Kirsten Luce for The New York Times Rob Veksler, right, at the bar and restaurant he opened called Vekslers on a once-desolate block on the edge of Cobble Hill.Every so often, along this dismal, grimy strip in Cobble Hill, Brooklyn, you could make out a man â€" a tall, thin figure moving darkly behind the fogged-up, heirloom-tomato-brimmed windows of the storefront at the corner of Hicks and Degraw Streets.
The store, on a stretch of the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway that local residents call “the Ditch,†was called Brooklyn Farms. It advertised hydroponic growing supplies. The neighbors generally passed by without inquiring, keeping to themselves their modest curiosity about the proprietor, his wares, his product. Brooklyn Farms appeared in 2009 and a few months ago, as quietly as it operated, it disappeared.
“I would’ve been interested to poke my head in,†said Anna Skiba-Crafts, who could see the shop from her home on the opposite side of the expressway. “But it seemed like a lot of specialized things I wasn’t sure I’d use.â€
Tessa Williams, an owner of a nearby store called the Brooklyn Collective, said, “I would’ve gone in, but it just looked like it was never open.â€
Locals wondered if there was something perhaps a little “seedier†going on inside. Or maybe that guy, you know, knew a guy?
These days, it is clear that the place is open again and that it is on the up and up â€" and few locals seemed bashful about dropping in and asking questions.
The difference? The owner, Rob Veksler, has transformed his 1,100-square-foot hydroponics shop into a stylishly appointed bar and restaurant called Vekslers.
Gone is the industrial-grade growing equipment, making way for a bar and booths, with a menu featuring dishes like lightly grilled Atlantic squid in a chili and shrimp tapenade. Drinks include inventive $10 cocktails, draft wine and $6 beer-and-shot pairs.
The neighborhood is abuzz.
Somehow, the possibly seamy hydroponics store made a certain amount of sense on Hicks Street, a block known for its noise, its grit and the danger its speeding traffic poses to pedestrians. But a smart-looking tavern that stocks both Fernet Branca and Branca Menta and serves up boiled duck egg over garlic rice with thrice-cooked pork? On Hicks Street? On the porch of the B.Q.E.?
It is likely that Mr. Veksler may well have been surprised himself by that news not very long ago. In 2008, when he was looking for a location to open a hydroponics shop, Hicks Street was not his first choice.
“I was thinking of putting it on Union and Keap, right ‘on campus,’ but the zoning was wrong,†he said. He found the listing for the space on Hicks Street on Craigslist. Mr. Veksler, a 40-year-old Ukraine native who grew up in Maryland, had lived around the corner in the late 1990s and liked the idea of returning to the neighborhood.
He opened Brooklyn Farms and kept hours mostly by appointment, selling supplies â€" never seeds or plants, he is quick to note â€" to customers from across the city and Long Island. “I never asked them what they were doing or why they were doing it, and no one ever volunteered that information,†he said.
Mr. Veksler said that he sold equipment to local “moms†and “old Italian men,†and provided hydroponic growing systems for classrooms in Chinatown and on the Lower East Side.
He also served restaurants, furnishing Mario Batali’s Del Posto with systems to grow its own herbs. Wintertime diners at Del Posto can credit the restaurant’s two hydroponic troughs for providing the accents of lemon basil, minutina and the especially rare agretti to their dishes.
Mr. Veksler spent much of each day alone in the store, with most clients arriving just before he closed at 6 p.m. to relieve his nanny in Manhattan.
“Existentially, it began to be my man cave,’’ he said. “I missed interaction. And what better way than a bar? But I was attached to the space: I didn’t want to leave it.â€
So he sold off his stock, remodeled the space, renewed his lease and hired Joseph Bayley, a winning contestant on the show “Chopped’’ who had previously cooked at the Manhattan tapas bar Boqueria, to work the kitchen.
“For me now, it’s still weird to see people in here,†Mr. Veksler said. “Now there’s all these people with their kids, and they need to be served, with their food at the proper temperature.†He trailed off, surveying the dining room. Everyone seemed content and comfortable. Mr. Veksler did, too.
As for what was really going on at Brooklyn Farms, Veksler is emphatic: “Honest to God, I’ve never grown marijuana in my life. But now, knowing what I know, I could be a master farmer.â€
So why is there not a single plant inside Vekslers now? “I have a plant outside the door that my in-laws gave me,†he said. “I’m actually no good with houseplants.â€
Victor Kerlow 
