The Black Chef Series Taking Over Maison Yaki This Fall

Updated August 28, 2020

• Back in June, Greg Baxtrom (the chef behind Maison Yaki and Olmsted) committed to offering Maison Yaki’s kitchen space to aspiring Black entrepreneurs, chefs, bartenders, and sommeliers who want to work on their own projects.

• Since then, four chefs in the series (Lani Halliday, Jared Howard, Michelle Williams, and Mohamed Wahiba) have hosted two-week pop-ups. You have until this Sunday, August 30th, to try Mohamed Wahiba’s pop-up before the fall segment of the series hits. Having spent time cooking at Speedy Romeo, Wahiba specializes in pizza, and is also serving his family’s secret lasagna recipe. He’s the chef at Tripoli Events - a company that hosts pizza and pasta classes, catering, and private events. You might know Tripoli Events from their pizza booth inside of Berg’n in Bed-Stuy.

• Baxtrom recently announced the next set of chefs who will be taking over Maison Yaki’s kitchen between August 31st and October 25th. Here’s a little more information about who they are and when you can taste what they’ve got cooking:

Fall 2020 Chefs

• August 31st - September 13th: The co-founders of Food Plus People, Mavis Jay & Sicily Johnson, are hosting a pop-up called “Black-Ass All-American Comfort Food.” Their company seeks to make quality, thoughtfully-sourced food more accessible by directly shipping products and meal-kit recipes.

• September 14th - September 27th:Joe Smalls, who used to work as a chef at The Cecil in Harlem and now runs B-Raised NYC, will team up with Kilolo Strobert, a wine expert and the founder of wine education platform, Get Comfy With Wine.

• September 28th - October 11thCamari Mick, a pastry chef who has worked at places like Le Bernardin in Midtown and TAK Room in Hudson Yards, will be offering a dessert tasting menu as part of her project, The Tasting Spoon.

• October 12th - October 25th:Chris Weathered, co-founder of the catering company Appetizing Events, will be running a pop-up called Ena’s Eats.