Owner, Chef, Graphic Designer, Food Photographer, and Social Media

Yuck Kitchen

June 2018 - May 2019


After my previous position managing Apple’s Campus Store at Columbia College Chicago ended, following Apple’s contracted partnership with the college expiring, I decided to take a risk and start my own small food business.

Taking my management experience with finances and branding, as well as my creative work with graphics and photography, I opened and operated an independent - and 100% vegan - catering project called Yuck Kitchen, where I was the sole cook responsible for prep, dishes, event planning, branding at local markets, DIY spaces, pop-ups and more.

My experience with Yuck Kitchen was short lived, primarily due to the workload and expenditures being unsustainable in the long-term, buy this one year project taught me so much about my own strengths and weaknesses, and it led me to start my first professional cooking job at Tanoshii.

I have a huge love of cooking, and a passion for food that drives me to broaden my knowledge and expertise on all kinds of cuisines and flavors,

Yuck Kitchen was an incredible venture and it allowed me to work at a lot of amazing events and spaces like Chicago Vegan Test Kitchen, Lo Rez Brewing, Grandma’s House Poetry - who I have also taken event photos for (shoutout to the Chicago Tribune for mentioning my Mac & Cheese), and the Digital Arts and Demo Space (DADS). Not to mention I ended up placing in Chicago’s 3rd Annual Vegan Mac Down - I would like to note that I still have my golden macaroni bracelet.

While Yuck Kitchen is no longer operating, I cannot understate how valuable the experience was in showing me what I am capable of and how many places and people I can reach if I focus hard enough and put all of my passions into gear - a year well spent.

Below is a collection of some of my graphics, promotional images, business cards, and food pics!

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first attempt at making kofta curry, the pictures of traditional kofta I saw online were mostly huge meatballs, so I did the same here by processing some soy curls and making a chia seed egg to hold it together, I air fried it wrapped in some tin foi
finally got around to making my own cream cheese from a mix of soaked cashews, almonds, white miso paste, lemon juice, yogurt, garlic and onion power, and chives
the end result wasn’t crazy exciting or anything, but this is a soup made from sunchokes, celery, carrots, onion, leeks, almond milk, veggie broth, with some lemon zest, black pepper and thyme. I added some shiitake mushrooms and broccoli too.
enchiladas 🤰🏻
first ever attempt at making a seitan, I have to wait until it cools to know if it really turned out, but my first bite straight out of the oven left a good impression 🥳
I made some pretzel bagels last night, having them today with some of the @cheezeandthankyou dill havarti melted down into a roux for a dip 😇
one of my favorite recipes of all time, Japanese Curry from norecipes.com, which I highly recommend
i just made a grilled cheese today, sourdough bread, chao gouda, portabella mushrooms, spinach, pickled jalapeño, and sriracha vegan mayo 🥺
spicy sweet spicy salad
a simple dish that has a Tom Kha broth i made for a base, tofu noodles, green bell pepper, broccoli, celery and some mushrooms, just wanted something light but tasty 🥰
made vegan tonkotsu ramen in a really weird way... the base broth is soaked almonds and cashews mixed with soy sauce, sesame seeds, shiitake mushrooms, veggie stock, kombu, sake, and ginger, it’s incorporated with some unflavored soy milk and r
a little bit of an improv meal because im out of ingredients lmao, it’s tofu, shishito, and pumpkin seed roasted with garlic ginger and Thai chili in a spicy coconut and peanut butter sauce with a side of rice with umeboshi furikake seasoning
I’ve been craving cream of mushroom soup for a long time and finally decided to work out how to veganize it and make it work, I didn’t follow a particular recipe and kind of just mashed together parts of different ones that seemed interes
im trying to make these crumbly blackberry bars later, so I had to make my own jam first - I’ve been trying to avoid added / unnatural sugars, so I used 100% pure maple syrup, blackberries, grated apple, a little bit of ginger and lemon juice,
I kept burning my fingers during lunch and I got too mad to make it earlier today, but I went back tonight and made this injera bread to go with some chickpea tikka masala I had made with some baby corn, greens, and a ton of juiced turmeric and ginge
this was a “kitchen sink curry,” sometimes I have a lot of produce I need to use so I throw it all into a dish, and this time it was a yellow curry. I used shiitake mushrooms, bell, shishito, and thai chili peppers, a little bit of celery
just messing around a bit today! I made some shishito peppers with mushrooms and pan fried them, put them on a bed of quinoa and then topped it with a sauce I made from vegan yogurt, sriracha, and incorporated with basil. super basic, super tasty 😋
another more simple dish, no recipe just playing around... but it’s shiitake mushrooms, snap peas, baby bell peppers and sunflower seeds pan fried with Thai chili, minced garlic and ginger for aromatics, a simple teriyaki sauce, some basil with
this is just a simple stir fry I made with a mirepoix, oyster mushrooms, quinoa, and sriracha marinated tofu with a sauce made from vegetable stock, coconut broth, Thai Chile’s, ginger, garlic and turmeric. 🥳
this lunch was just me throwing some stuff together for a Thai red curry, I don’t really have a recipe it’s just based on making some other Thai food... but it has potatoes, tofu, basil, bell pepper, Thai chili, ginger, lemongrass, shiita