In 1987, Samuel Yhdego, as part of a sponsored high school student exchange, journeyed to Wisconsin all the way from Ethiopia. To do so, he not only had to cross oceans but had to adapt to life on a farm after spending his entire life in Addis, a hot, sprawling desert city. And then there was the Wisconsin snow. There was more snow than existed in his imagination, yet, he stuck around.
In time, Yhdego visited a friend studying in Cincinnati. He decided to go to
Cincinnati State and Technical College and afterwards worked for ten years as a machinist for an aerospace contractor. Later, his mother, Emanu Mogos, and father, Yhdego Beyene, came to visit from Ethiopia. Their visit was intended to be a brief reunification of family - they also brought Sam's brother with them - but it turned into something more entirely when his parents decided to stay.
Emanu began spending time helping at an unassuming dining spot in Pleasant Ridge called the Middle Eastern Restaurant. When the owner decided to sell, the restaurant became Yhdego and his family's. Yhdego's mother had learned to cook as a teenage girl in a Eritrea, and had enjoyed cooking her entire life for family but had never cooked for an entire restaurant, let alone had run one.
So the family moved in to the blue two-story frame house on Montgomery Road and changed the name to the East African Restaurant, serving authentic Ethiopian and Eritrean cuisine. Yhdego's father handled operations while Emanu cooked, and Sam worked out front greeting guests and patiently explaining the savory meats and vegetable stews ladled on top of a flat bread called injera, used by diners to scoop up their food around a common, shared plate.
As one of only a handful of Ethiopian restaurants in the region, the family's business and popularity grew, and after six years, they moved into a larger building at the corner of Losantiville and Montgomery. They changed the name of the restaurant to
Emanu, in honor of their mother whose food had been drawing neighbors, students, professors, and curious first-timers in growing numbers.
"When everyone wants to meet the chef, when everyone appreciates the food, it touches your heart, you know you're doing something right, " Yhdego says.
But the independent restaurant business is not for the faint of heart. Sam Yhdego knew that in order to make the kind of money needed to sustain the restaurant, they would have to do better. For many restaurants, the accompanying sales of alcohol and liquor can be a big boost to the bottom line, especially when food prices escalate and diners are more choosy about where they eat.
Yhdego sought the advice of an attorney who advised him that he could buy a liquor license directly from the state, but those licenses were limited and the odds of getting one was slim. Furthermore, licenses were not cheap. Alternatively, Yhdego could buy one privately from a broker, but this would cost at least $30,000.00. Cash only.
The situation seemed impossible. Yhdego and his parents were not rich, and the restaurant, while successful, was not making them wealthy either.
"To go to the bank and ask for a loan in order to buy a liquor license, well they just laugh at you," Yhdego says.
Yet he realized that without a liquor license it was only a matter of time before Emanu would become an empty store front on Montgomery Road. "We simply couldn't survive without it," he says.
Yhdego shared his liquor license woes with Bryan Lewis, a local businessman and long time regular customer. Lewis was deeply interested in Emanu's success and offered to look into the matter. He looked around Pleasant Ridge, and saw too many empty store fronts. "I didn't want to lose Emanu. I knew something had to be done," he recalls.
Lewis remembered that in the 1980's a special entertainment district had been created that made liquor licenses available to businesses on Main Street in Cincinnati. Although he wasn't an attorney, he poured through the Ohio Revised Code to try to find the answer he wanted. He did more research and eventually learned that there was such a thing as a
Community Entertainment District - CED. Lewis also learned that CED's weren't just a thing of the past - there were several currently in existence in the Cincinnati area - one at downtown's rising Bank's development and another at Jungle Jims in Fairfield. Lewis envisioned making Pleasant Ridge's business district that straddles a length of Montgomery Road a CED, and enlisted the help of the neighborhood Citizens Council and the
Pleasant Ridge Development Corporation (PRDC).
Another customer also heard of Emanu's plight, and reached out to another regular customer, City Council Vice Mayor Roxanne Qualls. Things began to happen.
Councilmember Laure Quinlivan also went to bat for Emanu. She oversaw the process of modifying the city ordinance which had originally required a non-refundable $15,000.00 application fee for the liquor license Yhdego needed to buy. Concurrently, Bryan Lewis and the PRDC worked through the community, educating its citizens and solidifying support. Eventually, the ordinance was amended so that the city, depending upon circumstances, might discount or even waive the application fee for non-profit corporations.
The Pleasant Ridge business corridor was declared a CED. The designation came with five discounted liquor licenses specific to the Pleasant Ridge community. Emanu applied for the first and was able to come up with not $30,000, but just over $3,000.00 in application, license and filings fees. Two weeks ago, Yhdego opened the mail to find Emanu's liquor license.
"It's important that word gets out there that this sort of thing is possible all around the city - Emanu is just a beginning, a stepping off point," says councilmember Quinlivan. "34 out of 52 neighborhoods in Cincinnati have non-profit development corporations; CED's could work in any of them."
Yhdego is quick to note that without the support of the community, and his new liquor license, it was only a matter of time before his family's labor of love was forced to fold or move. Now they have a chance and hope to buy the building they are currently renting. It's a win for him, his family and ultimately, his community.
Photography by Scott Beseler.
Emanu dining room
Samuel Yhdego in Emanu's window
Vegetarian dinner dish
Samuel Yhdego
Vegetable sambosa
Fresh deep roast coffee