Chris Williams: People aren't ignorant to the things that have been done to Black people in this country, and then for African-Americans, there is no generational wealth.

I think we're smart enough now to understand the only real progress is gonna be made through peace and through empathy, but what makes this time now so special is it's, uh, Black people of America have woken up to their socioeconomic power.

Jonny Rhodes: As long as we see soul food as a means of our survival, as a means of our ingenuity, a means of our journey, I think that that's what soul food is.

Soul food is a segue of the Black journey through all, and the Black journey is vast, and it's very broad.

Marlon Hall: You have to know that the state of Texas has a long history and tradition of people of African descent and business, and I believe that the vestiges of slavery whisper to present entrepreneurs, and that whisper says, "You will no longer be used for business.

You will be used in business."

[Sizzling] [Kettle whistling] [Indistinct chatter] Chris Williams is the synergy of what it means to be a gladiator entrepreneur.

There's a finesse to how Chris moves in a room, yet there is this barbaric way in which he approaches how he serves the community through his gift of making tables, making meals.

Williams: African-American foodways, it's one of those things that's kind of polarizing, and the majority of time, it's used out of context.

You think about the staple ingredients of--oxtails used to cost nothing.

Now they're, like, $9.00 a pound.

You think about pigs' feet.

Like, those ingredients right there lets you know the genesis of this cooking, right?

So the ingredient determines the method of cooking.

You have these hard, dense proteins, and so--and how are we getting the flavor into it?

And so the brilliance behind it is that we were using throw-away ingredients, scraps after we prepared all these amazing dishes for whoever we were preparing for.

We were left with the undesirable bits to come up with something delicious and nutritious for our families and out community.

Soul food, I don't believe, for me defines African-American foodways because you got to remember that the chefs in the White House were African-American, and they were schooled in French cuisine.

We learned that for free, and we prepared for free, and that's folded into our culture.

Look at Creole food.

That's African-American cuisine.

That's different from soul food.

Hall: Chris is not afraid to explore new territory on a plate nor in a room, and studied at the Cordon Bleu, has traveled all of the world, and has used what he has learned to infuse it into a family tradition of preparing a meal inspired by Lucille B. Smith, his grandmother.

Williams: I didn't know the culinary legacy was a real thing in the family.

It just became one of those things that we took for granted at all family gatherings to where, you know, somebody's bringing Lucille's or great grandmommy's hot rolls, and so it wasn't until we decided to name the restaurant after her that I started to spend time just poring through her records and looking at all the pictures that it really started to take shape on what a culinary icon, what an American icon she was.

My great grandmother Lucille B. Smith was known as Texas' first businesswoman.

Back then, women couldn't own or operate their own businesses without their husband's signature, so to that end, she was one of the first women in the country to file femme sole, which is Latin for woman alone, so that she could have full independence of her business.

Woman: At that time, hotels were not accessible for African-Americans, and so Grandmother and Granddaddy would open their homes, and people who had come to perform or to speak to affairs in Fort Worth would often stay at her home, so that's how she met so many of the notables, and Joe Louis and Martin Luther King were among the many persons who stayed at her home.

Hall: She was the quintessential Texan.

She was an educator at Prairie View A&M University.

There's a picture of Lucille B. Smith with her car rolled onto the campus of Prairie View A&M University, looking over her shoulder taking the picture.

Now what does that say?

That says she was like, "I ain't got time for this picture.

I'm running a business and teaching this course."

Williams: One of the things that my great grandmother was known for, one of the many things but the one that she's most famous for, she created the nation's first instant hot roll mix.

This is the thing that I had to master to really honor the legacy of my great grandmother.

Heh.

This is what she had to do to create her legacy was to master this dough.

I know what it feels like when it's right, and this is right.

So it's a simple process.

It's not finished until it's bathed in butter.

The way that matriarchs of the family keep themselves at the table is that when it comes to recipes they always leave a little something out.

You can make it, you can reproduce it, but it's never quite like Great Grandmommy did it.

So that took a couple of years of me making this recipe 5 times in 1 day.

Hall: Other Meccas of culture for Black communities all over the nation have their own unique contribution to this national tapestry, but, like, our patch in the tapestry as Houston, it comes from not just our ability to create art, not just our ability to create music--which is popularly what African-Americans are known to contribute in the nation--but our ability to also create businesses.

We understand that sometimes you may not have or sometimes you may not know the person you're supposed to know, but you still have an innovative and imaginative idea, and so Houston provides an elasticity for social imagination like no other city.

Rhodes: Historically, soul food is made with scraps and leftovers.

At Indigo, we focus on soul food being made from the highest quality form of ingredients.

If Black people got reparations and we got our land, that's all we would have access to is top-of-the-line food ingredients.

Everything that we do at the restaurant is based off of preserves in some form or fashion, and then of course, we grow our own food.

Typically in the winter months, that's when we do our red meat.

In the spring, do our pescatarian menu.

Seafood, charred eggs, freshwater animals and creatures, and then in the summertime, that's when we like to do our poultry menu serving either, you know, birds like guinea fowl, chickens.

At the restaurant, we focus on using, you know, a particular technique of cooking live fire as a means of representation for, you know, our ancestors that didn't have access to electricity or to gas.

The houses in which that, you know, the enslaved were cooking in were all hardwood and charcoal only.

There are people that live in poverty now that have to cook that exact same way right now to this day in Houston at home.

Hall: Jonny has the unique capacity to bring all different segments of culture and society in the most culturally diverse city in the nation.

So he doesn't introduce the idea or the concept or the history of being Black through the ears and through the eyes alone.

He does it through the mouth.

Food has a way of lecturing the love that a people can contribute to a larger community in a way that nothing else ever can, ever will.

Rhodes: Historically, soul food has been the food of Black Christians, and it was created during the Civil Rights Era by freedom fighters.

This is the food that that gave the Movement soul.

Black Muslims don't eat soul food because of the history that co-exists with it.

People like Malcolm X didn't associate.

That's why the NOI and the Civil Rights Movement never worked together is because they didn't have the same ideologies anywhere, but for Black people, I believe that our equity and ideology with each other is food.

There are Black Christians that don't eat pork.

No Muslims eat pork, but here at Indigo, we've tried to reshape that narrative by making soul food inclusive of all Black genres.

For the vegetable ham, we use it for different applications, but one of the main applications that we use it for is pork replacement.

It's a cured, hung, smoked, and pickled turnip.

We usually let it sit for 12-18 months before we're ready to serve it.

From Indigo's inception, we've given all the history out every single course.

Sometimes, it can be a powerful reaction, whether it be for the better or for the worse, but, you know, come out and give the history as straightforward as we can, but the proof is in the pudding.

You know, nothing that I've ever said about food and our experiences has not happened in the past.

Always thought it was a weird combination of how Americans love avocado toast but were having so many issues with the people who provided those avocados.

You have a Third-World country mass producing avocados, and we keep them in Third-World countries on purpose.

You know, they don't have the infrastructure to sell their avocados across the world, so they sell them to us, and that's the definition of a banana republic, and our avocado dessert's titled Banana Republics of America.

It has the avocado parfait, dark chocolate, and then the pit of the avocado, which looks like the actual pit of the avocado is a dark chocolate, as well, but it's filled with preserves.

Our communities here in the United States are banana republics.

You got Black people, who are massively funneled into sports and entertainment no different than these other countries that are experiencing their avocado problem.

We're experiencing the same as our own.

Williams: All right.

We ready?

Lucille's 1913 is my nonprofit that I started with the pandemic, and its mission initially was to just feed our elders in these impoverished neighborhoods, so what we started doing was going directly to their doorsteps and creating these deliberately curated meals that spoke to their palates, meals with dignity.

Anybody knows anything about restaurants, nothing happens without community, like, nothing, but with this, it took me out, and it really woke me up to the food insecurity issues that we've had for a minute, what it looks like, where it's at, and it can really be right next door.

These are our elders, who provided comfort and provided change for us because they were there for the Civil Rights Movement, so we committed to doing this every single day as much as we could afford, and so, yeah, today, it's at 215,000 meals.

Hall: Chris and Lucille, they both weren't motivational speakers.

They are motivations that other people can't help but speak about, know what I mean?

Their passion is their protest, and their art is their activism.

They don't have to say not one word, yet what they do says so much.

Heh heh.

Rhodes: Oh, you good, you good.

So when Indigo very first opened, we started off at $79 per person.

People complained that it was a little too high, so we upped the price to 125.

Once we did that, the work became even more strenuous, so we upped the price one more time to 225.

I know that nobody in our area--hell, I can't even afford to pay 225 to go eat.

Our customer base isn't gonna be from our community, and if I wanted to do something more meaningful for my community, I needed to pimp this situation by upping my customer base and making as much money as we possibly we could.

It bootstraps our next endeavor, the idea of having a self-sustainable grocery store, so we're working on our farm right now to make sure that we can grow our own produce, and then once we decide and we figure out what we can't grow and produce ourselves, we'll look at other Black farmers and other farmers of color to provide or sustain what we don't have.

We're doing things along the lines of broccolis, carrots, bok choy, things that are gonna be common users and sellers inside the grocery store.

We don't want to grow extravagant crops that people don't know about or people can't cook with at home very easily.

Hopefully my kids haven't picked all the big carrots out.

Oh, yeah.

We got some.

Some nice big ones in here, even a baby one that was still growing underneath it all, but we got some really nice carrots in here, and I'm gonna see if we can get some more out.

Oh, we got a whole lot more.

So we've grown these carrots ourselves naturally, no type of spraying.

This is all just grown with water and then using fish as our fertilizer, compost.

If somebody can just simply grow food for themselves, they're a productive member of society because they can feed themselves.

If somebody can grow food for other people, an even bigger productive member of society because now they can feed themselves and others, but we don't praise those things, and we don't invest into those things as a society.

Man: There they go.

Williams: Captain Fred.

Woman: Captain Fred.

Fred: What's up?

Woman: What's going on?

Fred: All right.

Woman: Long time, no see.

Fred: All right.

Y'all ready?

All right.

Yes, sir.

Williams: Me and Chef Dawn got a wager.

Fred: Oh, what is it?

Williams: First fish $10.

Let's go get some fish, Boo-Boo.

Dawn: Yes.

I'm ready.

Williams: So are there any other Black-owned businesses like yours in Houston that you know of?

Fred: No, not commercial fishing.

Williams: The reality is, like, to get in I'd imagine it requires a ton of education.

Fred: Right.

I never in my mind would have known anything about commercial fishing at all until I would have gone out with a friend, and then he was just like, "Hey, man.

Just come and check it out, you know," and go out there, and I'm like, "You can really make money doing this?"

Williams: Yeah.

That's huge.

You think more people will follow after you set the example?

Fred: I think--I think--I think once it's been introduced, I really do.

I think--I mean, there are a number of other guys that do, like, fishing--like, they're fishing guys, charter captains, and they're Black, and they're trying to get other Black people to really get into fishing.

Part of the problem is just in the inner cities we just don't have that sort of access to going to the water.

Most people, as you know, in the hood, they unfortunately stay in the hood.

Williams: Yeah.

Fred: They don't come out.

Williams: And it costs money to do it.

Dawn: Tell me about the types of fish that you would bring to Chris.

Fred: The thing that really--I really think got him hooked was the sheepshead, and then I made a transition from sheepshead to black drum... Williams: Yeah.

That black drum, man.

Fred: Yeah.

Williams: Have you had the black drum?

Fred: Not from Lucille's, no.

Dawn: I have not.

Williams: So it's essentially we just do a light blackening, house-made blackening season on top of it and just do a simple sear on the fish... and we introduce a little mustard green, fresh, raw mustard green puree to it to brighten up the color and just give it a little bit more acidity.

Then we add the Hoppin' John component, which is just, like, the definition of the South.

That's Carolina gold rice with black-eyed peas, peppers, and tomatoes, and then we have the green gumbo.

Louisiana all day.

I'm telling you those 3 things together, like, we can't keep it in the building.

Yeah.

So I just appreciate it, man.

It's been great.

I'm glad that we could be conduits to introduce people to the stuff that you've been enjoying privately for a minute.

Hopefully we can keep doing that.

Fred: Oh, yeah.

We're gonna definitely keep it going.

Dawn: Oh, what you--what you got here?

Williams: First one of the day.

$10, baby!

$10!

Dawn: OK. Williams: It put up a good fight!

Fred: Ohh!

All right, Chris.

Williams: Totally fat.

Dawn: He may get away.

Ha ha ha!

Fred: I seen them get away now.

[Thunder] Man: What's going on, man?

Rhodes: Not much.

Man: How things going?

Rhodes: It's good.

Want to look at them cows?

Man: Man, we saddled up, we saddled up.

You ready?

Rhodes: Yeah.

Let's hop on.

I met Lloyd in 2000 and, uh, 15.

I was coming back home from New York, and I was visiting Houston from New York, and I went to the farmers' market, and I just saw a Black purveyor there, and I was just--I was in shock, I was in awe, and I was just like, "I'm going there.

Ha!"

I appreciate you bringing me out here to day, bro.

Lloyd: Oh, man.

It's a pleasure.

I been trying to get you out here.

Rhodes: I mean, it's just amazing, bro.

I never seen this, and to see you being-- spearheading it, man, it means a lot, you know, to not only be able to bring it to the community but for the community to see that it's coming from you, somebody that look like them, somebody that's from there.

It make a difference.

I think it's inspiring.

Lloyd: And then being able to put it in your grocery store and right in the neighborhood so people can--that we grew up with can walk to there and see our name on there, you know what I mean?

Rhodes: That means a lot.

Lloyd: People from right next door, they come from... Rhodes: Yep.

Lloyd: they can come out here.

Hey, man.

This is the best of the best.

Rhodes: Right.

Lloyd: You know, as far as the quality, the premier of it, so... Rhodes: I mean, that right there within itself is inspiring that somebody right next door to you--you never know--could be doing something so integral and so important to the well-being and the health of so many others, and, man, just I can't wait to have this product into our grocery store and, you know, us controlling the process.

It allows our people in our community to really trust what we're giving them to put into their bodies.

Lloyd: We have to spread the knowledge, man, because a lot of people don't get this opportunity, so that's when we go in the neighborhoods like you do, do urban farming and introducing people to it.

Those that want to know will come out and seek it if we provide them the opportunity, you know what I mean, and so that's the same thing that we're looking for as far as this grass-fed beef, making it affordable, putting it right there in the neighborhood, let everybody else get a taste of royalty, man.

That's how we--taste of royalty.

Rhodes: Hey.

You think we'll get a taste some of that royalty back over there at the house?

Lloyd: Oh, man.

You know we can.

You know we can.

We got the embers waiting on us.

Hall: When enslavers brought slaves to Texas, they came from all over the South, but what was different about Texas was that Mexico had this resistance.

So there is a history of resistance to slavery that's connected to entrepreneurship, that's connected to business that I still believe comes up in how African-Americans who are Texans live today.

We will take ownership of our communities.

We will take ownership of our businesses in a way that is a resistance to the way that we were owned at one point in our history.

Rhodes: Nice cook on it, too.

I think it's really important that we work with other Black producers and purveyors is to create more Black producers and purveyors because if people-- Black and brown people see Black producers and purveyors making money off of agriculture, it will give them incentive to make money off of agriculture, as well, which creates longevity and sovereignty for our communities.

So the next step for us is focusing on the farm and on the grocery store, and all of our guests and patrons from before have helped propel us to this stage so that way we didn't have to have investors and things like such.

We could be self-sustained, self-started.

We invest into our businesses to make them more equitable and make them more accessible to people in our communities.

Williams: What Chef Jonny's doing and what Captain Fred's doing, what we're doing, and what Lucille did, what my parents did and are doing is that it's showcasing Black success in so many different lights.

One thing that was special and unique about my great grandmother and essentially truly my family is that for African-Americans there is no generational wealth.

When we come into this world, we come into this world with nothing.

The gift that the family's been able to give us that we've-- that our generational wealth is a sense of entrepreneurialism and purpose.

That's the importance of highlighting these different looks of entrepreneurialism and hopefully success.

It's just amazing to see the synergy of this happening right now, so, yeah, it's a beautiful thing to witness and a to be a part of.

Hall: African-Americans have consistently been so generous with our culture, so generous with our wisdom, and so we are impairing the sum total of human flourishing by not providing opportunities for African-Americans to have their freedom completely.

Not just the Black community suffers when the Black community suffers from systemic oppression.

The whole world suffers from what we could contribute to make the world a better place.

Williams: Yeah.

Give me a move.

Oh, oh, oh, oh!

Ha ha ha!

I didn't know anybody moonwalked anymore.

Hall: Thanks for bringing it back, man.

Williams: Nice one.

Nice.

You got some moves?

You gonna do something on those roller skates?

Hall: He took his durag off.

He said, "Let me show you."

Williams: OK. Show us.

Hall: Look at those waves, man!

Whoo, whoo!

Williams: Ha ha ha!

Hall: Nice, brother.