A summer salad, salmon amore and crème brûlée are among the most popular dishes at Silk Spoon, the first kosher, sit-down fine dining restaurant on Staten Island.

For Isaac Berg, who moved to the neighborhood with his wife and eight children about two and a half years ago, the restaurant has made daily life noticeably easier.

What You Need To Know

Many Orthodox Jewish people have moved to Staten Island to live in a suburban neighborhood and still be close to Borough Park, Brooklyn, an Orthodox Jewish center

While many Orthodox Jewish families move to Staten Island for the space and the growing community, they still send their kids to school in Borough Park, as there are not as many options for Jewish education on Staten Island

“Silk Spoon,” the first kosher sit-down restaurant on Staten Island, just opened on Bradley Avenue in Manor Heights, and a new mikvah, which is a Jewish ritual bath, is under construction in the neighborhood

“It’s absolutely life changing. It’s such a big thing for us. It’s a huge thing for us,” Berg said. “We came here for a meal. And we were so happy. Now we can take our kids for their birthdays. You don’t have to travel all the way to Brooklyn, which is a time-killer.”

The commute to Borough Park, Brooklyn, is a familiar one for many Hasidic Jews living on Staten Island. In recent years, families have increasingly moved to neighborhoods like Manor Heights, drawn by suburban space while remaining close to one of the city’s largest Orthodox Jewish centers.

“Never in my life did I think I was going to live on Staten Island, then we’re like, ‘Oh my gosh, there’s no sirens. It’s so quiet,’” Berg told NY1. “Now that there’s a restaurant, we’re like, ‘OK, we really scored.’”

Berg’s family is among a growing number of ultra-Orthodox Jewish families that have relocated to Manor Heights over the past decade.

Joshua Katz, owner of Katz Realty NYC, said he has seen an average of 70 to 80 new Orthodox Jewish families move to Staten Island each year for about a decade.

“Everyone’s Orthodox that’s moving in. It’s just more, I’d say, Hasidic families that were born and raised in Borough Park. And then it’s right over the bridge,” Katz said. “You have a lot bigger bang for your buck. You get grass, you get backyards, you get driveways. It’s a hot commodity in Brooklyn to get a driveway.”

While many families move for the space and the growing community, education remains tied to Brooklyn. Many Orthodox Jewish children still attend school in Borough Park, where there are more religious schooling options.

Bright yellow school buses with Hebrew writing can be seen throughout Manor Heights, picking up and dropping off students each weekday.

Sheva Kurtz, who moved from Borough Park to Manor Heights about five years ago, said her three children still attend school in Brooklyn.

“This is just off the bridge from Brooklyn, so it’s convenient to just, you live your Brooklyn life when it comes to schooling and your work, but you have the spaciousness of Staten Island,” she said.

Her husband owns Island Kosher, a supermarket a short drive from Manor Heights. Kurtz said he has seen steady growth in the community year after year and hopes the neighborhood continues to develop into a self-sustaining hub.

“Hopefully one day it will be a center, and we’re not going to be depending on Brooklyn,” she said.

There are already visible signs of that growth. Congregation Khal Mkilnitz, one of the area’s main synagogues, recently added a new building. The synagogue has been in the neighborhood for eight years.

Rabbi Babad, who leads the congregation, said 125 Hasidic families belong to the synagogue and estimates there are about 800 Hasidic families living on Staten Island.

A new mikvah, a Jewish ritual bath used for spiritual purification, is also under construction in Manor Heights.

The project has been supported through a series of community fundraisers.