The Perfect Hosts

Philly Kitchen Share is changing the way the city's food pros do business.

by Lauren F. Friedman

Jessica Kourkounis NEW MODEL: Eli Massar and his wife, Emily Pollack, are the founders of Philly Kitchen Share, which allows independent food businesses to use a licensed kitchen space for a reasonable price.

When Sugar Hill Bakery opened in 2002 on a desolate stretch of Baltimore Avenue, its triple layer cakes and oatmeal butterscotch cookies won devoted fans and glowing reviews almost immediately. For Eli Massar, a Jersey native who had been working for the University City District to attract new businesses to the area, the bakery was a success story: a promising symbol of neighborhood resurgence and homegrown entrepreneurship.

But just a year and a half after its debut, Sugar Hill — crippled by rising ingredient prices and still unable to recoup the cost of building a commercial kitchen from scratch — permanently shut its doors.

Food intended for public consumption must be prepared in a licensed kitchen, but after witnessing firsthand just how difficult it was to transition from a home kitchen to a storefront, Massar realized that the necessary start-up investment was almost prohibitively expensive. "If you're making two dozen cookies and selling them for $2 each, it's going to take a lot of cookies," he says. "That's the $100,000 barrier."

Massar, who co-founded PhillyCarShare in 2002, thought he might have a better idea: "Why don't we create a kitchen and share those up-front costs with lots of chefs and bakers?"

The seed that would become Philly Kitchen Share (PKS) began to take shape when Massar teamed up last spring with his girlfriend (now wife), Emily Pollack. "We realized that neither one of us wanted to be behind a desk forever," Pollack says. "Opening up a business together seemed ideal."

An exploratory Craigslist post yielded almost 40 enthusiastic responses, and — after finding, buying and completely renovating a three-story, 2,400-square-foot building at 1514 South St. — Massar and Pollack had their first taker, on Feb. 25 of this year.

"The second they opened, I was like, 'Let me in!'" says licensed dietician Katie Cavuto, a personal chef and caterer who had been using her local church's kitchen for months as she tried to expand her nutritious meal business, Healthy Bites, from in-home preparation to delivery. The brand-new 800-square-foot PKS kitchen — with 10 burners, two giant convection ovens, a 20-quart mixer, a 40-gallon steam-jacketed tilting kettle and then some — was a perfect fit.

"Now, having this space, it really opens up the doors to a lot of new ideas," says Cavuto, a finalist on upcoming reality show The Next Food Network Star. "I'm thinking about wholesaling products and doing things I didn't even think about before."

Anne Kulak, a cake decorator whose creations look like edible fine art, was also on the hunt for a commercial kitchen space. Last year, she had hoped to participate in Let Them Eat Cake, a charity event and expo, but couldn't meet the competition's requirements for a licensed kitchen. This year, she jumped at the chance to use PKS and spent five hours baking and decorating her five-tiered entry.

"I don't have to assume any kind of risk," she says, describing the kitchen-sharing model as ideal. "If my business fails, or if people stop eating cake, it's no problem."

Massar and Pollack's model is designed specifically to allow people to flex their culinary muscles without assuming the financial risk that contributed to Sugar Hill's 2005 closure. Once potential users acquire insurance (generally a one- to two-week process), all they need to get started is a $250 security deposit and proof of food safety certification (for those not already certified, it requires eight to 16 hours of class time). And while Kitchen Share offers a discount for frequent users, there are no recurring fees or minimum usage requirements — just a flat rate of $39 to $44 per hour, depending on time of day. Massar calculated that unless someone is cooking for more than 35 hours monthly, the sharing model yields significant savings.

While most chefs starting out don't need even close to 35 hours — Cavuto, currently the heaviest user, clocks only about 20 hours a month — Massar and Pollack would love to see people outgrow the space. "Our best hope is that one of our folks here becomes a huge success and opens their own restaurant," Massar says.

While that might seem like a hollow sentiment from the owners of a for-profit business, Massar and Pollack see PKS as an incubator for start-ups — not just a shared physical space. "They sincerely want to help," says Melissa Gray, a user just getting her Southern-style catering business off the ground. "We're all here to make a profit, but ... they've created an atmosphere very tailored to growth, [and] it's very budget-friendly."

Cavuto agrees: "They definitely work with you, and they want you to succeed just as much as you do."

Massar and Pollack are remarkably upbeat, but they get especially enthusiastic when talking about their plans for the future. The pair is committed to making the space a hub not only for culinary professionals, but also for the neighborhood and for food enthusiasts all over the city. As a first step toward reaching a wider audience, they will offer cooking classes that emphasize hands-on learning. Cavuto has already begun teaching the first series, "Spring Into Spring," with classes like "Grains and Greens" and "Lavish Leftovers" still coming up. Ian Moroney, chef/owner of the nearby Pumpkin, led a session on pairing local wines with seasonal dishes, and more classes highlighting local foods are in the works.

If Massar and Pollack are able to acquire the necessary permits and licenses, they also hope to offer the upstairs as a 20-seat dining space that would be rentable in conjunction with PKS. In addition, they hope to buy from users and then retail their food — essentially creating demand for their own kitchen.

"Our goal," says Massar, "is to make it a vibrant community and a node of the culinary community in Philadelphia." And PKS users are already forging connections: Kulak got to know Cavuto when they worked together at the same time. In a few weeks, she'll be at PKS again, crafting her next creation: Cavuto's wedding cake.

(editorial@citypaper.net)

For more on Philly Kitchen Share, call 267-808-0729, e-mail phillykitchenshare@gmail.com or visit phillykitchenshare.com.