Bakers around Chicago, including Justice of the Pies Maya-Camille Broussard, were happy to flip their calendars to February. Carbs and sweets are easy targets for New Year’s resolutions, and that means business can be slower. She’s responded with more lighter offerings, like quiche.
But Broussard is ready for Mardi Gras with two holiday-inspired cakes available this weekend, February 9 to 11, only.
She explains that while growing up her father, Stephen, had King Cake shipped to Chicago from a Louisiana bakery — his family’s from Lake Charles and New Iberia, Louisiana. The tradition involves finding the tiny plastic baby baked inside the cake, it can mean good luck. In the Broussard household, it meant being crowned king.
“If after biting into the pastry and my teeth hit something hard, I’d extract a little pink baby from my lips,” Maya-Camille Broussard says. “I’d win but most years, I’d lose.”
Justice of the Pies is selling king cake.
Cream cheese frosting tops this dark stout cake made with chocolate and espresso.
However, one year, the future baker, who many know from Netflix’s Bake Squad, says she bit into the cake and found a little brown baby: “I was so overjoyed to win a baby that was brown like me. It made up for all the years that I didn’t win,” she says.
That memory meant a lot to Broussard, and as her bakery, 8655 S. Blackstone Avenue in Avalon Park, sits in a predominantly Black community, she figured other customers would enjoy that feeling. So she spent some time searching online for packs of little, plastic, brown babies. She consents that it wasn’t easy. But she achieved her goal.
“I hope to share that joy that I received when I won as ‘king’ after finding a little brown baby,” Broussard says.
Maya-Camille Broussard searched long and high for these.
Hi, there!
She bakes her king cake with a cinnamon layer and folds dried cherries, blueberries, and raisins. She’ll sell them by the slices. And there’s an incentive for the customer who finds the baby — they’ll win a slice of Justice of the Pie’s famous key lime pie.
That’s not the only holiday-minded treat the bakery will sell. Broussard is testing out a new cake that might appeal to St. Patrick’s Day celebrations. Her dark ale cake is made with stout ale, chocolate, espresso, and sour cream. It’s topped with cream cheese frosting. Broussard is hoping she can find a fandom among South Side revelers, and if it’s popular enough, she might offer it in March in time for the holiday. But for now, it’s this weekend only leading up to Fat Tuesday.
Maya-Camille Broussard is happy January is done.
Perhaps the stout cake could be part of future St. Patrick’s Day celebrations?
Crab rangoon can be a polarizing menu item, but a new crop of chefs and diners are embracing the Chinese American staple in Chicago and beyond.
The fried wonton wrappers are normally filled with some ratio of cream cheese and imitation crab, then served with some variant of duck sauce. Its origins aren’t well defined, with the most accepted narrative being it was invented in the ‘40s or ‘50s in the kitchen of Trader Vic’s, the famous Polynesian and tiki bar chain that had a Chicago outpost until 2011 in Gold Coast. There’s not a ton written about the appetizer’s origins. Most scouring the Internet will be taken to a 2019 story in Atlas Obscura.
In 2022, crab Rangoon broke through to social media thanks to a series of TikTok posts made over the years by a Rangoon superfan. The item’s name is derived from a city in Myanmar. Yangon is the largest city in the South Asian country.
Though not a prime example of gourmet cooking, a handful of chefs are dressing the item up using premium ingredients. Some may not take the Rangoon seriously, but the item is enjoying a surge in popularity. And with Lunar New Year approaching (the Year of the Dragon starts on Saturday, February 10) here’s a trio of restaurants offering their unique takes.
Lobster Rangoon from Duck InnThe Duck Inn
Kevin Hickey reveres Chicago’s Chinatown and he grew up nearby in Bridgeport. For the last nine years, the chef and owner of the Duck Inn has celebrated Lunar New Year. It’s the only time they change how they prepare the restaurant’s signature duck, prepping it Beijing-style for the holiday. Hickey reasons that many of his customers are part of the Chinese community. Up until Saturday, February 10, the Duck Inn will offer lobster-filled Rangoon. They come with a pomegranate sweet & sour and optional chili crunch.
The Rangoon Royale served at Bixi Beer in Logan Square is like the Mercedes Benz of the Rangoon circuit. Chef and owner Bo Fowler gave in to her staff’s request for the item and created a souped-up version of the appetizer. Fowler, who was also the mastermind behind Owen & Engine, does not like to skimp on premium ingredients, sourcing from some of the Midwest’s best farmers. After much experimentation, uses a thicker wonton wrapper and fills it with lobster, crawfish, lump crab meat, and snow crab. Instead of cream cheese, she whips cream by hand for a mousse-like texture. She put the item on the menu and didn’t think customers would want a $20 order of fancy crab rangoon. She was wrong, and behind the burger, it’s Bixi’s No. 2-selling item: “I didn’t think they would sell at that price, but they sold like crazy,” she says.
Perfect with one of the beers brewed on the premises, the Rangoon Royale is a permanent menu item at Bixi.
Chef Henry Cai wanted an appetizer to complement the more American items on the menu of his Chinese American restaurant, something to pair with his burger and chicken sandwiches. He dipped into the nostalgia vault for memories of growing up in America with an immigrant family, seeing kids eat Tontino Pizza Rolls and Hot Pockets, and begging his parents to buy those products for him.
In January, he unveiled the Pizza Rangoon, a superior version of what he wanted in his youth. Unlike Hot Pockets, the crusts aren’t soggy. The wonton is a better vessel, Cai says, and he stuffs it with shredded mozzarella, white onions, tomato puree, pizza sauces, a dash of five spice, and then wraps the filling with a slice of mozzarella. The latter gives the Rangoon a cheese pull worthy of an old cartoon, Cai says. The exterior is coated with Italian season and Romano cheese. This is a permanent menu item at Cai’s new South Loop restaurant.
Sweet-toothed Chicagoans are counting down to Paczki Day, the last day before Lenten season and better known as Fat Tuesday outside of Chicago. Locals descend upon city and suburban bakeries annually and line up for boxes of the traditional Polish treat, which essentially packs 40 days’ worth of sugar and butter into a holeless doughnut.
Kelly Ijichi, a Japanese American chef, has kept an eye trained on the calendar. On Tuesday, February 13, she and a cadre of hospitality collaborators will unveil their unusual and inventive paczki creations. They will host a paczki party on Fat Tuesday in the former home of Big Kids in Logan Square. The irreverent sandwich shop closed on Sunday, February 4, after three years. The festivities will also serve as one last hurrah.
For Ijichi, who ran a pop-up and food stall called Mom’s, this isn’t the first time she’s dabbled with paczki. Chef Lorraine Nguyen has concocted a pastry with malted sunchoke cremeux, dark chocolate, and cacao (“In my head, it tastes like a very good chocolate milkshake from Steak ‘n Shake,”), while baker Rosie Est is stuffing hers with guava citrus cardamom filling and topping them with vanilla icing and puffed rice for a satisfying crunch. Cheesemonger Alisha Norris Jones is tapping into her memory of a standout cheese board at Michelin-starred Lutèce in D.C. for her take, featuring curry comte honeycomb cream.
Not to be outdone, Ijichi promises two paczki, a milk chocolate version with hatcho miso and hazelnut praline; and an old favorite, her truffled paczki. It’s stuffed with truffle honey cream and showered with shaved winter truffle and edible gold leaves. That’s all on top of special walk-in-only offerings, like Nguyen’s Fruity Pebbles-inspired option with strawberry mousse filling and makrut lime glaze. She estimates that each year, the team makes around 600 paczki. It’s a goofy, sugar-soaked time, and Ijichi’s way of forming partnerships with friends and hospitality players, with past participants including Roshelley Mayén of to-go cocktail business Juanitas Bebidas and Palita Sriratana of Thai food brand Pink Salt.
Ijichi began making paczki five years ago when she ran Mom’s out of Marz Community Brewing in Bridgeport. Every year, the Polish- and Korean-owned brewery hosts a Paczki Fest featuring sweet treats from neighborhood bakeries as well as special seasonal beers. Neither Ijichi nor her collaborators are of Polish descent, but the Chicago tradition piqued their interest and presented an opportunity to experiment with questions of food and identity.
“As people who had multicultural experiences growing up, it’s always fun to look at food as something that evolves,” Nguyen says, noting the prevalence of Western chefs who build careers by interpreting cuisines from other parts of the world. “But I think there’s something really powerful and great in flipping that scenario. Instead of a Western lens looking globally, it’s a global lens looking at something Western.”
Four packs of paczki (one of each flavor) and truffle paczki are available for pre-order online through Thursday, February 8. Pickup is from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. on Fat Tuesday, February 13 at Big Kids, 2545 N. Kedzie Boulevard.
John Latino, the chef and founder of the Bongo Room, the Wicker Park restaurant that helped usher in the phenomenon of brunch in Chicago, has died.
A South Side native, Latino opened the original Bongo Room in 1993 with longtime friend and business partner Derrick Robles in Wicker Park. The duo earned legions of fans over their 30-year partnership, attracting admirers and imitators with a joyful take that raised the bar on breakfast and brunch all over town.
The 58-year-old Latino died suddenly of natural causes on Thursday, January 11 in Chicago, Robles says.
“John really spoke with his food,” Robles says. “He was a quiet man, shy most of the time… We never really sought out recognition, we just kind of kept our nose to the grindstone and blinders on to focus on the restaurant, letting John’s food and our service speak for itself.”
They would move from the original Damen Avenue location four years after opening. Long weekend brunch lines would regularly stretch onto the sidewalk of Milwaukee Avenue outside the current location in Wicker Park with customers indulging in specialty pancakes and other items. While chefs famously hate brunch, Bongo Room embraced it and customers woke up early to get on the waitlist. Bongo Room is hailed as one of the restaurants that turned Wicker Park into a brunch village. Bongo Room also provides a haven for weekday breakfast for neighborhood locals.
Derrick Robles (left) and John Latino (right) founded Bongo Room in 1993.Derrick Robles
Robles, who grew up in Beverly, met Latino in 1992 when they worked together at Gold Coast’s famed Pump Room, but the men had crossed paths before. Robles recalls first seeing Latino in 1988 across the room at now-shuttered LGBTQ nightclub icon Berlin. “He was kind of goth back then, he wore kilts and combat boots and had his hair spiked up 10 inches high,” Robles says.
While Robles was growing weary of hospitality, Latino, then a student at Kendall College, always wanted to open a restaurant. That dream became a reality faster than they anticipated when a friend of Latino wanted to get out of a lease at 1560 N. Damen Avenue, the present site of Stan’s Donuts. That’s where Robles and Latino debuted their first location. After struggling the first year and a half with operations, challenges that Robles says contributed to the end of their romantic relationship, Latino developed a series of dishes that would become the restaurant’s signature, like fluffy lemon ricotta pancakes and banana bread French toast.
Robles and Latino were best friends and business partners for three decades.Derrick Robles
1994 was a red-letter year for Bongo Room thanks to rockstar Liz Phair, a Chicagoan who recorded her debut album Exile in Guyville at nearby Idful Music studio. Phair (also a former regular at indie rock dive Rainbo Club) met a reporter for an interview in Rolling Stone over Latino’s blueberry pancakes, and the restaurant snagged a mention in the article.
Longtime friend Margaret MacKay held several positions at Bongo Room in the late ‘90s and says the restaurant’s popularity never went to Latino’s head. “He was a perfectionist,” she says. “He wanted to touch every plate [because] every plate had meaning to him. He felt like it was a reflection on him and [Robles].”
During the early years of Bongo Room, Chicago businesses generally didn’t advertise their LGBTQ ownership. While the restaurant was never awash in rainbow flags, Robles says they never hid who they were. He credits that to the accepting atmosphere of Wicker Park at the time, then an artist enclave where “everyone could be who they wanted to be and live without judgment,” relative to other parts of the city.
Latino and Robles sought out a larger space and in 1997 relocated to 1470 N. Milwaukee Avenue. Six years later, they opened a South Loop location (it closed in 2019) and expanded in 2012 to Andersonville. Since 2020, however, the business has struggled, says Robles.
As he grieves for Latino, he is unsure of what the future holds for Bongo Room. Weekend business has returned to about 80 percent of pre-pandemic levels, but weekday numbers remain dramatically reduced.
“[His] passing, on a personal level, has been so incredibly devastating and soul-crushing for me,” Robles says. “For me, it’s kind of like losing my left arm and I don’t know how to envision staying open without him…. it’s knowing there will never be another John Latino spring or fall menu — that was a rude awakening. It was a jolt, that it won’t happen again.”
News of Latino’s death spread quickly among the extended Bongo Room community, with friends and former employees across the country reconnecting to share memories from years past. MacKay remembers Latino’s affectionate, kind demeanor, as well as his apparent inability to say a bad word about anyone, including the most difficult patrons.
“I’d like for people to think that about me, but it really was the case with [Latino],” MacKay says. “He was always just lighthearted to be around, loving, like a unicorn. To me, he was one of a kind.”
Robles agrees. “In the restaurant business, you can come across some pretty challenging customers, and we did throughout the past three decades,” he says. “But John never had an unkind word for anybody… He’d do anything for the people he loved. It wasn’t easy to get into John’s circle, but once you were in, you were in for life.”
Funeral services were held on Wednesday, January 17 at Lawn Funeral Home in Tinley Park.
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At any one point in time, I’m bugging dozens of chefs and bartenders all across the country to let me know what their favorite store-bought items are (like chicken nuggets, croissants, boxed mac and cheese, bourbon, and vodka). This is all in hopes that we, dear reader, can recreate that restaurant-level magic at home. And what better way to start the new year than by seeking out the chef’s favorite brand of arguably the greatest ingredient of all time?
As it turns out, there is one brand, in particular, that really sizzles.
The Best Bacon to Buy, According to Chefs
As far as chefs are concerned, you can count yourself as especially lucky if you’re familiar with North Country Smokehouse’s bacon. If not, it’s time to get acquainted. “I’ve tried just about every variety and brand of bacon available to the general public,” says Chef Gavin Lambert of pop-up restaurant Bon Ami. “If I’m not making my own … I’m buying North Country.”
This is not your average slab, Lambert notes: The delicacy of smoke, and the general care and pride in its production, make North Country’s bacon one of the most versatile for using in stews, braises, and sauces. “Plus, in my house we save every single gram of rendered bacon fat to use for cooking in place of oil — liquid gold, as we call it.”
Chef Brian Poe, of Tip Tap Room and Crane River Cheese Club in Boston, who heard about the brand from acclaimed Michelin-starred chef Thomas Keller, agrees wholeheartedly: “It’s got such a lovely thickness, viscosity, umami, and proper smoke to it,” says Poe. “It’s meant to be snacked upon, as well as an amuse, app, soup, salad, entrée, and dessert.”
Whether it’s at home or in his restaurant kitchen, North Country also has a fan in Chef Morgan Jarrett of STATE Grill and Bar, the flagship restaurant of the Empire State Building. “We use North Country at my restaurant for our “Clothesline Bacon,” Jarrett says of the popular dish, which involves slow-cooking bacon over rye bread (to catch all those majestic bacon drippings).
If You’re Cooking Bacon, a Few Chef-Approved Tips
So you’ve brought home the bacon — what now? You’ve got two main choices: Opt for pan-frying or cook in the oven. As for the chefs, the oven is, overwhelmingly, the way to go. “Stop cooking your bacon in a frying pan — this is Sisyphus’s work!” pleads Jarrett. “Instead, take a small sheet tray and line it with parchment paper. Lay the bacon in a single layer, and cook it at 350ºF.” After about six to eight minutes, much like you’d do while tanning on a hot beach, give that bacon a flip.
No matter how you choose to cook your bacon (in the oven or in a frying pan), don’t forget the flip. “Flipping halfway through cooking is crucial!” Lambert adds. “Cooking the bacon too far on one side will result in crunchy, dry strips, and it will lack that signature chew.”
Across the board, chefs beg you to not throw away that bacon grease. Like, don’t even think about it. Of course, we all have had a jar full of bacon grease (and good intentions) that we’ve forgotten to use in a timely manner, but Jarrett urges home cooks to keep that jar of liquid gold — especially when you’re shelling out for top-notch bacon: “You can then save that bacon fat and keep it by your stove for general cooking needs; I keep it in this container.”
Do you agree with these chefs? Let us know in the comments below.
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If you’ve ever seen The Bear, you know there are major differences between the rush of restaurant service and making weeknight meals at home. And yet, it doesn’t matter if you’re cooking in a high-end restaurant kitchen or whipping up dinner after a long day at work: Putting care and effort into what you cook and eat can turn any boring plate of food into an incredible culinary experience. That’s one of the reasons why I work in hospitality — and a big part of why I think you should buy a gift for the home cook in your life this holiday season.
It doesn’t have to be something super expensive, either. Just treating them to a memorable meal — or better yet, a gift that helps them make one at home — is perfect for those friends or family members who love to cook. A gift for the home chef in your life, whether they’re learning how to scramble eggs or perfecting their bouillabaisse recipe, not only develops, but encourages the kitchen skills and culinary curiosity that leads to cooking great food by making time spent in the kitchen more engaging — and improving the final result.
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
In the ever-evolving landscape of the restaurant industry Hart House is committed to creating a space where plant-based food options are more accessible to all.
“This is plant-based food for the people…” Hart House CEO and co-founder Andy Hooper tells host Shawn Walchef of CaliBBQ Media. “…an opportunity to take food that is objectively delicious in its own right that just so happens to be made from something different than it’s normally made from.”
Hart House is an innovative quick-service restaurant concept founded by Kevin Hart and partners. The company is committed to the future of food, as well as the overall wellbeing of its customers.
“I founded Hart House to create a good experience that combines the joy of coming together over food, with the power of purpose,” Kevin Hart said on the Hart House website.
Drawing inspiration from renowned restaurant brands, CEO Andy Hooper envisions a melding of their successes with a goal of creating a job structure that empowers individuals managing Hart House units. Therefore offering them real equity and the opportunity to thrive.
“What would it look like if we took the best of Chick-Fil-A, the best of Outback’s Managing Partner program, the best of what Darden (Restaurants) has done to build their brand with full service over time. The best of what Cheesecake Factory did with their single unit operators.
“And rolled that all into a job that gave real equity to the people managing these units?” says Hooper. “Thinking about it more as an investment thesis than a cost management approach.”
This employee facing experience aligns seamlessly with Hart House’s overarching mission to create a space that is both hospitable to customers and serves the employee.
Andy Hooper recognizes that a restaurant’s success transcends its physical offerings. Taking cues from industry giants like McDonald’s, Hooper understands that building a lasting brand necessitates careful consideration of every detail that contributes to the broadest possible appeal.
With Hart House, the team is aiming to embrace the investment thesis that emphasizes the long-term benefits of cultivating a skilled, dedicated, and motivated workforce.
Hooper’s pursuit of his vision was amplified when he met with multi-hyphenate entertainer extraordinaire and health enthusiast Kevin Hart. During this initial meeting, Hooper posed an important question to Kevin.
“Candidly, my first question was, why do you need this?” he recalls. “Restaurants, as you know well, are not exactly a get rich quick scheme, especially for somebody who honestly probably has more to lose than to gain, at least on the surface. My question was like, why?”
Luckily, Hart’s answer aligned with Hooper’s vision and the two set the wheels in motion for what would become Hart House.
As we witness the birth of a new level of accessibility in plant based foods, the possibilities for both customers and employees in the realm of hospitality are expanding.
Hart House stands as a testament to Hooper, Hart, and team’s audacity and unwavering dedication to creating a paradigm shift in the restaurant industry and usher in a new era of quick-service food.
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When reached for comment, Johnson responded with the following statement via her personal attorney, Rachel E. Juarez:
“Last November, my client Liz Johnson made the extreme decision to seek protection for herself and her three dogs from her partner Will Aghajanian. Over a decade together, what began as a deep love for him had deteriorated into an unsafe, abusive, and isolated environment for her.
She chose to do this in silence and secrecy—fleeing her home without alerting anyone as to what she was doing. It is and has always been Ms. Johnson’s intention to maintain the privacy of this situation, and to get through this as quickly as possible.
What we are witnessing publicly play out is what Will has done behind closed doors for years. Exercising control over Liz through humiliation and confusion. We otherwise will not comment on his actions and ask that you respect her privacy as she continues to heal.”
Horses opened in late 2021 to glowing reviews. A New York Times headline declared it “A Hollywood Hangout Where the Food Is Actually the Point”; last January, the LA Times called it “a new modern LA institution.” VF featured the restaurant in our annual Hollywood issue, citing the legacy of its building: Between 1934 and 2007 the space was home to the British pub Ye Coach & Horses, frequented by Richard Burton, Alfred Hitchcock, and Quentin Tarantino. Under Johnson and Aghajanian, celebrities from Will Ferrell to Chrissy Teigen dined at the restaurant; in late 2022, Jeff Bezos and Jay-Z were photographed there together on a typically closed Monday night. In meteoric time, Horses became the kind of hard-to-book table favored by a particular set of industry insiders, for which having a contact to text for a reservation garnered cache. The rumors and reported divorce filings have thus been met with tantamount, if morbid, interest.
In a metatwist of one whisper, A24 supposedly secured the rights to an as-yet-unpublished feature about these reports. Untrue, according to a spokesperson for A24: “can confirm not us!” “This is an emergency episode,” said Jason Stewart, cohost of the “bicoastal elite” podcast How Long Gone, in Friday’s installment. “AI is going to replace us creatives,” he joked, alluding to the episode’s content. “I’m just kidding, it’s [about] Horses.”
The couple’s rapid ascent in the food world had not been without controversy. In March 2020 the couple suddenly departed their posts as head chefs at Nashville’s acclaimed The Catbird Seat, which they had held for a year. “While it’s true the restaurant itself is defined as a chef incubator intended to develop young chefs and give them their own eventual restaurants, this stint seems curiously short, especially given the recent national spotlight,” Eater wrote at the time of their departure. Johnson, now age 32, and Aghajanian, 31, had been co-nominated for the James Beard Award for Rising Star Chef of the Year only a week before. (In Aghajanian’s complaint, his friend Sam Burchett alleged that Johnson physically abused Aghajanian at the restaurant. The Catbird Seat did not respond to VF’s questions by press time.)
In August 2022, Eater reported that Ken Friedman had done the walkthrough of the Horses space with Johnson and Aghajanian. Friedman, in one of the restaurant industry’s earliest #MeToo-era shakeups, left the Spotted Pig following an investigation by New York’s attorney general that found he had sexually harassed 11 staff members. (Per the New York Times, Friedman agreed to pay $240,000 and a share of his profits to former employees.) Horses denied Friedman’s involvement in its business, but Friedman maintained that he held a twenty percent stake in the restaurant, telling Eater, “People know, the word’s out. Why should I hide it?”
Earlier last year, in April, the New York Times reported that Johnson and Aghajanian had tapped another controversial figure for their newest venture, Froggy’s, set to open in New York: Thomas Carter, the former Estela co-owner whose partner Ignacio Mattos bought him out of the restaurant following a report of toxic workplace behavior. Former employees alleged that he made comments about his genitals and was prone to calling various staff members, at various times, a “fucking retard.” (A statement to the Times approved by both Carter and Mattos confirmed his departure but did not comment on allegations.) Johnson told Eater in April 2022 that she had hired him “because we were seeking someone whose expertise would complement the vision for the project, and would help lighten the load from a business perspective,” but that “Thomas will not be present on the floor day-to-day.” This week, Carter confirmed to Eater that he is not “a managing partner” nor involved in the restaurant’s future plans.
On Wednesday night the restaurant posted a message to their Instagram account: “Will Aghajanian has been on a leave of absence from Horses as of November 2022, and since then he has not been involved in the day-to-day operations of the restaurant. Under the guidance of Chef Liz, our incredible front and back of house teams are working to continuously make Horses what she had always intended it to be – a place of joy and celebration. Horses has no further comments outside of this statement.”
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
Mr. Bake Kareem Queeman has been baking since the age of eight and has found fame from the oven to the camera. Now, he has become a rising voice advocating for the LGBTQ+ community.
Kareem Queeman found his purpose by answering a difficult question: “If I was to leave this Earth tomorrow, would I be happy with the life that I’ve lived?”
After acknowledging that his answer to the question posed above was “no”, Queeman took action to change the narrative and became a strong advocate for the “unseen” LGBTQ+ community.
“I started to really start changing with that and start speaking out more about that change, about going to therapy. And then that’s when I found that passion,” says Kareem Queeman to Restaurant Influencers host Shawn Walchef of CaliBBQ Media.
One of the most important qualities an entrepreneur must possess is courage. Kareem Queeman didn’t always possess that in spades.
After a meeting with a fellow black entrepreneur who made wine, Queeman realized the importance of telling his story with media, which helped him progress and become the powerful voice he is today.
“He said, they will get into your story more than they will buy into your product. And I sat on that for a little while,” Queeman says of the encounter. “And then it hit me six or seven months later.”
Running a business is not an easy feat, and there will be plenty of obstacles to overcome, and Queeman has faced his fair share of adversity. But he has done the internal work necessary to persevere and advises other entrepreneurs to do the same.
“When you are faced with another adversity or when you are faced with another opportunity or you want to go for something and you start to doubt yourself, I want everybody to remind themselves, how did they get to where they are today?” asks Queeman. “Do not forget your power.”
Kareem Queeman’s story is an inspiring one. His journey to find and intentionally pursue his passion of becoming a voice for the LGBTQ+ community is one that reminds us that we have the power to achieve our dreams, and find our own voice, as well.
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Rethinking How We Get Food – A traditional restaurant is one brand under one roof. With a commissary kitchen you can have multiple brands under one roof. But with CookUnity it’s different. Their “roof” is an app that connects chef with consumer. Technology is helping food get around easier, which is a win for cooks and eaters alike.
Helping Chefs Scale – While the average chef might feed hundreds a day, CookUnity helps them reach thousands with a scalable model that includes kitchen space, ingredients, and essential services for running a food business. This model has helped their chefs make lots more money than they would just cooking at one restaurant.
Customers Want Variety – In the food industry the customer wants choice. Mateo Marietti points out that even the biggest burger brands don’t reach a majority of customers because the market demands options. CookUnity helps provide eaters with a bevy of choices by partnering with dozens of chefs from around the United States.
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CookUnity CEO Mateo Marietti is on a mission to reconnect farmer to chef to eater.
Mateo Marietti co-founded the CookUnity meal subscription service with a belief in the power of great food. And great food comes from great chefs.
But far too often it’s hard for cooks — even the best — to expand outside the walls of their restaurants.
That’s where CookUnity comes in to help.
“We want thousands of people per day to enjoy your recipes, not just hundreds,” said Mateo Marietti to Restaurant Influencers host Shawn Walchef of CaliBBQ Media.
CookUnity is an innovative “chef collective” that sells personalized meal subscription plans with an emphasis on quality, health, and sustainability. It connects top chefs from top restaurants directly with thousands of diners all over the United States.
The New York-based company provides kitchen space, ingredients, and other vital services for their large line-up of chefs. Then the meal magic can be scaled much easier.
“The problem that we are trying to solve primarily is the access problem. So if you’re a successful restaurateur or chef, your impact is not that big. Your reach is not that big, even the successful ones.”
Being a chef with CookUnity means being able to tap into a pre-existing customer base, scalability potential, and far less headaches than it takes to operate a restaurant location.
“We have two chefs doing more than $2 million a year in income, while more than 20 percent of our chefs are making more than a million,” the company co-founder said.
Mateo Marietti has been connected with food his whole life. He was born on a farm in Argentina and has worked in the business for a long time at the intersection of food, logistics, and technology. Mateo estimates that the brands he has built have delivered more than 25 million meals combined.
The Pandemic of 2020 took CookUnity to another level due to an increase in people wanting to eat at home.
“It was an inflection point. And we continue growing steadily since then,” he said.
Even though CookUnity is operating in an emerging space in the food industry, Mateo knows in a few years people will get used to the idea of ordering their meals online directly from amazing chefs. After all, there was a time when it was still new to rent a stranger’s house through a website, or get a ride from a stranger with a cell phone app.
“I will argue that customers are always looking for new things and not necessarily satisfied,” said Mateo Marietti. “Even the biggest brands, companies become a tiny fraction (of the market). And to me, that is a sign that consumers always want to try new things.”
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