HARLEM — While Harlem's first Whole Foods is still in development, uptown residents hungry for organic food can find it at a Lenox Avenue coffeeshop.
Gourmet pantry Riley/Land is opening a pop-up shop in the market section of Astor Row Café at 404 Lenox Ave. near 130th Street this summer. The shop will offer items such as handmade peanut butter from North Carolina, Argentinean dulce de leche and Wasabi peanuts from Virginia.
“I am happy to be bringing new and exciting foods to the neighborhood — my neighborhood — because, like many of my neighbors, I don’t want to have to go to the Upper West Side to shop if I could do it steps from my home,” said store creator Joseph Riley Land, who has run restaurants in Nashville and managed Williams-Sonoma stores in Manhattan and Atlanta.
Riley Land said items will range in price from $3 to more than $50 for high-end oils and vinegars.
A jar of Big Spoon Roasters peanut butter will cost $10, for example, with a bottle of Villa Manodori Organic Balsamic going for $48.
The pantry is set to open on May 1, and Riley Land said customer response would determine where it goes from there.
“Brooklyn has been owning the artisanal food market for years," Land said. "It’s time Harlem residents had a chance to partake as well.”