Cafe Pedlar Targeted By Angry Brooklyn Mom

Inside Cafe Pedlar

Earlier today someone forwarded us along the latest complaint from the Brooklyn parenting camp, this one aimed at Cafe Pedlar in Cobble Hill.

The inexplicably traumatized woman wrote, "I wanted to warn others so that they don't have to experience that I did this morning. Our family have been regulars of the Cafe Pedlar since they opened... This morning I went in like normal... I was drinking my coffee and feeding my daughter some fruit and yogurt that I had brought with me, when one of the employees came over to tell me that the owners are now enforcing a policy that prohibits outside food—baby food included, and I either needed to stop feeding my daughter or leave. I was so embarrassed, sad and to be honest, a little angry. To enforce this type of policy at a coffee shop that is so often frequented by parents and families just seems over the top."

Really, the nerve of an establishment wanting to stay in business! We called Pedlar and spoke to an extremely friendly employee, who told us they have always had a no-outside-food policy (again, maybe because they sell food, including fruit, which is what this woman was feeding her child)—but as far as babies and children were concerned, breastfeeding is allowed and if parents can be discreet with snacks for their children, they can give it a shot. This sounds more than reasonable to us, which has us wondering if Brooklyn breeders are just running out of things to stand on their soapboxes about.

Contact the author of this article or email tips@gothamist.com with further questions, comments or tips.

By Jen Carlson in Food on April 19, 2010 3:12 PM

Comments [rss]

Horse Badorties

I would not have left. They're not going to drag anyone out. Parents should flock there with their kids and feed them and refuse to leave when confronted with such an idiotic rule.

Loulou

Im with the restaurant on this one.. boo hoo

bobbyj123

Just another establishment that is trying not to become a day care center. Tea lounge was so full of stroller mafia that no one could bare to hang out there anymore and hence it went out of business.

"I was so embarrassed" get over yourself and move to the suburbs already. People like this entitled b_tch are really ruining the neighbourhood.

behrens

boring.

JVO

Well, in all honesty my visits to Cafe Pedlar were becoming less of a quiet stop for a great soy latte and more like I was entering a daycare. Well, actually it was more like holding the door of a daycare for about five minutes while parents try to get their enormous strollers out! Perhaps the tone of the employee whom delivered this disparaging news was less than kind, that I do not know, but...Oh well, you can't feed your baby outside food while sitting there! Deal with it!

Spook

Tip, why should they tip at all?

The servers should simply feel blessed that the above parents allowed them to bask in their presence while tending to the needs of their glorious gifts to the world. So many Second Comings so little time!

robingee

Hey, don't talk that way about my precious triplets, Porter, Hunter and Fleagle!

soxinthecity

Next time, try putting a couple of $$ into the tip jar, and you will be amazed how little drama you will have.

Holsum Pan

BFD. Don't like it? Don't go back. Not news. Not even blogworthy.

bananapapaya2

After reading this I have no interest in ever going to this place. Is there a DOH rule that CHEWING GUM isn't allowed now either?? I agree who doesn't carry snacks, maybe a small yogurt or small zip lock bag or whatever for my small child. Since eating is a basic human need having and giving a small amount of food ie. a small yogurt or a zip lock of puffs, in case she refuses to eat what I buy wherever we are eating. In turn it keeps child happy, and quiet perhaps? It's not like the child is at Per Se!! Why not order something for yourself, AND for your child. What is the big deal?

Spook

Dear yuppie mom, nice that you took time out of your "busy" day of bossing around your illegal -poorly paid- immigrant nanny to create a Gothamist profile just so you can represent the interests of all self centered stupid witches and their moronic husbands.

The point is that while your rat kids are the center of your universe, they are not the center of the real world, which means no one- including small businesses -should have to even risk losing money or costumers over them. Additionally. wait staff making min. wage should not have to suffer over the waste that you created. How do I know your kids are waste? Because what else could self centered holes create???????

People like you have made this toxic environment, while creating a second generation of self centered human roaches. I hope you choke on your "small yogurt or small zip lock bag"

p.s. I don't hate kids, just self centered parents. It's enough to bring children into an over populated world where so many children are in desperate need( including in America) but to be sooooooo arrogantly self absorbed and pompous about it( during this time of immense suffering of children) is a modern example of the "banality of evil."

Now I'm gonna go work out before I write something I regret!

fosiacat

against fucking health regulations! tough shit yuppie mom!

jesus fucking christ, the level of arrogance and ignorance from these fucking park slope/carroll gardens/cobble hill newmoms is fucking astounding. "well i /just/ want to do /this/..." well you can't! end of story! i don't care if you're fucking precious chloe/tyler/whatever doesn't like it either!

i saw some yuppie mom dip into some sample guacamole, take a bite, then dip it in again for her kid she was carrying around. yeah, thats okay to do, you're precious. we know.

fuck!

oofstar

i watched a little girl carry around a funnel, popping it into her mouth several times. i figured her parent was buying it. but no, the parent saw they had it, took it out of their hand and put it back on the shelf! this was at a kitchenware store. you'd think they'd at least tell the staff so they'd know to rinse it off. (and before you ask, i was the staff, so i didn't have to decide whether to tell on them.)

robingee

I used to work at a boutique toy shop many years ago, and one lady let her child chew on a plastic squiggle-shaped pen the whole time they were in the store, and she wrenched the sloppy thing out of the kid's mouth to put it back on the shelf but I made her buy it. I said something along the lines of, "What are you, NUTS?" Not the best response but I was 22, assistant manager so I felt I had some authority.

fosiacat

PS - the double dipping queen was at union market, in case anyone is wondering.

Teddie Boy Eddie

Cafe Pedlar has delicious almond croissants ... I'm just sayin'.

rdsizzle

We take our 15 month old son out all the time and we try to exercise good judgment about where we go / time of day. We always adapt to the food that they serve and we sometimes even order our food in consequence of sharing with him.

We always make an effort to support the business. That being said, my wife does keep a Ziploc bag filled with nutrios and rice cakes in the diaper bag, but that’s mostly to keep him quiet…

Manitoba

The sad truth is that all of the posters here who are rabidly anti-breeders will eventually become parents themselves and will be just as bad or worse as the people they despise. If you have the "crazy gene" which compels you to spew hatred at one group, that 30-something NY-transplant hipster rage will transfer itself to your new breeder-entitlement mentality in about 5 years when you wake up and decide to hurriedly do IVF. Plus, it will be all you can talk about (just like complaining about Park Slope is all you can currently talk about) to the point that you will have no friends (or lose the 2 or 3 you have now - the ones that can stand listening to you complain about how much worse New York is now than it was in 1982, when you were 2 and living in Ohio).

Both sides should just ignore the haters and try to be considerate of each other. I'd swear that Gothamist is made up only of commenters who love/hate kids, love/hate bicycles, love/hate graffiti, and they have to make sure everyone understands their love/hate to the fullest extent.