With a recently announced minority investment from Chipotle providing wind for its sails, the fast-casual Mediterranean concept Brassica is positioning for growth.
When asked about that growth plan, co-founder Kevin Malhame gave a very specific answer:
“One restaurant at a time.”
Malhame, who co-founded Brassica in 2015 with his wife Katy Malhame and his brother Darren Malhame, said he has seen promising young brands grow too quickly and flame out.
That’s something he doesn’t want to see happen with Brassica, a more-premium fast-casual concept with six units in Ohio. Now with the investment from Chipotle’s venture capital fund, there is open road ahead.
Malhame declined to specify the amount of the investment. But he said Chipotle has “a very long-term perspective on this. And we value that, because it’s different from what you typically see in the industry.”
And though Brassica is a young brand, the three partners behind it are experienced operators.
The three first opened the restaurant Northstar Café two decades ago, a three-daypart concept that also now has six units, and a seventh under construction. Their Northstar Restaurant Goup also includes a one-off full-service concept, Third & Hollywood, in Columbus.
The upscale Northstar Café was inspired in part by Kevin and Katy’s experience as students at Washington University in St. Louis, where they ate regularly at St. Louis Bread Company. At the time, it had recently been acquired by Panera-founder Ron Shaich as he built that brand.
“It was a restaurant we loved and we started to dream about operating something like that,” he said.
Kevin also worked with Hillstone Restaurant Group, and he was a general manager for Chipotle, before it went public, and had the opportunity to meet founder Steve Ells and vendor Bill Niman of Niman Ranch. “It was an inspiring experience there,” he said.
He went on to attend the Culinary Institute of America. Wife Katy, meanwhile, worked with Ohio restaurateur Cameron Mitchell, another operator known for a keen focus on the guest experience.
With Northstar, the Malhames set out to create concepts that emphasize quality, organic ingredients and made-from-scratch cooking in a limited-service, but elevated atmosphere.
“Our intention is to do simple things and do them really, really well,” he said. “In the end, the quality is really a reflection of the execution, and the execution is extraordinary.”
He doesn’t think of Northstar Café as fast casual, though guests order at the counter. Food is run to tables, and tables are bussed. There’s live jazz.
It’s a healthy business and one the Malhames expect to continue to grow, he said.
But the focus of growth now is primarily on Brassica, a concept that taps their Lebanese roots (the brothers’ grandparents were from Lebanon). It was designed to be simpler to operate and more focused.
A Brassica in Cleveland, Ohio. | Photo courtesy of Brassica.
“What we’re focused on is continuing to create loved restaurant experiences and do it at a high level,” he said. “So it was really our intention to take all of our strengths from Northstar, and our sensitivities to food quality and ingredients and service and architecture and just apply them in a simpler environment.”
On the menu are options to build a sandwich, bowl, salad or hummus plate. Not surprisingly, the brassica family of vegetables are well represented: kale, cabbage, broccoli and cauliflower.
A standout feature is the fresh baked pita, which is made in house with whole wheat organic flour and baked in open-hearth ovens.
Spreads like hummus and baba ganoush are made in each restaurant (the restaurant uses the sought-after Soom brand of tahini). So is the braised beef brisket, which is rubbed with harissa, seared and slow cooked in a 36-hour process, as well as the slow-roasted chicken shawarma (from meat raised without antibiotics).
Pita is baked throughout the day in open-hearth ovens. | Photo courtesy of Brassica.
Brassica’s light and crisp falafel was inspired by a restaurant Kevin stumbled across in Paris 25 years ago. The restaurant had a sign boasting its falafel was a favorite of Lenny Kravitz.
“I stopped and ate there, and I’ve been dreaming about that falafel since,” he said.
Brassica also serves beer and wine. And there’s a frozen cocktail they have dubbed a Brassarita, made with their mint-spiked pink lemonade blended with tequila and Cointreau in the style of a frozen margarita.
The first Brassica was about 1,600-square feet, near the original Northstar in Columbus. There was no parking, and guests sometimes had to stand at a counter to eat.
But it did “outrageously well,” Kevin said—though he declined to reveal sales numbers for the brand, other than to point out that “Chipotle was happy with our financial performance.”
Now units are more typically about 2,000-square feet and about half of sales are from dine-in customers.
Brassica offers digital ordering, through the website and app, and there’s a brisk takeout/curbside pickup business.
But the brand does not deliver. At all.
“We had a chance to experiment a lot throughout Covid with the various [delivery] options, and we weren’t satisfied with any of them,” he said. “It just didn’t seem sensitive enough to the guest experience.”
Going forward, the Malhames plan to grow with a concentric circle model, though they can’t reveal where the next will open just yet. All units will be company owned. The funding from Chipotle will support roughly the next two years, as the company gears up for expansion, Kevin said.
The Mediterranean fast-casual competitor Cava has become a clear leader in the niche, but Kevin sees plenty of demand for this type of food.
What drew Chipotle to the brand was not to compete with Cava, he added.
“Interestingly enough, the category of cuisine we serve was not really ever a part of the discussion with Chipotle,” he said. “I think what drew them to our brand and organization had more to do with quality, execution, unit economics and an overall strategy.”
Kevin said he doesn’t spend a lot of time thinking about Cava and how the category is evolving.
“There are a lot of hungry people out there,” he said. “We’re just going to focus on making as many of them happy as we can.”
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