Rasen eatery goes under the hammer

But after 36 years, Jossals . . . Market Rasen’s oldest Café Bistro . . . will disappear from the Queen Street scene on Tuesday next week (March 26) when everything goes under the auctioneer’s hammer.

The sale follows the decision of the partners – Sally Graham, Jo Parsons, Nick and Maxine Guymer – to retire and close the business that started as a small coffee shop before growing to become also a restaurant, with private dining areas and function rooms, as well as an outside catering service.

The last day of business was Saturday March 2, followed by an open house on Sunday 3, an event that saw hundreds of friends and clients crowding into the early 19th Queen Street building and one-time town post office that has been home to Jossals since 2000.

Paul Cooper, a director of auctioneers Eddisons, which has been brought in to carry out next week’s auction, said: “Jossals is clearly going to be missed – people did say the most amazing things about the café bistro and the cooking, including those remarks about the sausages – but three and a half decades is actually an exceptionally long time for a restaurant business to be around, so the town’s been rather lucky in that respect.”

Paul continued: “It’s a really nice little auction that will provide a good opportunity for other hospitality businesses or indeed anyone else to acquire a wide range of restaurant furniture and furnishings, as well as some very good quality, well maintained, commercial catering equipment.”

The furniture and fittings from the restaurant and the function rooms include a large number of farmhouse-style tables, with dozens of ladderback chairs, together with another 40 banqueting style chairs and a few bar stools too.

In terms of the kitchen and food prep equipment, there is an extensive range of professional catering equipment, including cookers, fryers, grills, toasters, fridges, freezers, food preparation kit and the like.

Paul added: “We have handled a number of restaurant disposal auctions around the country over the past year and I have to say that the kitchen at Jossals is amongst the best, well-maintained setups that we have seen.

“Of course in an establishment that was a coffee shop during the day, you would expect the coffee machines to be special and they are. One of the machines is an Italian-made Biepi stainless steel counter top machine that was bought just 18 months ago at a cost of £3,500.”

In total, the auction extends to 81 lots. The illustrated sale catalogue is available now at auctions.eddisons.com . Viewing is by appointment on Monday (March 25). The online auction is scheduled to end at 1pm on Tuesday (March 26).