefeather restaurant hasn’t even been open a year as he grapples with what feels like “nuclear warfare.”

Rob also speaks with The New Yorker staff writer Helen Rosner about the events of last March -- where we were and what we’ve learned.

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