Ye Olde Waffle Shoppe and the places we’ve lost to COVID

Oh, what I’d give for one more waffle from Ye Olde Waffle Shoppe. Or another serving of eggs over medium, crisp bacon, and shredded hashbrowns. Or all of that, accompanied by a small orange juice and an ocean of black coffee.

Word spread quickly this month on social media, then in The News & Observer, that Ye Olde Waffle Shoppe was closing for good. It’s been a fixture on Franklin Street in Chapel Hill since 1972, even as countless other, ephemeral eateries have come and gone. For many UNC students in those decades, the Waffle Shoppe was one of the gifts bestowed on arrival and cherished at departure, offering vast amounts of comfort food at modest prices. It was perfectly positioned just at the intersection of town and campus, where academic McCorkle Place met commercial Franklin Street. Seemingly unchanging and permanent, it’s now another COVID casualty.

One of the challenges the Waffle Shoppe faced in 2020 was also one of its charms: its incredibly narrow open kitchen. Grills and burners ran lengthwise opposite a counter where patrons could watch their waffles and eggs prepared by hustling cooks, who engaged in an endless sidling dance as they moved, mixed, stirred, toasted, fried, and flipped hot food. But it turns out that such proximity between cooks and customers is insufficient social distance in a pandemic. The Waffle Shoppe shut down in March, when UNC students left town and dining rooms closed statewide, and it will never reopen. The owners, the Chris-Peng family, saw no way to run a restaurant whose “business model is intimacy, it’s immediacy, it’s feeding people on the spot.”

For me, the Waffle Shoppe was a discovery made early in my first year at UNC, an inexpensive weekend alternative to the dining hall. Even a lonesome freshman was welcome to take a seat at the counter. It became a place to meet friends, wait in the line behind a counter for a booth, and have long, caffeinated conversations. By senior year, it was a place and a time to consume the fat Sunday editions of N&O and The Charlotte Observer along with waffles and eggs. I recall walking down Franklin Street on a sunny May morning, exams behind me and graduation ahead, thinking it was the perfect way to start a perfect day.

Years later, breakfast at the Waffle Shoppe was part of almost every trip back to Chapel Hill – the familiar sounds, smells, and yellow tile that had stayed unchanged since those college years. I took our boys there for pancakes and waffles years before they became UNC students themselves. Once I was able to point out former UNC System President Bill Friday, the person most responsible for the creation of the multi-campus University, to my then nine-year-old. And you never knew who you’d see in a neighboring booth that you hadn’t seen for years.

Of course, the Waffle Shoppe is just one of many beloved restaurants across the state, from high-end to greasy spoon, which have been unable to keep their doors open during the COVID pandemic. What makes us feel these losses so keenly is that they were comfortable places that offered comfort food and community. They provide a sense of permanence in times when so much seems impermanent and unsettled. And they are generally welcoming to any paying customer, in times when there is so much division and even hostility. They remind us that almost everybody likes waffles, and fried chicken, or really good barbecue served friendly.

There are similar places, now lost to time and rent increases, in almost every North Carolina city and town. It’s good to remember, though, that we have survived these losses before.

What we all need to remember is that there are chefs, cooks, and wait staff out there who can’t wait for this pandemic to end so that they can open new restaurants, sometimes in the same now-vacant spaces. They can’t wait to welcome us, cook and serve us food, and start to build a following and a community of regulars. When they do, and when it’s safe, let’s go out and support their new businesses. And I’ll be looking for good waffles and eggs over medium.

This story was originally published December 9, 2020 at 12:23 PM.