Latest / The Steve Harvey Morning Show / Chef Edouardo Jordan: Founder of Chitlins’ Clothing Line, Acclaimed James Beard Restaurants Owner

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Chef Edouardo Jordan: Founder of Chitlins’ Clothing Line, Acclaimed James Beard Restaurants Owner · The Steve Harvey Morning Show

• 0:04
  Speaker 1: Welcome to Money Making Conversations. It's the show that she
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: has the secrets of success experience firsthand by marketing and
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: Brandon expert Rashan McDonald. I will know he's giving me
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: advice on many occasions. In occasion didn't notice, I'm not broke.
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: You know. He'll be interviewing celebrity CEOs, entrepreneurs and industry
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: decision makers. It's what he likes to do, It's what
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: he likes to share. Now it's time to hear from
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: my man, Rashan McDonald. Money Making Conversations Here we come.
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: Welcome to Money Making Conversations. I'm your host with Sean McDonald.
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  Speaker 1: It is important to understand that everybody travels a different
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  Speaker 1: path to success. That's because your brand is different, the
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  Speaker 1: other people's success stories and start writing your own. Now.
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  Speaker 1: You can be motivated by their success because their stories
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: can offer direction and if you reach your goals through
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: your planning and committed effort. My next guest is Eduardo Jordan's.
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: He was born and raised in St. Petersburg, Florida, attended
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: college at the University of Florida. I know he'd happy
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: right now because at football team, you know, make it
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: into college football playoffs. After graduating with dual degrees in
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: business administration and sports management, Jordan decided to enroll in
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: culinary school that they looked look Look Carton, Carton Blue
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: and on Lando Farida, and his life shifted from business
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: to food. She have Georgiana's twenty seventeen James Beard Award
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: finalists and received the prestigious teen James Beard a War
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: for Best Chef Northwest and Best New Restaurant for June
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: Baby Restaurant. Currently, his per Mental cheese is in Whole Foods,
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: mat Market, Kent Market and more. To comp please work
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: with the money making conversations. I'm called a good friend
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: because I've shared the meal at June Babies. I know
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: how good it is. Edward Jordan's all right, thanks for
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: having me. And well, you know it was funny, man.
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: I was, you know, my wife, our anniversaries. It's in
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: December last year, and and so we're just trying to
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: figure out the place to go. And uh and I said,
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: we know, share read reviews on your restaurant, you know,
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: and uh, and your restaurant is really the reason I
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: love your restural because it's in the northwest part of
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: the country and it has a Southern menu. Okay, that
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: corn bread, that biscuits and all that. So tell us
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: about bringing a Southern menu to the northwest part of
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: the country. And I want to tell everybody the place.
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: I had a line out to do it. So I
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: felt fortunate to get in. When I got in, and
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: this was in the month of December of last year,
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: so talked about that menu coming northwest like that at water. Well.
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: You know, I'm a classically trained chef. I always dreamed
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: of opening my own restaurant. Uh and I have three restaurants,
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: but my first restaurant, it was all about my culinary journey.
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: It was about expressing my whole journey as a professional chef.
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: And you know, as I built my platform and had
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: a microphone to start speaking, I realized that I needed
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: to do more and share my story as an African
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: American chef. UM and I opened up the doors to
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: Junie Baby, and yes, we're about away from the South,
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: but I'm here. I'm here in Seattle, and I wanted
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: to express myself my ancestors, my mom, my grandmother, all
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: the foods that made me who I am and so
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: um that was the birth of jim Baby pretty much.
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: I know I mentioned something a couple of things on
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: the menu. Can you break down some of the Southern
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: items that are on that mevenue from your standpoint and
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: why you decided to You know, I would say take
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: a risk, but then that food, that culinary experience or
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: experience food experience wasn't up there, so I have to
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: say it was a risk. But you you put you,
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: but you did, You did your sampling and you did it.
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: Talk about adding different things and why you did, why
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: I did it? Yeah, I mean there there's so much
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: to it. You know. When when I opened up Jim Baby,
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: southern food was a cool thing again, and all the
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: cool restaurants that were Southern were rambo white male chefs.
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: And what I knew I needed to do is open
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: up a restaurant that represented my perspective as a black man,
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: as a black chef, um from my perspective, from my lens,
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  Speaker 1: and so the foods that I ate as a youth
• 4:07
  Speaker 1: is the ones that I wanted to have on the
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: menu and done from a chef perspective. Still like elevated.
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: Grandma went to culinary school kind of feel. So you'll
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: see things on my menu like neckbones, Well tell about
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: pork neckbones, you know with rice um. You gotta see
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: chileans on my menu. You're gonna see hogma on my menu.
• 4:25
  Speaker 1: And we've got some of the Southern classic staples like
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: pimento cheese, and we got like boiled peanuts and fried
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: okra that Sunday fried chicken. Things of that nature are there.
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: But I'm also opening people eyes to like, you know,
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: other ingredients that made up the South before the South
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: became commercialized by these franchise restaurants like ben A Seds,
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: and you know, the birth of various color greens, not
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: just one particular color greens. You've got like blue blue
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: vein color greens. You got your Georgia colar greens. You know,
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: You've got you know, soft skin color greens. You got
• 4:58
  Speaker 1: your mustard greens. You got to turn green. So I'm
• 5:01
  Speaker 1: bringing that all to light in this restaurant. And what
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: I tell people is that like I pretty much put
• 5:06
  Speaker 1: on horse blinders and didn't let anyone distrike me, and
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: I actually made the food that I wanted to cook,
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: the food that like my I grew up on the
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: food that, like I knew, it was my heart and
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: my soul and more importantly good food though good. Yeah. Man, Now,
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: like I told everybody when I went up there at
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: last December, the restaurant was packed. The service was outstanding.
• 5:28
  Speaker 1: Uh No one out now say that because he knows.
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: I just went in as a customer. You know. I
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: didn't want to like going into an experience where you know,
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: people put extra shine on you because they know who
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: you are and things like that. And the service, the
• 5:40
  Speaker 1: food was outstanding, you know. And uh and he also
• 5:43
  Speaker 1: they also know I pay for my food. I don't
• 5:45
  Speaker 1: go in there looking for a hook up or discount
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: because you're a small business. And with that being said,
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: with the COVID nteen hidden small bit black or white,
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: the restaurant basiness has been confusing as to how to
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: operate on the COVID at talk about what's going on
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: with your business right now? Yeah, I mean it has
• 6:03
  Speaker 1: been up and down, your blessing and a curse to
• 6:06
  Speaker 1: a certain degree. Um you know, sadly, we did have
• 6:09
  Speaker 1: to close the restaurant down and pivot into the takeout program.
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: Um My, I got three restaurants, Like I said earlier,
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: one of the small little grain bar, which was kind
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: of like the overflow to June Baby right next door,
• 6:21
  Speaker 1: serve cocktails and little bites and everything. We had to
• 6:24
  Speaker 1: close that down. It was a small location, so we
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: can't even fit anyone in there technically under the restrictions.
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: So UM, all the restaurants pivoted into take out. My
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: first restaurant salary, we did UM a community kitchen for
• 6:36
  Speaker 1: the first seven or eight months, beating uh, families with
• 6:40
  Speaker 1: food insecurities, restaurant workers and those who are displaced out
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: of jobs for free. We served over twenty six thousand
• 6:47
  Speaker 1: meals for free and we're still doing UM small takes
• 6:51
  Speaker 1: on that along. We're doing takeout. UM. You know, it
• 6:54
  Speaker 1: sucks because like I lost a lot of staff. I
• 6:56
  Speaker 1: had to lay off a lot of people to actually
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: keep the business alive. You know, those are adjustments and
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: the and the pivots that we had to make. Um,
• 7:04
  Speaker 1: but we're surviving. We're doing okay, just because we had
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: to change our business plan to a certain degree. UM.
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: I say that too, because like there has been so
• 7:13
  Speaker 1: many blessings this year in disguise, um, you know, from
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: from me being able to create my clothing line, my
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: chipling clothing line, to getting Climento cheese into grocery stores,
• 7:24
  Speaker 1: to opening up other outlets to bring in revenue to
• 7:29
  Speaker 1: one sustained me personally as a business person, um, and
• 7:32
  Speaker 1: then to to sustain the business so that I do
• 7:35
  Speaker 1: have the opportunity to grow when this pandemic pandemic is
• 7:38
  Speaker 1: over retherland um you know, shrink, you know, I'm I'm
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: still having a growth um process in my head when
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: I'm thinking about what's next for me and not trying
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: to like you know, cuttle up and and and sit
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: back and like I'm I'm thinking, you know, I want
• 7:53
  Speaker 1: to be able to succeed after this year. Well, you know,
• 7:56
  Speaker 1: the thing about it that I love about talking to
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: a small business person who had to pivot is that
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: you learned some things about your business model, some things
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: that you would not have made these adjustments. So what
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: are the adjustments that you will maintain once we get
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: to a sense of normalcy, once the vaccines out there
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: and people we retrafficking your restaurants, they're are in white neighborhoods.
• 8:17
  Speaker 1: By the way, I want to let you know his
• 8:19
  Speaker 1: restaurants aren't bury. He's African America. They're not buried in
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: the black neighborhood. They're in white neighborhoods, which we're talking
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: about in a minute. But let's talk about the changes
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: that you had to make and why, right huh um.
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: You know, there were a few changes that I had
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: to make and the things that I will keep in
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: the long run. The restaurant industry, we we survived on
• 8:40
  Speaker 1: very thin razor thin margins and so our biggest costs
• 8:45
  Speaker 1: to date is always our labor. So you know, one
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: thing I had to look at is either lowering the
• 8:51
  Speaker 1: labor in the long run or increasing the revenue um.
• 8:55
  Speaker 1: And so means to be able to balance that out.
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: Like we didn't. We weren't take out restaurant before, but
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: we're gonna have to implement take out into our normal
• 9:04
  Speaker 1: business plan in general moving forward, UM, so that we
• 9:08
  Speaker 1: can at least if we're gonna keep the same staff,
• 9:10
  Speaker 1: that we have the revenue to maintain that staff and
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: also build a better profit in the long run. So
• 9:16
  Speaker 1: there's those are those are some of the auxiliary things
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: that we are incorporating into our business plan. Also like
• 9:22
  Speaker 1: the retail aspect um adding it in more catering projects.
• 9:27
  Speaker 1: So it's all about, you know, bringing in more revenue.
• 9:30
  Speaker 1: At this stage, now we're trying to maintain that same
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: business costs um you know, other than that, like yeah,
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: we're analyzing like what our costs were before, and like
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: how we can shrink those costs down, Like how can
• 9:41
  Speaker 1: we run a restaurant less full service but still offer
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: the same type of service? Is that better training, better
• 9:47
  Speaker 1: education for our staff so that can be more efficient.
• 9:50
  Speaker 1: Are we bringing in more technology into our restaurant now
• 9:54
  Speaker 1: so that we can make um ordering and and reordering
• 9:57
  Speaker 1: and in service and a little bit more streamline. Those
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: are all the things that we're thinking about and implementing
• 10:02
  Speaker 1: right now and to the restaurants to make it sustainable.
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: Right You know. It's really interesting because you know a
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: lot of small businesses you see that that take out
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: of that to go principle and to change, you know,
• 10:13
  Speaker 1: because they understand they understand that model. When you're a
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: small business, sometimes you don't want to, like, you know,
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: you want to fight the whole that that that that
• 10:20
  Speaker 1: flavor that tastes the authenticity of the experience, and sometimes
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: you're afraid they're like, you know what, my chicken tastes
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: good at their house and I could potential to lose
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: them as a customer, or if there were a customer,
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: they may not come back. Is that is that some
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: of the stuff they played into your mind, pride or
• 10:35
  Speaker 1: making these change before COVID forced you. Yeah, you totally
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: hit it. You know, as small business owners, we are
• 10:41
  Speaker 1: super stubborn. A lot of times we're so stubborn because
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: like we came in with a certain mindset and direction
• 10:46
  Speaker 1: and we did not know how to pivot. We have
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: been forced to pivot and get creative again, and that
• 10:54
  Speaker 1: allows us to open the doors to new opportunities and
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: understand that like our way may not have been the
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: only way, it may have been the best way at
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: that point in time, but our new pivot, our new direction,
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: is gonna probably be the best direction now. And so yeah,
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: like we I was super starving before. There are certain
• 11:11
  Speaker 1: things that I didn't want to do because, like I'm chef,
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: I didn't want to compromise anything. I didn't want to
• 11:15
  Speaker 1: see my fried chicken go out cold. You know, it
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: needed to be piping hot and need to be extreme.
• 11:25
  Speaker 1: So all of that went into play. And then when
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: I had to put chicken into a box, take out
• 11:30
  Speaker 1: a whole different mindset, like wow, like this can happen,
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: we can do this right right now? You're not You're
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: really it's it's really because you know you don't want it.
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: There's nothing negative, but you didn't get into business to
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: be Kentucky Fried Chicken. You didn't get in the business
• 11:42
  Speaker 1: to be Popeye's. And that mentality plays into I don't
• 11:46
  Speaker 1: want to be that. But unfortunately the times call for
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: you to think like that, to think about mass marketing,
• 11:52
  Speaker 1: thinking about if your restaurants packed and you can still
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: do additional income from people doing to go our curb
• 11:59
  Speaker 1: to pick up you go, wow, I didn't have to
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: pay anybody extra for this, and that correct do the math.
• 12:05
  Speaker 1: At the end of the year, I guarantee you'll start
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: changing your mind right right, And that's what you got
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: that I needed to start thinking outside the ball. And
• 12:11
  Speaker 1: that's that's the beautiful thing about it and show. But
• 12:14
  Speaker 1: then then again, it's all about who you are. You're
• 12:16
  Speaker 1: successful African American chef, you know in the business. I
• 12:20
  Speaker 1: always talk about hbc US. There's so many that so
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: many people graduate from hbc US, and I would tell
• 12:25
  Speaker 1: people White college to get credit for because people don't
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: know about of education that comes out of HBCUs. Because
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: of the Food Network and Cookie Channel, you start to
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: see more through competitions. You're starting to see more black
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: bakers or black chefs. But there's still he is a
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: hidden secret about who you guys are. Talk about that
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: experience of being a successful owner, not only a chef,
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: but an entrepreneur and an owner uh in Seattle and
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: the rest of the country. Because I've had Samuels under
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: my show has become like a sounding board for for
• 12:54
  Speaker 1: high profile chefs and start chefs. And I like that.
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: I really do love that. And so but talk about
• 12:59
  Speaker 1: your spears being a uh, young man coming from the
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: South going north and being being dominated and also winning
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: James Beards, which is the which is the Oscar of
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: the restaurant business. Talk about that. Yeah, I'll tell you
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: what I mean. Everyone's like, you're so young. I'm like,
• 13:16
  Speaker 1: I don't feel young anymore because I've been through the hoops.
• 13:19
  Speaker 1: I've ran through the fire. I stepped on the stones
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: and cut my feet and bruised my knees and you know,
• 13:25
  Speaker 1: rust the old Ashley elbows because like they've been working.
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: I've been working hard, you know, And I think people
• 13:31
  Speaker 1: come into this restaurant industry thinking that it's easy, it's
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: a novelty. It's like, this is like what I want
• 13:36
  Speaker 1: to do is a side gig. Um, this is a career.
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: And when I set myself to go into the restaurant world,
• 13:42
  Speaker 1: I made it my career and was career minded. But
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: priorly to get into the restaurant industry, I went to
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: the University of Florida. I got a degree in business.
• 13:50
  Speaker 1: I understood that like it's it's hard work's dedication is
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: understanding the numbers. Um, it's more than just like cooking
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: behind the stove. It's pr and marketing. Um, there's there's
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: relationships that you have to build. There's networking. That's a
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: friendly face that you have to to have also that
• 14:07
  Speaker 1: will open up these doors. You know, a lot of
• 14:09
  Speaker 1: chefs came in his mentality came came with this mentality.
• 14:12
  Speaker 1: I'm cooking behind the soul. That's all I do. I'm
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: making good food. Don't talk to me and I come.
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: I come with a smiling face and ready to conversate
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: and ready to share my story. And more than anything,
• 14:25
  Speaker 1: like there is a story behind what I do. There's
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: heart and soul. There's not me just cooking care free
• 14:31
  Speaker 1: food um, and so like there's a whole business like
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: build into that whole, whole whole like bubble that I
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: just created. That Like it's easily um supportive because people
• 14:42
  Speaker 1: believe in it. They see it, they understand it. They
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: see a minority, a young black chef like in this industry,
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: like hustling his butt off. So it's a combination of
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: all of that. You know, it's a little bit of dedication, passion, love, um, grit,
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: like all of that is like and we can go
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: through and define and all of that, but like all
• 15:01
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• 16:59
  Speaker 1: T E r AI. Well, two things I want to
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: bring up. The Chidling clothing line, which I knew nothing about.
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: Okay was it? Was it out when I came up
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: there and to visit your restaurant. It was. It was
• 17:10
  Speaker 1: right in the beginning stages. We were we were looking
• 17:13
  Speaker 1: for some taylors, some some designers. So we were, we were.
• 17:17
  Speaker 1: I was scrambling hard, like I always got multiple things
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: going on because I do nothing about that. Tell us
• 17:24
  Speaker 1: about that line with the T shirt cap? What is it?
• 17:26
  Speaker 1: What is it? Yeah? So um, I should have wore
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: one today. But I have a lot of crew neck
• 17:31
  Speaker 1: shirts or sweatshirts, some hoodies, and I'll be bringing on
• 17:35
  Speaker 1: some other items. But chiplings have been a very intimate
• 17:39
  Speaker 1: part of my whole story, from from day one as
• 17:42
  Speaker 1: a youth to me opening up June Baby, where I
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: ate chillings all my life, like it was part of
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: like my my food. That's what my grandmother cooked for
• 17:50
  Speaker 1: us on you know, these special days. Is what I don't.
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: Don't act like a boy yourself. I've been eating them too. Now.
• 17:56
  Speaker 1: My dad used to bring the hall to the house
• 17:59
  Speaker 1: and we cutting up, so we we gotta we're gonna
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: in test us into the bathtub. O, my god, come
• 18:06
  Speaker 1: on now, like that whole process, Like I mean, this
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: is a whole long the story. I don't know how
• 18:13
  Speaker 1: much time we have, but like if you think about
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: the techniques and and and ingenuity that went into like
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: making chiplands into something edible, like it blows your mind.
• 18:22
  Speaker 1: First of all, for those who like don't know what
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: chiplings are they pig intestines. You know, these are awful
• 18:28
  Speaker 1: the things that the white man got rid of and
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: said the slaves need to eat. You can have that
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: to feed your family. And so that story is like
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: a lineage of like who I am. And when I
• 18:38
  Speaker 1: talked about chiplands as a kid, I got rid of
• 18:41
  Speaker 1: cute that I ate chiplings, so I kind of turned
• 18:43
  Speaker 1: my back onto talking about my food. And so you know,
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: some thirty years later, when I decided to open up
• 18:49
  Speaker 1: my own southern restaurant. I decided to put ship lands
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: on the menu and be proud and loud about chiplings
• 18:56
  Speaker 1: because that is part of my heritage. So chip has
• 18:59
  Speaker 1: been on my menus and it is day one of
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: opening June Baby, and I realized, like, they're the bigger
• 19:03
  Speaker 1: story that need to be told, and so I probably
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: start putting Chiplands on the shirt. And then people said,
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: I want that shirt, I want that shirt, and so
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: I literally went through a whole trademarking process, got a trademark,
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: and now I have a Chiplands line of clothing. Um,
• 19:19
  Speaker 1: and we're we're probably talking about chilings because it's more
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: than just the food. Now, it's the stories. The history,
• 19:26
  Speaker 1: is the perseverance, is the the ingenuity, it's all of
• 19:31
  Speaker 1: that that people are people. Many people eat chiplands and
• 19:35
  Speaker 1: you know, across this world in some fashion. But you know,
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: just talking about my history and my folks, it's just
• 19:40
  Speaker 1: like what they had to do to make chiplands into
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: something out of nothing, to feed the family, to feed
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: the country, growing cotton and rice and and and shucking
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: okrah and selling it and getting nothing out of it,
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: Like you know, this is this is like just paying
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: homage and paying respect and showing love. And it's more
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: in the food now. So it's a story. It's a
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: great story. And now are you a white rice and
• 20:04
  Speaker 1: hot toss chiplans eater? How are you? That is a
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: straight classic for me. I heard like everything else like
• 20:10
  Speaker 1: potatoes and things like like I'm straight right sauce putting
• 20:14
  Speaker 1: pepper on that. I tell I love chidlings and so
• 20:18
  Speaker 1: and like I said, I grew up in a grew
• 20:20
  Speaker 1: up in the hood. Man my dad would go, Uh,
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: he was a truck driver. He going the country because
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: we lived in Houston, Texas, live in the wood. He
• 20:28
  Speaker 1: going to get get a get a hog, and they
• 20:30
  Speaker 1: bring that hog home. We made hog, that cheese. You know,
• 20:33
  Speaker 1: I had to all the ham, all that stuff. We
• 20:35
  Speaker 1: made that pig feet wait the pig fee pig is
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: we are we? Of course we did the chidling so
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: that hog. I don't think that hog left that house.
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: I think he s in as water and uh and left.
• 20:47
  Speaker 1: But you knew when we got to the to the
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: chipling part. Everybody in the neighborhood knew what was going.
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: Everybody knew because you have to really and also when
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: you talk about that you really do have to clean
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: it out. You have to clean that because you know
• 21:01
  Speaker 1: it can get you. You can get sick if you read.
• 21:03
  Speaker 1: If you as they say, you eat chipland they have
• 21:06
  Speaker 1: been cleaned properly, and stuff like that, bar properly and
• 21:09
  Speaker 1: things like that. So it really is a science to
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: all of this. And that's why I wanted to make sure.
• 21:13
  Speaker 1: And I'm kind of man at you because now I
• 21:14
  Speaker 1: gotta go online and again when I could have been
• 21:16
  Speaker 1: up there and took a photo with you, we took
• 21:18
  Speaker 1: a photo together, because the hell of chipland T shirt up,
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: shirt up, a hoodie on. But I'm definitely gonna order
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: one online because that's exciting to me because I'm a
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: big fan. And I tell my staff I eat chidling,
• 21:30
  Speaker 1: they go, that's that's what I got as a kid.
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: It don't face me, brother, don't et face me. I
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: forgot cracking. Now it doesn't FaZe me. Now, it doesn't
• 21:42
  Speaker 1: face me. I think, like as a kid and not
• 21:44
  Speaker 1: like even teaching my little boy now, it's just like,
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: don't be afraid of your history and your story because
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: like as a kid, I didn't know how to defend
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: myself at that right right now we give our we
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: give some fire, we give some weapons now to be
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: able to professionally hum defend ourselves now in our history.
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: Let's talk about the pimento cheese which I did sample
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: at your restaurant, which was fantastic, Like Sava, just tell
• 22:08
  Speaker 1: when I when we sat down, we ate, we went
• 22:11
  Speaker 1: through this like we we went through the menu, just
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: enjoying everything. I don't think you don't think children's I
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: wasn't seasonal. I don't think they were on the menu
• 22:17
  Speaker 1: at the time. But but other than that, we tried
• 22:19
  Speaker 1: everything and enjoyed everything, and and and and the whole
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: experience was the service. But now the perimento cheese, tell
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: us how they got started out became a secreature dish,
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: and how did you get it into Whole Foods and
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: met Market and Kim Market totally? Um wow. That the
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: secondary part was the whole process of getting to the
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: retail store. But but pimento cheese for me was just
• 22:41
  Speaker 1: like you know, it was the iconic Southern spread. You know,
• 22:44
  Speaker 1: you got like your your hawkhead cheese preads that you
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: can have sometimes and you got your pimento cheese. Um,
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: and pimento cheese is like everyone knows pimento cheese. Everyone
• 22:53
  Speaker 1: had it. Everyone goes to that corner store, even the
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: grocery store in the South and there's like five different
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: cremental cheese and her um, and I've had a ton
• 23:01
  Speaker 1: of pimento cheese in my lifetime, but nothing really impressed me.
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: So my mission was like, I'm gonna put the pimento
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: cheese on the menu. It's gonna be the best pimento
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: cheese out there. And um, when I developed the recipe,
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: I knew it was a winner. And you know, we've
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: had them me and you again from day one, like chiplings,
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: and people requested it. They like asking I get tubs
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: of it? Can I when are you gonna get this
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: in the hood the grocery stores, And when COVID hit
• 23:28
  Speaker 1: us in the pandemic kind of slowed us down. Um,
• 23:31
  Speaker 1: I was already in talked with Whole Foods by doing
• 23:33
  Speaker 1: like we're gonna do the special event with the pimento cheese,
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: and so they pretty much held my hand through the
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: whole process of getting it into Whole Foods. And we're
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: locally here in Washington and Oregon state right now and
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: we're working hard to find a Copacker that we can
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: get into California and then go nationwide. So um soon
• 23:52
  Speaker 1: soon to be soon to being here back down South
• 23:54
  Speaker 1: Texas in Atlanta, the Georgia and South Carolina where long Hey.
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: That's that's when I say that secondary process is so hard.
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: It's so hard to like jump to that retail retail
• 24:06
  Speaker 1: aspect of consumer goods. There are so many loops and
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: loops that you gotta go through. But we're working hard
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: to get it nationwide within the next year. I'm talking
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: to a chef Jordan and twenty seventeen James Berer And
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: Award winning finalists and he received the prestigious eighteen James
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: Beard Award for Best Chef off the West and Best
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: New Restaurant for June Baby Restaurant. That's where I dined
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: with my lovely wife and had a great time. And
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: I love the baby to say that, you know, to
• 24:33
  Speaker 1: be able to say, I went up to Seattle, Washington,
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: and you know, it's been a weekend out there and
• 24:38
  Speaker 1: dine at your restaurant. That's one of my favorite travel stories.
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: And and and and and building your brand out, you know,
• 24:44
  Speaker 1: and we're talking about the perimental cheese. We talked about
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: the child lin line. We're talking about pivoting and and
• 24:49
  Speaker 1: doing things that you were stuffing about doing From an
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: entrepreneur standpoint, you said, Hey, this is how I want
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: my brand to be being served. And now you realize, okay,
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: it's still would be served that way, but now with
• 25:01
  Speaker 1: options and uh, and options allow you to be so.
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: I like the fact I like about the perimental cheese
• 25:06
  Speaker 1: and I like about the T shirt. I call that
• 25:08
  Speaker 1: mail box money. You know that aline by your T
• 25:12
  Speaker 1: shirt you get checking the mail. You know, that's the
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: beauty of what you're trying to do with your brain.
• 25:16
  Speaker 1: And that's why you're growing. That's why I can't wait
• 25:18
  Speaker 1: till it, you know, you expand and come down into
• 25:21
  Speaker 1: soft with that perimental cheese, because that's amazing mailbox money.
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: But the old law man, uh, you know, we we
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: know what what as a black business owner and the
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: p PP checks was supposed to be distributed out there
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: to the small business owner. How did that affect your business?
• 25:35
  Speaker 1: During the COVID NAT were you able to participate in
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: p P P or what? Yeah, I mean it was
• 25:40
  Speaker 1: a scramble at the beginning. We missed the first round.
• 25:43
  Speaker 1: And I say I'd say that lightly because we did
• 25:45
  Speaker 1: everything proper inappropriate to get that loan, and so like
• 25:50
  Speaker 1: we were literally pulling our head, our hair out, what
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: I'm saying, like, what are we gonna do? Luckily they
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: had a second round. We got to prove we didn't
• 25:58
  Speaker 1: get approved from as much as like I thought, we
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: were going to get a proof for UM. And that
• 26:04
  Speaker 1: was a kind of a turning point for me. I
• 26:05
  Speaker 1: realized that as a business owner, a small business owner,
• 26:10
  Speaker 1: as a minority business owner, I could not depend on
• 26:14
  Speaker 1: anyone else saving my businesses, and I needed to do
• 26:17
  Speaker 1: whatever I needed to do to be creative enough to
• 26:22
  Speaker 1: keep my businesses alive. And that's when we're like the
• 26:24
  Speaker 1: pivoting started happening hard for me and making the proper
• 26:27
  Speaker 1: adjustments to to to be a business person. UM, And
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: I didn't depend on the government to bail me out.
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: And and some people need that like that's it's it's
• 26:37
  Speaker 1: the curse of two thousand twenty, but like I didn't
• 26:39
  Speaker 1: want to be part of that curse. I wanted to
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: actually capitalize on this opportunity to to be a really
• 26:45
  Speaker 1: good businessman. And we've done well despite this pandemic. UM.
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: You know, I've I've had many opportunities. I've actually I
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: now became owner of all my businesses. Congratulations in two
• 26:58
  Speaker 1: thousand twenty. You know, like I'm gonna go back years
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: from now and say, like doing a pandemic, I was
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: able to become a hundred percent owner of my businesses. Like,
• 27:09
  Speaker 1: that's mind blowing from me. But yes, we've had some hurdles,
• 27:12
  Speaker 1: we had some hiccups. Um And like I said, this
• 27:15
  Speaker 1: gear has been a blessing and a curse. But it
• 27:17
  Speaker 1: has taught me a lot. I've grown a lot, I've
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: seen a lot. We'll cool well. I I did something
• 27:22
  Speaker 1: during the pandemic. I bought me a building in Atlanta.
• 27:25
  Speaker 1: They're gonna office building, the one acre property stand alone,
• 27:28
  Speaker 1: and then it has a full kitchen. That's why I
• 27:31
  Speaker 1: love this Building's a full kitchen oven, it's everything, you know.
• 27:34
  Speaker 1: And so I've been inviting favorite chelfs like you over
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: the over the past few months, saying, hey, I love
• 27:41
  Speaker 1: to do a zoom zoom. You cook something, I cook
• 27:43
  Speaker 1: something if you have times no pressure, But I love
• 27:46
  Speaker 1: the I love to cook some chitlings in my office
• 27:49
  Speaker 1: and got all my staff out. You're gonna run them
• 27:53
  Speaker 1: out of the office and why going off And I
• 28:00
  Speaker 1: don't care. I don't. I don't care a running about
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: my office. You could be in Seattle, Washington, you could up.
• 28:06
  Speaker 1: They're waving me off, not the Childlers, not the Chidler.
• 28:10
  Speaker 1: But I love to dothing else. I love for us
• 28:13
  Speaker 1: to do something vias. Yeah that's awesome and yeah, yeah,
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: because that's what I man. I'm not having fun with
• 28:19
  Speaker 1: my life. Man, I'm having fun to be able to
• 28:21
  Speaker 1: speak to people I would call a friend, to call
• 28:23
  Speaker 1: your friend because of your businessman, you're entrepreneur. You're understanding
• 28:27
  Speaker 1: that they are some setbacks, but they don't beat you.
• 28:30
  Speaker 1: They don't let the win. And again, like you said,
• 28:33
  Speaker 1: you've taken control of your voice, your business, your brand.
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: And I had to do the same thing. You know.
• 28:37
  Speaker 1: It's like, you know, I I bind this building and
• 28:41
  Speaker 1: allow me to finally stamp my resume of what I
• 28:44
  Speaker 1: can do and what when people are comfortable what I
• 28:47
  Speaker 1: can comfortably people coming to my space and they walk
• 28:49
  Speaker 1: in the door, they go wow, okay, so the resume.
• 28:52
  Speaker 1: They see the MS, they see the image awards, they
• 28:54
  Speaker 1: see these posters of autograph. Famous people are managed over
• 28:57
  Speaker 1: the years or been associated this year and that's all
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: you doing with your brand and so so I want
• 29:02
  Speaker 1: to thank you for coming back on the show that
• 29:04
  Speaker 1: we missed last week. But you're one of my favorite man.
• 29:07
  Speaker 1: I love you, man, I like I support you. I
• 29:10
  Speaker 1: need to get a link for the Chidling t shirt.
• 29:14
  Speaker 1: Baby Seattle dot com are now not all the pimento cheese.
• 29:20
  Speaker 1: Is that being shipped? Cannot be. We're working on getting
• 29:23
  Speaker 1: that ship so like in the meantime, you know, give
• 29:25
  Speaker 1: us about a month, so we will. We're starting to
• 29:28
  Speaker 1: get a process to get that shipped out to nationwide.
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: But let us team know immediately and then we're scheduled
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: time and figure out something really really easier to make.
• 29:36
  Speaker 1: Just have fun talking and do you make it your
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: wead whether it's car barette, I do my cor burette
• 29:40
  Speaker 1: down and you do have it. We'll do that and
• 29:43
  Speaker 1: get it hooked up. So thank you for coming on
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: the show. At Pleasure Brother, we talked to it. Okay,
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: that's my man. June Baby Restaurants to how to watch it.
• 29:52
  Speaker 1: He wants some chidlands. He gathered up there in the
• 29:54
  Speaker 1: north week northwest part of the country because he's from
• 29:56
  Speaker 1: the south. Again, this is Rushan McDonald. I'm your host.
• 30:00
  Speaker 1: You want to hear anything on money making conversations, Pretty
• 30:02
  Speaker 1: good Money Making Conversation dot com or subscribe on my
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: YouTube channel. Thank you. In this season of giving, Coals
• 30:11
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  Speaker 1: Still living in manually taking notes, There is a better
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  Speaker 1: dot Ai. All right, We're at home with Claire, who
• 30:55
  Speaker 1: was warming up for a bit of boxer size. Yep,
• 30:57
  Speaker 1: She's welcomed in the new year with a fancy new
• 30:59
  Speaker 1: work got set up look at that branded punchbag with
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• 31:05
  Speaker 1: She is working out and working it well with prices
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