By John Burton
RED BANK –Going out on his own, Casey Ruff decided Red Bank is where he wanted his restaurant to be.
“I always liked Red Bank. It’s always been a fun area,” he said, with its plenty of activities to draw the public to the area – and hopefully his soon-to-open eatery.
Ruff, a 28-year-old New Brunswick resident, has rolled up his sleeves renovating his new space, 38 West Front St.
And like New Brunswick, where there are already two Hansel ‘n Griddle locations, Huff said Red Bank has both a busy daytime with workers and shoppers around and a vibrant nightlife with its restaurants and entertainment and cultural venues.
Ruff is renovating the West Front Street site to operate Hansel ‘n Griddle. Like its three other locations, in New Brunswick and Somerville, it will specialize in breakfast items, lunch sandwiches, wings, wraps, salads, smoothies and other fare. And that includes Ruff’s personal favorite: Hansel n’ Griddle’s signature crisps, especially the Ragin’ Cajun variety. Crisps are the restaurant’s variation on quesadillas. Along with the Ragin’ Cajun version, with diced Cajun-seasoned chicken and tomatoes and pepper jack cheese, crisps also come in popcorn buffalo chicken, barbecue bacon chicken, garden and tuna styles, and one called Coco, with roast beef, bacon, cheddar and pepper jack cheese, served with a side of gravy.
The crisps, and “everything is fresh,” Ruff stressed. “It’s all same day stuff. It’s all made to order.
“I think Hansel serves a really great product for a really great price.”
Ruff is doing much of the renovations himself on the approximately 1,300-square-foot site that had previously housed Muscle Makers Grill and 30 Burgers and is expected to seat about 30-40 diners, redoing the interior and installing new equipment. He has leased the site from the Red Bank Elks Lodge 233, which has “a bunch of options,” Ruff said, to continue at the location.
He is hoping for a Jan. 1 opening but acknowledged, “There is a still a million things to do.”
Hansel n’ Griddle was started about a dozen years ago, when owner Nick Komandis opened the first one, on New Brunswick’s Easton Avenue area, in the vicinity of Rutgers University campus, with college kids the primary market. He gave it that name as a fun, “playing off the whole fairy tale thing,” Ruff said.
Ruff said Komandis opened a second location in New Brunswick on Church Street, in a densely populated business area. Since then a third location in Somerville opened, owned and operated by Michael Ivers.
Ruff, a former Rutgers student, has worked for the restaurant for about eight years, finding he enjoyed “the hustle and bustle” of food service, he said. “There’s always something to keep you on your toes,” he observed. But more importantly, it was “the whole entrepreneurial thing, the whole being your own boss kind of deal,” that had him decide to leave the university and concentrate on his business ventures.
Along with the restaurant, he co-owns and operates a pick up and delivery laundry business in the New Brunswick area.
“It’s always been my goal, and Nick’s (Komandis) goal, to go out on my own,” with this new restaurant location. And he will be when the work is done.
“It’ll be awesome when it’s completed,” Ruff predicted.
