Nosh Culinary Showcase returns to Atlanta with a bigger mission than food

When Warren Luckett brings the Nosh Culinary Showcase back to Atlanta on Saturday, he wants people to do more than sample food from some of the city’s Black chefs, caterers and bakers.

He wants them to become customers.

At the tasting event at Uptown Atlanta, guests will receive cardboard trays to collect small bites and beverages from more than 20 Atlanta-based Black culinary professionals. They’ll also be able to vote for their favorite dishes, giving participating businesses an opportunity to gain exposure and potentially secure larger commercial partnerships.

For Luckett, who founded Black Restaurant Week in 2016, the event is about connecting Black food entrepreneurs with the people who can help sustain their businesses.

Now in its sixth year, Nosh returns after a three-year absence. It was last held at State Farm Arena in 2023, and Luckett said requests from past attendees helped convince him to bring it back.

“The community has been asking for it,” Luckett said. “We wanted to bring back the spirit of competition and community with an event that can bring out everybody and let the people decide who’s the best in these categories.”

Nosh Culinary Showcase is returning to support Black culinary professionals at a time when closures, staffing and rising food costs affect business. Luckett is providing vendors with food stipends to cover their ingredients at the event.

“Folks are struggling to keep their doors open and people inside of the restaurant. Less folks have been eating out because of inflation and things getting more expensive, and there’s a new protein every other week we aren’t supposed to eat,” Luckett said.

“For a consumer being more price conscious, they want to be able to try that food before they go make that $50 or $100 investment. It also gives folks an opportunity if they have a birthday party, graduation or large occasion coming up a chance to try before they buy.”

More than a tasting

The Nosh Culinary Showcase lineup includes J’ouvert Caribbean Kitchen and Bar, Mississippi Chubb BBQ and More, Fin and Feathers Restaurants, West End Gin and Best Dirty Lemonade.

Nancy Davordzi, chef and owner of the Ghanaian and Jamaican restaurant Tribe and Spice, is preparing jerk chicken with rice and peas and beef suya with jollof rice. She first participated in Nosh Culinary Showcase four years ago and Black Restaurant Week’s inaugural year.

Davordzi said getting involved creates brand awareness for her business and camaraderie with other Black culinary professionals. “It allows the community to know and learn more about us. It’s always good to compare notes with other people in the industry, learn and teach them a thing or two,” she said.

VIP ticket holders can enter and sample food at 6 p.m., an hour before general admission. Guests can also attend a two-course chef’s table dinner, make their own desserts in the Sweet Lab, blend seasonings in the Spice Lab and hear live music from Aleshia Denise and the Righteous Experience.

Robert Butts, executive chef at Auburn Angel and Station 11, is co-curating the Southern-inspired, two-course intimate dinner with wine pairings. He said collaborating with Luckett brings diversity and inclusion to Atlanta’s restaurant and food festival scenes.

“We do Food and Wine Festival and Taste of (some city), but a lot of times, our food gets overlooked and doesn’t get respected. Nosh allows us to tell our food stories in a positive way and makes people aware of what we have going on,” Butts said.

“It’s made me more confident in my advocacy of myself and Black foodways.”

Setting his own table

Luckett’s commitment to supporting Black culinary entrepreneurs grew out of his own experience in the food and beverage industry.

Luckett, who grew up in South Africa and graduated from Morehouse College in 2007, spent two years at Morgan Stanley before launching Branwar Wine Distributing with his father in 2009. The company imported wines and worked with fine-dining restaurants, giving Luckett a firsthand look at an industry where he believed Black culinary traditions were often undervalued.

“Corporate America was not for me,” he said. “Nobody was coming to save us, so we had to set our own table. I learned very early on you’re either going to work for somebody or you can be building for yourself.”

As he built relationships with chefs and restaurant owners, Luckett became increasingly concerned about the recognition given to Black culinary contributions.

“I noticed a lot of these high-end restaurants were misappropriating our food culture,” he said. “It led me to do a deep dive into the history of Black Americans and our contributions to the culinary scene, because I didn’t want our legacy to be forgotten.”

That realization helped inspire Black Restaurant Week, which Luckett cofounded in 2016 to spotlight Black-owned restaurants, attract new customers and create opportunities for culinary entrepreneurs.

He expanded those efforts with the launch of Latin Restaurant Week in 2019 and the cofounding of Feed the Soul Foundation, a nonprofit that provides grants, internships and mentorship to food business owners, a year later.

The foundation also publishes a State of the Industry Report examining challenges facing more than 400 Black and other minority food operators.

Luckett plans to organize a one-day global culinary conference next spring, continuing his efforts to connect food entrepreneurs with new opportunities.

But he said the success of Black-owned restaurants also depends on the people who support them, whether they’re attending a tasting event, booking a caterer or becoming regular customers.

“We are a community that has to continue to reinvent ourselves and evolve to stay relevant,” Luckett said. “But it only works if the people get and stay behind us.”