Welcome to The Minnis
This is a long one, but then so were the last four months!
Tuesday 17th February had been an optimistically busy evening for a business fighting through the credit crunch. However the fates had spun their wheel shortly after midnight when P.C Mark Rigden drove past The Minnis on patrol. As smoke billowed from the empty building the fire brigade was contacted very quickly as was Jason (a friend of Mark’s and so only a mobile call away). Thank you Mark for your vigilance…we think!
Perhaps watching the fire brigade in the dark hours, doing what is often taken too much for granted, was not even quite as shocking as standing in the cold light of morning. An obliterated molten mess was now our kitchen, only two years old. The restaurant and bar was now a pungent, blackened, sodden ghost, our silence punctuated by drips of water from charred and burnt out timbers. It was a sad and truly shocking day.
Neither did we realise that the bizarre world of insurance would turn our attempt to be up and running from several weeks into four months. Suggestions of “was it an insurance job?” will be met with brutality!
So what’s happened throughout this time? Firstly we were embraced into the community bosom with the spirit of the Blitz. Thank you to those who came bearing biscuits, cakes, hot drinks and sympathy to creatures resembling a rabble of Victorian chimney sweeps in the first few weeks. Thank you to Rani and family at the Bestone Store for the food and support then and throughout.
The Minnis team was not an idle one, neither were customers and friends during the monumental salvage programme that ensued for the following two and a half months. As we went on to miss Mother’s Day, Easter and two school holidays, skills were being honed in other very different fields. Chefs, waitresses and bar staff became adept in the use of crowbars, chisels, hammers, power tools, rollers and paint brushes. Ceilings were torn down, carpets and floors ripped up, tiles and cement chipped away by hand and rubble cleared on a daily basis. Anything even vaguely inanimate was hand-washed, jet-washed, buffed, re-buffed, sanded, re-sanded, stained or creosoted. Strange objects fell from strange places, lunchtimes resembled Jurassic Park and the kettle became the Holy Grail! Limbs were bashed, digits were beaten repeatedly, bruises were profuse, language was prolific and sanity ebbed and flowed.
Although the insurance still wasn’t forthcoming, spirit and generosity was in abundance. So like an overblown Oscars speech there are so many to thank but special thanks follow:
Steve Hayden for quickly providing generators and help during those first cold dark days and consequently throughout. Heather and Clinton Sear for rustling up a soup-kitchen in their camper-van amidst fetching and carrying. The O’Donoghues, for spiriting our glass-ware away for cleaning and storage. Likewise Lynn Newton who also put her glam marigolds to great use. Darren Reed, for appearing like a genie and washing our windows, Chris Avery, for tackling our filthy ceilings and walls. His good lady Anne-Marie for manning a stove of bacon and chair-buffing. Enormous ‘thank-yous’ to Hullabaloo’s Jarrod Coombes, demolition man and jet-washer extra-ordinaire, you really do rock and sorry we scuffed your head! Finally a really big special mention, thank you and hugs to ‘Uncle’ John Greenhill-Jeffrey. Here everyday and on most days before and after most of us. Master –grafter, supreme trooper, custodian of tools, brushes and the obscure, problem solver to all and endurer of endless bleating, particularly from ‘the usual suspects’. You were patient with us when violence would have been an option, we’re sorry you ended up wearing earplugs!
The re-build finally commenced with Thanet Developments and their associates taking over the building like ants at a picnic. Yet we remained here, getting under their feet, over their wires, in their plaster and on their nerves! More thanks and a special mention have to go to Mark Harden and Fraser Marsh the resident sparkies for always laughing, smiling and really making us feel like part of your team. You made it Mark, even after electrocution via Stanley-knife on the penultimate day of completion! We would also like to thank Scott & Matt from S&S Gas & Water services for there problem solving and the great job they have done giving us water and heating….only 2 leaks (that’s not bad fellas! Sorry to Matt for not making him enough coffee.
Now we allude to the clichéd but nonetheless appropriate ‘phoenix from the flames’. The fire was awful for many, many reasons but it did provide a number of opportunities and insights. We realised how much we were really missed and the service we provide on many levels. The opportunities came in giving The Minnis a much-deserved technical and cosmetic makeover along with a new leash of life and a second new carpet! We hope you approve of this fresh new look in our favourite old building. Likewise the new summer menu has a fresh new twist but still with old favourites to avoid disappointment. We’re still supporting our local suppliers and produce much in the same way we’ve been supported by locals in recent months. We apologise for having inconvenienced many of you for so long, it really couldn’t be helped.
But here’s to a New Minnis, a New Menu, a New Summer and a New Start.
Cheers!