Tag: Jimmy Lewis

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Food & Wine Food & Drink

Now open in Crosstown Concourse: French Truck and I Love Juice Bar

For a while there, the running joke was that Geoffrey Meeker‘s laundry smelled like coffee.

That’s because the former chef was determined to roast the perfect coffee bean with a five-pound roaster that he operated in his laundry room.

And that is how French Truck Coffee was born.

Based out of New Orleans, the coffee roaster and shop holds itself to high standards — sourcing its beans directly from farmers around the world, delivering the freshest roast possible, and pulling the perfect espresso every time.

“The highest standard for Geoff is Blue Bottle Coffee,” says Memphis French Truck partner Jimmy Lewis.

Ah, Blue Bottle Coffee. I have stood in line in Williamsburg. It was pretty darn good, even if there was a dizzying amount of beards and tattoos and scarves.

Lewis came into the picture just over a year ago once he saw the potential for growth of his coffee roasting business, Relevant Roasters.

After several conversations with Geoff, the two created a partnership, and a Memphis French Truck Coffee was born.

“I recognized I needed help and that I wouldn’t, couldn’t, and shouldn’t do this alone,” Lewis says.

Recently Lewis and Meeker have expanded from their original location on Tillman, the former Relevant Roasters shop and roastery, into the Crosstown Concourse building.

Situated in the central atrium of Concourse, the shop offers one of the most interesting people-watching opportunities in the city.

They also offer a tasty menu. The Waffle Sandwich with egg, prosciutto, and goat cheese is sensational ($9), and their avocado toast rivals any in the city, with red pepper and pickled red onion (one $6/two $9). They have a variety of toasts, actually, including B.N.B. — that would be bacon, Nutella, and basil (what?!), bacon date — bacon, date, ricotta, and pistachio crumbles, and other savory and sweet choices.

They import their pastries from Porcellino’s and have some specialty fizzy teas they can whip up for you.

For now, food is offered until 2 p.m. Hours will expand, but first they hope to remodel their Tillman location from a roastery and cafe into just a cafe where they will offer a similar menu, making the Concourse location the primary Memphis roaster.

So far, there are six French Truck Coffee locations — two in Memphis, three in New Orleans, and one in Baton Rouge.

Look out, Blue Bottle.

French Truck Coffee, 1350 Concourse, 878-3383. Open Mon.-Fri. 7 a.m. to 6 p.m., and Sat.-Sun. 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. 584 Tillman, 458-5599. Open Mon.-Thurs., 7 a.m. to 1 p.m., Fri. 7 a.m. to 4 p.m., Sat. 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., and Sun. 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. frenchtruckcoffee.com.

Part of the core mission of the Crosstown Concourse concept is to provide an environment of health to its residents and visitors, with gyms and many medical businesses setting up shop in the monolithic structure on Cleveland.

So it makes sense for I Love Juice Bar to join the party.

“I talked to them a long time ago, before the whole project here got started,” says Memphis I Love Juice Bar owner Scott Tashie. “I’ve always liked the old buildings here, and I took notice and interest in the building.”

The juice, smoothie, and wellness shop will host the opening of its second location in the Concourse building, along with the block party the project is hosting for its grand debut to the community, this Saturday, August 19th.

The first Memphis I Love Juice Bar opened in September 2015, bringing a menu of fresh and organic juices, wellness shots, smoothies, and clean grab-and-go foods to Midtown on Cooper.

Tashie also ran Cosmic Coconut, a similar concept on Sanderlin by the Racquet Club, which he recently reimagined as City Silo Table and Pantry, a restaurant concept offering most of the same smoothies and juices, but with an expanded menu of tasty breakfast, lunch, and dinner dishes.

“This location will be like the Midtown one, but with a few different grab-and-go items and some new, really neat products like bars and snacks,” Tashie says. “We will have a fully stocked grab-and-go section with quick juices you can grab, spring rolls, sandwiches, our Pad Thai bowls, and we make it all here.”

The 800-plus square-foot space will offer some indoor seating as well as open onto the block-long “patio” of Crosstown Concourse.

“It’s been a lot of fun working with the concept here with the columns inside the space, and we designed these special wooden doors to slide in when we are closed,” Tashie says.

Folks can enter either from outdoors via the patio or from inside the building.

Tashie says he’s excited to be a part of the Crosstown Concourse vision.

“It has been cool to watch this take place, and it will be interesting to watch everyone come in and out,” Tashie says.

He also thinks his product has something to offer the space.

“We have a community feel at our shop in Midtown, and it will carry over here,” Tashie says.

I Love Juice Bar, 1350 Concourse. Open 7 a.m. to 7 p.m., seven days a week. ilovejuicebar.com.

Categories
Food & Drink Hungry Memphis

French Truck Now Open in Crosstown


French Truck Coffee has opened in the Crosstown Concourse.

The new location in the Central Atrium offers a healthy selection of coffee drinks from Cafe Au Lait and Cappuccino to iced. They are now serving a few pastries like coffee cake and croissants.

The New Orlean-based coffee company teamed up with Jimmy Lewis’ Relevant Roasters on Broad last year, merging operations under the name French Truck.

According to Lewis, French Truck will begin roasting at Crosstown as soon as they get all the necessary equipment. Visitors to Crosstown will be able to view the process through giant windows.

French Truck will also serve a full menu featuring breakfast and lunch in about two weeks.

Lewis says, “We’ve been vitally inspired by others, by that I mean Crosstown. We’re just a little speck on this big screen.”

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Food & Drink Hungry Memphis

Relevant Roasters To Become French Truck Coffee

Geoffrey Meeker of French Truck Coffee

Geoffrey Meeker of the New Orleans-based French Truck Coffee has entered into a partnership with Jimmy Lewis of Relevant Roasters. 

Relevant Roasters will be rebranded French Truck Coffee, with Lewis in charge of the Memphis operation. The rebranding is set for September. In addition, they will open a roaster and cafe in the Crosstown Concourse building. 

Meeker started French Truck out of his home in 2012. He says he got into coffee via his cousin.

“She brought me a bag of coffee from a San Francisco roaster that was roasted the day before she got on the plane, and it was an epiphany,” Meeker says. “I couldn’t understand why coffee could be so good and I had never had it before. I then set about reverse-engineering to see how it could be done.”

Meeker, who has a background as a chef, started the micro-roaster out of his laundry room. The coffee was delivered to customers’ homes via a vintage truck. 

French Truck outgrew the laundry room. The business was moved into a warehouse with a coffee bar like Relevant’s. There is now a French Truck Cafe as well.

It sells 14 types of coffee — 8 single-origin, 6 blends. 
 
According to Meeker, Lewis first contacted him to compare notes on the roasting business, and, eventually, Lewis asked him he was interested in a partnership. Meeker initially told him no before reconsidering what combining the brands might mean. 

As for the rebranding of Relevant into French Truck, Meeker explains the reason, “It’s twofold: We feel, and Jimmy is of this opinion, that our brand is a really strong brand and it’s got a lot of legs. And number two, if we were to remain two separate entities as far as naming goes, we wouldn’t be able to capitalize on some of the efficiencies of having a larger operation because we would be buying two kinds of bags, two different websites, etc., etc., etc.”

“Some of the steps that we’ve already taken and some of the lessons we’ve already learned get added into what Relevant was doing. We wouldn’t have done this if Jimmy hadn’t stayed on board,” Meeker adds. 

 
The Crosstown Concourse French Truck will be a roaster/cafe with large windows on all sides so customers can get a peek into the roaster. The cafe will serve a European-inspired menu and beer and wine. Meeker envisions for the space coffee-centric education events, pop-up restaurants, and cuppings. 

Says Meeker of the partnership, “Jimmy already has amazing equipment. With our background in buying coffee and his background in roasting and us putting all that together, it just means that the Relevant Roaster product when it becomes French Truck is going to take one step forward as far as quality goes and the coffee that we’re going to be selling in Memphis is world class, on par with what you might find in San Francisco and New York.” 

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Food & Wine Food & Drink

Now Open: Relevant Roasters and Bounty on Broad

CREDIT: John Minervini

For most of us, making a cup of coffee is pretty straightforward: You get the grounds out of the cupboard, get the maker set, and press “start.” But for Jimmy Lewis, the process is a bit more complicated. Take today’s cup: It started halfway across the world, on a sun-kissed hillside in the highlands of Nicaragua.

“These beans,” enthuses Lewis, “were grown by a young guy in his 30s, a graduate of Washington University. He did his thesis about the working conditions of coffee growers, and he ended up buying a farm.”

John Minervini

Jimmy Lewis of Relevant Roasters

Lewis is the founder of Relevant Roasters, a coffee wholesaler that recently opened on the corner of Broad and Tillman. His aim is twofold: Teach Memphians to brew better coffee while making better, more mindful decisions about the things they buy. It’s a sentiment that is summed up in the company motto: “Every Cup Matters.”

“I wanna be relevant,” Lewis explains. “And the best way I know how to do that is to model a behavior that says life can be more fulfilling when you consider the meaning of your actions and how they affect others.”

Lewis works directly with growers in Ethiopia, Sumatra, and Nicaragua, selecting only those farmers who treat both their workers and the environment well. But sourcing good beans is only half the battle. The real work begins when the coffee arrives in Memphis.

To roast the beans, Lewis purchased a Loring Smart Roaster, a shiny, futuristic device that looks like the front of a stainless steel steam engine. At a cost of $78,000, it was a considerable investment, especially when compared to more traditional roasters. But Lewis says he chose the Loring for two important reasons.

The first is environmental. Because of its cutting-edge design, the Loring uses up to 83 percent less fuel than conventional drum roasters, while producing a fraction of the smoke. The second reason is good, old-fashioned flavor. Unlike most roasters, the Loring heats by convection, which produces a smoother, brighter, cleaner-tasting coffee.

The results are good enough to sip. The cup of medium-roast Nicaraguan coffee I tried had a rich mouth feel and a pleasant progression of flavors, including caramel and lemon zest. To experience it yourself, visit Relevant Roasters this week; they’re hosting a preview in their tasting room from Thursday-Saturday, 7 a.m.-10 a.m. Or buy a pound of Relevant coffee ($12.95) at Miss Cordelia’s on Mud Island.

“Local” has long been a buzzword among foodies. In short: If it’s not from around here, we don’t want any. But the team at Bounty on Broad (set to open on Wednesday, October 8th) has taken that concept to a whole new level. Beyond the 20 or so regional farms that supply Bounty with meat and veggies, there’s a whole host of local businesses that quite literally built the place.

“We get our beer from about 300 feet away,” says chef Jackson Kramer. “We get our coffee from 500 feet away. We bought most of our kitchen equipment at Chef’s Supply; that’s about 200 feet away. And we get our light bulbs at Light Bulb Depot, which is right across the street.”

A good illustration of Bounty’s commitment to local is the restaurant’s signature dish: the Bounty Bowl. Each week, Kramer calls around to local farmers and builds an entrée around what’s in season. Available in both an “herbivore” ($13) and a “carnivore” ($18) version, this week’s bowl features heirloom tomatoes from Whitton Farms and butternut squash from True Vine Farms.

John Minervini

Bounty on Broad’s Stuffed Mountain Trout

Bounty is located at the west end of Broad in a 100-year-old dry goods store, incorporating salvaged wood, brick, and tile from the original structure. But ultimately, because of rotten joists and deteriorating mortar, the building had to be gutted.

“At one point,” remembers Kramer, “there was nothing left standing except the front wall. No ceiling, no floor. Just dirt.”

The new space is light and airy, with polished concrete floors and a prominent diagram showing the different cuts of meat on both a pig and a cow. It’s a sign of things to come: In about a month, Kramer plans to open a butcher shop on Bounty’s ground floor. There he will break down local pork, beef, chicken, and lamb into fresh cuts, for sale.

“I’m a true believer in the way something is raised, how it comes out in the flavor of the meat. And if you drive up to Circle B [Ranch, in Seymour, Missouri], all you have to do is take one look at these pigs to know that they’re happy.”

To get a taste of Kramer’s butchering chops, try the lamb tartare ($12). Served with toast points, grated egg white, and watercress, the ground lamb is unforgettable, its mild, fresh flavor beautifully accentuated by pickled capers and lemon vinaigrette.

Categories
Food & Wine Food & Drink

Plans for Jimmy’s Market “Abandoned”

Jimmy Lewis, former owner of the much-missed health-food store Squash Blossom, has announced that he will not open Jimmy’s Market as originally planned.

Jimmy’s Market would have been located at Poplar and Evergreen at the Burke’s Book Store site. The store was scheduled to open in 2008.

According to an email sent out by Lewis, there were three factors in this decision: construction costs, high operating costs, and the recent purchase of the Wild Oats chain by Whole Foods.