One day, a celebrity event requested that we veer from our typical regional Italian menu and serve tacos and sliders, instead. That night, we styled countless, creative versions of sliders and tacos, one of which was a killer fried chicken sandwich that everyone went crazy for! That’s when my wake-up call sounded loudly, “Girl, it’s time to simplify!! Let’s get into the fried chicken business!” My experience in fine dining was incredibly high-touch with so many custom requests and high demands that it was simply not sustainable. Not to mention, the comfort food still had a dynamic taste while harnessing the down-to-earth, approachable values that I identified with best.

Nevertheless, it took many years of friends and family asking for chicken sliders, toying with the idea of opening my own restaurant, and my analyst/entrepreneur husband always looking for ways to grow a business, that Daddy’s Chicken Shack was eventually born. In fact, it was at a focus group with Travis Kalinack, founder of Uber, where we learned about his “cloud kitchens” (old buildings turned into to-go kitchens for food delivery services), and we saw what had only been a mere dream suddenly come to life in reality in the form of a hybrid cloud kitchen. Six months later (and while very pregnant with our first daughter right before the holidays), our first Daddy’s Chicken Shack location in Pasadena, California opened shop.

Initially, in order to make things scalable, this first brick-and-mortar was a lunch-only, primarily to-go concept, with a heavy focus on delivery apps to start out. Very much like our very own “cloud kitchen.” Several months after opening day, my husband quit his day job in the finance world to manage Daddy’s full time. He’s a force, and we make an awesome team. When something feels right, the clouds part and the light shines and it almost feels like a huge relief- duh! Because you’ve figured out your purpose.