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00:00And good morning Attorney Dean. Good morning Mason. How are you? I'm great. I had coffee so I'm feeling real
00:06good. Tell people what you run. Yes, I am the president and CEO of the Michigan Black Business Alliance. We
00:14serve thousands of black entrepreneurs across the state of Michigan and I'm happy to be here. You were once an
00:19attorney for the city of Detroit. That is right. I'm the former director of civil rights. I am still an
00:25attorney. I used to work for the city of Detroit. I'm also an entrepreneur. I own a coffee shop called
00:29Rosie.
00:30Where's that at? On Wayne State's campus in the bookstore. Back to school started yesterday. I didn't know that. I
00:36got to mention that on. Yeah. I didn't know that. That's cool. Yes. You brought a guest with you again.
00:45I did. I did. And we have a special guest but we'll talk about our special guest next. But the
00:51entrepreneur that you brought. Yes. I'm going to let her introduce herself. Go ahead Q. Well I am Keanu Rice
00:58but everybody calls me Q.
00:59I own The Kitchen by Cooking with Q in Midtown Detroit. Oh wow. Nice meeting. Oh wow. No kidding. Yeah.
01:08We outside. We outside. In the old days. In the old days. In the old days. In the old days.
01:14Shut up. I'm screaming. I'm screaming. Shut up. Please. Shut the noise.
01:21She said. Shut up. What was in your coffee? That's not Rosa coffee you drink. Listen. It should be. They
01:31just don't let you in the Ford Field. They don't. Well. And that's the main thing first.
01:35You know. There's all kind of licensing that's. Yeah. Crazy is all get out. You have been in the culinary
01:44business how long?
01:45The restaurant's been open for seven years. We made it for seven years. That's awesome. Yeah. We started June 3rd,
01:502019. And our entire mission was just to show people how to eat to live.
01:53Because they told us. You know. Your people don't want to eat healthy. Wow. They're not going to want to
01:58eat. It'd be better if you'd open up a dialysis center than to open up a healthy. Wow.
02:01Q. Tell us what's on the menu. Everything you can think of that's healthy. But what you got to know
02:06first is no microwave. There's no fryers. Say that. Say that.
02:09Every single thing is to make people stay alive. So you can get your soups, sandwiches, salads. But it's food
02:13for everybody. Because you have people with a lot of ailments right now. So no matter what you are. Whether
02:17you're a cancer patient. You have high blood pressure. We have food to heal people.
02:21So soups, salads, sandwiches, smoothies. Salmon. Of course. That's your favorite thing. It's my favorite thing. I think people think
02:28because I'm vegan they think the entire restaurant is vegan. But it's not. It's just like the place to show
02:32people how to eat to live. So you eat. Cooking classes. Team buildings. There's so many things you can do.
02:37You're able to educate the buyer when they come in to your facility. Absolutely. Again, you are located slowly where?
02:49We are at 6529 Woodward Avenue. Okay. Give me some landmarks. You're on West Grand Boulevard, in between West Grand
02:59Boulevard and Milwaukee. So we're on Woodward with it every six out of seven days a week.
03:04Okay. That's where the train station is. Yeah, a block over. You know where Joe Louis Southern Kitchen is? Yes.
03:09You know the 10 Nail Bar?
03:10So you're where? Right there. You're in that cluster. Yes. Wow.
03:15And again, it is called? The Kitchen by Cooking with Q. The Kitchen. And that's what's on the sign. It
03:22says it.
03:23The Kitchen by Cooking with Q. Because where do all the good times happen in your house?
03:27The Kitchen. The Kitchen. Say that.
03:30Go back to that salmon. I can tell you some kitchen stories.
03:34Please. Stop. You know what, Mason?
03:36No more stories from you today.
03:38I'm going to tell you about the salmon. Talk to me.
03:40It's a salmon salad. I get it every time. It has capers on it and red onion. It is delicious.
03:45I get it every single time. And I also get the vegan mac.
03:48And also, I mean, you got DJ on Friday nights.
03:52Thursdays and Fridays.
03:52She does cooking classes. She got entrepreneurship camps in the summertime for kids.
03:57All kinds of stuff.
03:58I just wanted to put all that out there.
03:59And we make all of our salad dressings from scratch. Dairy-free. Amen.
04:03Amen.
04:04The mayor gets a salmon salad and a vegan mac and cheese and barbecue cauliflower wings every day.
04:08You're on the same side as Joe Louis.
04:10Yes.
04:11That's a black-owned strip. There's a lot of black-owned businesses right there.
04:14I've been in your restaurant. Because you have a bar.
04:16I do.
04:17You sat at the bar.
04:18Amen.
04:20I ate at the bar. I sure did.
04:23And it's bright. Green, orange.
04:24Everybody don't understand the detail of onions. I'm an onion connoisseur.
04:28I love onions. I think onions is the secret to help.
04:31Well, I just want to compliment you on, because the key thing she mentioned was you put red onions.
04:36Fresh.
04:37Come on.
04:37There's a real...
04:38Talk to me.
04:39And for a connoisseur of onions, tell her the difference between the white onion and the red.
04:45Oh, God.
04:46So for us, we make a Vidallion onion vinaigrette dressing. We use those onions for our dressing.
04:51They're sweeter. They're delicious. But the red onions, I'm going to keep a hood. We're from South Carolina.
04:57My family from South Carolina. We put red onions on everything.
05:00If you're having greens, we're going to chop up some onions, put them on greens.
05:02And it's going to be on your plate with tomatoes every time we make something to eat.
05:06You have been in business for seven... And your restaurant is beautiful, by the way, which is why I stopped
05:12in and sat at the bar to eat that day.
05:15It's a good time.
05:15It was. It was a really nice time. And I... Dutch, wait a minute.
05:21Honey.
05:22The night I came in, there was a DJ.
05:25Yes.
05:25That means it was a Friday morning.
05:27Or a Thursday.
05:28Yes.
05:28During the daytime. Because it had to be around five or six or seven.
05:32That's when it starts.
05:32Okay, baby.
05:33We are done.
05:34Okay.
05:36So what I did, Dice, is I ate whatever I ordered. And then I pretended I was still hungry, which
05:42I still was. So I ordered something else. Because I wanted to hear the DJ.
05:47So I enjoyed the DJ.
05:48It's a good time.
05:49It was.
05:50Yeah.
05:50It was a very nice experience. I really enjoyed that.
05:53Friday, I call it the adult turnip. It's the Friday night wind-downs. You come and get wine. Thursdays, it's
05:58called Tacos and Turntables. And there's a different DJ every 30 minutes.
06:01So you get DJs that just come from anywhere. And they sign up and they spin.
06:06It's beautiful.
06:06Yeah, it was insane.
06:07People must visit. Do you do, obviously, what is it? Grubhub and all of that?
06:14DoorDash.
06:15DoorDash.
06:15Yes.
06:15And all of that. Okay.
06:16We cater. We deliver. We do weddings.
06:18You cater.
06:19Yes.
06:19Good.
06:19Because people are used to catering that is not delicious. So we just, my birthday was on Saturday and we
06:24did a wedding on my birthday. And it was a delicious wedding.
06:28They actually had an all-vegan wedding, but nobody knew.
06:31Say that. I love it.
06:32Amen.
06:32That's beautiful.
06:33Yeah, you have a beautiful spot. What did you run into trouble-wise in terms of business? What was the
06:41first hurdle for you?
06:42I think our first hurdle was, first off, if you didn't notice, I'm a black woman. Hi.
06:48And in the food industry, when we started, because the company started in 2015, it was just not common. You
06:54don't have a lot of women in food.
06:56Right.
06:56Right. Right. So you have a woman that's in food that never went to culinary school. So it's not an
07:00industry that people, per se, wanted to actually let you in.
07:03But I'm not good at no. So when people tell me no, I just feel like I'm talking to the
07:06wrong person in the name of Jesus.
07:08And I'm going to get what I need because, you know, God didn't put me here by mistake. So you
07:13getting funding, that's kind of where the charities came in.
07:17Because it was like, help me get to where I need to get to. Tell me where I need to
07:20go.
07:21How did you find her?
07:21Yeah, good question.
07:23Nosey.
07:25I'm nosey. I'm going to get all the information because, first off, I do two things real good you got
07:29to know. Cook and pray. Okay?
07:31So when I ask for stuff, I get it. And Charity came like a storm in the night. And she
07:37already worked for the city.
07:38So I was like, what do I have to do to get these big city contracts? Because I'm trying to
07:42be with the city.
07:43So that's how the two of you hooked up. Then you find out she's part of the Black Business Alliance
07:50now.
07:50She's everything. Keep saying it.
07:52How do you then help her, Charity?
07:54Yeah. So one of the beautiful things is I had a new Q when I was at the city.
07:59And then when we started the Black Business Alliance, she's one of our first members.
08:02Oh, wow.
08:03So like Q, it's about connection, access. We have a partnership. We're going to be talking about Ford Field.
08:09The next couple of folks that I'm going to be bringing are in Ford Field.
08:13So we're going to talk about that. It's the Lions. And there are Black businesses in Ford Field as a
08:16partnership with,
08:17we have a partnership with the Lions and Levy, which is the concessionaire in Ford Field.
08:22So we did a tour. We showed, we, you know, walked all of our, well, not all of our members,
08:26some of our members through the process.
08:29So, yeah. I mean, and so, and then when it comes to advocacy, right?
08:32So it's not just the programs, but it's, if things come up and they need a voice, our members need
08:37a voice to speak truth to power.
08:39They're always there.
08:40That's what we do as well.
08:41And I think you braze, you like this, you can't brush over it because what happens is when you're trying
08:45to get into big places like that,
08:47there's a lot of certifications you need. You have to get certified with the city.
08:50They need to make sure your insurance is right. You need it.
08:52They walked us through everything. Like the things that we didn't have, when you're a new small business owner,
08:56you don't know all of these things.
08:58And there's also not a place where you can go and get all the information for free because, you know,
09:02people like the gatekeep.
09:03Come on.
09:04Somebody should tell the truth in here.
09:07And they didn't gatekeep.
09:08You know, you ask the questions, if they don't have the answer, they're not going to say, I don't know.
09:11They're going to be like, well, let me find out.
09:12We're going to go find it out.
09:12We're going to go figure it out.
09:13And those are the kind of the people like, that's your ammunition.
09:17My producer, who produced my weekend show for years, was part of doing business in Fort Field.
09:25His name was Tobias Smith.
09:26I don't know if you've ever heard of Tobias.
09:28I have.
09:28I've heard of Tobias.
09:29I have.
09:30I was like, I definitely have.
09:31Yeah, and Tobias lived off Milwaukee for the longest.
09:35You get into Fort Field, someone's saying, we don't hear about that.
09:40And we don't know that black businesses are in Fort Field.
09:43How's that happen?
09:45Well, I mean, for us, I can tell you, so we're super intentional about finding the gate, opening in it,
09:52and then bringing people through.
09:53So what we did probably years ago, we started a relationship with the Detroit Lions and their concessionaire.
09:59So Fort Field has a concessionaire.
10:01That's a company that hires other companies, right?
10:05And so Levy is a great partner of ours.
10:08And so we've got many black businesses there.
10:10There's Q there.
10:11We've got Breadless is another member of ours that'll be here for the love of cheesecake will be here.
10:15So there are black businesses there, but also in other stadiums, too.
10:19The point is that Detroit is a black city.
10:20And so when we experience Detroit, we need to experience all of Detroit, including black businesses.
10:27And so that even spills into, you know, the Renaissance Center community benefits stuff is happening right now.
10:32We go to the table.
10:33We're going to be at that meeting tonight talking about what are we doing for black business.
10:38That's that's you to cope.
10:40And I'm sitting there like what are we doing?
10:43That's outstanding.
10:44I come from the Black Panther era.
10:48So I didn't know that my best shot at trying to help black entrepreneurs at the time was to go
10:55get a charity dean.
10:57What they did, I was doing the Negro League game at the old Comerica Park.
11:05And they took these three black men face down on the ground and cuffed them and left them there in
11:11the hot sun and left them there.
11:13So I went in and I'm on a radio appearance with the Tigers letting me in to promote Negro League.
11:22I destroyed the whole area, the tables, the merchandise.
11:28I stood on a concession.
11:31I was going to do what I was going to do.
11:32Well, I wanted them to understand you can't do that because they were trying to sell Negro League merchandise.
11:41You didn't want to let them in, but you're not going to put them in jail.
11:44That's exactly right.
11:45So we destroyed it.
11:46And the whole the point was that Major League Baseball came to the table.
11:51Yeah.
11:52And allowed black vendors.
11:53Sometimes you got to act a fool.
11:55Well, that was the way then.
11:58Well, even.
11:58Jesus did flip the table.
12:00Jesus went in a table and flipped the table.
12:02But now.
12:03No, no, no.
12:04But now.
12:05But now the most powerful weapon that we have.
12:08This is the same stuff that we talked about during Black Panther era.
12:14That you would be our rifles.
12:17You would be our guns, our machine guns, our knives.
12:21You would be the one to hold the knife to the throat, make the threat, and go through with it
12:26because you're educated.
12:27And now we see that change through Black Business Alliance of Michigan and what you're doing.
12:35Do you feel that you are carving out a historical time period in Detroit?
12:43Absolutely it is.
12:44In Michigan.
12:45100%.
12:47100%.
12:48100%.
12:48COVID exposed what we already knew to be true.
12:51And that in this beautiful black city, we had no voice for black business.
12:57No advocate for black business.
12:59And that's where I think what you're talking about makes sense in terms of having education and being able to
13:04use my access to the table to say I'm bringing other people, but I'm not afraid to flip the table
13:09over if necessary.
13:10I don't want to, I don't start there, but I'm not afraid.
13:15And so that fearlessness allows me to create space for other people and to advocate unapologetically to whomever.
13:23I love you, your restaurant.
13:26And what caught my attention, I knew the Joe Louis.
13:30I know that one.
13:32It was so bright when I walked the strip.
13:35It was bright.
13:36It looked inviting.
13:38I'm like, you know what?
13:39I'm going to go.
13:40So, so Dice, I walk in.
13:42I'm like, I don't know where I am.
13:48That menu looks good.
13:49It's a happy place.
13:51I'm not going to walk around.
13:52I walk in the door.
13:54There's two chairs right there at the bar.
13:57You said right there.
13:57Boom!
13:58And I parked.
13:59And I had a great time.
14:01Again, Q, tell them the name of the restaurant.
14:04It is called The Kitchen by Cooking with Q.
14:06And we are literally there to serve our community.
14:08So, that's why I'm so happy.
14:10You're in Ford Field.
14:13We're in Section 134-135 on the main concourse.
14:17How's it go?
14:18How long have you been here?
14:19Right in front of the freaking...
14:20This is our third year.
14:22I get it.
14:23What do the fans, the NFL fans say when they come by?
14:28They're obsessed.
14:29I'm going to tell you, we were advocating for healthy food in the field because that was
14:32the biggest thing.
14:32Like, you go to games, I don't always want a hot dog or a slice of pizza.
14:35Like, why can't I get something healthy?
14:36So, people tell us where the healthiest food in the stand.
14:38We have, like, our chicken pitas.
14:40Of course, fresh chicken.
14:41We know where everything came from.
14:43You have your, not your regular lettuce, our salad blend.
14:47We know where it came from.
14:47No germs ever.
14:49Amen.
14:51Tomatoes, pickles, onions.
14:52You can get it regular or vegan.
14:53What about my mac and cheese?
14:54Our vegan mac and cheese is there.
14:55People can get it regular, loaded with chicken, or they can get it diabolical with chicken and
14:59shrimp.
15:00And then we have burgers.
15:01You can get your burgers beef or you can get them vegan.
15:03The goal is that there's options for everybody.
15:05We have gluten-free buns for people who are gluten-free, so every single person has the
15:09opportunity to eat and eat healthy at the game.
15:11Your biggest business challenge going there, what did you learn from serving football fans
15:20to serving people like me on the street?
15:23The biggest thing was, like, you have to give people what they want, but a lot of times
15:27people want to be told what they want.
15:28So, give it to them, but show them you're going to eat healthy, but it's going to look
15:31like you're not.
15:33So, yeah, I put a lot of, there's a lot of salad.
15:35Yes, your dressings are homemade from scratch.
15:37Yes, the ranch was made from scratch and there's no dairy.
15:40People are used to eating a certain way, and when you, I don't force them to have vegan.
15:45I just say, come and have a good meal.
15:47How do you handle the line?
15:49So, the greatest part about it is because I'm a hustler, baby.
15:55I'm used to Master Pen mac and cheese from the 2015.
15:59Anywhere I can sell it, I was selling it.
16:01And our biggest thing was, like, people don't like to wait, so how can I get you something
16:04to eat within two minutes or less?
16:05And we've never changed that.
16:07So, like, we can build six sandwiches in, like, two minutes while you're at the field.
16:11So, like, we will see probably, you know, they sell 65,000 plus tickets.
16:17So, your goal is to get a, let me get a percentage of that.
16:21What's the smart, if I serve 600 people, I know those 600 people are going to come and
16:25they're going to spend, like, $60 a piece.
16:26Yes.
16:27And I'm going to get them done.
16:28They don't have to wait too long.
16:29People get, they order and they have it in less than, in less than two minutes.
16:32When you do Fort Field game day, your day starts at what time?
16:36So, if the doors, everything is the doors.
16:38So, if the doors of Fort Field open to customers at 10, we have to be there two hours earlier.
16:43So, like, the last game, the preseason game was nuts.
16:47So, we had to be there by 8.
16:49So, that meant we had to be at our building ready to go by 5.
16:52Ready to go and get packed up.
16:53You leave at what time?
16:55It takes me 8.
16:57Ooh.
16:57Games end around 3.34 o'clock.
17:00Don't, we, they cut food at the top of the fourth quarter.
17:02Oh, do they?
17:03So, you can't get food or drink at fourth quarter.
17:06Okay.
17:06So, top of the fourth, whatever you need, and most of the time, we're sold out.
17:10Yeah.
17:10Not even on purpose.
17:11Like, it just goes.
17:12Like, it's crazy.
17:13The name of your kitchen again is called?
17:16The Kitchen by Cooking with Q.
17:18Remember it.
17:19It's a household name.
17:20It's a staple name.
17:21It's a name you're going to hear for a long time in the name of Jesus.
17:25You're welcome.
17:26Yes!
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