It started at home, the way most good food does.
Before there was a storefront, there was a cottage food business run out of the Young family kitchen. Benny cooked what he knew: soul food, made from scratch, the slow way. Word got around the way it does when the food is real.
Turning a home kitchen into a business is its own kind of long cooking. Benny and Denise decided to be intentional about every step, and they had help from people in Battle Creek who bet on them early.
How we got here
A step at a time.
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01
The home kitchen
A cottage food business, cooking soul food from scratch for a growing list of regulars.
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02
Two years at Sprout BC
Cooking out of the Sprout BC shared incubator kitchen in Springfield, building the recipes and the volume that a business needs.
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03
The Business Plan Cohort
A Northern Initiatives cohort, a pitch, a loan, and startup grants funded through the W.K. Kellogg Foundation. The plan on paper became a plan with money behind it.
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04
The first storefront
Doors open on Calhoun Street. The first place customers could walk in and order.
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05
Downtown, June 2026
A ribbon cutting at 215 W Michigan Ave. A bigger kitchen, a dining room, and room to do Soul Food Sundays right.
Faith and family
Three kids, two owners, one kitchen.
Benny runs the kitchen. Denise runs the operations. The three Young children are part of the story, and the family's faith is part of it too. We are not preachy about it. It is simply who we are, and it shows up in how we treat the people who walk through the door.
That is the whole idea behind the name. From our mitts to your pit. Food made by hand, by a family, for yours.
People who bet on us early
- Sprout BC incubator kitchen
- BC Food Reimagined
- City of Battle Creek Small Business Development Office
- Northern Initiatives
- W.K. Kellogg Foundation
In the press
Downtown Battle Creek Zine
Second Wave Media, On the Ground Battle Creek
Northern Initiatives
Come eat with us.
Walk in, call ahead, or let us cater your next event. Either way, you are getting food somebody actually cooked.