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An Oasis For All

  • Writer: boxton9
    boxton9
  • Dec 17, 2022
  • 2 min read

Updated: Nov 10, 2023

Finding Pride in Paradise


Edible Hudson Valley/Edible Westchester, Winter 2017


By Elazar Sontag








Hannah Black and Carla Perez-Gallardo couldn’t have guessed their restaurant would become such a cult favorite. But they love what Lil’ Deb’s Oasis has grown into since they took over the space three years ago from Debbie Fiero, the restaurant’s namesake. What used to be an old-school diner is now a top-notch restaurant and a gathering spot for Hudson’s queer community.


“I remember in our first few months looking down the bar and being, like, ‘Oh my god, everyone here is queer right now,’” recalls Perez-Gallardo, a smile lighting her face. “It felt so good! Our highest aim is inclusivity—not just to queer people, but to everyone in our community.”


A waitress sporting a necklace fashioned from a shoelace welcomes you in. Both owners are as much artists as chefs, and the walls of their restaurant, vivid pink and orange, are covered in paintings done by friends. A bag of tennis balls swings mysteriously from the ceiling, a whole pineapple sits on the counter and an array of real ferns and fake flowers fill any empty nooks. A line cook, her hair tied up around what appears to be a ripe banana, stands over a fryer basket cooking an order of yucca fries. Black describes these cooks and waiters as their “freaky family.”

But if you aren’t in it for the art, the music and the vibe, you’ll still want to come for the whole fried fish dredged in a sweet and tangy vinaigrette, served with a side of rice and greens. A wildly delicious menu of tropical comfort food inspired by Perez-Gallardo’s Ecuadorian background and Black’s Alabama roots has brought the restaurant a loyal following of young queer locals and even some old-timers from Debbie’s original restaurant.


If you’re in the area, searching for a place to shake, shimmy and be unabashedly proud, look no further. In this oasis, everyone’s welcome.

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About Me

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I Was Supposed to Go to Grad School

Growing up in a large, loud family of 7, they use to call me “Pass Me The, Pass Me The” for the way that I’d try to doctor my dinner with whatever condiments were on hand. At about 8 or 9, I gave up on condiments and took control of dinner entirely, cooking out of a beat-up copy of The New York Times Cookbook that I still own, my little penciled-in annotations intact. I cooked for 7 people nightly, all throughout high school. By the time I was winding up college, I’d become a damn fine cook.

 

My father was a professor of American History. I figured I’d follow in those footsteps, teaching Dickens to 18-year-olds who were not at all interested. I gathered applications to doctorate programs, meanwhile, I took a job as a waiter in a busy catering company. The kitchen where I worked was perpetually understaffed—my cooking skills were quickly identified and I was press-ganged onto their crew. I LOVED it—the excitement, the creativity, the freedom, the trench humor, learning professional cooking techniques. There I stayed for several years while my graduate school applications gathered dust.

 

Cue me, later, a refugee from a crash-and-burn restaurant opening where I was not only the sous-chef, but also the loan application writer and babysitter for a chef/owner who had gone spectacularly off the rails. By then, I had a couple of herniated discs and no desire to stay in restaurants. I moved back to the world of words, and I’ve never looked back. 

 

Since then, I’ve been a restaurant critic, a national award-winning blogger, a food journalist, a travel writer, a columnist, a cookbook author, and the editor-in-chief of four Edible titles. I can’t wait to see what's next.

 

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