09/26/2026
💚A little note from our Green Bowl family. 💚
We want to start by saying thank you. The love and support you have all shown us these past few days has been overwhelming in the very best way. Your messages, your visits, your kind words, and every one of you who came in just to tell us you have our back. We see you, and we are so grateful.
As many of you know, a customer recently took issue with the Bible verses an employee wrote on our takeout boxes. What followed were negative Google reviews insulting one of our employees, along with two very angry and nasty emails attacking her personally. Not once, in any of it, was there a mention of a problem with the actual order. I reached out directly and asked what was wrong with the food so we could make it right, and all we heard back was more nasty insults about the words on her take out container. We reviewed our cameras, and from everything we can see, the order was made, packaged, and handed over exactly as it was placed. So we can only assume the frustration was about the words on a box.
Now, we would never pretend we don't make mistakes. We are human. We are a small family business with at most three or four people working at any given time, and when we get slammed, we get SLAMMED. Everything we serve is made fresh. Our patacones alone start with plantains that get peeled, fried, smashed, and fried again before they ever reach your plate. Same love goes into our empanadas, our arepas, our pica pollo, our bowls and our juices. So our food takes time, if we ever get something wrong, we want to know, and we will always do our best to fix it.
We also want to be clear. The Green Bowl welcomes everyone. Every culture, every background, every belief. This is simply part of who we are, which is why you will find a few Bible verses around our shop and sometimes on our boxes. We don't ask anyone to share our beliefs. Our employee just wanted to share a little uplifting words with anyone who might need it, we are here to share some love, the same way we do through our food. As someone who has spent a lifetime studying many different religions, I can truly say we are open and accepting of all of them. I just happened to find my way back to my Bible. And yes, those verses around the shop were there all along, on every visit.
We have always been blessed with the most amazing customers, from every background, every culture, and every belief. And through all of this, we have met so many more. Those reviews did not hurt us one bit. If anything, they brought wonderful new people through our doors who chose to show up with kindness. What was meant to tear us down only lifted us up.
I also can't help but think of my grandmother, who recently passed. She was a preacher her whole life in the Dominican Republic, deeply faithful right to the end, and every time she made her yearly visit to New York to see all of us, she spread the word to anyone who would listen, including a younger me who used to scoff at it. Watching something ugly turn into all this love, I truly believe she had a hand in it.
If this isn't God, the Universe, Jehovah, Allah, whatever you choose to call Him, turning something bad into something good for kind people who simply try to spread a little love every single day, then I honestly don't know what is. We appreciate every single one of our customers, and we just want to be good humans who help those in need and contribute to our society in a positive manner. We aren’t here to judge anyone for their beliefs, actions, way of life but we are also not ashamed to display our faith here.
Con amor, The Green Bowl Family. 💚
