Remedee coffee brings a micro batch roastery to a beach block garage in Atlantic City

ATLANTIC CITY — On a weekend morning bike ride, a quick turn off the Boardwalk, it’s a welcome surprise to find the Escobar sisters, Amanda and Colie, ready with micro-batch cold brew from their garage on the Bartram Avenue beach block.

This is Remedee Coffee Roasters, an homage to the countless cups of coffee poured on the porches of Bartram Avenue in the Lower Chelsea neighborhood of Atlantic City their whole lives, the sisters said.

Amanda, 31, and Colie, 28, have operated Remedee as a micro-batch craft roastery since June, permitted under New Jersey’s new law that grants permits to “cottage food operators” to create and sell their goods out of their homes, with some restrictions.

Amanda says the sisters began roasting coffee as a pandemic hobby, “once we realized baking was really bad for our waistlines.”

“Since before Colie could walk, Bartram residents have gathered in the morning on their porches for coffee & conversation (and cocktails most nights),” Amanda wrote via Instagram message. “On these porches, coffee has been the remedy to sleepy starts and the fuel behind the ideation of remedies for the underserved Atlantic City community.”

The new law eliminated the requirement of a commercial kitchen and regular health department inspections for bakers and food makers to sell their goods.

It gave the Escobars the opportunity to open Remedee from the garage under their porch, selling cold brew, coffee shandy with homemade blood orange syrup, a shandy with blueberries straight out of Hammonton, and bags of freshly roasted beans sourced from Colombia, to a stream of bike riders and walkers just off the Boardwalk on weekend mornings.

They also offer the option of taking your drinks in beach-ready pouches.

Prior to the law, New Jersey prohibited people from selling homemade baked goods and prepared foods, a law widely flouted at every school bake sale.

The new law grants New Jersey cottage food operator permits for $100 that could apply to a wide range of home-crafted goods, including baked goods and candy, teas, coffee, dried herbs and seasonings, dried pasta and fruit, honey, nut butters, fruit empanadas, vinegars and mustards, waffle cones and pizzelles. Bakers are not permitted to use anything considered TCS — temperature controlled for safety — in fillings or frostings.

About 600 permits have been issued so far, according to the Department of Health website, many with adorable names like SoWheets CakeShop in Voorhees, Peace Luv N Applesauce in Clementon, and Oh Maia Goodness Bakery in Collingswood. Operators may not gross more than $50,000. The law went into effect in October 2021, and according to the N.J. Home Bakers Association, it typically takes between two and eight weeks to get permitted.

“I think the same craft wave that happened to beer is going to happen to coffee,” Amanda said. “Hoping we are still at the beginning of that wave.”

They describe their coffee as “smooth, light, and fruit-forward roasts that sip like summer,” and say their beans are “direct-trade, single-origin, high-altitude ... quality coffee beans from Colombia, roasted in their home.”

The Escobar sisters’ Atlantic City roots date to 1994, when their father Diego Escobar, a mechanical and electrical engineer and Colombian immigrant, took on the restoration of an abandoned Victorian home on Bartram Avenue, they said.

They see Remedee as an homage to Diego, their mom Emma, a systems analyst in research at Children’s Hospital, and to a neighbor, Dolores “Dee” Salicandro-Palusci.

“For decades, they’ve been steadfast in preserving the historic charm of Lower Chelsea and believing in the beauty & potential of A.C., while pouring each other countless cups of coffee,” the sisters said in a message over Instagram. “Now, it’s A & C’s turn to be a remedy for A.C., while honoring their Colombian roots.”

The sisters are donating a portion of their profits every month to an Atlantic City organization “committed to the advancement of A.C.’s local culture, people, and community,” they said.

While both sisters have full-time jobs — Amanda runs a boutique strategy and content marketing business, and Colie is a nurse headed to Johns Hopkins in the fall — they said they have bigger ambitions for Remedee.

“Cottage food operator permits were a way for us and so many others to remove barriers to entry into the food retail space and we are just getting started,” Amanda said. “The garage will always be a part of the operation, you can’t beat the location and it represents the roots and grit of us and Atlantic City.

“But our sights are set on expanding production,” she said. “Our sights are focused on wholesaling beans and possibly, ready-to-drink.”

Ultimately, the sisters would like to see Remedee model some craft alcohol operators, like Little Water Distillery has done so successfully at 807 Baltic Ave. in Atlantic City.

“The ultimate dream is to have a full production and experiential facility right in A.C., where you can come see how our coffee is roasted, learn about it, and get a tasting flight of coffee — very much like the craft alcohol category experience,” she said.

Remedee Coffee is open weekends from 7 a.m. to 1 p.m. at 118 South Bartram Ave. in Atlantic City.