Josh Lewin is certainly one of the busiest chefs in town. After recently leaving Wink & Nod’s rotating incubator culinary program, the co-founder of Bread & Salt Hospitality has launched his second pop-up dining concept with business partner Katrina Jazayeri. The pop-up, dubbed “Gitana,” is now located at Cuisine en Locale in Somerville and will be ongoing throughout the summer.
In addition to the new Somerville pop-up, the chef has also managed to raise over $40K on Kickstarter for Bread & Salt’s first standalone restaurant concept, Juliet. The Kickstarter campaign lasted just 28 days this June but managed to attract over 300 backers to the upcoming project. According to Lewin, the forthcoming brick-and-mortar restaurant will be a neighborhood cafe located in Somerville’s Union Square, serving breakfast, lunch and dinner.
As plans heat up for Lewin, the entrepreneur tells BostInno how he manages to run a pop-up concept while also raising funds and creating Bread & Salt’s first permanent restaurant.
Marian White: You currently have a new pop-up concept, Gitana. Can you tell our readers what makes it different from your other past concepts?
Josh Lewin: Gitana is a celebration of our appreciation of Spanish cuisine and culture. Think fresh, fun and simple cooking. Bright citrus, olive oil, fresh vegetables, very fresh seafood and some great jamon. We’re here all day Thursday through Saturday and then for brunch on Sundays. It’s a simple and fun way to eat that is great for the summertime. There’s no pretense at Gitana, it’s fun and easy. We’re doing our best to create a natural and authentic experience and we are very excited to share it with Somerville over the next few weeks.
MW: You recently completed a Kickstarter campaign for your upcoming permanent restaurant, Juliet. Can you tell us what that experience was like?
JL: Public! We raised just over $40K through Kickstarter to help us put Juliet in motion. It was a 28-day sprint that was in full view of well, everyone. I was talking to Nookie (of Commonwealth) about halfway through, and he had been quite successful with Kickstarter in the later stages of building Commonwealth and he had an interesting perspective on the process, which proved very true. When you publicly set a goal and then ask for help from the public meeting, you are setting yourself up for an emotional roller coaster.
In dealing with a bank or a private investor you get to sit down pull out your spreadsheets and ask for help. With Kickstarter, everyone is watching. And accomplishing that goal was an important part of validating our concept. As our intention is to truly build a neighborhood place…. if our Kickstarter fell flat, well… that would have told us something. But it didn’t, and we met a lot of people along the way.
MW: Why did Bread & Salt decide to finally settle down with a permanent restaurant concept?
JL: Bread & Salt was formed just over a year ago with the intention of building a restaurant in our neighborhood of Somerville. But of course we have developed a bit of a nomadic reputation over the past few years and for good reason having cooked for one night here and there all over the city with our themed pop-up events, and eventually spilling out into other cities like New York and Chicago as well. But for quite some time the goal has been clear. Eventually we graduated from pop up to what we have dubbed “temporary restaurant” first for 7 months as Bread & Salt at Wink & Nod and now as Gitana at Cuisine en Locale.
Since last September, we’ve been operating full service operations, training and developing a staff, building a reputation with the dining public and refining and proving our business practices. And with all of that experience informing us we are building Juliet, the first permanent outpost for Bread & Salt Hospitality with a big head start; a strong foundation and a lot of momentum.
MW: Can you tell our readers what they can expect from Juliet?
JL: Juliet is simply a place for us to share our favorite things and stories, with our own neighborhood, all day long. The concept is modeled somewhat after a European-style cafe featuring casual yet professional service and a menu that changes throughout the day. The menu will be a rotating collection of things we really love.
Our opening date is still flexible but we are getting very close to being ready to put our developing construction plan to action. So, get ready to see some activity over there soon…
MW: Anything else you’d like to share with our readers?
JL: Aside from running one full service concept and building another… no not really, that covers most of it! But keep an eye on Gitana, we are still very new and getting used to the flow of the neighborhood here. Brunch has been very popular so far and we are really in the beginning stages of dinner services. We have some plans for the Fourth of July and some other on site promotions that we are putting the finishing touches on and will be excited to present soon.
Image courtesy of Bread & Salt Hospitality
