‘It’s ‘Chopped’ every day.’ How this Overtown chef and his team make 300 free meals a day
Tristen Epps feels like he’s cooking in an episode of “Chopped” every time he arrives at Red Rooster Overtown.
Celebrity chef Marcus Samuelsson’s highly anticipated restaurant opened March 27 after more than two years of planning — but only as an outpost for José Andrés’ massive outreach non-profit World Central Kitchen.
With donated ingredients, Epps and his staff of four have cooked more than 3,500 meals since then for those left food insecure or jobless because of the coronavirus pandemic. Epps was ready for that.
A 2017 “Chopped” champion, Epps was a runner up to chef Amanda Freitag Wednesday on an all-star episode. That show, taped in January, has had broad applications in his restaurant today.
“It’s ‘Chopped’ every day,” he said. “It makes you a smarter cook and it keeps us energized.”
To celebrate his appearance, Epps created a three-course menu based on his dishes from the show that paying customers can buy at several other South Florida restaurants that have partnered with Red Rooster. Red Rooster’s kitchen has been dedicated solely to cooking for World Central Kitchen so proceeds will go toward keeping Epps’ small staff paid. (A portion of each sale will still go to the non-profit.)
“They are the ones coming out and putting themselves at risk,” Epps said.
The meals for two include Red Rooster’s famous miso malta truffle-glazed dark meat chicken with white mac and cheese and a 12-ounce pork chop with chipotle beer sauce, which he used on the show. It is available at the Red Rooster website, at each of the partner restaurant websites, Stiltsville Fish Bar, Glass and Vine and Root & Bone, or on Uber Eats for $65.
In “Chopped,” contestants are presented with boxes of secret ingredients they must use to whip up innovated dishes. Similarly, Epps has taken donations from major retailers to nearby community gardens to make up to 300 meals a day at Red Rooster with World Central Kitchen. When ingredients run out mid-stream, they write new menus for the kitchen, which serves meals from noon-4 p.m. Monday, Wednesday and Friday.
“We come in, see what we have, see what we can get and make the menu that day,” he said.
And they do more than turn out simple cafeteria style meals. Their meals have included fresh baked bread, heirloom corn and tomato salads, lentils with watercress, hearty sandwiches, homemade cheesecakes, yogurt parfaits, banana breads and soon barbecue from a smoker Samuelsson had ordered for the restaurant at 920 NW 2nd Ave.
“It wouldn’t be as rewarding to us if we weren’t able to cook the way we know we can cook,” Epps said.
And they’ve done it all while keeping social distances in their kitchen and disinfecting several times a day to minimize the risk of COVID-19 infections, Epps said.
Volunteers from the Miami chapter of Food Rescue US pass out food and to keep an orderly line of people six feet apart picking up the meals outside the restaurant.
They expect to keep it up until the restaurant can finally open the way Samuelsson intended, as a new draw to Overtown.
This story was originally published May 1, 2020 at 6:00 AM.
