Niki Gillota of Gypsy Beans
Her Culinaria Will Turn Around Your Gypsy Heart

Attention diehard foodies, java fiends and folks jonesing for a little bit of world travel in your café experience: we here at Cool Cleveland have someone we’d like you need to meet. Her name is Niki Gillota, owner/proprietor Gypsy Beans & Baking Co. And she is passionate about those same things that you are. You might recognize her if you spent any time in Ohio City area, hanging out at Talkies. Gillota’s new endeavor is a traditionally styled European coffee house and bistro – complete with a newly launched menu with a world view.

Gypsy Beans truly has a gypsy heart: inspired by Gillota’s European travels with her sister, the place is independent to the core. The locally-owned bakery/café is located in the Gordon Square Arts District in the Detroit Shoreway Neighborhood and features select locally roasted coffees, pastries, desserts and a tasty Bistro Menu filled with fresh seasonal ingredients and worldly influences. Local business including the Souper Market, CityFresh, Urban Herbs, the Red Cedar Coffee, the West Side Market and others support Gypsy Beans, helping provide Gypsy’s flavorful aromas, savory scents and zesty tastes.

For Gillota, a culinary arts school graduate, Gypsy Beans seems like destiny. She went to Hocking College in Nelsonville and did 2 degrees in 3 years with emphasis on classic and production baking, then focused on hotel and restaurant management and culinary arts when her studies progressed. Having grown up on a 100-acre farm in southern Ohio, Gillota “learned to appreciate the land and all that it could offer. It got to a point where I said, ‘I’m either going to stay here and run the family farm business, or do something else entirely.’ I decided I would do the only other thing I knew how to do. I love to cook, so that made the choice easy.”

A self-professed “workaholic who loves what she does,” Gillota often puts in 18-hour days at Gypsy Beans and unlike the usual nine-to-fiver, has never been bothered by overtime or the long hours it takes to run her dexterous bistro. “I’ve always been a worker, a do-er, a producer,” Gillota said. “Producing something with a tangible result is something I have always valued; it was instilled in me from very young. In fact, I find it very hard to put myself in someone else’s shoes and not think like that. I’m very rarely stagnant.”

Did we mention that she loves challenges? Gillota originally bought a wholesale baking business in August of 2005 as a part of a five-year plan she had to open Gypsy Beans. She accomplished opening the bistro in a little less than a year and a half – an aggressive process and level of productivity that eclipses all of those of chain restaurants. Even at peak performance, she's still striving for more.

“[Those places] expect a certain level of productivity and to me would be almost boring,” she agreed. “With this, you never know what you’re gonna get! That is the kind of thing that drives me to come to work every day. We still wholesale bake here too, so everything’s always a matter of timing. We roast lunchmeats, make our dressings, side dishes, salads, pastas… it’s always a juggling act. You can’t skimp and it’s a sacrifice of quality and efficiency if you walk away from it.”

How do you balance such a hectic schedule? “I’ve been single for 7 years, I don’t know if that helps!” she laughed. “Truly, having understanding friends family and getting to slip away a half hour here and there helps. Spending a little time with the people I care about is always better than hours of sleep, even when I need the sleep. And my friends stop in here. If we’re not crazy busy here, they will stay and hang out. Of course, the core group of staff I have here is great, responsible and reliable enough that they’re cool if I need to duck out of here for a minute if I need to.”

As for propping herself up with the very coffee she serves? “I have to monitor how much I have,” she smiled. In an 18-24 hour day, it’s too easy to prop yourself up, so you have to watch. I remember during the opening week, I had a 36-hour day, and at one point, I had 4 coffees in 2 hours. Try decorating a cake like that! The week we opened, I thought it was funny that Cleveland Public Theatre was running the production of Sleep Deprivation. That was incredible 3 weeks of my life, I only wish I could remember more of it!”

Gillota was drawn to the Gypsy Beans location on Gordon Square, home to CPT, about 3 years ago and not just for the theatre. “It was this extremely spacious space, surrounded by historically restored buildings with a lot of student activity in the neighborhood and, of course the thriving arts population,” she said. “It was easy to notice all the changes here, and there was a lot of buzz on the street when I was working in Ohio City at the time. That’s when I made my mind up.”

When Gypsy Beans opened for business on January 2, Gillota was thrilled by “the great response from the community. The support for us has been awe-inspiring and overwhelming, hand-in-hand. It’s nice to see people value what we’re doing. We always have a wide walk of life coming here, from the 80-year-old man who wants a slice of chocolate cake, to pharmaceutical rep who comes in every day for pastries for his meetings, to little girl who runs in and buys cookies for her to share with her brothers. I think she’s 8. She’s pint-sized!”

Cookies are only a small part of a deluxe worldly menu that Gillota and company recently launched. Her clientele loves lunching at Gypsy and to wit, the gourmet selections on their recently revamped menu reflect her travels just as much as patrons love of lunch there. Offerings include flavors from around the globe... Mediterranean, Thai, Italian... and a stunning coffee concoction called the Mexico City. And yes, it comes in a decaf.

Visit Gypsy Beans & Baking Co. at 6425 Detroit Ave. between breaks in the action at the Resonance World Music Festival being held this weekend in the Detroit Ave./Gordon Square Arts District. The two-day event features worldly sounds to match the bistro’s worldly flavors. For a complete list of artists, showtimes and events, visit http://www.parishhallcleveland.com. Visit Gypsy Beans online at http://www.gypsybeans.com.

To hear a full interview and sampling of the new menu, listen to Gillota’s recent interview with meet.the.bloggers here.

From Cool Cleveland Managing Editor Peter Chakerian peterATcoolcleveland.com
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