Pork Cheek Adobo
that “the biggest gold star a chef could have” is when a guest can sit back, enjoy the dish, and reveal a glimpse of who they are—“and you take all the other crap and throw it out the window.” To him, a meal is a snapshot of a person’s life. Everyone has bad days and good days. We get married, have children, and all these other wondrous or miserable things. For someone to go back and reminisce about these details, those little gestures, as well as the beautiful dish, they will forever be on the hunt for that. It is not just the steak or the pasta but the experience and the moment they want to relive. They will remember the taste or the aroma of something on the table. And his goal is to create these snapshots in the lives of others. Chef Grant, his wife (whom he half-jokingly says he works for), and his family are now getting ready to open up the first Mahal Open Fire BBQ outlet in Washington, DC. They are pouring everything into it to make sure the build-out is correct, and the operation is in tip-top shape. “Mahal is our family business. Mahal is our family restaurant… I want my kids to work at the restaurant and to have their hands in any area possible,” he says. “(We want to build) something really, really great.” From the days of Chef Grant hanging out at the fast-food restaurants where his mother used to work at, it seems like life has come full circle.
needs to be a reasonable understanding of equity amongst cultures and different people. He has seen and heard many things first-hand, like how some people can easily get whatever deal they want or any funding they need. For a racialized person like him, those same opportunities are hard to come by, nor are they publicized. Furthermore, the days of being seen as a culinary novelty should long be over. We should do away with adding an ethnic restaurant “because the demographic here loves it” or “sprinkling in a token (exotic) eatery.” Instead, we should give people genuine opportunities to help them excel. Everyone should get the proper opportunities and equality that others have. In his mind, his food is analogous to modern America. His dinner table is an American dinner table. He grew up in a military household with a lushly diverse background. Yes, there is Filipino lumpia, there is dumpling, there is roast turkey, jerk chicken, and all these awesome things on the table, but that represents who Americans are in 2023. Despite having won his share of awards, such as the 2012 RAMMY for “Best Casual Restaurant” and the 2016 James Beard Award nomination for “Best New Restaurant,’ he thinks
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