For years, I have had the opportunity to head to London to speak with the guys in charge of insurance rates along the gulf coast, and try to bring the rates down, but obviously no success.
However, my trips to London allowed me a three hour train ride to Liverpool, where I got to watch my favorite soccer team: Everton, due to an American named Joe Max Moore who played there in the 90's and would give soccer camps in Tulsa, where I attended middle and high school after moving from Hammond, LA in 6th grade.

Long story short: fell in love with Liverpool, the people, the community, etc, and after drinking on a train in Italy, decided to open up restaurant in Liverpool serving gumbo, jambalaya, red beans and poboys, naming it after my mom, who grew up in Destrahan.

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Longer tale here:

quote:
For the past couple of years, my wife and I have traveled to Liverpool, on purpose, to watch my favorite lovable losing soccer club, Everton. We have fallen in love with the city, the people, the place, and everything it has to offer.

This latest trip found us on a train, in Italy, full of love and Prosecco. After the second bottle, we decided to make a restaurant menu on a bar napkin of Cajun food offerings, like gumbo, red beans, jambalaya, and the soon world famous, shrimp bread.

That napkin followed us to Liverpool, where we ran into our old pal Davy, who is the concierge at a wonderful hotel, The Titanic. Davy, besides being a great dude, is also a huge Lynyrd Skynyrd fan. We gave him a ton of swag, like a belt buckle, a poster, a mug, playing cards, etc. I then mentioned to him the restaurant idea, and he loved it. He said locals would eat it up (literally!). He mentioned everything that is America/New Orleans has a premium, and he believed he could get us into the new stadium Everton is building right across from his hotel. ("Cool", we thought).

The next day, we are taking a taxi to Liverpool Centre (think French Quarter) and as we are getting out, I mention to the taxi driver our idea. He exclaimed that his son was the head chef of the Hard Rock in Manchester, and gave us his info. ("Weird coincidence", we thought).
Same day, after leaving the Everton store, I had on a new jacket, beanie, and a bag. My wife was cold, so she went into H&M to grab a sweater. While in there, I found myself on a bench, a fat American in a pink shirt and aviators, pondering life. All the sudden, a woman asks if she can take a pic of my bag. "Knock yourself out", I said. She then said you're not from here, and we got to talking. She then asks if she could take some pics of me, and I was like, "who are you?", she then mentioned she was the official Twitter photographer for Everton, and her hashtag was Mint of Culture. I was excited, she took some pics, and then left. Cassie comes out the store, I tell her what happened, we try to find her username to no avail, and then we leave the Centre.

The next day is match day, and Cassie and I make our way to this beer garden outside the stadium, where there are hundreds of people and long tables. We grab two seats next to these elderly strangers who tell us about going to Everton matches for 50 years. We drink and talk, and then they leave. Next, this guy in a suit and tie asks if he could sit with us, we say sure, he notices the American accent, and we begin chatting. I ask, after a couple of minutes, what are his thoughts on our restaurant idea. He loves it, and says he is on the Everton board of directors, and here is his info. He would love to have us offer our food in their stadium. ("This is getting even weirder", Cassie and I thought", as he left.

Then, two dudes come up, ask if they can sit down, we say sure, and one guy is like, "I know you!", to me.....I say I'm visiting from Alabama, bro, no you don't. He said that he knows that, then asks if I was wearing a pink shirt yesterday, and I say yes. He says he saw me on Twitter. The post of me was viewed over 30k times in Liverpool! We start chatting, and after awhile we mention our restaurant idea. Turns out, these guys own a pharmaceutical distribution company, and have given us their attorneys and accountants info. ("This is getting crazy!", we thought!)
Here is the Twitter post:
https://x.com/mintiscu.../status/1784130393894965732/photo/1

So, I'm like, "Cassie! This is freaking me out, lady! I'm going to get another pitcher of rum for us, and then we'll head out. But Holy Cow!" So, I go up to the bar again, and there are dozens of bartenders at this packed place. I make my way to the front of line, and ask for a pitcher of rum. The bartender is like, "Where are you from?"
"Alabama", I yell.
"Do you eat Southern Food?"
"Look at me lady! There isn't a lot I don't eat!"
"Do you eat crawfish?" she yells back.
"Who the hell are you?"-I exclaim. "I made them last week!"
"What about jambalaya?", she asks in her Scouse accent. She then said she makes a great jambalaya. I asked if she put tomatoes in it, she said no. I then told her about the restaurant, she loved the idea, and wants to be our first employee. Charlie is her name.

I go back to the table, flabbergasted, and tell Cassie who I encountered. The universe was yelling at us to open a restaurant across the pond! Crazy!

We get back to America on like a Tuesday, sober up, and are like, "We can't really do this, right?" We're discussing it as the week goes on, and then she has to fly to Tampa to get certified as a swim instructor on Friday. She gets the first flight out of Pensacola, gets to Tampa, gets in a taxi to go to her instructors house, and where do you think her taxi driver is from?????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????
Liverpool!

We have found a local baker to make french bread (we gave them what we think is leidenhamer's receipe) and muffaletta bread. We found a local butcher to make andouille sausage. We are Liverpool's ONLY "living wage" restaurant out of over 2,000 restaurants, and will be sharing 10% of our profits with our employees.
I have a partner moving over there full time and I will be traveling back and forth every quarter.
Goal is to open 9 in the UK over the next couple of year in various cities that have over 400,000 people.

We'll keep TD updated, but feel free to follow along as we bring our culinary expertise overseas.

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