Garden Kitchen Restaurant and Patio: ˝ Supporting a Small, Local, and Farm-toTable San Diego Eatery By Robin Dohrn-Simpson
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y neighborhood in central San Diego is a prime area of the city located 15 minutes from anything— the beaches, the football stadium, and the mountains. That is everything except good restaurants. “Why don’t we have any nice restaurants?” we would constantly ask our neighbors. No one had an answer. After years of traveling to different areas of town, Coral Fodor Strong thankfully saw this area as a food desert and decided to take a chance. Was it the Jamaican flag flying at the rundown building she was looking at? Was it a sign from her favorite singer Bob Marley to put down restaurant roots? She thought it was and so she did—put down roots in the San Diego neighborhood of Rolando. At that point, Coral was only a home cook, but she was keen to owning her own business. Having no previous experience was not a problem for her. “I had a vision” she says, “and failure wasn’t an option.” She rented a fixer upper building and began to pour love—and elbow grease—into her project. Her largest initial challenge was how to get business in the door.
“I wanted the business to grow organically, slowly and methodically so I could learn and grow along the way. I chose to never advertise, so there were nights when only one table would come in. Word of mouth was important to me, because I never wanted to be a trendy restaurant, I wanted customers who understood what I was doing with the food movement—customers who would seek out true farm-to-table cuisine, who wanted to eat cleaner food, and who would respect and be interested in food sourcing. I opened the restaurant in May 2015 and by September, I was feeling confident. By January 2016, I knew I’d made it.” Chef Coral never meant to be the chef, rather the owner and manager, but life had other plans. Her first chef quit after a month, so she had to get in the kitchen and start cooking. On a self-funded budget, she quickly realized she couldn't find affordable talent. “So, I kept on cooking. Once I started cooking, I realized it was a passion that I couldn’t let go. While I thought I was just a house cook, people kept coming back for more, so I knew I had created a special type of cuisine in my self-taught kitchen,” she says. Having a unique daily menu is a challenge. “Focusing on being a true farm-to-table restaurant, and only working with the
Photos: Garden Kitchen sign & GK patio
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