All About Maloya, Showcasing the Cuisine of Réunion in Bushwick

1. It all started with a motorcycle ride, and a cocktail in Paris.

Lebreton and Gruszkiewicz met just over two years ago through mutual friends.

“Sam was out riding his motorcycle, and he and his friends pulled up on my block where I was managing two different restaurants in Washington Heights,” Gruszkiewicz recalls. They were originally all going to a different bar, but she convinced them to come with her for a drink.

Maloya came to be when the pair were having a cocktail on their first trip to France together. “We decided right there that we were going to open our own cocktail bar together,” Gruszkiewicz says.

Even then, they knew it would be a Réunion restaurant, choosing the name “Maloya,” a reference to a genre of music and dance popular on the island. It’s also the predominant style of music that they play inside the restaurant. “It’s a big, important part of our ambiance,” Gruszkiewicz notes.

2. The food was so personal to Sam, it became personal for Tara.

Both of Lebreton’s parents are from Réunion, a small French island in the Indian Ocean. And even though he was raised primarily in France, his whole life was shaped by the culture of the island.

“It’s not just a culture I know of; it is my culture. It’s the thing I know best,” Lebreton says. “I always wanted to share it, because I think a lot of people don’t know about it, especially in the U.S. Réunion’s people are very resourceful and always make the best out of what they’ve got. The cuisine and various delicacies now enjoyed by everyone were once all they had to eat, or just something for a special occasion. To this day, a lot of people raise livestock and cultivate vegetables or plants in order to eat.”

He keeps a map of Réunion behind the bar, primed to talk to people about where he’s from. And before they opened Maloya, he and Gruszkiewicz took a trip to the island to develop the menu.

“It’s a very harmonious melting pot of people from France, Europe, Africa, India, China, Madagascar, Vietnam, Thailand … and all those influences on the food makes it really interesting,” Gruszkiewicz says.

Guests can expect deep-fried snacks (“big in flavor, small in size,” Gruszkiewicz says), slowly braised meats, aromatic sauces, and lots of rice and beans.

The menu is also full of dishes that Lebreton grew up eating. There are samoussas, similar to samosas, Gruszkiewicz says, made in different varieties like tuna, pork and Thai lime, and more traditional French flavors like aligot and cheese. Spicy lima bean fritters, called bonbon piment, are also on the list of starters.

“Those two are the most ‘flagship’ snacks, I would say. Anybody who has been to Réunion has eaten these,” Gruszkiewicz notes.

Perhaps the most classic Réunion dish, and Lebreton’s favorite, is the rougail saucisse, a housemade sausage ragú. There’s also cabri massalé, with braised lamb leg and tamarind; the camarons à la vanille, with shrimp and vanilla; and the tartiflette creole, with potatoes, bacon, camembert, and crème fraîche. For dessert, you have your choice of house-baked baba au rhum, yuca, and corn cakes — many of which combine pastry traditions from both France and Réunion.

“We’ve had people from Réunion come and dine here, and they love the ambiance. The foods are so familiar to them, and it brings them back home. We’ve had lots of tears in the restaurant,” Gruszkiewicz says.

3. Come ready to drink (rum).

The pair also knows their rum. Lebreton grew up with it (“not that I drank it growing up,” he laughs) and both of them have a practiced palate for the spirit.

When they first decided to open Maloya, there were no Réunion rums available on the market that they could find. But a serendipitous meeting at the New York Rum festival (where else?) put them in contact with a supplier who happened to be offering select rums from the island, right on time.

Maloya’s rum list has more than 20 choices, for now, and their spirit-forward cocktail list boasts a majority of rum-based cocktails. Don’t be fooled, though — this is not a tiki bar.

“The [rums] are very polarizing. Most people, when they think of rum, are thinking of the traditional rum made with molasses rather than agricole rum, which is pressed from sugarcane juice,” Gruszkiewicz says. “The two main rums that we focus on here that are from Réunion are not aged rums. You might think they’d be boring or bland, but they’re nothing of the sort. All of the aromas are just naturally occurring from the distillation process; it’s really beautiful.”

One has a scent like olives, so Gruszkiewicz fashions it into a dirty martini. The house daiquiri, made with saffron, thyme, and lime, runs savory, inspired by the flavors coming out of the kitchen.

4. The space was so appealing to them, they pivoted to a full restaurant.

The pair knew that they wanted Maloya to be in Brooklyn, and the space they ended up in also happened to be the first one that they visited in person.

“We saw a lot of listings via phone, but we hadn’t visited any until this one. We really loved the space and the neighborhood just felt correct,” Lebreton says. “We wanted to make sure that we would land in a neighborhood where we could appeal to a lot of different cultures, because we’re tying in a lot of different culinary traditions at this restaurant.”

Before finding this location, the plan for Maloya was to be a cocktail bar. The lease on the building required them to be full-service, though, so they pivoted into what the restaurant is today.

Lebtreton did all of the interior renovations himself, painting the place from top to bottom in a coastal blue-green, tearing down the mirrors that were glued to every wall, and building a new custom bar. They also installed the lacy gutters that adorn the storefront and fixed all the moldings.

“We had a dream and we believed we could do it. People tell you that you need a million dollars to open a restaurant? False. You don’t; we didn’t,” Gruszkiewicz says. “We’ve really put in the work ourselves.”

5. There’s very little that the pair can’t do.

This is the first restaurant that the pair have worked on together — one of many firsts for the couple behind Maloya.

Gruszkiewicz, who moved to New York to pursue a career as an opera singer in 2008, originally fell into the restaurant industry as many do, as a means to an end.

“I got really interested in beverage and really focused on it. COVID really delayed my singing career,” Gruszkiewicz says. For the last four years before opening Maloya, she was the director of operations and beverage director for the restaurant group behind spots like Midwood Flats and The Uptown Garrison.

Nowadays, though, she finds herself in the kitchen for the first time in her career. And while they’ve finally been able to hire a few additional back-of-house staff members, Gruszkiewicz is always cooking during service.

“I’ve certainly always liked a challenge, and have always been a very adaptive person, so I was game to transition to the back of house,” she says. “I’ve been a pretty accomplished home cook for several years, and I love entertaining friends and family at our home. I also spent some significant time as a captain in New York City fine dining, which really extended my culinary vocabulary and awareness, and showed me what a beautiful plate and overall dining experience can look and taste like. I spent two-thirds of 2023 planning and testing our menu, every single day. It was grueling, but extremely satisfying. Sam acted as my expert consultant on whether the food was staying true to the traditions.”

Maloya is Lebreton’s first foray into the world of restaurants. “He’s had a crash course,” Gruszkiewicz adds with a smile.

You’ll find the pair at Maloya seven days a week, working every single service, and so far, they’ve got no regrets.

“We really, really went for it,” Gruszkiewicz says.

Maloya is open daily from 5 p.m. until midnight.

Ellie Plass is a freelance writer based in Brooklyn. Follow her on Instagram and X (formerly Twitter). Follow Resy, too.