Where the name came from
Essi started in restaurants at fourteen and became an operator fast. After selling Rib Shack in 2018, the pull toward barbecue never left — and he kept coming back to the phrase he had always used in the kitchen to describe what he was making: food made with southern love.
That is the whole origin of the name.
What this episode covers
Bobby Shaw and Myles Gift host The Cutting Onions Podcast around a single question: how leaders build cultures that produce other leaders. Essi’s episode sits squarely in that frame.
- Starting in kitchens at fourteen, and opening his first barbecue restaurant at nineteen
- Selling Rib Shack in 2018, and what he took from it
- Building a people culture in an industry with famously punishing turnover
- Why the operator’s job is developing the next operator
Just over an hour.
Related
Booking & media
To book Chef Essi Tadrus for an interview or podcast, email [email protected] or call (813) 945-2443.