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Created: 04 May 2023

Last week, I surprisingly received a text from Marvin Garcia asking if we could meet. Marvin, you might recall, is the person who used to make sushi for Adath Israel on Fridays and special occasions. 

Unfortunately for us (but fortunately for him), he had to stop making sushi for us because he found a good full-time job – making sushi. In the text he wrote that he had an idea that might be mutually beneficial and wanted to come discuss it together. Since Marvin is a great guy and his sushi is REALLY good and I REALLY like sushi, I was happy to meet with him. 

He came to the meeting with a friend, his potential business partner. A sort of strange thing is that Marvin’s friend/partner’s name is Mario. Why is that strange? Because before we had Marvin, we had Mario (who tragically passed away during the Pandemic). Mario brought Marvin to A.I. and now Marvin is bringing Mario. 

In any case, what’s the deal? Recently, Marvin was able to change his work schedule to start at 3:30pm, thereby freeing up his mornings. Pursuing the American Dream, both Marvin and Mario want to improve their financial situation by not only having a good job, but also having a successful side hustle - selling kosher sushi out of our kitchen. 

I explained to them that though I was interested in their idea, this time, unlike last time, I did not want to be too involved. Last time I saw making sushi as a community service provided by A.I. and as a result, I was super involved. This time, it needs to be a real for-profit business with everything that entails. However, I am more than happy to assist them in getting started and over-seeing the kashrut, which would be under the Va’ad.

At the moment, M&M are putting together a menu, pricing, and a marketing plan. Hopefully they’ll be up and running in the not too far future. As a show of goodwill, M&M will be catering (free of charge) lunch on the first day of Shavuot. YUM!!!!  

On another kitchen-related note, as I type these words, the floor in the kitchen is being redone. This week the dairy kitchen is under construction and the meat kitchen is on the menu for next week.

More importantly than sushi and kitchen floors, we are looking into the possibility of having a preschool move into our building. Unfortunately, the SFFD is no longer willing to allow us to have a preschool in the back part of the ground floor. BUT, they would be willing to allow a preschool in the social hall if we made some modifications. Therefore, we’ve engaged an architect who is currently exploring with both the city and the SFFD what it would take. Once we have all the information and costs involved, we’ll be able to discuss if this is something we want to pursue. I’ll keep you posted on all of these developments.