Cup & Crumb reopens at Berry Pond Corner

By Denise Roy-Palmer

MOULTONBOROUGH — Rod MacDonald looks up from his newspaper and confesses he’s not easily satisfied when it comes to food. He likes it to taste good and be a good value, and at Cup & Crumb in Moultonboro, he finds both.

“I’m picky,” and “these sandwiches are big,” he says as he motions to half of one he’s had wrapped to take home. “This will be my dinner.”

It’s the first time the Cup & Crumb regular has been into the bakery and deli’s new location at Berry Pond Corner. He looks around and nods appreciatively. The space is bigger, but the place still feels the same, he allows. “It has a hometown atmosphere.”

He pauses and points to the beams overhead. “I’m meeting another guy here Friday,” he says; he’ll show him the beams repurposed from the barn that once stood on the land where the café is now and enjoy another meal. He hasn’t decided yet what he’ll have. If they come for breakfast, they can choose from a variety of sweet and savory scones, crumbcakes and biscuit sandwiches. If they come for lunch, there’s always a new special to try, like today’s chicken bacon ranch panini, or a house quiche with spinach, sundried tomato, broccoli and feta; but if they come between, they’ll have to make hard choices among an ever-changing array of muffins, cakes and pastries.

When pressed to name his favorite, Rod will have none of it. “Everything’s my favorite, and they’re all good,” he responds.

A glance to Rod’s left finds Macy Yellin and Gail Goldberg focused deeply in real estate listings. They look up quickly, though, when asked if they’d like to talk about Cup & Crumb’s new location. Macy is from Swampscott, Massachusetts,but is a part-time resident of Suissevale in Moultonborough and, like Rod, this is her first visit to the new café. When it was located on Governor Wentworth Highway, she would walk up every morning, she says.

Her friend Gail Goldberg of Marblehead, Massachusetts, nods, and notes that Cup & Crumb is one of the selling points Macy has given for her to seriously consider buying real estate in Moultonborough.

It’s not only the food that draws them to Cup & Crumb, however, they say. It’s the atmosphere, too.

“It’s small. It’s intimate,” and — they both chime in — “the people are so nice.”

Cup & Crumb owner Kimberly Prause knows that hiring staff members who like what they’re doing and who are able to enjoy a quality of life outside of work is key to her own success.

When first asked about her reasons for moving her almost-four-year-old coffee shop to a larger, more visible location, she points to accessibility, improved parking, a larger kitchen, and an opportunity to expand offerings: possibly serving later into the afternoon and creating a more expansive menu.

Will that possibility include a dinner menu? Her answer is a quick “no.” Staff members have families and other priorities at that time of day.

The Cup & Crumb actually grew out of Kimberly’s own need to find balance — and a good cup of coffee at the eastern edge of Moultonborough. A longtime teacher and administrator, she was finding it increasingly difficult to separate work and leisure time when she lived in the same town where she was employed. Ready for a change, she did her homework and decided to create a gathering place near the intersection of routes 109 and 25, where folks could get good food made from scratch in the early hours of the day. She and husband Michael, owner of Calico Graphics in Wolfeboro, created a business plan, bought a 1,200-square-foot property on Governor Wentworth Highway, and drew up plans for renovation.

Despite her voluminous preparation, however, she ran into roadblocks when it came time to obtain financing from traditional banks. They were not willing to take an unsupported chance on her new enterprise, so she turned to the Wentworth Economic Development Corporation, the private nonprofit devoted to promoting and supporting businesses and the creation of employment opportunities through development assistance and financing. From WEDCO, she received a $65,000 loan to work in concert with a construction loan from Meredith Village Savings Bank.

“Without WEDCO, I don’t think we would have opened,” Kim says, looking back.

Certainly Cup & Crumb would never have become an anchor in the newly opened Berry Pond Corner with two full-time and 12 part-time employees in summer, and 8-9 staff members in winter.

Patron Macy Yellin pats her white bag. She always buys one scone to eat and two to take home, she confides.

“She is the most unbelievable baker,” she said, referring to baker Jennifer Clifford, the anchor of Cup & Crumb. 

Hearing the story of how WEDCO supported Kimberly in opening Cup & Crumb, Macy’s eyes light up with a thought. She has played with the idea of starting a knitting store in Swampscott, but she would have to spend all her time down there and give up spending long days in Moultonborough. That’s a deal-breaker. She has also thought of opening such a shop in a town almost an hour north of here. That would take her away from her happy place for long hours. WEDCO’s help in starting Cup & Crumb has her dreaming now in a new direction. The storefronts at Berry Pond Corner are quite attractive, and just a stone’s throw from her vacation home. She could open a knitting store here, she muses to Gail. Maybe Gail can help, too, when she buys her new place by the Lake.…

Perhaps owner Kimberly Prause should consider a name change in her new location: “Cup & Crumb & Dream.”

Cup & Crumb is open Monday-Friday, 6:30 a.m. – 1 p.m., and Saturday – Sunday, 7 a.m. – 1 p.m., at its new location at 1040 Whittier Highway (Route 25) in Moultonborough. For more information, see www.cupandcrumb.com.

Denise Roy-Palmer is executive director of the Wentworth Economic Development Corporation.