The FastDay Forum

Today marked the opening of a new restaurant where my son is half owner. I'm so proud of him, especially because of the kind of food they decided to serve.

The restaurant is a modestly priced sandwich shop in the newly-revitalized downtown of a middle-sized Midwestern city. But what sets them apart is that they are cooking every thing they serve from scratch. They're baking the rolls for the sandwiches, making their own mayonnaise, salad dressing, slaw and desserts. All the meat that goes into the sandwiches is roasted completely in house, too.

In short, they are selling food without any of the pretension you find in the expensive bistros that crow about how locally sourced their food is, while actually serving their customers clean, healthy and most importantly delicious food.

A very exciting day for us, indeed!

Oh, peebles, you deserve to feel proud! What a great idea for a restaurant. I hope that they are very successful.
My daughter owns a bakery in Madrid, Spain, and she makes all her own cupcakes and large cakes from scratch, using locally sourced ingredients whenever possible. It works out more expensive than using commercial cake mixes but the end results are so worth it!

@peebles great news, many congrats to your son and his partner. Tis a shame I'm so far away and can't saviour his delights first hand . Thanks for sharing your proud son moment, they are priceless.

Oh how lovely @peebles - that is such a great idea!

Will keep my fingers crossed that it is a huge success.....and look forward to the business going global! I would love there to be such a place near where I live in the UK...because I would definitely support it

@StowgateResidentHow nice to have such a good excuse for visiting Madrid frequently. (And eating cupcakes!<G>)

@Lizbean, It's even more unfortunate that he's 700 miles away from us, so it will be another few weeks until I can sample his food, and that only for a few days. But I'm glad he got out of the region where I live. It's a beautiful rural area, perfect for someone who has their own business, but there are no opportunities for young people at all, and his friends who didn't leave are all working jobs close to minimum wage with no future.

@Hazelnut20,

My son's partner started with one small take-out restaurant in our local college town, back in the late 90s and turned his first partnership into a company that was franchised out and has shops in quite a few college towns throughout the Eastern and Midwestern United States.

So if this shop flies, they will certainly be expanding. And they designed this business to avoid some of the problems they ran into with the earlier company (which is still very much in business and very profitable.) So who knows where it might go? They are both very good businessmen.

But for now, I will be happy if the new restaurant earns them enough to earn my son a decent living and pay back the investment he made in it, which was a combination of the money he'd saved over the past decade and an inheritance he received from my mother.

An honest, good quality place to eat healthy food is rare. The very best to your son and partner!

Great stuff to hear @peebles especially after hearing so much about the difficulties of getting this type of food in the States ... It seems from what @rawkaren says that this kind of food is very expensive and out of most people's reach. It sounds like they've done their research, so all power and good wishes being sent from this end!

We have a lot of this kind of thing happening here in Newcastle and NE England, a sort os. Slow Food thing going on. It's increasingly popular here. Do you have any 'Great Taste' Awards over there, (such as has been won by our very own @PennyForthem recently?)

@peebles Fantastic and all the luck in the world to him. I'm all for a bit of enterprise and real food is always the best

Sounds like they have taken lots of previous experience, business wise, and coupled that with passion.
I hope it is a great success for them.

[carieoates]

Wow, just wow.
I can feel your pride from over here. Good luck to him and his partner.

Sounds great Peebles..i wish them every success!
You must be such a proud Mom ! X

Many congratulations to them. I'm a big fan of people serving good food at sensible prices. As a cake maker (now a hobbyist) I know how difficult it can be to price things just right, to gain a profit but not alienate customers. It sounds like they know what thy are doing and will be a tremendous success

Proud you should be @peebles That's some achievement
and a fantastic idea I really hope it turn into a massive success for them both they do deserve such success, enjoy your sampling when you visit next time I'm sure you will. Best of to them.

Food from scratch so much discussed on this forum as the way we are now preferring to eat. Very best wishes to your son $& to you his aptly proud mum

[carorees]

How brilliant! Wishing your son every success in this venture...the world needs more people like him! Am looking forward to hearing how you get on when you visit and hoping you will post some pictures too.