A lifetime serving a clientele that was always loyal to them. The couple, Francisco Moya Écija and Mari Carmen Munuera Guirao, opened the doors of El Mesoncico in 1983. Now, a year after completing four decades of service and having inaugurated the latest expansion of the premises with the addition of the winery, they have decided close your establishment. The time for retirement has arrived and, given the impossibility of members of their family continuing to run the business, they have been forced to cease the activity they have carried out for the last 40 years in this square in the old town of Cehegín, at the that his bar ended up giving him its name.
At the bar and tables, many families from the Northwest region and other parts of the Region of Murcia have enjoyed good service, who came to Cehegín attracted by the fame of the establishment. Mari Carmen remembers that, when they took over the bar, it was a dark tavern with no windows. The owner of the ground floor told them that it was not necessary to make a new contract, that the one she had signed with the previous tenant, named Piñero, who had run the tavern since 1939, was sufficient. «We went to see a lawyer friend. ours with the contract and he himself wrote a paragraph on the back of the document stating the change. Throughout the first 12 years, until 1995, they continued renting it until they acquired it on that date; A few years later, in 2014, they bought the adjacent premises that for years was the Motolite bakery.
Paco and Mari Carmen have been great entrepreneurs who have known how to maintain the loyalty of a clientele who, on the day they were going to close the doors of their establishment, wanted to make a present by giving them several surprises that were seasoned with a music band, a fireworks and with the presence of the big heads.
The consolidation of the establishment as a gastronomic reference of the town has been the result of decades of sacrifice
A little over a year ago they decided to 'get into work' to expand the establishment with the basement. Mari Carmen says that, when the bricklayers were trying to demolish a limestone that was in a corner, the ground collapsed, revealing an area that once must have housed jars where the wine that was produced in the area could be preserved. Once they recovered from the shock, they completed the work, in which they invested a good amount of money, and created a new, very charming, vaulted space, which was highly valued by those who have used it for a special celebration.
The hope of a reopening
Paco and Mari Carmen trust that El Mesoncico can open its doors again with new management. “There is no rush,” says Mari Carmen: “We would like to be sure that those who take charge of this business can carry it forward with the same affection and with the same professionalism that we have put in all this time.” When Paco and Mari Carmen started this project, they had just gotten married and were 25 and 21 years old. Mari Carmen was pregnant and, as the business prospered, her first child, Francisco, was born, and three years later, her youngest, Laura. Then a beautiful granddaughter arrived for whom her grandparents lost the winds.
The consolidation of the establishment as a gastronomic reference in Cehegín has been the result of many years of sacrifice. Among the most notable specialties is “rinrán, as it has always been done in Cehegín, with roasted potato, cod crumb, onion, dried pepper, pitted black olives and olive oil.” Paco has been a master of salads, both Russian and seafood, crab and even octopus. “Paco was the first in the entire region to make fresh grilled goat cheese and he also introduced quail eggs.”
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