The State Liquor Authority issued Moksha Cafe its own license on August 14, and with that, the wine bar that has been quietly taking shape at 249 Main Street in Northport is official. The license, on the books to Moksha Cafe LLC, runs through July 31, 2028.

A coffee shop that was always headed here

Moksha never hid its ambitions. The cafe across from the John W. Engeman Theater bills itself as a specialty coffee shop and wine bar in the same breath: handcrafted espresso by day, curated wines by the glass, kava cocktails, charcuterie boards, sandwiches and flatbreads as the day goes on, with wine bar evenings running Thursday through Saturday. The through line is the man behind the counter. Founder Joe VanRoten is a sommelier, and the wine program reads like it, built on curation and pairings rather than a cooler full of the usual suspects.

VanRoten and his wife Robyn took over the Main Street storefront in April 2025 and built it into Moksha, a Sanskrit word for liberation. Robyn, who balances a healthcare career alongside the cafe, was four and a half months pregnant with the couple's first child when they took the keys, a detail that says something about the household's appetite for a challenge.

What the license actually changes

The difference between an application and an issued license is the difference between a promise and a fixture. The state's food and beverage license now on file for 249 Main Street stands in the cafe's own name, Moksha Cafe LLC, and holds through July 2028, which means the Thursday-through-Saturday wine bar nights, the tastings and the by-the-glass list are not a preview of a concept awaiting approval. They are the business, secured for the next two years.

Moksha has been building that side of the house in public view. A four-course wine and cheese pairing with Northport's own Harbor Cheese, 70 dollars a seat, has run through the village chamber of commerce calendar, and the cafe's menu leans into territory most coffee shops never touch, kava cocktails included.

Main Street is becoming a drinks block

The timing puts Moksha at the front of a small wave on its own block. Steps away at 245 Main Street, a newcomer called Mimi's filed its own liquor application with the SLA this month for a storefront facing the Engeman, a filing this publication covered last week. The theater anchors the east end of Main Street with hundreds of ticket holders a night, and the storefronts across the way are visibly organizing themselves around that foot traffic: dinner before the show, a glass after.

Northport has never lacked for bars, but a sommelier-run wine list on Main Street is a different offer, closer to what the North Fork does than what Route 25A usually serves. That it lives inside a coffee shop, where the espresso machine works mornings and the wine list works nights, makes it the kind of double-life business that villages this size increasingly run on.

The block matters because Northport's Main Street is one of the few on Long Island that still works the old way: a walkable run of storefronts sloping down to the harbor, a village dock at the bottom, and a professional theater in the middle pulling audiences out of their cars on nights the weather would otherwise keep them home. Businesses on that street live and die on whether people linger after the curtain or the sunset, and every licensed table is another reason to linger. A cafe that can hand you an espresso at 8 a.m. and a glass of something the somm picked at 8 p.m. is built for exactly that rhythm.

What it means for a Northport evening

The practical version: on a Thursday, Friday or Saturday night in Northport, there is now a licensed wine bar across from the Engeman with a sommelier choosing what is open, and the arrangement is secured through the summer of 2028. If you are seeing a show, the pre-curtain glass just got easier. If you are not, the cafe's evening service is its own reason to walk Main Street, which has always been the point of Main Street.