With COVID-19 forcing all of us to stay home, our talents for home cooking were put to the test. It wasn’t just amateur foodies breaking out the pots and pans. Two local professionals turned their kitchens into work spaces with very tasty results.
Magical things can happen when you’re whipping up food at home.
Just ask pastry chef Tobias Smith.
Take a look at his created Chunky Monkey Bars, which he created in his own kitchen.
Tobias Smith, Chunky Monkey Bars: “It has a chocolate cake on the bottom with a roasted peanut caramel and an ice cream — a milk chocolate and banana ice cream textured mousse.”
The North Bay Village resident knows his way around desserts.
Tobias Smith: “I’ve been a pastry chef for a little over 10 years now.”
Chef Tobias worked at the Fontainebleau Hotel before COVID hit, and he found a way to make the quarantine sweet.
Tobias Smith: “Well, I decided to come up with Chunky Monkey Bars one day. Because of the pandemic, I’m stuck at home, so I said, ‘You know what? Let me put my skills to work.'”
Chef Tobias also offers the Chunky Monkey cookie, a candy walnut-filled banana bread and chunky monkey truffles.
He’s ready to bring them all to you.
Tobias Smith: “So delivery, I do all by myself. I’m a one-man show.”
Cristiano Azevedo, What Soup Miami: “My ultimate thrifty lunch would always be a soup. Soups are very versatile. I absolutely love them.”
Chef Gordon Ramsay would absolutely love what’s cooking in the kitchen of a Midtown Miami apartment, the home of What Soup Miami.
Cristiano Azevedo: “It’s a homemade soup company that focuses on delivering fresh soup made with the best ingredients we can find locally.”
Cristiano Azevedo became the soup maker extraordinaire. He ran restaurants around the world.
Cristiano Azevedo: “In busy cities like New York, London, Portugal where I’m from.”
He began making soup for himself and his girlfriend/partner, Luisa Lopez, and then, everyone needed a little comfort food when the pandemic hit.
Cristiano Azevedo: “We started giving soup to friends. COVID hits and kind-of soup becomes the easiest and fastest way to eat healthy.”
Word of mouth has boosted business big-time.
Cristiano Azevedo: “One of the most amazing things I’ve experienced doing this was the feedback and connection I have with people. Now, we’ve done over 40 different recipes of soup.”
Five different soups are featured weekly on a rotating basis, and you can either pick them up or get them delivered.
Estiven Rojo, customer: “I think they’re the best solution ever. It came out of hard times and quarantine, but it came at the perfect time, you know?”
FOR MORE INFO:
Chunky Monkey Bars
561-706-9096
chunkymonkeybar.com
What Soup Miami
732-618-8223
www.whatsoupmiami.com
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