As restaurants do a 180 on reopening, Melville Tavern’s patio stays busy.

It’s a Friday night and every patio seat at Melville Tavern in Monterey is taken, including two new two-tops that are set up in a hallway entry to the building, part of an effort to accommodate as many diners as possible in a changing landscape of what’s allowed.

This bustling scene feels almost normal for this restaurant that specializes in elevated pub fare, except for the masked servers and slightly reduced menu. But it’s still far fewer people than would’ve been here on a warm weekend night just a few months ago, when indoor seating could fit 50 people (plus 14 at the bar) and outdoor tables could fit 20. Now, with distanced outdoor tables only, the max is 16 customers at a time.

Still, for owner Ian Penniman, this is a scene to celebrate. In mid-March, before shelter-in-place orders came down, he was watching as Gov. Gavin Newsom directed restaurants to reduce seating by 50 percent, and people started staying home. He closed Melville a few days before SIP began, but not because of the coronavirus – he walked in on a Saturday morning and found the walk-in cooler at over 70 degrees, with $2,300 worth of food that had to go.

“The cooler just blew up,” Penniman says. “I had to go to State Farm and make a claim. They go, ‘Is this Covid-related?’ I say, ‘No – I just lost everything.’”

He laid off his staff and spent the next six weeks doing major work: Installing a new cooler, redoing the bar and getting the pizza oven fixed. “I’m a people person,” Penniman says. “It was horrible, walking in here every day and no one was here. It crushed me, for a good month. The only thing I could do during that time was remodel, fix a cooler and keep this thing going.”

Melville reopened for takeout only on May 4, and then for reduced indoor seating on May 31, after state health officials granted Monterey County’s request for an expedited reopening of certain sectors, including indoor dining with physical distancing and other safety measures in place. Shared table-top bottles were gone, replaced with packets of Parmesan, ketchup, hot sauce. “Everything now is single use,” Penniman notes.

Then on July 7, just after Melville staff had adapted to the new normal, they reversed course again and closed indoor dining. A rising Covid-19 case count had landed Monterey County on the state’s watchlist, and health officials ordered some sectors to close again in an effort to control the spread of the virus.

Penniman remains surprisingly upbeat about his prospects despite the string of tough times for the business, which he bought only six months before the pandemic began.

“I’m just a roller and I roll with it,” he says. “I have my evenings of tears. It is hard. But it is so rewarding.”

He applied for and received funds from the federal Payroll Protection Program and Economic Injury Disaster Loan; even at reduced seating capacity, the whole staff is back.

For Penniman, the bigger picture is that he’s living a dream, even if it’s crisis mode. After 35 years in the restaurant business, he finally owns his own place. He started tending bar at 21 at TGI Friday’s in Cupertino, where he had to memorize how to mix a list of 300 drinks. He spent the last 20 years as a bartender and manager at Baja Cantina in Carmel Valley.

His first order of business at Melville was to begin the process of applying for a liquor license so he can bring his bartending experience to bear and add to the current beer and wine offerings. He also went on a mission to add a fish sandwich to the menu, in pursuit of a flavor memory he’d held onto for 30-some years.

“When I was 21, I went to a place in Los Gatos and ordered a blackened fish sandwich,” Penniman recalls. “I could not wipe out in my mind what that sandwich was and what those flavors were. I carried that flavor around in my head.”

The menu has been only slightly revamped to include the blackened mahi sandwich with garlic mayo, red onion, tomato and shredded lettuce on a soft bun.

“The first thing when I came in here was put that blackened fish sandwich on the menu, to satisfy myself,” he says with a laugh. “If you can’t find it anywhere, buy a restaurant to satisfy yourself.”

MELVILLE TAVERN is at 484 Washington St., Monterey. 643-9525, melvilletav.com