Liberty Street Bistro to close

By Alberto Gilman
Posted 11/15/22

After all the meals prepared and various customers served over the past several years on Liberty Street, Liberty Street Bistro will serve its last dinner service on November 19. The closure was made …

This item is available in full to subscribers.

Please log in to continue

Log in

Liberty Street Bistro to close

Posted

After all the meals prepared and various customers served over the past several years on Liberty Street, Liberty Street Bistro will serve its last dinner service on November 19. The closure was made known to the public on November 7 via its official Facebook page.

Liberty Street Bistro, located at 97 Liberty Street, is co-owned by Michael and Alexandra Kelly, who also own the Newburgh Flour Shop on Liberty St. Michael Kelly officially opened the Bistro in 2016 and now he and Alexandra live in the City of Newburgh with their child. He serves on the city’s Planning Board and Industrial Development Agency board.

Michael announced the closure on his Facebook page:
“Over the last six and a half years I’ve been asked many times “Why Newburgh? Why did you choose to open here?” I’ve always danced around the question because it’s a hard one to put in simple terms…. Growing up in Cornwall, my impression of Newburgh had never been a good one. That was the point: “stay away from there”. Our driving bypass was, as it remains to many today, Water Street where you enter Newburgh, but not very much of it. You see the water, some larger buildings and greenspace, but you don’t have to experience the thing you’ve been taught to fear and avoid. Moving back home from NYC gave a bit more perspective on what it means to be in a bad neighborhood. When my friends at Newburgh Brewing Co. told me to check out the space on Liberty Street my intuitions about avoiding Newburgh had essentially disappeared. I went right away and knew what we were doing there instantly. Liberty Street Bistro was alive the moment I walked in the door.

‘To be clear, Newburgh, like most places does have bad neighborhoods, places you probably should at least be cautious of. But, those places are few and far between. The truth is that it’s full of wonderful people trying to make sense of a generationally chaotic municipality that hasn’t quite figured out its place in the world. We live in this city now, and don’t plan to leave anytime soon.”

Neither Michael nor Alexandra Kelly responded to a request for comment.