Copyright forbes
Hello Holloumi, bringing Cyprian cheese desserts to Greenwich Village, just opened. Courtesy of Hello Halloumi According to the 2020 U.S. census, New York City’s had a population of 8.4 million people, but only 1,497 people hail from Cyprus. But that hasn’t stopped Constantino Papadakis from opening Hello Holloumi, a bakery that specializes in Cyprian cheese snacks and coffee, on October 18th in the middle of busy Greenwich Village on Greenwich Avenue, not too far from 8th Street and 6th Avenue. When this reporter met Papadakis at the soft opening and told him that statistic, he replied that he likely knows a thousand Cyprians in NYC so only has 497 left to befriend. Papadakis came to NYC when he was 20 and has worked mostly in private equity firms, concentrating on real estate investments. But, on the side, he managed a few restaurants so opening a snack shop marks his return to the hospitality business. Besides running the bakery, he teaches a Real Estate Finance class at Baruch College. He’s funding the bakery with his own capital supplemented by a start-up loan to cover costs. Unlike most start-ups, however, he has no angel investors or any other financial partners, a rarity these days. A Savory Not Sweet Bakery He was inspired to open his hometown Cyprian bakery because he thought NYC was filled with “incredible sweet bakeries, but very few that focus on savory.” In addition, he felt that New Yorkers were unfamiliar with halloumi and would fall in love with it. AI calls Halloumi cheese, a semi-hard, brined cheese from Cyprus with a salty, creamy taste and a high melting point. Papadakis adds that it’s only produced in Cyprus and is protected by law there. MORE FOR YOU In NYC, Hello Holloumi produces a slew of cheese snacks that will be sold in his 300 square feet take-out store, that includes a tiny kitchen in the back space where all the snacks are made. “There’s no melting pot like New York City,” he says, so he’s hoping that a new snack will grab the attention of locals and tourists looking to try something new. Asked how he would familiarize his audience about halloumi, Papadakis replies that many more people know it than he might have expected and his PR and social media manager will “help spread the word with carefully curated explainer videos on TikTok and Instagram.” Hello Holloumi serves a variety of baked goods including: bagels bites with halloumi as a variation on feta cheese; three-cheese triangles; halloumi focaccia bread; sweet tahini swirls. He added that snacks will be charged by the pound. It also offers coffee, iced coffee and tea, and its coffee partner is Malliard, which imports specialty grade coffee brands from Ethiopian, Colombian, and Guatemalan beans. Currently it’s to-go only, with no indoor seating, but he says that it expects to have high-top tables outside so people can stand and eat, as they do in many pizza shops throughout the city. It also doesn’t sell sandwiches as of now, but will be rolling out a Halloumi cheese sandwich in the future, which also pairs well with avocados. If this outlet goes well, is he considering opening more of them? Papadakis replies that expanding and opening more locations is definitely the goal. “The concept has a small footprint, and it can become a staple since we offer the perfect snack from midday to after a night out,” Papadakis concludes. Editorial StandardsReprints & Permissions
