Exploring Life & Business with Lawrence Asterilla of L.A’s Kitchen

Today we’d like to introduce you to Lawrence Asterilla.

Today we’d like to introduce you to Lawrence Asterilla.

Hi Lawrence, so excited to have you on the platform. So before we get into questions about your work-life, maybe you can bring our readers up to speed on your story and how you got to where you are today?
Well, I’ve always loved to cook and entertain for as long as I can remember and never really thought about doing it for a living but about eight years ago, I decided that I wanted to open a food truck part-time since I already had a good career that I enjoyed at the time. Of course, being naive about the business part of the dream, I began learning about writing a comprehensive business plan, food costs and all of the other intricacies of actually running a food business and realized that I wasn’t ready.

Several years went by and lots of changes to the corporate structure happened, I no longer enjoyed my job as I did previously and was borderline depressed when I was there. I was literally sitting at my desk, saying to myself, I make more money than I’ve ever had, I have a nice 401K, amazing benefits and my work-life balance was second to none but I was miserable. So, I asked myself one simple question if I had my choice, what would I do and of course without hesitation, I said to myself own my own restaurant. I realized that the reason I didn’t keep going with the food truck was because I was going to do it part-time so there was no real sense of urgency but now the plan was different; I planned to do it full-time and quit my job!

Around June 2018, I got back to the books studying the business, creating recipes, getting recipes from my mother, etc. I had a plan to create a following so I started to take pics of my dishes and post them on social media using my cell phone and it worked. I put together a great business plan, my financials were tight and at this point, I was able to save close to $75,000 and when I thought I was ready, I started looking for investors. I had some friends who were a part of an investment group and so around November; I set up an investment meeting all equipped with a PowerPoint presentation and a seven-course tasting menu with an elevated soul food theme; it was a hit; they loved everything about the plan and the food and that fact that I had my own money to invest impressed the group, no one pulled the trigger but agreed to have me cater their annual Kentucky Derby party in May of 2019, for 300 plus people. That was the first time I actually cooked and served food professionally.

I didn’t have a commissary to prep the food in so I decided to ask one of the people I went after as an investor, who also told me no, Jim Duignan of the Original Flying Burrito if I could use his kitchen to prep for the event and he said yes! So L.A’s Kitchen Catering was born. I did several mostly successful and some unsuccessful catering events and my confidence grew and since Jim let me use his kitchen for free that really helped me out. Right around July, August of 2019, I said to myself that at this point there is no way I can concentrate on my catering business part-time so I was going to quit my day job get a night job so I can work on my business.

I asked Jim if he would mind training me as a bartender so I could accomplish that feat and he said yes, so I started bartending a couple weeks later. One day out of nowhere, Jim was at the bar and told me that he had a great idea! He was opening another restaurant downtown, called the Flying Mayan, with a gigantic kitchen. He said that he could invest in all of the equipment I needed and I could use a portion of the gigantic kitchen downtown to run my catering business. I was all set up, with all of the new businesses downtown Raleigh, there would be plenty of customers, I also set up a contract with easy cater to provide lunch catering deliveries to businesses in rtp. We purchased all of the equipment and I invested every dime I saved for everything else. All we had to do is wait for inspections to pass and we were in business and so in October 2019, I finally quit my job but before we even got the inspection passed, on March 16th, 2020, we shut down.

Once the shutdown was official, I found myself with several thousands of food and no one to sell it to so it was time for me to get creative. First, I sold smoked turkey sandwiches with collards and mac in cheese via Facebook and personally delivered each meal all over Raleigh, Next, they allowed pick up and delivery only so then I created a curbside website, set up a grill in the back parking lot of the Flying Burrito along with a portable steam table and began selling plates of food that way. When we were allowed to have a limited amount of patrons in the restaurant, I did some pick up catering and did a pop up brunch every Sunday at the Burrito but unfortunately, although the pop up was a serious hit even with the other sporadic pick-up caterings it still wasn’t enough to keep my apartment, so I had to sleep on the couch of a good friend in hopes that things would turn around soon. It didn’t, lol but now my buddy was pursuing a serious relationship and so I had to make plans to move again. I wound up renting a room in an apartment from a stranger and after about a month, I began to hit rock bottom and said to myself that if I don’t get this going soon and very soon, I would have to go back to the corporate world which for me was the worst-case scenario.

My time to do brunch at the Burrito was coming to an end and on the last day, I had another restaurant owner in the area ask me to do brunch at their restaurant since they had come to my pop up for several weeks, they loved my food and wanted me to do the same thing there. Still, it wasn’t enough so I put my resume out there and started to interview, got an offer and was going to do my pop-up on Sunday and work full time until I had the chance to continue my journey. Right before I took the job, the owners of the place where I was doing my pop-up revealed to me that they were bar people and not restaurant people and we worked out a deal where we became partners and I owned the kitchen part.

It was definitely not what I really aspired to do but at least I was in business and began learning things that you can’t learn in books so it was doable. In the beginning we had some disagreements on how business should be conducted but since then we’ve worked out our differences and I’ll continue to manage this kitchen along with my next venture. Fortunately, this was about one month or so ago and all the restrictions started to drop and restaurants began to open again and this was exciting. Previous to all of this, I found a really nice spot to open a restaurant and it met all the needs as far as affordability and everything else important to get started. I called up Jim and told him I was ready to do something different  and that I had the perfect spot. I negotiated with the landlord, Jim agreed that he could invest in what I wanted to do and now, I have an agreement with the landlord and our timeline for opening up L.A’s Kitchen by the end of summer/early fall!

Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
My whole journey has been both obstacles and challenges.

Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your business?
We specialize in smoked meats, sandwiches and soul food including many healthy options. We use only fresh ingredients and all local produce. We will provide dine in, take out, delivery, curbside pickup and online ordering. I’m known for several dishes since I love to experiment and share but if I had to pick a few things, it would probably be my smoked turkey braised collard greens, my smoked gouda and cheddar grits/mac n cheese, my Nashville hot chicken breast sandwich and my bourbon bbq smoked brisket grilled cheese to name a few.

Contact Info:

• Email: cheflawrence71@gmail.com
• Instagram: @la_the_chef
• Facebook: @lathechef
• Twitter: LAthechef
• Youtube: LAtheChef