Salare Restaurant - Chef Edouardo Jordan

Chef Edouardo Jordan - Interview Transcript

Yeah, we're here at Salare Restaurant, I converted my restaurant into a community kitchen over the last 17 days now, as you know all the restaurants in the city have had to change their format, their business plan and had to pivot–either closing, doing takeout or trying to figure out the next step. I wanted to figure out how I can help the community and be involved and be a part of feeding as many people as possible. I was lucky enough to partner with Chef Edward Lee with the Lee Initiative to bring free food to restaurant folks that are displaced on unemployment or are just looking for a free meal. And we became an outlet for that now, and you know, we're serving more than just industry and hospitality employees or former employees. We're actually feeding anyone that is in need.

And we're just trying to hit like three or 400 meals a day and we're just doing our best to feed the community, We're getting the support of the greater community to help us out with cash donations, donating a product from dairy, to meats, to breads, that we're actually creating a complete meal that people can have in their home for reheat with no question, no money asked or anything. These are all free meals.

We basically consolidated down and one of the restaurants we did turn into a takeout restaurant, Junebaby, and that's just just to help pay the bills. And then I wanted to figure out how I can give back to the community. I'm in a neighborhood that has showed me so much support and so much love. I opened my restaurant in the neighborhood and I assumed that no matter what this neighborhood would be here for me. And during this hard times, I wanna be here for the neighborhood, I wanna be here for the people that have been so good to me to actually allow me to have a business in a small neighborhood and be successful.

So this is a means of me showing my support, giving back to the community and just being another outlet to take the stress off of some people. This is a stressful time of the year for a lot of people, losing a job, not knowing where your next paycheck is gonna come from, and not even knowing where your next job is gonna be can be overwhelming. And the last thing that someone should be worried about is where their next meal is gonna come from and spending money on the food like no, that's not who we are and what we should be doing.

Each and every day, seven days a week from 4:00 to 7:00 pm we're serving out free meals. Our day starts at 7:00 am here from prepping and cooking these meals and we're doing pretty much like a multi course dinner of sorts or a complete meal I should say. Where you're getting a protein, a starch, vegetables, you're actually getting a beverage, you're also getting essentials if you need it. Toilet paper, toothpaste, toothpicks and other female products and other items that we have on availability. And so it takes a team to do this. I was able to bring back my team for the most part, at least 50% of my team, from cooks and front of the house servers to kind of facilitate this project. And yeah, it feels good to be able to employ my staff and also it feels even better to be able to feed the community and the people who actually need this a hot meal at this time. Yeah.

Beyond me, let's be supportive in the entire Seattle. There's so many small businesses and restaurants that make up all the neighborhoods of Seattle. If we lose all of these entities, we're gonna lose the fabric of Seattle so it's very very important that we do our part from you know, supporting by buying gift certificates, gift cards and merchandise, support take out and then if organizations are doing, you know, these community kitchens, donate by supporting with cash, by donating product, from essentials to food product if you have it. And we're also taking donations, I know personally with us we're taking in donations in house, so you can write a check to us, you can drop off whatever you can give. And we're gonna try to keep this going until we're able to function back as normal as a dining restaurant. But until then we'll be here serving free food and giving out free food.

We are driven to help people, this is the hospitality industry. We are a restaurant, our restaurant is built to restore people and that's what we're doing. We're feeding the community through free foods, and we're also offering a service with Junebaby, so we're here for the community, we're here to restore and we're here to be as impactful as we possibly can. And I have to thank my staff truly for stepping up. I could not do this by myself, I would not do this by myself, I wouldn't even fathom thinking about doing this by myself and they have my back.