 Masbia is the brainchild of Mordechai Mandelbaum, a Hasidic Jewish resident of Brooklyn who donated the seed money for the first restaurant in Borough Park in 2005.He and co-founder Alexander Rapaport, another member of the Brooklyn Hasidic community, were aware of many families who had fallen on hard times and were struggling with the high costs of rent and tuition.Back in 2003, a report by the Metropolitan Council on Jewish Poverty had shown that 30% of Brooklyn Jews were living at or below the poverty line.