How ‘Top Chef’ Kwame Onwuachi went from selling candy on subways to running his own restaurants Under30Summit
list, he had raised $2 million to run his own restaurant, the Shaw Bijou in Washington, D.C. The venture received much advance acclaim, but failed—closing in just 11 weeks as Onwuachi clashed with investors and burned through cash. “They had $200,000 budget to open a restaurant, and it ended up costing $2 million,” he said. “It was soul-crushing, for sure.”
The rise was dramatic, the fall more so, as Onwuachi tells in his book . But after the book, he returned as a chef, a story that he told on stage at the Forbes Under 30 Summit in Detroit this morning. First, just one month after Shaw Bijou’s closure, he opened a restaurant serving Ethiopian food, doing it quietly so he wouldn’t face pressure from the press and his fans. “I just wanted to cook again,” he said.
With Kith/Kin, it’s clear that Onwuachi is back. Earlier this year, he won the James Beard Award for Rising Star Chef and was named one of America’s best new chefs bymagazine—accolades that, as he has noted, rarely go to black chefs. In his memoir, he explored in depth what it’s like to be a black man in the rarefied world of fine dining where racism is all too common.
On stage in Detroit, he talked about his hopes for opening more restaurants, writing more books—and seeing his story come to life on screen starring Lakeith Stanfield. “So much goes on behind the scenes when you are the leader of a kitchen,” he said. “I’m still trying to figure out how to take care of myself.”
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