Jon Gray Transcript
Kerry Diamond:
Hi everyone. You are listening to Radio Cherry Bombe, and I'm your host, Kerry Diamond, coming to you from Newsstand Studios at Rockefeller Center in the heart of New York City. Each week we feature interviews with the coolest culinary personalities around. Joining me today in the studio is one of my favorite New Yorkers, Jon Gray. Jon is the co-founder of Ghetto Gastro, a culinary collective of sorts from the Bronx that has the goal of nourishing the world while celebrating Black food and culture. Their first book is just about to drop, and it's called Black Power Kitchen. It's one of the most anticipated cookbooks of the fall, but it is way more than just a cookbook. Jon's going to tell us about it in just a minute. He'll also talk about Ghetto Gastro's expansion. They're in the packaged food biz now maybe they're Wavy Waffle mix or their Sovereign Syrup, and they have a kitchen appliance brand called CRUXGG.
This is actually going to be a two-part episode, Jon's co-author, the amazing writer, Osayi Endolyn was going to join him but couldn't for scheduling reasons. So you'll hear from Osayi in part two. Make sure you're subscribed to Radio Cherry Bombe on your favorite podcast platform, so you don't miss Osayi. We will chat with Jon in just a minute.
Do you love cookbooks as much as we do at Cherry Bombe? I think I know the answer. Then don't miss our annual Cooks and Books event taking place November 5th and 6th at the Ace Hotel in Brooklyn. We have talks and demos and panels with all your favorites. Claire Saffitz and conversation with pastry icon Claudia Fleming. Ruth Reichl is interviewing Jody Williams and Rita Sodi of Via Carota. Bon Appetit editor-in-chief Dawn Davis is interviewing Chef Tanya Holland about her career and her new cookbook. There are so many other amazing folks joining us as well. Head to cherrybombe.com to see the schedule and snag your tickets or all-access pass. The Cherry Bombe Cooks and Books Festival is presented by Kerrygold. Now let's check in with today's guest.
Jon Gray, welcome to Radio Cherry Bombe. Tell us your title because you've got a million titles.
Jon Gray:
A lot of titles. My name is Jon Gray, co-founder of Ghetto Gastro. My official title, the one that if I had a business card would be on. It is a dishwasher, and I recently got a promotion to an underwater porcelain and ceramic technician. So I'm just bussin' suds.
Kerry Diamond:
In addition to you, who is Ghetto Gastro today?
Jon Gray:
Ghetto Gastro. The humans involved in being forward facing in Ghetto Gastro. My partner, comrade, childhood friend, Lester Walker. My buddy, my brother, Pierre Serrao. So those are my partners. We have so many people that support in our behind the scenes from Janae Haynes, Jacobian, Harold [Kenyon], Cece, José [Mejia]. Man, Bonna, Devon [Scarpulla].
Kerry Diamond:
It was like the best picture award at the Oscars. Got to name all these people.
Jon Gray:
Of course, Osayi who co-wrote the book with us. And then we got Sushma [Dwivedi], who's the president of our company, especially like the CPG [consumer packaged goods] side. We got two Zoe's on deck. It's a big team. Malcolm [Livinsgton II], Tatiana [Pitta]. Yeah, so many people that you don't see that are responsible. New Studio responsible for the look and feel, the book design and everything that we do.
Kerry Diamond:
I'm slightly obsessed with New Studio because I love design.
Jon Gray:
We have that in common. We have that in common.
Kerry Diamond:
And when I heard you said you wanted it to be this sort of Bauhaus Collective and it doesn't mean the band, it means the art and design collective from decades ago.
Jon Gray:
And it feels like when people think of Bauhaus often they separated from the collective and think about it as an ideology. So I would like to have that same effect with this project. I'd like Ghetto Gastro to become a verb, an action word.
Kerry Diamond:
What is the Ghetto Gastro mission today?
Jon Gray:
Mission is really to nourish the world. And that's an abstract answer because I like to keep it open ended. But it's really nourishment in the form. Of course, putting food in stomachs from the high falutin and high-profile projects that we do. But also the work we do with Rethink, La Mirada, and really feeding people and communities. But also I think some of the most important work and probably the most scalable work is nourishing minds food for thought planting ideas, creating conflict and friction of how people think about certain things. Changing perception. So I think being that trickster to where we could change perception on a global scale is the real work.
Kerry Diamond:
How did you wind up as part of a culinary collective when your background was fashion?
Jon Gray:
I had the idea for it. So I've always loved food. It's weird. I realized fashion wasn't my calling because I would quickly spend a few hundred dollars on a meal. But if you try to put a pair of jeans or a sweater in front of me, it's like, yeah. And I never liked the shopping experience. So even today with my mother and girlfriend, they want to go shopping. I'm like, "I love you, but I'm not going." If I'd go shopping, it's quick. I'm like woo, woo. To sit around clothes has never been a good thing. But I've always had very creative ideas and I've always liked to be a generator. So to think of something and to be able to have it manifest into something tangible, whether it's experience or object. And I think the low hanging fruit and what my imagination, the bounds of it was just like, all right, let's do t-shirt then it became jeans.
It seemed like something where I could exercise that muscle. My joy comes from food, these moments, and breaking bread, sharing experiences, and communing with loved ones or even people I might not love and coming to some type of understanding and even if it's in conflict. But I grew up with Lester. I think my neighborhood, two friends that I admired, Lester being one of them, and my buddy, Kwame [Onwauchi] they were chefs in high school. So I remember Kwame used to give me recipes to impress girls. He gave me a homemade shrimp alfredo with the Kraft parmesan cheese. Get the heavy cream-
Kerry Diamond:
Oh, the green container.
Jon Gray:
... dump the whole Kraft parmesan if that's even cheese, I don't know what you could call that stuff. And then add some crack black, fresh black pepper, cook it down, I get the frozen shrimp pack, you know what I'm saying? Hit it with some olive oil, some Italian herbs, and then just cook the pasta. And then that was homemade. I'm like, yeah. So I was stunting with that. So I had a understanding and a love for food always. It started for me with restaurants going at very young age with my mother, like five, six being responsible for it on food. But I never thought of it as something that could be a living or-
Kerry Diamond:
A career.
Jon Gray:
A career or my life's path. But Lester, we had always been talking about doing something. I remember I had got into some trouble, and I was out on bail fighting a case at FIT [Fashion Institute of Technology] at the time, but also in this business program that Allan Houston founded at the Harlem Wildwood Citibank.
And I was getting all of this knowledge on how to create a business plan. I was using the FIT library to do crazy market research like download Doneger and Mintel reports, which cause a fortune, but had the student access. So we finessed that and crafted a great business plan. And I was just giving him the outlines of the lessons that I was getting because I know he had ideas at the time. He wanted to do a catering company, a food truck, which is all wraps and call it, "It's A Wrap." It was called, It's A Wrap Cater. And I was like, Yeah, one day we going to do something. But I thought that I have to make a billion dollars like my Patagonia homie and then come back and do something for fun, like a passion project. But it ended up being a passion. That's the work getting us to those goals.
Kerry Diamond:
Let's talk about this amazing book. First off, I have to say congratulations.
Jon Gray:
Thank you.
Kerry Diamond:
It's your first book and it's a beauty.
Jon Gray:
Thank you so much.
Kerry Diamond:
There's so much to it. And we're going to peel back the layers.
Jon Gray:
Labor of love.
Kerry Diamond:
I can imagine-
Jon Gray:
An emphasis on the labor part.
Kerry Diamond:
It's one of the most anticipated culinary books of the season. Congrats on that.
Jon Gray:
Thank you.
Kerry Diamond:
You told the Financial Times it's a cross between The Joy Of Cooking and the Bible. That made me laugh out - knowing you to the extent that I do, that did make me laugh out loud. But then I thought maybe Jon's dead serious about that description.
Jon Gray:
I was using Bible as the acronym because taking it back to you.
Kerry Diamond:
I was doing a capital B Bible.
Jon Gray:
Staten Island Roots, Wu-Tang Clan on their first album is a song called Bible is by Masta Killa. And it's basically the acronym breaks down into meaning basic instructions before leaving earth. But I say the Bible, I say yeah, the Quran I think it belongs in every home, every hotel room. It's one of those things that it's not just about cooking recipes. This belongs outside the kitchen. It's a lot of knowledge, great conversations with folks like Thelma Golden, Emory Douglas. The way Osayi was able to put the pen game down as incredible and really take our ethos and ideas. The big mission with this was like, all right, hopefully they understand what Ghetto Gastro is let’s approach this like it’s our first and our last book.
Kerry Diamond:
That's heavy.
Jon Gray:
Because you never know. You don't want to think, oh yeah, this is just volume one. And then we, it's like, if this is the first one and the last one, let's give them enough so they feel like, all right, we know what this is. Not we just have to leave them with a cliff hanger. Because one of my main things is, and I struggle with describing what we are, what we do? Because it's multitudes, it's blurry. It's a lot of things. It's not like a 30 second or a tagline where it's like boom, boom, boom. It's not Uber for pizza. Like we don't know how to break it down succinctly like that because it's a lot of things.
Kerry Diamond:
If you think about it like a bookstore. I was in McNally Jackson yesterday because I wanted to go see Jean-Georges’ the Tin Building down at the Seaport.
Jon Gray:
Okay, okay.
Kerry Diamond:
This whole big complex, It's like Jean-Georges’ [Vongerichten] version of Eataly. And I was meeting somebody, so I was walking through McNally Jackson, and I was doing research on you guys all weekend. So you're foremost in my mind. And I'm like, “it could be in the art section, it could be in the culinary section. It could be down front with the brand-new books. It could be, there's so many places that book could live.” It's really a coffee table book.
Jon Gray:
The goal, me coming from the non-cook lens. Yeah, we want this to be able to live on your coffee table, live in your bedroom, your bedside, so you can actually read it. It's pretty pictures, but the words are important. Even the head notes. The head notes. Every recipe has an essay. Some are short, it's not too verbose.
Kerry Diamond:
Great stuff to read in this. I mean more so than the average.
Jon Gray:
Yeah. Yeah.
Kerry Diamond:
Cookbook by far.
Jon Gray:
Well, Osayi is brilliant. She like to be able to be our partner and our thought partner and creating this work together.
Kerry Diamond:
The only place I don't want people to put this book is right next to the stove where it's going to get dirty, greasy and all that, no.
Jon Gray:
Well, just buy two for each of the rooms. We mentioned buy a copy one for the kitchen. You got to have one for the collection because this first edition is going to be a collectible and then one for the bedroom slash living room, depending on how you feel.
Kerry Diamond:
Why the title Black Power Kitchen?
Jon Gray:
Well, we call ourselves the Black Power Kitchen. And I think it's just an idea. Just much Ghetto Gastro that's jarring but necessary.
Kerry Diamond:
You mean the name Ghetto Gastro?
Jon Gray:
Yeah, yeah, yeah. So it is not about an exclusive because this is for everybody. It's not just for Black people, but it's really wanting to tell the stories of Blackness and food, past, present, future. We're going to talk about the hard stuff, but we're also going to have joy, abundance, redemption. So it's just a vibe.
Kerry Diamond:
There's a lot of feminine energy in this book, which I didn't realize when I got it. I was so excited to get that book because I know how long you guys have worked on it and I know how hard it is to do a book that layered. It's just hard to do a basic cookbook. But to do a book you guys did, I mean just the art pages and the color reproduction and I mean we could talk about that for a long time. But I was so happy when I opened it to see all the feminine energy coming through. And that's not the first thing people think of when they think of you guys.
Jon Gray:
Tell me how it came through for you without giving them too much of a spoiler.
Kerry Diamond:
Okay. I won't. You've got your editor Judy Pray, your recipe testers, Dr. Jessica B. Harris, who's been a guest on the show who everybody loves. And if you don't know Dr. Jessica, she wrote High On The Hog on which the great Netflix show is based. She wrote the intro, and she wrote, I was so moved when I read this. She wrote that learning about Ghetto Gastro made her quote, "Feel as though I had some spiritual children on a planet, I didn't know with whom I had miraculously reconnected." I had goosebumps when I read that.
Jon Gray:
Wow. Yeah, we were at family reunion, and she was talking about the importance of her being a bridge and thinking about her relationships with Maya Angelou, James Baldwin and being, she's like, "I'm the bridge between them and Ghetto Gastro." And I'm like, "What?" That's like. And that made me emotional and think about, because when you do a thing, you're deeply invested in it. But it's like 50% of the work is making the thing. The other half is up to you, the person that receives it and how they receive it. The reception with how they feel about it. It's an interesting and difficult thing when you put something into the world. So to have it resonate with folks, how it resonates with me or the intention even just the intention, the way we wanted people to feel, picking it up, flipping through the pages, reading it's like, "Wow, it is really resonating." And that that's a feeling that you can't put a dollar amount on. And elders like Dr. J, come on. She's not just handing out compliments.
Kerry Diamond:
No, she doesn't do that.
Jon Gray:
That's not her style.
Kerry Diamond:
No, but I mean there's a lot of powerful stuff in your book. But that line made me stop in my tracks. And also, not to give this away, but in your acknowledgements in the back, you could have name dropped every chef on the planet and you thank your mom first and you thank your grandparents and aunts and just all these women in your life. And I just felt like it was such a beautiful bookend. You've got Dr. Jessica's introduction and then you thanking all these women in your life at the end. I was just like, "That's really powerful stuff."
Jon Gray:
It's crazy because I don't even think about it like that. But because it's so natural. I was raised by a community of strong, brilliant, beautiful, smart Black women. So it's without, we dedicated a whole chapter to our mothers. Had a conversation with them because really without them, there's no, this doesn't exist human life. It's not happening without women. So we have to give it up. And also because we're so, it's a certain amount of bravado and it's Bronx, it's tough. It's like got to, not even to say that the women we work with are soft. But you need that feminine energy just for it to work to balance it out.
Kerry Diamond:
You've also got Thelma Golden in there. That's a mic drop. Thelma is a total New York City icon and she's the director of the Studio Museum in Harlem.
Jon Gray:
For the Studio Museum to get the recognition and the love it deserves, and it deserves a lot more. She has to weave through these worlds, right? Because these people need to know they need a support with the work that's going on. I just actually did, I introduced a panel with Thelma Golden, Tremaine Emory, Anicka Yi,, and Father Mike [Lopez] for Sky High Farms. They did a symposium at the Judd Foundation.
Kerry Diamond:
Tell me Thelma's contribution to the book.
Jon Gray:
Thelma's contribution to the book. We had a brilliant conversation, and she just lit a fire inside of me, much like Dr. J, when certain things that she said. And often a lot of times with the work with Ghetto Gastro, we're just doing what we do. It takes other people to frame what we do. Because when you're doing it, sometimes you don't know what you're doing or so for her to frame this as a powerful movement in the Black art canon and just the art canon and to think about the importance of community, she also just gave us being motivated. Because I was a little discouraged trying to find, she's like, you got to get a space in the Bronx that's yours. Because it's discouraging when the real estate is just all being overdeveloped and gentrified and it's like nothing left for the people with some means to get something that's reasonable. So it's for the community. So I was discouraged the last few years, but she was like, "No." That's back on a to-do list.
Kerry Diamond:
Oh, good.
Jon Gray:
For us to find a space to activate something that we own though. So we could literally, and really express the vision, whether it's architecturally design, bringing the right collaborators. And sometimes when you're rinsing that level of investment doesn't make sense. because even after you've seen with COVID, so many irrational landlords, look at Uncle Boons. Why that's been vacant for years. Even I had a conversation yesterday, ownership is the wrong word because how do you own something on earth, right? Becoming a steward of property, especially as a black person in this country, is a radical act in itself. So that's back on the to-do list for sure.
Kerry Diamond:
Good. Well let's all manifest that for you because that would be fantastic. Who worked with you to curate the art in the book? It is such a powerful collection, and the reproductions are gorgeous.
Jon Gray:
That's all me.
Kerry Diamond:
That's all you.
Jon Gray:
The homies P [Pierre Serrao] and Les [Lester Walker], they got the recipes. I can only, I help name a few. But the art curation...
Kerry Diamond:
Is that going to be an exhibit somewhere at some point?
Jon Gray:
It should be. It should be. I think it could be. We're actually doing all that.
Kerry Diamond:
I mean you did all the work for the museum.
Jon Gray:
Yeah, this is true. They just got to reach out to a bunch of collectors. Some of the work in the book is we have in our collections throughout the collective. But yeah, they could take that and do it. I think it'd be amazing. We're doing our launch for the book at the Met. So that's going to be a lot of fun.
Kerry Diamond:
Nice.
Jon Gray:
Yeah. But at some point, it would be dope to do an exhibition because to see all of this in a room. Oh my God.
Kerry Diamond:
That'll happen.
Jon Gray:
Yeah, it will.
Kerry Diamond:
That's your gift. You make things like that happen.
Jon Gray:
I appreciate that. I appreciate that.
Kerry Diamond:
Well, I can't wait. Okay. And then we have to talk about Osayi, the award-winning food writer. Why did you want to work with her on this book?
Jon Gray:
It's going to sound shallow. I knew she was the person not based on her reading her articles. I waited till I met everybody and felt them because we met a few potential people to work with. She had the right vibe, and she had the right coat. I was like, "All right, this person's going to get us. She had a Montclair coat on. It was like pre-fall. I was like, "All right."
Kerry Diamond:
Did you say the right coat or code? The right coat?
Jon Gray:
The right coat. That's why I said it's going to say I shallow. I'm like, she respects the drip. And then when I started getting into some of the articles she wrote and I was like, "Yeah, I think she gets it. She is firm. It's like we could work on this together. We could craft these words and really get the point across."
Kerry Diamond:
And there is so much in it to read. I mean you snuck an entire non-fiction book into that book.
Jon Gray:
Maybe we should have broke it out and got more paper.
Kerry Diamond:
I think you've got four different books in that one book. I do love that you said you approached it would be the last one and only book you ever did. I mean that could start us down a whole conversation about perfectionism and why some projects take so long. I think I approach a few things like that too, to my detriment.
Jon Gray:
Yeah. And I think it's never going to be perfect, right? Perfectionism doesn't exist, but you want it to feel like you want it to feel. And when you have a vision and you're a dreamer, you see it. So when the thing isn't what you set out for it to be, it could be tough. But I don't think our book is perfect in any sense of the word. I didn't get excited until I got the digital galley because it's different when you see, even when you click the button and you see a page flip and you feel the effect like, "Ooh, that hits like that when you turn the page." Because even when you just scrolling down a PDF or whatever InDesign file, it doesn't hit when you turn a page. So I'm glad the galleys have that effect of turning pages. And I was like, I remember I was in front, and I was in front of a big desktop too, so I was in front of the Mac studio with the desktop and I'm clicking and I'm like, "It's going down."
So that's when I felt it. And just being able to, I didn't get every artist that I wanted to get in there just because the nature of being a creative person studios. So it's people that would definitely be in volume too, on a director's cut, on a reprint. I'm just so happy with it. It was so many things that I wanted in there that didn't make it in. But there will be more. Because I think when you approach something, it's the first and the last. You are going to give the people what they need. And because this is Ghetto Gastro, it's our first book. We got to tell them what we're about because so many things you can't get through Instagram. You can't get at a pre-dinner speech that is 30 seconds. So it's like, let's really give them the ethos, what we stand for, what we care about. Let them feel it.
Kerry Diamond:
Were you scared to open it when you got it in your hands?
Jon Gray:
Nah. When you get to see the feel the paper quality and the cover and whatnot. I was running around with a dummy cover. We used our dummy copy. So for yours, you don't know the dummy copy is where you have the book cover, but the pages are just blank. And we use it a weird yearbook. So we have, we've taken it around the world. We got iWay way in there. The yearbook is going to be in museums, Tom Sachs, Chase Hall, Theaster Gates, like everybody, I'm like, everybody tagging John Hancock in here, Mary Frey, Mario Sorrenti is going to be. So that is something like-
Kerry Diamond:
That's awesome. All right, let's talk about one of your favorite subjects. Your mom, Denise [Lee].
Jon Gray:
I was just with her. She just went back to Savannah.
Kerry Diamond:
Oh, is that where she lived?
Jon Gray:
She's back and forth on a season. But yeah, she was here. We went to my buddy Luar Raul [Lopez], he does the, he's the fashion designer Luar. He does Luar. Incredible. Dominican designer from Brooklyn. Grew up in Williamsburg, the south side does dope bags. So took my mom just down to just come hang too. So it's cool.
Kerry Diamond:
Does she know Mashama [Bailey]?
Jon Gray:
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Mashama is... My mother's first trip to Savannah, I started a Mother's Day tradition because my grandmother lives in South Carolina of going to The Grey for Mother's Day when we can, So that's how she met-
Kerry Diamond:
The Grey is at the Gray.
Jon Gray:
Yeah, exactly. So she was introduced to Savannah through our time at The Grey.
Kerry Diamond:
And Mashama Bailey, who I hope all of the great chef of The Grey.
Jon Gray:
She claims queens, but she was born in the Bronx. So you know what it is. When I think about the culinary output of the Bronx right now.
Kerry Diamond:
Paola Velez.
Jon Gray:
Paola, Kwame, Ghetto Gastro, Eric Adjepong, Ghanaian brother, Mashama, La Mirada family like Carolina [Saavedra]. It's goes crazy. So we come it.
Kerry Diamond:
You always tell stories about your mom, and I thought that was so sweet.
Jon Gray:
Yeah, she's the reason that I'm here. Not just from a biological sense, which is very true. The way she socialized me is why I see the world, how I see it and also why I love food. She was eating great food when I was in her belly because she was working. We're at Rockefeller Center now. She was working a few blocks away at John Atkinson's, which was the luxury black hair salon. I think he's still around. She was doing Stevie Wonder's hair. Michael Jackson's hair, did Lenny Kravitz stuff back in the day. But she would hit the bakeries and the trattoria's around there and just have great lunches. And then because she was working during the day, going to school at night when I was already in this realm of earth, she didn't often have time to cook. So we would go out to eat. She liked to eat and that's how I got my palette up.
Kerry Diamond:
You're a little gourmand.
Jon Gray:
Yeah, yeah. Started early and I was good at sports, but I feel like the first time I had external validation that greatly reinforced my confidence was from a food recommendation I made when I was five or six years old to a woman at a restaurant called First Walk. Now it's Walk 88, it's on 88 and 3rd Avenue because I used to live on a 100th between first and second and Metro North Houses. So
Kerry Diamond:
This was the orange chicken.
Jon Gray:
The orange chicken versus the lemon chicken. I was like, that's lemon chicken is a little too bitter. It doesn't have the right accoutrement. Trust me. Go to orange way. You going to be okay. Trust.
Kerry Diamond:
And that lady you made that recommendation to must have been like, who is this little kid with the super taster palette?
Jon Gray:
She's like, "You're remarkable." I like, I'm 36 now. I was probably five or six then I could close my eyes and just transport back to that moment. And it's these our child cells go even doing therapy and learning so much about how childhood is so important for our development and just the memories, whether it's trauma or great memories, really affect who you are. So I think the confidence actually enjoying the active eating. Something that you need to do over and over. Some people live to eat, some people eat to live. So I'm definitely live to eat type of person. When I think about traveling, it's often based on what I want to try. Peru is at the top of my list because I want to try the amazing food there.
Kerry Diamond:
And reading about you and hearing the stories about your mom, it sounds like she always had your back even when you got into some serious trouble.
Jon Gray:
Yeah. It's funny. I say my mother had a very difficult stretch with me between the ages of 10 and 20. We didn't see eye to eye on anything. I was just rebellious, smart, doing good in school with the grade stuff, but never behavior. And then I dabbled into the streets, caught a case, was facing a lot of time. She kicked me out when I was like 16. Let me back in maybe six months after. But I remember just being on the elevator with my mom. I rented a room in the same building she lived in and I'll be on the elevator with her. I looked at her like a stranger. I didn't even say hello.
We had rough patches. But one thing about my family, they've always held me down. I broke up with a girlfriend because she didn't go to one of my court dates and it broke my heart. I'm like, "Yeah, how you doing? I'm facing crazy numbers and you not coming to the court dates with me." Just the feeling of walking into the Supreme Court in the Bronx. No, I had a crazy case hanging over my head. That nerves are wild. But yeah, moms my grandmother, my aunt. Yeah, everybody held it down.
Kerry Diamond:
Are you going to write a memoir one day?
Jon Gray:
Osayi keeps telling me I think I got a little bit more to do. But yeah, I'm down to put some verbs. It'll probably be a mixture of life story but then something I want to leave people with actionable lessons I've learned so they don't make mistakes. So they go learn from great things that I've learned.
Kerry Diamond:
I mean Ghetto Gastro obviously has a lot of books in it, but I feel like you've at least got a memoir plus a business book. Seriously.
Jon Gray:
You should be my agent.
Kerry Diamond:
Ghetto Gastro has expanded dramatically over the past few years. You added a product line, you've got a signature waffle and pancake mix.
Jon Gray:
Yes.
Kerry Diamond:
And signature syrups. Tell us about Wavy and why you started with that.
Jon Gray:
Yeah, so the waffle, we started with that because even our journey in Ghetto Gastro to the outside world, we started getting recognized after we did this part. It was super neat. It was like at 2012 through February 2013. It was just like you had to be one or two degrees away to probably even know about Ghetto Gastro. Then once we did Waffles and Models, so it was a fashion week party took over Le Baron, right? We had the waffles, had the models, Cardi B performed.
Kerry Diamond:
And models like supermodels, fashion models.
Jon Gray:
It was a mix of supermodels and dancers. It was a big vibe. It was a big vibe. So yeah, waffles and models. And I got that idea at Art Basel in 2012 and I was like, "Yo, what model? What rhymes? What?" Because people keep saying, they always say, "Yo, pop bottles with the models." I'm like, "No, let's get waffles with the models, waffles and models." That's a party. And that's kind of how it happened. And then from there we just kept doing more interest from corporations, brands started to trickle in. Because at first nobody worked full time on us but me. Everybody had a job that was involved in that, which gave us the flexibility to really say no to things that didn't fit. And we've made some mistakes like we've done, but sometimes you got to learn, got to kiss a few frogs, right? You got to learn through doing like, all right, yeah, that's not the fit. These are the signs to watch out for in early conversations or first emails-
Kerry Diamond:
The red flags.
Jon Gray:
Yeah, it's like you learn the red flags, exactly.
Kerry Diamond:
Why the name Wavy, what does that mean?
Jon Gray:
Well, we keep it Wavy free Max B, free Max B. It's funny because with the different names, we don't want to confuse people. So we are just bringing everything, like me being a Aries that has ADHD, every idea I want to create a whole new house for it. We just bringing everything under Ghetto Gastro. It's just like, because we had astronomical, now it's just Ghetto Gastro foods. And we have a great team helping execute. But we keep it Wavy. The syrup is Sovereign Syrup. Thinking about sweeteners that weren't really a product of chattel slavery like sugar cane. And when I think about the and the terror and the Caribbean and American South from orange sugar cane plantations, the indigenous people that occupied this space first had the knowledge of maple syrup, like tapping the trees for sap and boiling that down and make syrup.
Then during the middle passage, sorghum made its way to the Americas from Africa. It originates there. The type of sorghum we have here. So when it's a pseudocereal that has the properties of grain without gluten, but it also, so sorghum is the main ingredient in the waffle. And we also have a version of syrup that we use sorghum at. And then we have the apple cider syrup.
Kerry Diamond:
Syrup, yeah.
Jon Gray:
Just paying Omar to New York because we in a Big Apple.
Kerry Diamond:
Oh, I didn't know why there was apple cider. It's such an interesting blend. You've got the sorghum syrup, the apple cider syrup, and a little bit of dark maple syrup. The Sovereign Syrup. I find so interesting though because obviously everybody knows what happened with Aunt Jemima being retired in 2020. Quaker Oats announced that they were getting rid of that. Probably should have happened much earlier than that. I think even as a little kid. I remember having Aunt Jemima Maple, if it wasn't even real maple syrup, imitation syrup, right? I remember having it on the table and even as a little kid-
Jon Gray:
You feel uncomfortable.
Kerry Diamond:
... knowing something was wrong with it was Sovereign Syrup a response to that?
Jon Gray:
Yeah, the waffle was too because it was like we actually formulated another product first that we haven't launched yet called Uptown Shake. It's like our answer to shake and bake. But we were like, yo, let's start-
Kerry Diamond:
Oh my God. Shake and bake. Remember Shake and Bake?
Jon Gray:
Shake and Bake, Ricky Bobby, I got to find Will Ferrell to do a commercial for us.
Kerry Diamond:
Ricky Bobby.
Jon Gray:
So we were looking like, all right, waffles and models. That's one pillar. So we were like, "Let's start with the waffles." But also this idea of the anti-racist breakfasts, right? Because yeah, Aunt Jemima, Uncle Ben's, they that you sort of skit on SNL [Saturday Night Live], they were retired or whatever. And it is just like, yeah, these are companies that didn't really take our... First of all, they're not taking our health and wellbeing in the consideration. It's profits over everything when you look at the ingredient stack. And then also just the culture and being offensive, not being sensitive to how this affects or what this means to people.
Kerry Diamond:
Your ingredients are great. I was looking at the ingredient list on Wavy and you don't hide it either. Some companies really make you search for that information.
Jon Gray:
We're proud of them.
Kerry Diamond:
All the food products are vegan. And you get this from the book as well. You're very plant-based foods and veganism, even though you're not purely vegan or plant-based, but like I said, both with your own products and some of the Black Power Kitchen recipes. What's the attraction for Ghetto Gastro for that?
Jon Gray:
Well, I think we all know Wagyu beefs taste great. You put it on a grill, a little salt, that's great. Cheeseburgers are great. But I have a lot of friends and people and communities that I live in and or are from even rich friends, people that are worth many millions. And they'll be like, "I don't like vegetables." There was a point in my life they're like, "I don't drink water, just juice." So it is thinking, all right, we know these things are delicious. They might not be the most nutritious. Some are I'm not. And I'm not demonizing animal protein. I was, what did I have last night for dinner? I definitely had fish and what I usually have some animal protein. And I wasn't just in Tokyo best believe I had some wagyu, and I went to sushi render and then we went to Mimosa and had a crazy Chinese meal.
It's great Chinese food in Japan. Don't sleep on it. But yeah, so it's really just amplifying and giving people the tools to make things that are super flavorful and then happen to be, it's not, it's plant forward but not plant forward. Because we're not starting with how we make this mushroom delicious. It's like, no, let's make something delicious. Oh yeah, a mushroom serves this idea to bring forth something delicious. It's a flavor first.
Kerry Diamond:
But also reclaiming some things that already existed in the Bronx. I mean I think when you look at wellness and plant-based, a lot of white people have co-oped that.
Jon Gray:
I was just talking about it yesterday. It's like they picture someone wearing hiking boots in San Francisco and Berkeley with a shout out to Patagonia. But with a Patagonia vest, when they think of better for you, well wellness food. So for us, we grew up in a neighborhood where many Rastafarians, you see me talking about sea moss all the time, right? That's something that was a part of my diet from a young age, from going to the juice bar. So I think it's definitely about reclaiming even okra, brussels sprouts, people like reclaiming ingredients and ways of eating that have because back in the day, meat was a treat. If you had to hunt for that, that's not on your plate every day. It's a treat when you get some animal protein. So being able to sustain and nourish yourself off of the other parts of the earth.
And even just thinking about the ecological impact that industrial farming has, that's the main thing. You're talking about the health of our bodies, but also the health of the planet. I think it's important and don't get it twisted. Like Dr. J, we were having a conversation yesterday. She's just as important. What goes into the vegetables you consume as what goes into the feed of whatever animals you're consuming. So all veggies aren't created equally, but how do we get delicious, nutritious vegetables and communities like ours? And it's not just getting the vegetables there. How do we create desire and demand for these things and recipes that appear like Bryant Terry's been doing it with the Afro vegan and you know have Shenarri Freeman. Was she doing that cadence with the vegan soul food? But we just wanted to run the gamut across the diaspora. But we got jerk chicken in there too. You know what I'm saying? We got fried chicken in there, like a karaage style fried chicken. We got the fish in there.
Kerry Diamond:
There's something for everyone in that book.
Jon Gray:
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Kerry Diamond:
Okay, CRUXGG, as if you're not doing enough-
Jon Gray:
Appliances.
Kerry Diamond:
You've got an appliance line that you can find in Target, Macy's, William-Sonoma. What's that all about?
Jon Gray:
I'm going to just quote another Staten Island or Ghostface. I might butcher this rap, but he's like, we work appliances and revolve around sciences. It's just like we got to give you the printer. I'll use the waffle example. The waffle makers, the printer, the waffle mixes the paper. The syrup is the ink. We got to give you the whole pack. We can't leave you out for dust, you got to give you it all. So I think for us it's really just think that that was more a design, exercising, same thing. Most of the things that I create come from a place of selfishness. What do I want? And then it happens to be a community of people that agree we want this. So just thinking about how do we, growing up in small New York apartments, oftentimes you might not have storage for your appliances. So if you got to look at it, let's make it look okay, let's make it a ornament for everyday living. So it was really about just leveling up the countertop.
Kerry Diamond:
And here's the most important question of this entire interview. Do I need an air fryer?
Jon Gray:
Yes.
Kerry Diamond:
And you guys have a popular one.
Jon Gray:
You need a black-owned air fryer. We have some softer colors coming. Some warmer colors. Right now, we have the gray and the white, but 2.0 is coming next year we got some more flavors for me. I love reheating in the air fryer.
Kerry Diamond:
Okay. I don't own an air fryer because I'm just worried about the size.
Jon Gray:
I was going to say the counter space, it's tricky.
Kerry Diamond:
But I feel like I'm missing out on something.
Jon Gray:
We'll rectify that.
Kerry Diamond:
How are you taking care of yourself these days? Mentally and physically?
Jon Gray:
Meditation, therapy. I actually got to hit my therapist to schedule some appointments because I've been slipping after we did the Oscars, I was doing really good in the beginning of the year, but after the Oscars I kind of fell off on the therapy wagon. But I felt great when I was doing it. Exercise, drinking water, being around loved ones, acupuncture and massage. If I ever feel a little out of whack and just give vibes the vibrations and trying to be around people that don't heighten my cortisol levels that I feel like I could relax and let my shoulders relax around.
Kerry Diamond:
I hope, you do that for a lot of people.
Jon Gray:
That means a lot. That means a lot because often it's calling yourself. Cool. You would hope that you're one someone that brings good energy in a room, but you don't know because you're not a recipient of the energy that you're putting out. So for you to say that resonates with me, it means a lot to me.
Kerry Diamond:
Looking back on the first decade of Ghetto Gastro and it's 10 years old, which is-
Jon Gray:
It went by in a blink.
Kerry Diamond:
It blows my mind.
Jon Gray:
It's like time is flying.
Kerry Diamond:
What would you say is your biggest accomplishment?
Jon Gray:
I think some major milestones. The book is a major milestone. Putting it all down on paper again, it done having it out in the world. This thing is going to outlive us, right? For sure. What else? The Oscars was a great milestone.
Kerry Diamond:
You and Wolfgang [Puck]?
Jon Gray:
Yeah, Wolfgang linking up and just being on that red carpet. Cutting up was a lot of fun. And honestly just being able to do it for 10 years. Business is hard. Groups are very hard changes. Going through the changes, the ebbs and flows, the work we were doing in the pandemic is probably the most important.
Kerry Diamond:
You fed a lot of people.
Jon Gray:
Like feeding people and just also just remembering that because sometimes if you get away, you get too focused on the business and the numbers or the cloud and the attention. For me, the real soul food is giving back. And not to sound like corny, but literally when I get to speak with the youth, the feelings another selfish thing. You get high off that. I'm like, "Oh, this is that high I've been missing." So just refocusing in those efforts. And really when people come up to us, people that have great careers and food right now and say we're what inspired them to take this path, that makes me emotional. I'm like, see that? And that's the work when we talked about what's the real job, what's the mission? It's like if we have a 100 people that do that and then another a 100 people come follow behind that's like impact.
Kerry Diamond:
Well, Jon. Thank you for everything you do.
Jon Gray:
Thank you, Kerry. Thank you for everything you do.
Kerry Diamond:
You are the Bombe.
Jon Gray:
Cherry Bombe. Black Cherry, black Cherry Bombesquad.
Kerry Diamond:
That's it for today's show. Thank you so much to Jon Gray for joining me. It is always fun catching up with Jon. If you'd like to purchase a copy of Black Power Kitchen, head to ghettogastro.com or pick up one at your favorite black-owned bookstore like The Lit. Bar in the Bronx. Don't forget our Cherry Bombe Cooks and Books Festival taking place November 5th and 6th at Ace Hotel Brooklyn. Check out cherrybombe.com to snag your tickets. If you enjoy today's pod, don't forget part two with Black Power Kitchen co-author Osayi Endolyn. Radio Cherry Bombe is a production of Cherry Bombe Magazine. Our theme song is by the band Tralala. Thanks to Joseph Hazan, studio engineer for Newsstand Studios at Rockefeller Center and to our assistant producer Jenna Sadhu. And thanks to you for listening. You are the Bombe.