4 Hoboken Friends From St. Peter's Prep To Open Restaurant Together In Jersey City

HOBOKEN AND JERSEY CITY, NJ — They grew up in Hoboken and attended St. Peter's Preparatory School in Jersey City. Now the four friends who started Alfalfa restaurant — which already has locations in Hoboken and Santa Monica, Calif. — plan to open new locations in Jersey City and Los Angeles.

The downtown Jersey City location will open this Saturday, April 8.

Andrew Arrospide, who was at the Hoboken store store last week, visiting from California, said that when he and friend Dan Sobsey knew each other at All Saints Day School and the Hudson School in Hoboken, they never expected to someday open a group of healthy restaurants with other school chums.

Dan Sobsey and his younger brother Ben are the sons of Michael and Sohiela Sobsey, who ran the popular produce store Sobsey's in Hoboken until they retired in 2017.

Arrospide eventually graduated from college and moved to California to pursue a career in the sports and entertainment industry. He noticed, when he moved back to Hoboken with Dan as his roommate in 2016, that there weren't as many places to order a healthy meal as in California.

At the end of 2017, both men decided to leave their corporate jobs to pursue their "entrepreneurial dreams," Arrospide said. They tested out the Alfalfa concept as a stand at the Garden Street Farmer's Market in 2018.

Ultimately, five St. Peter's Preparatory graduates became involved — owners Arrospide, Dan Londono, Dan Sobsey, and Ben Sobsey, along with Santa Monica store general manager Luke Leonard.

In 2018, the group began running pop-ups inside the historic Schnackenberg's Luncheonette at 1110 Washington St.

When owners Eugene and Joyce Flinn retired, Alfalfa opened up there full time.

Now they're adding to their Santa Monica and Hoboken locations with a third store in downtown Jersey City that opens to the public this Saturday, at 160 First St. It will be open from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. the first day.

It will offer its usual "balanced menu" of salads, breakfast burritos, coffees, other beverages, and donuts (see the menu here), Arrospide said.

"The owners' motto is joy through balance, and the menu very much reflects that," he noted.

Arrospide said that at the stores, the Peruvian chicken salad (pictured above) is a popular meal, but East Coast patrons tend to also go for the traditional Greek and Caesar's salads they're familiar with.

The founders are also at work planning their fourth store in the Larchmont section of Los Angeles.

Find out more about the Alfalfa locations here. And read about other recent Hoboken and Jersey City restaurant openings on Patch here.