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Chef-owner Pino Spatola of Paesano Ristorante in San Joses Little Italy has positioned the propane lamps on the courtyard and turned on the heat in the dining room even though all the doors and windows are wide open for ventilation. He and his staff are now welcoming customers with a question that they never thought theyd be asking during the chilly months of the year:Inside or outside?With temperatures plummeting in recent days, restaurant owners are scrambling to winterize their patios and put social distancing measures into effect indoors in hopes of weathering the coronavirus-caused loss of business. So far, many say, Californians may be a hardier breed than the stereotype would indicate. As long as the propane heaters keep humming, that is. They are quite a hot commodity, said Gina Seghi, general manager of Oaklands Belcampo, whose Southern California colleagues shipped eight heaters to this Jack London Square location to supplement the eight gas-fed stationary ones. We were lucky to get in under the wire. At the Taplands brewpub in Santa Clara, owner Matt Hartenstein has been scrambling to find a solution to his patio heating problem. By sheer coincidence, at the end of last winter we decided to get rid of the heaters we had. They were getting kind of ratty. We figured, well get new ones this winter. Now were kind of stuck, he said. Who knew?He searched unsuccessfully here and in Colorado, Utah and Nevada for propane heaters, the latest in a long line of pandemic-related product shortages to occur since March, when the coronavirus created new consumer priorities. A customer donated one propane heater, and Hartenstein now has pivoted and is having new wiring installed for electric heaters. Chef Paul and Laura Magu of Lafayettes Rve Bistro also had to come up with solutions besides French onion soup to keep their customers toasty when they discovered large propane heaters sold out at most