TAIPEI (JTA) — When Rebecca Schrage left Boston to work in finance in Hong Kong around 2014, “there were no bagels. At best, you could find bread with a hole in it.”
After starting to make her own bagels at home, which she sold to neighborhood businesses, she left her job in finance to devote herself to it full-time in 2014, opening a laboratory for making bagels and, in the end, a beautiful shop with storefront, called Schragels.
But what she wanted was to open a real Jewish specialty restaurant in Hong Kong, to follow in the footsteps of her grandparents, who ran a delicatessen At New York. In 2021, she teamed up with restaurateur Mike Watt and investor Jamie Wilson to develop the idea; it was then that she decided that the restaurant would be called Mendel’s, in homage to her father, Michael Mendel.
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Today, the dream has turned into a nightmare and, to the legal battle over Mendel’s, has been added a cruel outcry on social networks, fueled by customers and employees who accuse him of harassment, mafia activities and even cultural appropriation.
At the heart of the storm is a dispute between Schrage – majority shareholder of Joy Lox Club Ltd., company that owns Mendel’s Delicatessen – and Watt and Wilson. As members of the Jones Crusher Ltd. entity, Watt and Wilson own 40% of the restaurant’s shares and Schrage owns 60%. They are suing Schrage in the Hong Kong District Court for damages for breach of contract and, they say, misrepresentation.
The dispute came to public attention when videos posted from Mendel’s restaurant social media showed men dressed in black blocking the entrance to the restaurant, suggesting Schrage had sent them to intimidate customers. and staff.
“Security officers were hired by someone to deter – verbally and even physically – customers and Mendel’s team from entering the restaurant, and disrupting its operation, such as cutting off the electricity” , can we read in the messages of the restaurant’s account, to which Shrage says he does not have access. Other publications claim that one of the directors was attacked by one of the security guards. “As requested by their sponsor, the security guards take turns and never leave the premises. »
Posts from the same account claim that Mendel is “involved in a complex commercial dispute […] in the hands of the court. We are going to court to fight for the right to operate this business we have created,” one can read on Instagram.
The videos have outraged Hong Kong’s expat community, whose members have taken to social media to criticize Schrage, who they believe was responsible for posting security guards outside Mendel’s entrance.
“Bagels inspired by New York restaurants, Bullying methods inspired by Chicago mobsters #authentic,” wrote one commenter.
“Do I have to take my precautions to go buy a bagel? asks another.
In their complaint, Watt and Wilson claim that Schrage failed to pay his share of the agreed-upon fee to open Mendel’s. The three partners had initially agreed on a budget of around $102,000 ($800,000 in Hong Kong dollars), but “agreed orally” to double it quite substantially to $229,000, in the as the initial capital “did not fully cover” the costs. However, in April, Schrage would have paid only $29,500 of his share, while Watt and Wilson had contributed up to $191,000, can we read in the summons communicated to the JTA.
Schrage, for her part, says she was taken aback by the budget increase, adding that her request for disclosure of supporting documents and accounts was then denied. She believes that documents were purely and simply “thrown away” and that the funds were in fact diverted to other companies of which she was not a part. Watt, she says, offered to sell her shares in the company.
Faced with her refusal, says Scharge, Watt’s team would have threatened her and her company, and would have changed the locks of the shop.
Schrage admitted sending the security team to Mendel’s, not to keep customers out, she told JTA, but to prevent other “illegal activities” from occurring.
Watt, she says, was kicked off the board but continued to operate Mendel’s despite not having the legal powers to do so. “That’s why I had to send security guards to the scene,” she said, adding that local authorities were conducting a civil and criminal investigation into the case.
According to Watt, Mendel’s is “the fruit of the work” of his team. Schrage was “little or not at all involved in the project contrary to what she claims,” Watt told JTA.
Watt believes that the meeting called to remove him as a director was held in violation of the company’s articles of association.
Jones Crusher Ltd. has since filed an additional motion to liquidate Joy Lox Club Ltd.
“We have taken this case to the Hong Kong High Court and are eagerly awaiting the outcome of the proceedings,” Watt told JTA. “We look forward to being able to operate our business free of harassment and malice…all of which Rebecca has made a name for herself. »
Despite the excitement on social media, Hong Kong’s Jewish community, which numbers 4,000 members, seems to have distanced itself from the conflict. Erica Lyons, who has lived in Hong Kong since 2002 and chairs the Hong Kong Jewish Historical Society, said the dispute is “a private matter that does not concern the Jewish community”.
According to Lyons, Jewish community life in Hong Kong is centered around the main congregations, the Jewish Community Center and the Carmel Jewish School. Many other organizations have their headquarters in the premises of the community center, she adds.
A member of the Jewish community who has lived in Hong Kong for 10 years but wishes to remain anonymous due to the sensitivity of the issue, said he spoke with Schrage before she opened Mendel’s.
“When she had the idea, she had been looking for a name for some time. At a Shabbat dinner, I suggested Rebbeca call it ‘Crazy Rich Jewish Food’ but, in the end, I’m glad she chose another name, because to me ‘Jewish’ means ‘kosher’ ‘ and neither Mendel’s nor Schragels are kosher,” he explains.
This sprain of kosher annoys some members of the community and highlights new tensions between Schrage and his former associates. Some Hong Kong Jews resent the marketing or even the food at Mendel’s, which markets decidedly non-kosher products, such as a bagel with bacon.
“I certainly wouldn’t take my kids there and say, ‘Look, these are your roots. This restaurant represents our Jewish identity,” says Elizabeth LaCouture, assistant professor of gender studies at the University of Hong Kong and a member of the Jewish community. She was particularly annoyed by Mendel’s marketing slogans that use Yiddish terms, such as “schmuck.”
” In [ville] where there are so few Jews outside of our own community, I think we need to make sure that what represents us does so in a positive way,” she adds.
Watt and Wilson are not Jewish and the concept of an authentic delicatessen Jew “was totally alien to them,” Schrage argues.
“I wanted it to be a place where you could come and buy matzah ball soup or the deli classics I grew up on. I wanted it to be kosher in that the ingredients were kosher. Being certified kosher would be very complicated,” she says.
“Mendel’s never claimed to be kosher or authentically Jewish,” Watt replies. “Our offer and our marketing reflect the influences and experiences of a multicultural team. In addition to bacon, we also offer jalapeño hot dogs, matcha cookies, beet hummus, granola, hash browns, cocktails, and more. Above all, we want our coffee and the food we serve to be to the liking of our customers. »
Schragels and Mendel’s are just two of many bagel outlets in Hong Kong today, and neither is kosher. Both stores are frequented by Jews and non-Jews and are located in areas frequented by expats.
Over the years, Hong Kong has seen a number of Jewish-owned, Jewish-operated restaurants — kosher and not — on the city’s particularly demanding and volatile food scene. Jimmy’s Kitchen, originally founded by a Jewish family, served European classics, including non-kosher pork and shellfish dishes. It closed in 2020 after 92 years of operation.
Hong Kong’s first Jewish grocery store, called Lindy’s East, opened in 1966, calling itself “the only kosher restaurant in the eastern United States.” On the menu ? Lobsters imported from Maine, alongside the almost obligatory bagels and pastrami. “Those for whom kosher means strictly kosher would be outraged by the menu,” noted an article in the New York Times at the time.
The Jewish Community Center also has two supervised kosher restaurants.
Kosher or not, the bagel war is more than just a legal wrangle for Schrage.
“There’s no way I’m selling my shares and letting them use my dad’s name like that. I make it a very personal question, ”she concludes.
