Ryaisa Armelin takes a "Save Half for Later" container to diners at Creole Restaurant. (Photo by Jacqueline Guzman)

Ryaisa Armelin, 18, stands beside the dim-lit bar at Creole Restaurant in East Harlem, wiping down a smooth, granite-colored tabletop as the midday rush dies down. She’s dressed head-to-toe in black; her apron shows a cartoonish figure of a plate and says, “Save Half for Later.” Posters and display cards with the same design, in English and Spanish, decorate walls and tables.

Armelin is between adding up checks and clearing tables, when a group of twentysomethings from the auction house around the corner walks in.

“Four for lunch?” Armelin asks, “I’ll be right there.”

Alana Celii, 25, and her co-workers have a seat while Armelin brings them menus.  After giving them a few minutes, Armelin takes the order and asks if they’d like to have half of the their meal now, and take the rest home.

Creole is one of 15 restaurants that has teamed up with the Mount Sinai School of Medicine’s Communities IMPACT Diabetes Center in a portion-control campaign called “Save Half for Later.” It’s an effort to combat ever-increasing cases of diabetes and obesity in East Harlem. The neighborhood has the highest rates of diabetes in Manhattan, with an estimated 1 in 6 adults living with the disease, according to the center. A contributor to the diabetes rate is obesity, which is also rising for a number of reasons, including the increasing size of food portions in restaurants.

The campaign has even expanded to Central Harlem, where 36 percent of adults were obese in 2009, according to the New York Department of Health and Mental Hygiene. On Wednesday, Sylvia’s Restaurant on Lenox Avenue held a portion-control event, becoming the first Central Harlem restaurant to officially join.

It’s a simple concept — eat less and save money. When dining out, the server asks the customer if he wants to “Save Half for Later.” Before bringing out the meal, the server offers to put half into a reusable plastic container — big enough for an entree and side dish —  that has the campaign’s logo on the lid. Then the diner takes the rest home to have for the next meal or even the next day, just as the name suggests. With “Save Half for Later,” the diner essentially gets two meals for the price of one.

“That’s my favorite part of it – saving your money,” Armelin says. A lot of people don’t have time to cook every day, she adds, “so why not split that in half?” Although servers must kindly offer a container to every customer, the decision to take it is ultimately the customer’s. “Sometimes people say ‘no thanks, I’m fine’ or ‘I’m really hungry today.’”

“It makes sense,” says Celii, who hadn’t heard of the program before. She and the three others have lunch at Creole every couple of weeks, but normally get their meals to go.

“Most people wouldn’t stop themselves midway through a meal,” admits Cory Hooper, 24, including himself. Self-control is difficult, he adds, especially with current portion sizes. Saving money “is a good incentive for people to participate and watch their health,” he says. “I would definitely do it.”

The program was launched last summer. Carolyn Zezima, director of the Food and Health Initiative for the Communities IMPACT Diabetes Center, explains that the group had to first carefully map out all restaurants in the area.

“Our interns pounded the pavement, hitting every restaurant,” Zezima says. The team surveyed and interviewed a number of owners of sit-down, local restaurants with hefty portions. They narrowed it down to those who shared a positive attitude toward healthy eating. Then the team presented the plan and trained the staffs on engaging the community.

“We want to empower the consumer to make decisions about their meals,” says Zezima. The point isn’t to dictate changing their eating habits, but to spread awareness and make healthier choices easier for them.

Although “Save Half for Later” is still in its early stages, restaurants have been receptive to the idea, says Zezima. At Cafe Ollin, Lydia Perez’s only compliant is that the containers are “not convenient for sandwiches.” Since their sandwiches tend to be thickly packed with ingredients, Perez finds fitting even half a sandwich into the container difficult.

Half of the portion is put in a container before enjoying the meal. (Photo by Jacqueline Guzman)

On the other hand, Ramon Duran, owner and operator of El Nuevo Caribeño, has accepted the program into his place wholeheartedly.

“It’s a contribution for the people, in order to maintain their health,” said Duran. He operates the restaurant, located on Lexington Avenue, that his father opened more than 20 years ago. He said that customers’ responses have been positive so far.

When they see the program’s poster hanging in the restaurant, they often ask about it. Duran figures that in a given week, all the plastic containers that the program delivers are gone.

“I want to see all my customers as healthy as they can be,” he says. “I want to see people happy and look good. If you look good, you feel good.”

The Communities IMPACT Diabetes Center says that many affected residents are unaware they have diabetes because they have never been tested. The agency is concerned that if nothing is done to educate residents about making healthier food choices, poor eating habits could lead to diabetes in their children. By the time those children grow up, the cases of obesity could increase and the rates for diabetes could even jump to 1 in 2 diabetic adults in East Harlem.

The program is now entering a new phase, Zezima says. Case managers have been assigned to each restaurant and will follow up on their performance and send them more containers as needed. Plans to add more Central Harlem restaurants, like Sylvia’s, are also under way. Lolita’s on West 113^th Street is already training staff on approaching customers. A similar take-out version of “Save Half for Later” would also aim to teach children to make healthier choices at home.

Word of mouth is slowly getting residents to save half their meal. Wednesday’s event at Sylvia’s has drawn instant attention to the center’s effort. Tren’ness Woods-Black, vice president of communications and Sylvia’s granddaughter, tells the press that joining the campaign is “in line with what we do whenever we’re given the opportunity to empower the community and make them healthy.”

“It’s definitely catching on,” said Zezima, “we’re really excited about it.”

Betty Park, a Korean immigrant and owner of Manna's restaurants, tends to the cash register at its Frederick Douglass Boulevard location near West 126th Street. The restaurant recently moved from West 125th Street because of planned development. (Photo by Jason Tomassini)

The lunch crowd is steadily growing on a recent weekday at Manna’s Soul Food on Eighth Avenue in Harlem, patrons stuffing Styrofoam containers with fried chicken, mashed potatoes and collard greens. It’s a bitterly cold day, but the heat from the 50 or so trays in Manna’s food bar fogs the storefront windows.

A familiar song fills the restaurant, one instantly recognizable for fans of Jay-Z, the Notorious B.I.G. or Tupac Shakur, all of whom have sampled it. But this is the original track: The Isley Brothers’ 1983 soul slow-burner, “Between the Sheets.”

It’s a somewhat surprising atmosphere, given Manna’s owner: Betty Park, a 57-year-old Korean immigrant who has battled racial discord, Harlem’s gentrification, the lingering recession and, recently, squabbles with a major developer, to open seven Manna’s locations, four in Harlem.

“A Korean woman opening a soul food restaurant—people laugh at you,” says Park, a tiny woman with a bright face and an affinity for equally bright clothes—today , a vivid pink sweater, in sharp contrast to her employees’ white uniforms. She is taking a break from her usual circuit, rushing between the restaurant’s cash register, storage room and kitchen, where she will soon help a cook perfect a batch of clam chowder.

“People said, ‘What do you know about soul food?’” she continues. “Now they don’t even ask me. They come here for the soul food.”

The first Manna’s location, named for the Biblical reference to food falling from the sky, opened in 1983 to scoffs; the most recent opened in 2008, at the height of a national recession that particularly decimated upper Manhattan.  Known for its food bar of southern-style dishes—$5.49 per pound—Manna’s has not only survived, but expanded, even as economic factors, plus a national focus on nutrition, have torpedoed several longtime competitors.

Harlem’s soul food restaurants are among the major remaining preserves of African-American culture in a neighborhood giving way to a younger generation and increasing gentrification. Yet over the past decade, more than 10 local soul food restaurants have closed, including such landmarks such as Copeland’s, closed in 2007 after 50 years on 145th Street, and Charles’ Southern Style Kitchen and Louise’s Family Restaurant, both shuttered in 2008 after long runs on Lenox Avenue near West 125th Street. Even Amy Ruth’s, which opened to wide acclaim 12 years ago on West 116th Street, filed for bankruptcy last year but remains open.

“Most restaurants are defeatist,” says Londel Davis, owner of Londel’s, which has served upscale comfort food on Frederick Douglass Boulevard near 140th Street for 16 years. Davis says many soul food restaurants are reluctant to adapt to Harlem’s changing demographics, marked by an influx of Hispanics, whites and food tourists from downtown. “They are closing because of their own shortcomings.” Londel’s redesigned its bar and dining room to attract a changing clientele, but Davis says business has fallen 25 percent in recent years, nonetheless.

“I want to see the neighborhood go up and not stay the same,” says David Taylor, general manager of Jacob Restaurant, known for its beef short ribs and macaroni and cheese.  It opened five months ago on Frederick Douglass Boulevard near West 143th Street, joining an existing location on Lenox Avenue near West 129th Street. But gentrification “has ruined a lot of small businesses,” he says.

Manna’s is far from invincible itself. In the 1980s, it cost $50,000 to open a restaurant; now it costs about $250,000, Park says. She’s avoided lay-offs but has reduced hours for many of the 60 employees at Manna’s Harlem locations.

“I’m concerned if I’m going to make it,” Park confesses. She doesn’t always: The  upscale seafood restaurant she opened on Adam Clayton Powell Boulevard in 2007, just before the financial meltdown, closed within a year.

Making matters worse, Manna’s top-performing location on 125th Street near Frederick Douglass was forced to move because of a planned development project. In 2008, Manna’s and four other tenants were evicted to make way for Kimco Realty Corporation’s planned retail center; construction is expected to begin soon. The tenants sued Kimco and eventually settled for $1 million.

Then the project stalled and, to Park’s surprise, Kimco asked Manna’s to reopen in the same space earlier this summer. By September, as Kimco readied for construction, that location had closed again and reopened around the corner at Frederick Douglass and 126th Street.

“It’s like David and Goliath,” says that restaurant’s manager, Tony Kamosi. “It’s corporate America; they don’t care about the little guy.”

Park is kinder toward Kimco; she feels the $300,000 Kimco provided for relocation costs is sufficient. But without a prime location on Harlem’s main street, business has dropped, Park says. The new eatery location closed briefly in November because of problems with a gas line. Now, some tables remain empty at lunchtimes when the place used to be packed

Kimco representatives did not return calls seeking comment.

The lunch rush begins on a recent weekday at Manna's. The restaurant sells food at its hot bar for $5.49 per pound. (Photo by Jason Tomassini)

Park seems to thrive on adversity, however. She came to America in 1974 “for a better life,” she says, and worked at a family-run fish market in 1984 amid a lengthy and contentious boycott of several Korean establishments by African Americans claiming unfair hiring practices.

“I thought, You know what? I have to have black employees to survive in this community,” she says. So in 1985 she opened her first small restaurant in a 300-square-foot basement on West 125th Street along with a black chef from North Carolina, whom she had met through the fish market and who taught her southern cooking.

Now, both her employees and customers are almost exclusively minorities and Park is considered a staple of the business community, though she lives in New Jersey. At Thanksgiving, Park donated 100 turkeys to needy Harlem families and has sponsored YMCA afterschool programs.

“When you come into the community, you have to look at the needs,” says Theresa Freeman, a Manna’s regular, over a pungent serving of chitlins. “That’s just a good business model.”

Park sees some similarities between Korean and southern cooking. Korean cuisine uses pigs’ feet and oxtails, traditional soul food staples, and like some southern styles, tends to be spicy. But Park says customers are becoming less interested in those traditional yet adventurous soul food dishes, instead opting for mainstays like fried chicken, short ribs and mashed potatoes. “A lot of people don’t want to eat it,” she says of her chitlins—pig intestines cooked with liberal amounts of vinegar and hot peppers. “Especially the younger generation, because it stinks.”

Soul food restaurants have also been hit hard by a national focus on nutrition and health. Londel’s longtime corn bread recipe—heavy on milk, butter and sugar—now calls for more moderate amounts of those ingredients, Davis says. Cooking with seasoned meats like pork has yielded to sautéing and broiling. “We need to get away from cooking so old-fashioned,” he argues.

Park disagrees, and still cooks her collard greens in turkey gravy and her stuffing with chicken. She touts the extended salad and fruit bar, but acknowledges that her customers aren’t coming in for cantaloupe.

Customers fill up on fried plantains and fried chicken. Owner Betty Park, a Korean immigrant, learned to cook soul food from a North Carolina chef. (Photo by Jason Tomassini)

Whatever the economic conditions, Park hopes her relationship with customers allows Manna’s to survive, like the landmark Harlem soul food restaurant Sylvia’s, which opened in 1962 and is now a tourist attraction that sells its products in supermarkets.

On this day, Park stops midsentence after hearing some loose change drop behind her. She quickly gets up to help a middle-aged woman and by the time their brief encounter has ended, she’s learned that the woman is a schoolteacher. Then she jets back to the conversation she’s suspended.

Trying to locate Park, even  in Manna’s modest storefront,  often proves difficult. At a moment’s notice she might be filling in at the cash register, holding court with a regular like Freeman, unpacking flour in the basement, lugging a pan of mashed potatoes to the food bar, or consulting with a cook over the proper spices for clam chowder.

Someday she’d like to open a more upscale Manna’s or add a takeout window to the restaurants. But for now, she has no plans to open any additional branches, only a dedication to ensuring the existing ones survive.

“Everybody in their life has bad turns,” she says. “But it gets better.”

Midway through her monthly grocery shopping, Yvonne Shields pauses in the freezer section of Fairway Market in Harlem. She’s stocked her cart with a mix of basics, including a carton of eggs, toaster waffles, oranges to fight the nasty cold she’s been battling, and frozen green beans. Shields rifles through her potential purchases, mentally tallying how much her groceries will cost.

“I hate it when they don’t put the prices on here,” she says, frustrated by the items without stickers. After counting up the best she can, she estimates she has selected about $50 worth of groceries so far. Like many consumers on a tight budget, Shields has to be careful about what she spends.

But Shields’ budget isn’t simply stretched: she’s living below the poverty line. Though she has a job— she works 20 hours a week as a sous chef in a Morningside Heights soup kitchen, earning minimum wage—  she takes home only $290 every two weeks. Today Shields, who is 65, has come by bus from her apartment in a Bronx public housing project to spend what remains of her $200 monthly allotment of food stamps.

But because a bill Congress passed last week is slated to slash the national food stamps budget, Shields may see her monthly benefits shrink. The House of Representatives approved the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010, intended to expand and improve school meal programs nationwide.  Nearly half the bill would be funded by a $2.2 billion cut in the federal food stamps program, also known as the Supplemental Nutrition and Assistance Program or SNAP. President Barack Obama has said he will find a way to restore the money before the cuts take effect, but some advocates are skeptical.

In the meantime, the 1.7 million New York City residents receiving food stamps continue to make due with the SNAP benefits they currently receive. Last week the United States Department of Agriculture estimated the average monthly benefit for SNAP recipients in New York State is $150.63 per person.

Yvonne Shields lives in the Bronx but prefers to use her food stamps benefits at Fairway in Harlem. (Photo by Dewi Cooke)

At Fairway, Shields’ last major purchase is a pair of salmon steaks priced at $9.99 per pound— a bit of a splurge, she says, since she knows a market near her job where fish sells for less. “This is where I start getting concerned,” she says, waiting for her salmon to be wrapped.

As she makes her way to the checkout line, Shields is fairly confident she hasn’t overspent the remaining balance on her specialized SNAP debit card (actual food stamp coupons haven’t been used since the late 1990s). “Let’s go see what damage I’ve done to myself,” she says.

She has sometimes put food back to stay within budget. But this afternoon, she makes it through checkout with no problems, spending $84.74 of the $155 left of her monthly benefits.

Shields learned the hard way how to make her food stamps last. In 1999, after she lost a child development job in a downsizing, she was homeless for ten months and began receiving food stamps. She was forced to figure out how to stretch them.

“I bought stuff that was on sale. I used coupons more,” she says. “I would not shop just in one store, I’d go around and try to take advantage of the different sales of the products that I like.”

But Shields isn’t simply a careful spender; she relies on food sources beyond what she can buy with food stamps. She gets free bags of groceries once a month from the pantry where she works, and pays attention to the pantry’s other offerings, such as free fresh produce on Mondays. During warmer months she pays $12 every two weeks for a share of community supported agriculture that distributes fresh local produce.

Despite the extra legwork, Shields considers herself lucky. She has the time to gather food from multiple sources, and to travel to stores with better selection and prices than those in her own neighborhood.  And it would be much harder to take these extra steps toward eating healthily, she acknowledges, if she had children to feed — as many people receiving food stamps do.

“There’s still a lot of stereotypes about food stamps that persist, that it’s these lazy adult bums who’ve been on welfare for life and just don’t want to work,” says Joel Berg, executive director of New York City Coalition Against Hunger. “The truth is, more than half the people on the food stamps programs are children. Two thirds of the people on food stamps are either children, working parents who just don’t earn enough to feed their families, senior citizens or people with disabilities.”

Fabio Martinez, a benefit outreach coordinator for the Coalition , works with low-income clients in three food pantries across the city. His description of his clients accords with Berg’s description. “I see a lot of single parents,” Martinez says. “Mostly moms.”

Martinez has noticed that, like Shields, most of his clients must complement their food stamps money with other sources of food. “I would say 95 percent of people who are receiving food at pantries are also getting food stamps,” he says.

The food stamps program was designed to supplement, not fully pay for users’ food expenses, so it’s not surprising that recipients must turn to outside sources of food. But because food stamps funding differs only marginally from state to state, the high costs of living in New York City means that many New Yorkers receiving food stamps don’t have extra cash to spend on food; food stamps make up their entire grocery budgets.

As another social worker, Carlos Patricio, explains, “The need for food goes even beyond what’s been given to them.” Patricio, a case manger at Yorkville Common Pantry in East Harlem, works regularly with clients receiving food stamp aid. “If you have only $200 to feed a family, you have to stretch it,” he says.

Downstairs from Patricio’s office, client Terry Avenger waits to see another case manager. A mother of nine, Avenger says she’s in desperate need of food for her children. “I have absolutely no food in my house,” she says. She gets food stamps, but the money typically runs out after about three weeks, so she makes monthly visits to this East Harlem pantry to see her through the end of the month. She is unemployed, but looking for work.

Berg says if the recent cuts to the food stamps budget are not restored, low-income families like Avenger’s will suffer. “There’s no question that we’re going to see longer lines at food pantries, more people choosing between food and rent,” he says.

“These people would be in trouble,” Martinez agrees. “It’s going to destroy people.”

The Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act passed the House 264 to 157; the Senate unanimously approved it in August. First Lady Michelle Obama lobbied for the bill extensively, saying that it would reduce both childhood hunger and obesity, particularly in low-income children. The bill’s plans include expanding after-school meals for at-risk children, improving the nutrition quality of school meals and setting national standards for food sold in schools.

All but four of the representatives who voted against the $4.5 billion bill were Republicans. Rep Paul Broun (R.-Ga.) said during the debate that the bill was too expensive and gave government too much control over what kids eat. “I as a physician have been spending most of my adult life talking about nutrition and health, but this bill is not that,” he said. “This bill is a nutrition bill for a bigger government, greater spending, and it must stop.”

Many Democrats and advocacy groups supported the bill in principal, but were concerned about the $2.2 billion SNAP budget cut that would help finance it. The cut would mean that the recent increases in food stamps funding, a result of the economic stimulus package, would be rolled back. The final vote, with Democrats overwhelmingly in favor, came after President Obama said he would work to find other ways to pay for the bill before taking money from SNAP.

Opinions divide over whether this will actually happen. “I have full confidence that the White House will be able to provide the additional resources to fulfill that commitment,” says Melissa Salamanowitz, spokesperson for the House Committee on Education and Labor— the committee whose chair, Rep. George Miller (D.-Calif) sponsored the original House version of the bill.

Berg isn’t so sure the White House will find funding. “If there was some magical fix, I respectfully suggest they would have found it already,” he says.

Because of the food stamp reductions it might entail, Berg firmly opposes the bill. “You’re taking away kids’ dinners to pay for their lunch,” Berg says. “What sense is that?”

Harlem Dowling's Earl Whitted distributes bags of groceries from the center's food pantry. (Photo by Dewi Cooke)

A Harlem child welfare service is so overwhelmed by demand for its food pantry that it is dramatically cutting the number of times families can use it.

Cherie Blae, director of specialized services at the Harlem Dowling-West Side Center for Child and Community Services, says the organization would normally serve 900 to 1200 families a year through its twice-weekly food pantry. But in the past 12 months, 5000 have come through its doors.

“That has to do with the economical struggles we’ve been having; that has to do with those undocumented individuals not being able to have those day laboring jobs,” she says. “Everything is cut back.”

In response, the organization has limited access to once every three months, instead of monthly, in an effort to reach as many people as possible.

Around 30 people are gathered in the hallway of Harlem Dowling’s fourth floor offices on Adam Clayton Powell Blvd, waiting for their numbers to be called. Each receives at least one bag of groceries – enough food, Blae says, to last three days.

A 45-year-old single mother and Ecuadorian migrant is among those waiting. Mercedes, who doesn’t want to give her last name, says she relies on two Harlem food pantries to supplement what she can buy from her earnings as a house cleaner.  The rest, she says, she leaves to “God’s Grace”.

“It’s much more difficult now,” she says through an interpreter.

The center has no shortage of food, Blae says, but lacks enough workers to run the pantry.  The staff noticed the number of users increasing last year, but this summer was the hardest, she adds. Though volunteers are welcome, the need to fingerprint them and do background checks (required in a child protection agency) complicates recruitment. Food pantries receive the City’s help to pay for food, but not staffing.

Blae learned today the service would be getting money to buy plastic bags – until now, it has relied on bag donations from the local Fairway.

Carlos Rodriguez of Food Bank for New York City, a not-for-profit organization supplying food to more than 1000 city food pantries and soup kitchens, including Harlem Dowling, says the center’s experience is more common since the recession set in.

More than half of Food Bank’s membership have reported increases in the number of people signing up for services and 90 percent are seeing people using food pantries for the first time.

“It’s just continuous,” he says.

Harlem Dowling’s food pantry at 2090 Adam Clayton Powell Blvd runs Tuesdays and Fridays. This Friday it will host a family nutrition day; participants are eligible for a special Thanksgiving pantry.

A Supermarket Need Index determined areas lacking access to fresh food. The dark green areas show FRESH Food store areas and light green shows additional areas where financial incentives may be available. (Map courtesy of NYC Department of City Planning)

Growing up in Harlem, Gail Brown got used to having limited access to fresh foods. She now shops at Fine Fare, a chain supermarket on Lenox Avenue and 116th Street, but still doesn’t see farm fresh or organic food. “I’m a little disgusted with this,” she said, pointing to the package of cellophane-wrapped chicken in her cart. “But this is the selection they had tonight.” Brown describes it as “second class food.”

Laura Purcell, who moved from the Upper West Side to central Harlem, also shops at Fine Fare when she needs something quick. For larger orders, “I tend to shop at Fairway,” she said, adding that she appreciated that store’s wider selection when she lived further downtown.

The City Planning Commission has voted to approve a fresh food program that offers incentives to develop supermarkets in targeted neighborhoods, including Central and East Harlem and Washington Heights. The City Council has until November 24 to review the proposal.

The Planning Commission developed a Supermarket Need Index last year to pinpoint areas with high levels of diet-related disease and limited supermarket access. The index showed that East and Central Harlem and Washington Heights needed better access to fresh food. New Yorkers living there and in Inwood are more likely to be obese and to have diabetes and other diet-related health conditions than other Manhattan residents, according to the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene.

The FRESH program, short for Food Retail Expansion to Support Health, would allow businesses certified as “fresh” to be 20,000 square feet larger than the law currently permits. Such businesses would also benefit from reduced real estate taxes, sales tax exemptions and reductions in the amount of required parking.

A fresh-certified business would dedicate at least 6,000 square feet to selling groceries, according to the amendment, with 30 percent of that area designated for perishable foods like produce, meat and dairy products.

The FRESH program aims to improve the health of New Yorkers in “underserved areas,” according to a spokeswoman for the city’s Department of City Planning. The department also expects the program to generate new jobs for neighborhood residents.

Nancy Easton, co-founder of Wellness in the Schools, works with the Department of Education to get healthier food into school cafeterias. (Photo by Sarah Butrymowicz)

On a Wednesday afternoon, the yellow and green cafeteria at P.S. 161 was full of students talking and shouting. One sat down and pulled out a Lunchables, a prepackaged meal combination, but everyone else headed straight for the school kitchen. Most eagerly ate their sweet and sour roasted chicken, but didn’t touch the rice or collards with sweet tomato on their white Styrofoam trays.

Sometimes the school lunch is tasty, but “sometimes it’s disgusting,” said one fifth-grader, poking at her collards with a plastic utensil called a spork. “The vegetables are nasty.”

Her classmate agreed. “I like vegetables at home,” he said, but at school they just don’t taste good.

For some children, whatever they think of school food, there aren’t many alternatives. In low-income neighborhoods, many students get free or reduced-price lunches at school, which become a primary source of nutrition for the day. At this school, 93 percent of the student body lives at or below the poverty level and can be eligible for free or reduced-priced meals.

But critics charge that the meals aren’t always that nutritious or tasty and contribute to larger health problems. Financial and logistical problems make it difficult for the Office of SchoolFood to improve the cuisine, and despites its efforts, change can be slow in coming, the advocates say.

Some students eat little of what the school gives them, said Nayvi Merino, whose son is a first grader at P.S. 161. Merino works as a restaurant hostess in midtown, and although she gets home as early as she can in the afternoon, she said, often her son is ravenous.

“It worries me,” Merino said. “He’s not eating well at school.”

For students who do eat their fill, school food advocates have cited unhealthy lunches as a contributing factor to New York’s childhood obesity rate. Forty-three percent of the city’s children are overweight and about half of those are obese, according to a 2004 study conducted by the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene. Many of these children come from low-income communities.

School lunch programs are “horribly underfunded,” said James Subudhi of WE ACT for Environmental Justice, so schools are often forced to take short cuts to meet federal nutrition requirements, which limit fat content and mandate that school meals provide at least a third of the recommended daily allowances of protein, iron, calcium and Vitamins A and C.

The Office of SchoolFood’s budget allows about 90 cents per meal, limiting the amount of fresh ingredients it can buy, said Nancy Easton, co-founder of Wellness in the Schools, a grassroots organization that works to improve nutrition, health and fitness in public schools. A typical menu item is a “golden fish and cheese sandwich,” which Easton described as “mystery meat fish with mystery cheese on top wrapped in a breaded substance that has been frozen for a long time.”

By contrast, Harlem Children’s Zone schools, part of a nonprofit organization aimed at helping disadvantage families break the poverty cycle, spend about $6 on each meal, which normally contains organic vegetables and meat, Subudhi said.

But school food issues aren’t only budgetary; they’re also logistical. The Office of SchoolFood is charged with feeding about 860,000 students a day, Marge Feinberg, a Department of Education representative, said in an email.

At overcrowded schools where cafeteria time is precious, some students eat lunch at 10:30 a.m., Subudhi said. Many kitchens don’t have the necessary appliances to cook from scratch, forcing them to serve only reheated food, Merino added.

And almost all the kitchen staff lack formal culinary training, Easton said. When it comes to schools preparing nutritious, high-quality food, “all the odds are against them,” she said.

The Department of Education declined to comment on these obstacles.

Some problems are simply beyond the Office of SchoolFood’s control. Several students at P.S. 161 said they just didn’t like eating vegetables anywhere. But pizza, served every Friday, got rave reviews from nearly everyone.

And some students, like P.S. 161 fifth-grader Aaron Valdidia, don’t have problems with school meals. “I think they’re pretty good,” he said.

In the past five years, the Department of Education has taken steps like eliminating trans fats, replacing white bread with whole wheat and including more locally grown vegetables in its food, Feinberg said.

It has also put a salad bar in every high school, something Daniel James, an 18-year-old at Alfred E. Smith High School praised as “going the right way,” even though he usually skips the cafeteria lunch and grabs Subway after school.

But Merino would like to see a salad bar in every school, not just high schools. “Some of the stuff we want,” she said, “it’s not really that hard.”

Mike Santiago serves customers at Muddy Waters' grand opening. (Photo by Rachael Horowitz)

Muddy Waters Café on Adam Clayton Powell, Jr. Boulevard looks more like a living room than a coffee shop, with facing leather couches and coffee tables creating a familial atmosphere. Owner Ntozake Lundy talks with every customer who comes in an attempt to provide a sense of community. But what makes the café even more distinctive is the kind of staff she hires.

Lundy found an employee – just one so far – through recommendations from the Fortune Society, an organization that supports convicted felons after they’ve been released from prison. She began hiring former inmates as a favor to a friend, and has employed about five Fortune Society workers during her years as a café owner.

Lundy hosted Muddy Waters’ grand opening earlier this month. “We went through contractor, permit and electrical hell,” said Lundy, who acquired the space in July 2008. “It’s over now. It’s kind of like pregnancy pains, but I’m happy with the finished product.”

After operating cafés in Brooklyn and the Bronx, Lundy began looking for a new location last year. “I pounded the pavement,” walking streets and riding buses in search of an open space, “and got really lucky.”

Lundy doesn’t like to overemphasize her hiring practices. “Someone is not gonna dig a felon making their sandwich,” she explained. But she has had good results with people who need a second chance, she said, and that’s why she continues to hire them. “I have better experiences with former felons than with college students,” she said. “I found them a little more tenacious and hard working.”

Mike Santiago has been out of jail for nine years, but said that having a felony conviction has made it difficult for him to find work. “Off-the-book jobs would accept me, no problem,” he said. Before joining the Fortune Society, he mostly did plumbing, electrical work, drywall and flooring jobs for employers who kept no records, and he had scant hopes for career advancement. He didn’t have a real future in this type of work, he decided.

New York state law prevents companies from using a felony conviction as grounds to avoid hiring someone, but Joelle James, senior director for career development at the Fortune Society, said that it often happens, yet is difficult to prove. She coaches members to apply to businesses known to be “former offender -friendly.”

Santiago’s connection to the Fortune Society brought him to Muddy Waters, where he has so far found satisfaction in his work, and is enthusiastic about becoming a barista. “It’s important to be happy with your job,” he said.

As for the café, “it’s what we need,” said Julius Clay, pastor of Williams Church on Adam Clayton Powell, which has not yet seen the kind of commercial development sprouting on nearby Frederick Douglass. He added, “You can’t stop change.” Since the café’s opening, Clay has been a daily customer.

Antonio Bruno’s Covo, huge by Manhattan standards, is ViVa’s anchor eatery. (Photo by Sonal Shah)

Whipping up from the Hudson River, wind funnels through the cross streets between 125th and 138th Streets. Up on the Henry Hudson Parkway, traffic inches toward the George Washington Bridge. On the other side of 12th Avenue, which disappears under a stone bridge, Riverside Park rises out of a steep embankment. A handful of restaurants nestle in this unlikely spot, under the spidery arches of Riverside Bridge.

ViVa, or Viaduct Valley, is the latest contender for Manhattan’s next big entertainment district. Yet, despite several successful launches, scattered news references to the “new Meatpacking District” and a few celebrity sightings, Harlem’s waterfront restaurants still face many obstacles.

“It’s like a hidden valley,” said Fernando Mateo, an entrepreneur and activist whose wife, Stella, co-owns Talay, one of ViVa’s uptown upstarts. “This place is so beautiful but so uninhabited. We’re still waiting for a Christopher Columbus who can come and discover us.”

ViVa’s earliest pioneer was the 35,000 square foot Fairway Market, sprawling across several blocks around 132nd Street. Fairway, which opened in 1995 in an area that some people considered unsafe, remained the sole draw for years. “You couldn’t walk down here,” Mateo said. “You would run from one block to the other.”

The area’s three most visible restaurants – Talay, Covo Trattoria and Body Bar & Grill –operate in an old meatpacking warehouse at the end of 135th Street. Building owner Peter Skyllas originally considered relocating his plumbing business there. The neighborhood “was infested with drug dealers,” Skyllas said. “You couldn’t come within 10 feet because of the stench of garbage.”

In late 2004, however, Dinosaur Bar-B-Que, fired up its grills on 131st Street, just opposite Fairway. Dinosaur’s popularity made Skyllas reassess his property’s value. He knew that the Parks Department was developing the nearby Harlem Piers waterfront and that – eventually – Columbia University would expand into the area with its Manhattanville Campus.

“My whole idea was to bring the Meatpacking District to Harlem,” Skyllas said, acknowledging that urban planners have been talking about developing the 12th Avenue waterfront for at least 20 years.

Skyllas recruited Antonio Bruno, owner of the Morningside Heights restaurants Max Soha and Max Caffé, whose Italian menu he thought would make a good “anchor” for the area. Bruno needed a little more convincing. “When I first saw this place in 2004, I ran away,” he recalled at his airy, wood-oven-warmed restaurant Covo.

Skyllas found two other groups of tenants to open Talay, a Thai-Latin restaurant and lounge, and Body, a large restaurant and nightclub. As construction began on Skyllas’ warehouse, restaurateurs Hamlet Peralta and Max Piña opened Hudson River Café, just north of Fairway. Meanwhile, Skyllas successfully petitioned the city for permit parking, a sidewalk and a green island in front of his building.

In June 2008, just after Talay, Body and Covo opened, the Harlem Piers park opened. Further development seemed imminent and property prices rose. Warburg Realty, which managed Skyllas’ property in 2006, listed an asking price of about $85 per square foot per month on its web site – double what the realtor listed for the previous year. Still, ViVa rents were reasonable compared to similar locations along Broadway, which had no waterfront access.

Now shuttered and stripped of signage, Body Bar & Grill once hosted Shaquille O’Neill’s birthday party. (Photo by Sonal Shah)

As various owners, diners and critics recount, ViVa’s restaurant row enjoyed early success. Body caught on with well-heeled Harlemites and partygoers from further afield, who lined up outside on weekends. Shaquille O’Neill celebrated his birthday there and several cast members of “Harlem Heights,” Black Entertainment Television’s reality show about young, black professionals, counted Body among their favorite Harlem hangouts. Cast member Brooke Crittendon, Kanye West’s ex-girlfriend, wrote on the show’s web site that Body “could possibly be the crunkest club in the city right now.”

The splash didn’t last long. Body regulars were surprised to find the club’s signage stripped in late August. Sam Benjamin, who organizes a black/Latino social networking group, arrived at the club for a September event and found it closed. Body’s owners, Rigo Herasme and Joe Robles, had given him no warning, he said.

The owners did not respond to calls, but earlier this year, Body’s chief financial officer, Felix Parache, said he departed after a “falling out” with the owners. “I’m guessing these people invested $1.5 million or more to fix the place and believe in my dream,” Skyllas said. “Running a restaurant is a difficult job. I personally wouldn’t get into it.”

The current economic climate makes running a new venue difficult. The trade magazine Nation’s Restaurant News runs an online Restaurant Index; it plummeted between September 2008 and March 2009 and remains 30 percent below mid-2008 levels. Skyllas estimated that restaurant earnings, including tips, have fallen by as much as 60 percent. Bruno confirmed that the area had faced difficulties, though Covo makes more money than his Morningside Heights eateries.

Mateo acknowledged that ViVa is “definitely not coming up roses. Anyone who tells you that they’re making so much profit – it’s just not true. We’re barely breaking even.” Still, he remains optimistic.

Getting foot traffic is still the area’s biggest challenge. The restaurateurs want to dedicate the traffic island to Muhammad Ali, to include “a big statue – then it becomes a tourist attraction to bring people down,” Mateo said.

Though Harlem’s facelift continues, catering to the community’s changing clientele has proved a tricky business. In early September, Talay shut down briefly to turn its downstairs section into Pancho Gringo, a Mexican restaurant with a more “familiar” menu. But Body remains closed.

Visitors may be reluctant to walk from the 135th Street Subway station through Riverside Park. “There’s still that myth about Harlem – that it’s dangerous and people are scared to come down,” Mateo said.