Charles Lewis: Welcome to the First Person Cville, the podcast. I'm Charles Lewis, your host, and also the co-host of In My Humble Opinion, from 101.3 FM. Today's episode features chef Antwon Brinson, author of the article, "You Get What You Focus on, Antwon Brinson's Vision of Using Food to Build Community."

Antwon is the founder and owner of Culinary Concepts AB, a business that trains people in the occupational and social skills they need to get jobs in central Virginia's hospitality industry. He says that after 15 years of traveling internationally as a chef, he knew Charlottesville was the right place for something like CCAB.

Antwon Brinson: Charlottesville has over 500 restaurants in a ten mile radius. That's equivalent to New York, San Francisco, and D.C.. Right? And it creates, this “Rob Peter, pay Paul” mentality. I'm going to steal your dishwasher and pay him $0.50 more because there's no other dishwashers in the area. Right? So it's a very competitive landscape. And the reason why is so competitive, is because there's no other option. And I recognized earlier on that if I created this, like, this will be THE option.

CL: Antwon's journey to entrepreneurship wasn't always so clear cut, though. He spent years in the culinary industry and his feelings towards it are complex. His love for food and gathering people around a table has grown. But he's also seen the ugly side of hospitality.CL: All right. So, Antwon. Well, thank you, first of all, for being a part of this podcast.AB: Yeah, I appreciate you having me here.

CL: Absolutely, man. I'm proud of all your work. Got to say that off top. Let’s talking about hitting the streets of Charlottesville, right? And talking to restaurant owners about training chefs, so on so forth. What was that experience like? And did you get some door slammed in your face?

AB: All right so here's here's like the straight raw, right? So, you know, when I first decided I wanted to launch a company, I had never done that before. So I ended up taking a program – shout out to CIC, Community Investment Collaborative – I took a program with them and it's about, you know, creating a business model. Part of that is customer discovery. And customer discovery is where you go out and you test out your concept. So I'm like, all right, so I put down, you know, put I put a little survey together with some questions on there. And essentially the questions were, you know, “If there was a training program looking for people, identifying talent and training them, giving them certifications, would your restaurant hire them? And what are your needs?” And, you know, I decided that I was going to go out in the community and I wasn't going to tell them that I was a chef. So I, like, literally had on like a button up, you know, And I had my clipboard and a pen, and I'm just showing up to restaurants like, “Hey, can I have a, you know, a couple of minutes of your time? You know, I got a survey I'm doing trying to help, you know, with this workforce development program that we're developing.” And man, talk about humility! I mean, I had people say, “Get the hell out of here.” You know, “We don't we don't want a program like that” or, you know, “What do you know?” Like it was it was tough. And I mean, you know, I'm not gonna lie, man. I'm a proud chef. You know? I'm like, “These…these motherfuckers…” But, you know, I would say, like, out of out of, you know, maybe 40 or 50 restaurants, I got 25 to say yes. And so that was one side. Alright, so I found employers. So the second side was like, “Alright, we need to get people in this program.” And in the end, our first program, we end up getting six folks that, you know, were willing to, you know, to sign up for this pilot program. And it was 100% success all the way around. We got all of them to the finish line. They all finish and pass their certifications and all of them got jobs. And, you know, you fast forward, you know, we've diversified our programing. We've helped over 100 students find employment in Charlottesville. You know, we've we've worked with a ton of different employers all over. And it's constantly growing. And it's been a game changer. And I would say it's it's been extremely rewarding being a part of so many people's journey and just seeing the transformation.

CL: I noticed you started your writing by stating, “In my younger years I was full of misplaced energy and lacked focus. And the expectations facing me and my friends—young Black men, many of us from single parent homes—were not high.” So. Question: what was young Antwon getting into?

AB: Well, I think that, you know, it's all in the context of where you’re from. I grew up outside of Buffalo, New York. And, you know, the community that I grew up in, it was coming out of the crack epidemic. You know, you had a lot of old heads that was pimps and players back in the days. And those were the role models. Those are the ones that, you know, we looked up to. We had a community center and I learned to box at a young age. I'm like a skinny dude in the in the community And I'm a I'm a quiet, you know, I've always been–I'm a I'm an introvert, right? I'm a quiet type. But like, you push somebody hard enough and you keep pushing them, they, you know, let go. So I would just blow up. So I became known. I would like…fight. I would get into fights. And it was just misdirected. It wasn't like I was fighting because I was trying to like, be a bully or, you know, prove myself or something like that. It was just, it was survival of the fittest, you know, that was the expectation. You know, like either you going to show up or you going to get knocked out.CL: Hmm. So can you tell us more about the process of moving from a kid with misplaced energy to your internship in the Caribbean?

AB: So I grew up–my cousin was like my brother. Like me and him, we did everything together. You know, we won together, we fell together. We was in trouble together, was out of trouble together. And, you know, I ended up catching this case. And I'm not going to get too into the details, but like, we was looking at like 25 to life, it was intense. And I made a promise to myself. I was like, “If I beat this,” I was like, “I'll take whatever I have left over and I'ma do something with it, I'm gonna go to college, I’ma do something.” And by the grace of God, you know, I end up beating this case. And I kept a promise to myself, man, I started going out, looking for culinary schools. And I went to CIA which is the Culinary Institute of America. And I remember applying for I'm looking at it I'm like, “Man, I could never afford this. This this is out of my price range.” And I'm like, “You know? Fuck it.” You know what I mean? What do I got to lose? I'm gonna apply. I made a promise to myself, right? And um, they gave me a full ride scholarship for college. And that’s how I ended up going to culinary school. So, you know, like, you get a blessing like that, you're not going to squander it, right? So, we had this room in college where you can, like, look at internships all over the world. And everybody wants to go to New York, D.C., L.A., you know, go to the top restaurants. I'm like, “Yo, I'm getting the hell out of here. I'm going to the Caribbean.” Like, “I'm going left,” right? And I found a property in St. John. Shout out to Canille Bay. I think– I don't even think they open anymore. And, you know, I applied for an internship there, I got in, and then the rest was history.[music]AB: I didn't have the goal of being an executive chef when I was early– earlier in my career. I just wanted to learn. So I remember I had this book, this Forbes book, and it had all the five star restaurants in the world. And when I was in the Caribbean, I would circle on the different islands, the top restaurants, and I would go to these different islands and I would show up and work for these chefs for free. And then they ended up paying me in food or they paid me cash. Right? And I would just learn. I would learn. And I ended up building this crazy network of chefs just just by doing that. So I've been extremely fortunate to align with the right people in the culinary field and people that genuinely wanted to pour into me, people that genuinely wanted me to succeed and win. That experience changed me because it was it was the first time in my life that I seen people that look like me in positions of power, like I had never seen an executive chef in a fine dining restaurant that was Black. It fuck with me, right? Because I'm like, “Is this real? Like, is this, you know, is this a thing?” You know, once you get past the insecurity and like once you're able to break down that barrier and you're like, wow. Like, there's another way. And, you know, it completely changed my perspective on what was possible.

CL: Man, so, I got to imagine that your HBO experience had, you know, has to be a highlight of your journey. But…or maybe not! But, you know, HBO’s “The Big Brunch.” Please, if you would, share that experience and what that exposure means for you and CCAB.AB: So 2022 started out, you know, as I do every year with my team, we set audacious goals. Shout out to the CCAB team. And, you know, I get a call in they’re like, “Hey, you know, you got accepted to be on this TV show. And by the way, we need you to leave everything and come to L.A. for an entire month.” And I did it. And the show was HBO Max’s “The Big Brunch,” created by Dan Levy.Dan Levy: Brunch is the ultimate connector. The perfect convergence of food, comfort, and friendship. So we built a show to celebrate ten chefs, each striving to improve their communities by connecting people with food…AB: It was an amazing experience, man. I mean, like, at the end of the day, the show was all about highlighting, you know, chefs that were doing amazing things in their community. And for me, I saw it as an opportunity not only to highlight the community, but to highlight the work, you know? Like, culinary concepts was an idea, you know, now it’s a movement. You know what I mean? Like now we got people all over like, I have people reaching out saying, “Hey, can we open up another Culinary Concepts in Alaska? Can we open up in Ohio?” And it's just like, it’s crazy! It's crazy that it's turned into this. And this is like what the show did for the organization was it gave us a microphone, man. That's one side of it. And the other side, you know, I would say the show was a journey of discovery. Like when I first started cooking, I was like, cooking classical French, like, super technical—because that's what we teach, right? And then in like, you know, halfway through the show, next thing you know, I'm cooking Ethiopian, right? And it was the question, it was like, you know, “Create a dish that represents where you are in your life right now.” And for me, the last ten years, I really, you know, been on this journey of like learning more- I'm half Ethiopian, my dad's first generation. I didn't grow up with Ethiopians, you know what I’m saying, I grew up with my mom's side of the family. So, like, I've been on this journey of self-discovery for a while, just learning more about my culture, more about the heritage, more about the cuisine. You know, I've mastered all these different cuisines, like, why haven't I mastered Ethiopian cuisine yet? You know, I've been cooking for 25 years, and never once have I ever put a Ethiopian dish on a menu. And then I go on national TV and I'm just like, you know, I'm cooking Ethiopian food like I cook at home. And it was like a happy place for me, man.CL: What about your journey would you change, if you could?

AB: You know, my dad passed away last year. And, you know, like I feel like in life we feel like we got time. You know, we always like, “Yeah, I’ma do it later or I’ma get to it, I’ma put this off, I’ma do it next year.” And you know, for like ten years, me and my dad kept saying we're going to take a trip to Ethiopia, we're going to take a trip. But, you know, the apple don’t fall far from the tree, you know, I work like crazy. He work like crazy. You know, we just never put it on the calendar. We just kept working. And and then unexpectedly, he finds out he has cancer, and six months later, boom, he's gone. Right? And I would say if I could change anything, I woulda took that trip. I woulda took the trip with him.

CL: What are you most proud of?

AB: You know, man, I would say: I'm a proud dad. Business aside, you know, I'm proud to just be on this journey with with my family, man. And watching them grow, you know, watching my kids develop. And, you know, I try to make sure that I equally pour into the people that are in my inner circle and the way that I do to, you know, the people that I'm training. And I'm just–I love seeing my kids, you know, on their journey developing and growing and trying new things and learning from their mistakes and winning and then, you know, being able to grow from from those experiences. And just watching them interact with each other, you know, I just think it's a blessing, man.

CL: Antwon Brinson is a chef and founder of Culinary Concepts AB. You can find his First Person Cville essay at vinegarhillmagazine.com. Follow up on more of Antwon's work at his website: www.culinaryconceptsab.com.We want to hear your story and tell the story of our community, together. Share your perspective with First Person Cville at cvilleinclusivemedia.com/projects. The First Person Cville podcast is a production of Charlottesville Inclusive Media. It’s hosted by me, Charles Lewis, and the In My Humble Opinion Talk Show. Like what you hear? Subscribe and follow us at IMHOtalkshow.org. This episode was produced by Kelly Jones. IMHO theme music was from “God Vibes” by Miquel & Morris, with NYC Bangers on Production.

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