Inside his new commercial kitchen on Beatties Ford Road, Martin Clark, owner of Cajun takeout restaurant Bite Your Tongue, was busy preparing meals for his daytime customers one day this month.
It's been more than a month since the store quietly opened in a space that was once a clothing store and then a video game arcade.
“We do a lot of traditional dishes,” Clark told QCity Metro in between cooking sessions, “We also do jambalaya, red beans, gumbo. We also have an alligator dish that we're featuring right now. We also have boudin balls.”
If Historic West End Partners Group's plans go through, other food companies could soon join Clark in setting up shop in the commercial kitchen at 1121 Beatties Ford Road.
On May 22, Historic West End Partners purchased the 6,148-square-foot building, which will also house a convenience store, for $1.3 million.
Jaytaniya Adams, founder and executive director of the group, said the nonprofit hopes to use the commercial kitchen to increase food options along Beatties Ford Road, and the space will also serve as an incubator for emerging food businesses, she said.
“There weren't enough healthy food options,” Adams said of the historically Black neighborhoods, also known as food deserts.
Adams said Historic West End Partners has been “taking a step-by-step approach” to address the concerns, and the commercial kitchen is the group's latest endeavor.
The kitchen can accommodate two more chefs, who will rotate between the two, Adams said. The space also includes a large meeting area where some customers will eat their takeout meals.
Opening a commercial kitchen came at a perfect time for Clark, who came to Charlotte from New Orleans in 2005 as a refugee from Hurricane Katrina, which forced her to close her New Orleans restaurant.
Clark said she and her ex-husband ran several food businesses in Charlotte before their divorce and now supplies food to vendors at the Charlotte airport.
“We were going to stay here. [in Charlotte] “My plan was to stay a couple of days and then go home,” she said, “but that didn't happen.”
On Beatties Ford Road, Clark and her daughter are filling phone orders for food.
“We've had a very soft opening for a long time,” Clark said of their mid-May opening. “We just wanted to have a good system in place. We didn't want to be overwhelmed.”
On a recent Tuesday, a steady stream of customers showed up to pick up their meals. (Bite Your Tongue is open Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday from 11:30 a.m. to 4 p.m., and Friday and Saturday from 11:30 a.m. to 8 p.m.)
“It's been phenomenal,” Clark said. “We have customers that are coming back, some old and some new, and they've been so receptive to us.”
As Clark spoke, Adams was serving another potential customer, a 24-year-old woman looking to relocate her growing food business from her home in the University District.
Adams said the building will be a dining hub as well as a community gathering place, noting several organizations already use the space for meetings and events.
The building, located in the Oak Lawn business district across the street from the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department's West End Division, is Historic West End Partners' first property purchase since it was founded in 2010.
Adams said 80 percent of the purchase price was financed by Uwharrie Bank.
The organization leases two more buildings on Beatties Ford Road: one at 1017 Beatties Ford Road, which houses The Pauline Tea-Bar Apothecary and Murchison Videography and Photography, and the other at 1111 Beatties Ford Road, which houses 704 Dry Cleaners and Black Pearl Vision.
Adam said Historic West End Partners will work with local stakeholders to fill “gaps in services and amenities” in the corridor.
